The audition venue was on the stage. Following the staff's instructions, Xiao He walked onto the stage and immediately saw the four people sitting in the first row of the audience below.
The four people are director Wen Hongyuan, screenwriter Tan Yuan, producer Ma Qianyou, and the male lead of their drama, Zhang Mo.
Director Wen Hongyuan and screenwriter Tan Yuan are a well-known husband-and-wife team in the industry. One is responsible for writing the script and the other for directing. They are a model of mutual support and cooperation. Their works are very famous in the industry. In fact, one of their early palace intrigue dramas became a classic for a generation.
The script for "Shining Stars" was written by Tan Yuan over two years.
As for the producer Ma Qianyou, he's quite a laughing stock. Most of the gossip Lin Yipeng mentioned earlier was related to him.
He was initially pressured by the investors to give the production a male supporting role that was merely decorative, which aroused strong dissatisfaction from director Wen Hongyuan. However, when the original wife of the investors came looking for him, Ma Qianyou realized that this "decorative vase" was actually someone who had used his body to gain power. Taking advantage of the fact that the investors were preoccupied with their own problems, he reluctantly kicked the man out of the production.
Then he consulted a master to predict the crew's fortune, but unexpectedly, he encountered an actor who was his nemesis. Ma Qianyou quickly chased the actor away and asked the master to come to his house to check the feng shui and help him find a way to make money. In the end, the two new actors he found disappeared, and he was also swindled out of more than 100,000 yuan.
After learning about these past events, Xiao He even felt that Ma Qianyou was the biggest calamity for their film crew.
"Hello everyone, my name is Xiao He."
Facing the four people, Xiao He bowed and introduced himself with a calm expression.
Meeting Xiao He's eyes, Tan Yuan's eyes lit up first, and she nudged Wen Hongyuan next to her with her elbow: "It's Mu Ze!"
Wen Hongyuan was also somewhat surprised: "Is it the young man you mentioned before?"
“Yes, that’s right, I didn’t expect it to be such a coincidence.” Tan Yuan nodded, then seemed to be thinking, “So his name is Xiao He.”
Wen Hongyuan complained irritably, "So after watching for so long, you still can't remember the actors' names."
Tan Yuan gave him a reproachful look: "I didn't think that much about it at the time."
Despite being a highly renowned screenwriter in the industry, having written many original and excellent scripts, Tan Yuan herself is actually a big fan of watching TV dramas.
For example, the character Mu Ze is the one that left the deepest impression on Tan Yuan among all the dramas she has been watching recently.
However, they had already found an actor, so Tan Yuan never thought of letting Mu Ze play the villain role in their drama.
Now that we see them in person... I must say, their temperaments are indeed very similar.
But Tan Yuan was a little worried about this Mu Ze—no, no, it should be Xiao He. She was worried that Xiao He would overact when playing Meng Zetian.
Because Mu Ze and Meng Zetian are different. Mu Ze is a bit neurotic and morbid, while Meng Zetian is a clear-headed yet ruthless and vicious person.
One is an "artist" who is immersed in his own art, unable to distinguish between good and evil, and only cares about doing what he thinks is right; the other is a "traitor" who clearly knows good and evil, but still chooses to help the wicked.
The different connotations here completely distinguish between two different types of people.
Tan Yuan was both very much looking forward to it and very disappointed.
This Xiao He... is still too young, I'm afraid his acting skills aren't good enough.
Wen Hongyuan glanced at Tan Yuan, whose thoughts were written all over his face, shook his head helplessly in his heart, and then pulled out a script excerpt and handed it to the assistant next to him: "Let him act in this."
The assistant took the script and quickly handed it to Xiao He.
Perhaps because he had seen some of Xiao He's performance as Mu Ze, Wen Hongyuan deliberately avoided Meng Zetian's strong and aggressive scenes when choosing the clips. Instead, he chose the scene where Meng Zetian made a self-redemptive "repentance" in front of the second male lead before his death, which was arguably the most difficult scene to perform in the entire story.
In this storyline, Meng Zetian and the second male lead Bai Mingchuan are locked in a standoff, with Meng Zetian already at a disadvantage and about to be executed by Bai Mingchuan as a traitor.
In order to survive and to lull Bai Mingchuan into a false sense of security, Meng Zetian began to play the victim in front of Bai Mingchuan, even kneeling down to apologize and recounting his helplessness and pain, and even making up all sorts of high-sounding excuses for himself. He almost fooled Bai Mingchuan, but fortunately, the male protagonist Li Shuo arrived in time and shot and killed Meng Zetian. Otherwise, Bai Mingchuan might have been killed in retaliation.
This scene not only needs to portray Meng Zetian's fear of death and his anxiety to survive, but also his hypocrisy and cunning. It needs to show that he is "acting," and that his timid and pleading eyes reveal the mockery and murderous intent that his evil plan is about to succeed.
This is undoubtedly a huge test for the actors.
Xiao He watched this scene and gave a bitter smile to himself.
Oh no, this really puts my acting skills to the test.
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