Chapter 580 Questioning
Lu Yanhe has been saying that he should star in a play that takes the stage, not just to set an example for this type of theater, but also to send a signal—
This theater isn't some frivolous mess. Even Lu Yanhe is willing to star in one of the plays, so the rest of you don't need to be so cautious and watchful.
The script for "The Silent Staircase" has just been written.
Lu Yanhe read the script and nodded.
The script is of very good quality. The whole story takes place in a house, somewhat like a murder mystery game—a classic "locked room mystery" suspense story.
"This script is pretty good, I'll act in it."
Lu Yanhe nodded, jumped up, and the theater released its first batch of film lists, divided into three parts:
[At the height of its popularity, let's set an example]
1. The Silent Staircase, starring Lu Yanhe.
2. "The Intern" starring Yan Liang.
3. "Love Negotiation" starring Jiang Yuqian.
4. "Lies and Love" starring Cheng Hai.
[Big IP, for newcomers]
1. The Adventures of a Young Girl (adapted from the popular short story of the same name by Mingyin Gao).
2. "The Whirlpool" (adapted from the popular short story of the same name from Liujia Town).
3. "Uncertain Ringtone" (adapted from Bai Yugao's popular short story of the same name).
[New collaboration under negotiation]
Huang Kairen, Jiang Jun, Zhen Hongyu, Zhang Lan, Li Yuefeng, Bao Zhenzhu
...
The final line concludes: New theater, new model, new gameplay—we're serious!
The Jump Theater was already attracting attention because it was a new collaboration spearheaded by the magazine "Jump," and it was further amplified by Lu Yanhe's involvement and the halo of his miraculous success.
The release of this first batch of film lists has sent shockwaves across the entire internet.
Especially with the names of Lu Yanhe and the other leading actors listed, apart from Cheng Hai being a bit weak, who among the others isn't one of the most popular stars right now?
They all acted in one of the films, completely disregarding its experimental and adventurous nature, and the high probability of failure.
This has made many actors in the entertainment industry who hesitated because of this wonder if they missed the best opportunity.
At this very moment, the magazine "Jump Up," whose monthly sales had remained stable at around 200,000 copies, suddenly saw a new surge in sales. The March issue was reprinted twice, and the pre-sales of the April issue also broke records.
Everyone's interest in the theater led to a sudden curiosity about what kind of novel could inspire such a large-scale film and television adaptation project.
-
To promote the theater, Chen Siqi was interviewed by a cultural and entertainment news documentary program on Yuehu TV.
The theme is why I wanted to create a jumping theater.
"The main reason, of course, is that we want to add something to the 'Jump Up' magazine and brand, and expand its influence." Chen Siqi said frankly, without lying. "From having this idea to finally finding like-minded platforms like Yuehu TV and Aurora Video to cooperate with, we actually went through a lot of twists and turns. Fortunately, because of Yan He's 'Friends' collaboration with them, we had a basis for communication, and they were more willing to listen to what we wanted to do."
"When we shared our idea, I was actually a little nervous. We had never done anything like this before, creating a theater specifically to adapt a novel published in a magazine. For a long time, I thought it would be difficult to achieve. But after discussion and evaluation, we all thought it was worth a try."
"In the process of advancing this project, I became more and more determined to do it. You know, for our authors, it is very difficult to get short stories adapted into film and television dramas. The main channel for adaptation is film, but as you know, such adaptation opportunities are even more difficult. Having such a fixed theater can, at the very least, allow many of our authors to earn some royalties, and at a deeper level, it can also allow them to be recognized by more people."
"As for the film and television industry, I actually told Yan He that because this is ultimately an experiment, mostly experimental, we don't know if it will succeed. He doesn't need to use the audience support and trust that he has worked so hard to build up to endorse this theater."
"But Yan He said that this theater is also of great significance to the film and television market. It gives many directors who have no opportunity to prove themselves and many good actors who have no opportunity to perform more opportunities to prove themselves."
"Our theater alone produces over fifty plays a year. Of course, each play is quite small, only about two hours long, but that still amounts to over fifty projects. Aside from the popular actors like Yan He and Sister Yu Qian who come to set an example, to be honest, our theater mainly uses actors who may not be well-known to the public, and directors who are capable and talented but lack the opportunity to direct independently. Because our theater's budget is quite tight, and we've never done this before, everyone is afraid of losing money."
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Following Chen Siqi's explanation, Jump Up Theater officially announced the premiere date.
This theater will open on the first Sunday of May.
The first drama to air was "The Adventures of a Young Girl" with a completely new cast.
Immediately, netizens flocked to the comments section of the Jumping Theater to ask: Why didn't you cast Lu Yanhe or Jiang Yuqian in the first drama? Was it to create a great opening and attract viewers?
The official Weibo account also responded, saying: The objective reason is that the two dramas they starred in have not yet started filming and the broadcast time is undetermined. The more subjective reason is that we hope to remind our theater's positioning through such a broadcast: to discover fresh blood in the film and television industry.
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"That kid Lu Yanhe is really ruthless. He's created such a jumping theater. Things are going to get interesting from now on."
When Luo Yuzhong went out to a meeting, many people were discussing the Jumping Theater project.
This novel idea, just like Lu Yanhe's creation of weekly broadcasts, sitcoms, and simultaneous filming and broadcasting, has left the industry puzzled.
"It still has to be young people who come to play; there are always new things coming out."
"What's new? It's just that the number of episodes is getting shorter and shorter. Now they've made a two-episode series. They might as well just release it in theaters. Is this even a TV series?"
"Look at what you're saying. Does a two-episode series not count as a series? Xiao Lu's approach is great. He's come up with something fresh and might bring about a different kind of creative work."
"Have you read the novels in the magazine 'Jump Up'? They're either teen fantasies, unrequited love confessions, or suspenseful mysteries—all things that young people like to read. They're not realistic at all."
"What exactly is realism? Does it have to be filled with suffering and hatred to be considered realism?" someone immediately retorted. "At least there's still a magazine like this that's constantly discovering new authors creating short stories, generating unique IP content."
"Do I need to elaborate on the significance of Lu Yanhe's creation of this theater for the film and television industry? I heard that they have signed a lot of new directors and actors to work on this theater."
"They make it sound so nice, but actually these are all new people that Yuehutai and Aurora wanted to sign, people they had been training for a long time, and they're just using this as practice."
"Regardless of whether these people are all signed newcomers or not, this theater has brought something new and a new trend, which can't be a bad thing, right?"
...
Listening to the idle chatter and arguments around him, Luo Yuzhong, as Lu Yanhe's teacher, said nothing.
At this point, he stopped interrupting.
The controversy surrounding the Jumping Theater was entirely predictable. Any new innovation inevitably faces skepticism and opposition from some "conservatives."
Luo Yuzhong admires one thing about Lu Yanhe and Chen Siqi: they never just talk the talk, they dare to walk the walk.
Both of them are action-oriented, daring to take risks and try new things.
Chen Siqi's "Green Onion Project" failed, and she was ridiculed by many. Undeterred, she didn't give up or become afraid to try new things; instead, she turned to creating "Jumping Theater."
Lu Yanhe directs art films, sitcoms, and writes his own screenplays, while also experiencing on-again, off-again relationships with Beijing TV. Each attempt at a career shift sparks controversy, only to ultimately silence all critics with his dazzling success.
Luo Yuzhong had no intention of participating in the discussion about what these two people wanted to do.
"Director Luo, what do you think of this 'jumping theater' concept?"
"Director Luo, please don't show favoritism to Lu Yanhe just because he's your student."
Will this jumping theater affect our current filming methods?
...
Everyone started talking at once.
"I don't know." Luo Yuzhong's answer surprised everyone. "A new thing might succeed, like Friends, which revived our sitcoms. It might also fail, like the Green Onion Project. But I will definitely support young people's ideas for doing new things, whether they succeed or not. Our industry is a creative one, and we must keep coming up with new things."
"Director Luo, have you considered directing a play that involves jumping?"
"This theater is mainly for providing opportunities for new directors. I'm too old to compete with them for opportunities, which is something I agree with. New directors have no experience. If you ask them to make a long drama of twenty or thirty episodes right away, the difficulty and requirements are high. A short drama of only two or three episodes is more friendly to new directors and easier to get started with. With experience, they will be more confident when making long dramas."
"I heard that the filming time for this play is only one week. Can you guarantee the quality of the filming?"
"A script of 30,000 to 40,000 words, you've already prepared the pre-production shooting plan, coordinated all departments, clarified the storyboards, and set the daily shooting tasks. Is a week of shooting time too little?" Luo Yuzhong said. "I've read the scripts for several plays at Jump Up Theater. The stories they chose weren't the kind of high-difficulty plays with a lot of staging. In terms of shooting volume, a week is more than enough to finish shooting them. You shouldn't look at this theater with conventional shooting mindset. The positioning is different, and the shooting mode is different too."
Veteran like Luo Yuzhong understands very well why controlling the filming time to within one week is so important.
Time itself has never been a determining factor in whether a film is good or bad.
It's important to know that in film history, many classic movies were actually filmed in just ten or twenty days.
They have far more shots than the scenes in a jumping theater.
To put it bluntly, domestic film and television productions are still weak in terms of management and operation mechanisms, resulting in a lot of wasted resources and time. This time, Jump Up Theater used the filming model of "Friends," putting all rehearsals and preparations in advance, and only doing filming on set, further improving filming efficiency.
"Director Luo, aren't you going to collaborate with your student on another film? You haven't worked together since 'The Golden Era,' and Director Chen Lingling is going to collaborate with him for the third time."
"It'll be here soon, just wait and see," Luo Yuzhong said with a smile.
-
Sigh, I just finished being busy, and now I have a cold and fever. I wanted to write more today because I was going to be featured, but my head is just spinning. I'll just write nonsense if I try. I'm going to sleep now.
(End of this chapter)
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