The former basketball star shoots a goal for responsible drinking in mini movie. Sun Xiaochen reports.

China's tallest entrepreneur, basketball club owner and political adviser now has put on a new hat, as designated driver.

Yao Ming, the 2.26-meter hoops icon who in various roles has maintained his influence off the court after retiring in 2011, has taken another challenge by starring in a mini movie to promote responsible drinking.

In the nine-minute clip, Yao plays the character of "Boss Yao", who voluntarily drives his drunken colleagues home but one day found himself in urgent need of a chauffeur as well after drinking at a business dinner. While he struggled to find a competent driver, his wife Ye Li appeared and drove him home.

"What we acted is actually what happened in our real life," Yao said at a press conference to release the movie last week.

Yao, who has shown his witty humor and acting skills in a 2004 documentary The Year of the Yao and countless TV commercials, says working in the studio is much tougher than training on the court but expected his amateurish performance could raise social consensus on responsible drinking in a light-hearted way.

"We don't want to preach," says Yao, who was inspired and invited to shoot the film by world-famous brewer Anheuser-Busch InBevh. "We just wanted to tell a story that true love needs a designated driver and hope it could influence people in a warm way.

"Driving safe is not only responsible to your families but also to every passerby on the street, so if everybody stands up we will have a safer environment."

Ye echoes her husband's sentiment, saying being a designated driver is a happy burden for every wife.

"This is a real-life subject and making it into a movie works well to educate people," Ye says.

However, what amazed Yao wasn't Ye's acting but her look in makeup, which the former women's national team member rarely applies in daily life.

"She looks gorgeous," Yao says.

Although extending careers to the big screen seems a popular choice for retired sports celebrities, Yao says he has no intention to make it in the entertainment scene.

"I just simply don't have the talent," says the former Houston Rockets' center, who also appeared in China's national image promo shown at Times Square in New York in early 2011.

Since organizing his first charity game in 2007, Yao has enthusiastically engaged in socially responsible programs, establishing his own Yao Ming Foundation to build hope schools and assist children in underprivileged areas while promoting ideas like returning sports to schools and wildlife rescue.

The giant launched a nationwide charity program, the Yao Ming Foundation Hope Primary Schools Basketball Season, last year and reached 79 hope schools over a two-month stretch, during which college volunteers and visiting NBA stars instructed children on basketball skills and taught them the virtues of teamwork, leadership and camaraderie.

The responsible-drinking campaign was his latest initiative and was inspired by a father's sense of responsibility.

"The movie was shot on Father's Day and I hope we can set ourselves as examples for our descendants," says Yao, who brought his 3-year-old daughter Yao Qinlei to a charity program despite media scrums earlier in Beijing.

"Children start to consciously follow their parents' actions at that age and we hope to give her more positive influences."

Ye, who married Yao in 2007, stresses it's more important to educate their daughter with action than words.

However, whether little Amy (Yao's daughter's English name), who naturally inherits the couple's strong sports gene, will become a basketballer or an artist remains out of her parents' consideration.

"We don't want to make early plans for her and we'll just let her grow her interests in every possible field," Yao says in response to a recent photo, which saw him shooting hoops in front of his daughter.

"We won't push her to do anything at this early age but try to provide her with a more relaxed environment to let her do what she likes and eventually find out what is her strength."

Contact the writer at sunxiaochen@chinadaily.com.cn.

(China Daily USA 09/10/2013 page10)