Hong Kong - A China-born porn actress, who played the late porn star Pauline Chan in a biopic, was found dead in a Hong Kong hotel last Friday.

Crystal Sun, 36, was found hanging in the bathroom of her hotel room by rescue personnel after a hotel worker discovered a note saying 'Someone hanged herself' on the bathroom door.

She left a suicide note saying she had debts, Apple Daily said. Sources told the newspaper that Sun was a victim of the current financial meltdown.

Her strong resemblance to Chan, who fell to her death at age 29 in a suicide in Shanghai in 2003, led to her playing the porn star in a movie.

Chan was famous for her various outbursts and unruly behaviour before her death.

A native of China's Shandong province, Sun had a small role with actors Leon Lai and Maggie Cheung in the 1996 movie, Comrades, Almost A Love Story.

She was forced to drop out of the 1999 Miss Asia contest after saucy pictures of her appeared in the media.

This article was first published in The Straits Times on Feb 9, 2009.