The film is loosely based on real life "Phantom Lover" Dan Cheung, known as such due to the ghostlike (that is, not real) nature of the women he romances. The film is set in China in the 1940s. Song Dan Ping (Leslie Cheung) was an ambitious theatre actor and owner who built his dream magnificent playhouse from where he entertained and dazzled the theatre-loving populace with his adaptation of classics such as Romeo and Juliet and other tragic love stories.