From singing “Barney and Friends” songs to strangers as a child to performing in front of 10,000 people at the Esplanade, Lee discusses her journey to becoming one of Singapore’s rising stars
Annette Lee was born to perform. At three years old, her stage was a chair in the waiting room of a hospital, where she was being treated overnight for jaundice. She had stayed up late one evening and decided to belt out songs from the children’s show Barney and Friends for the people sitting around her. Her parents can still remember the moment clearly, but Lee quips that she, unfortunately, can’t.
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At 13, she wanted to become a singer. She learned to play the guitar and did covers of songs by her favourite bands and singers like Coldplay and Jay Chou.
As a digital filmmaking undergraduate at the Nanyang Technological University’s School of Art, Design and Media, she wrote and directed short films that were screened at both local and overseas film festivals.
Then in 2015, her path to becoming the content creator she is today kicked off. One of her viral blog posts caught the attention of Sgag, the Singapore spin-off of the popular social media website 9gag—and she was offered a job. There, Lee dived into comedy production and developed skills that would shape the content she created for her own platform later on.
Since branching out on her own, the 2023 Gen.T honouree continues to write, direct and act in her videos. Her breakout role is arguably in the viral parody video, The Cai Fan Song, which also stars fellow musician and actor Benjamin Kheng. The video has been watched more than 1.3 million times. She’s also recorded music with Grammy-winning producers, created a mockumentary titled Asian Billionaires and performed live at the Esplanade Theatre for an audience of over 10,000.
In her own words, she shares more about her favourite characters to play, how motherhood has changed her perspective on failure and her daily routine.
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I never actually had an ambition of being a content creator, especially since it wasn’t a common occupation people had when I was growing up. I kind of stumbled into it after working in media after graduating from university.
I get inspiration for new characters to play from observing people around me. Reality is sometimes funnier than fiction, and I often get inspired just by having a simple conversation.
