Chapter 53: Each Has Their Own Arrangements
While Li Sishi was heading to Shanghai with the "Project Sun 93" team, Zhuang Menghua was also in Hong Kong, discussing the plan for Huasheng Records with Lu Yiting.
It was only at this point that Zhuang Menghua realized how advantageous Li Sishi's act of keeping her promise without seeking credit was for her power struggle within the record company. Although she was confident that she could help Li Sishi cover up all traces and use these song resources to "cultivate" Li Sishi into a gifted prodigy with multiple skills in composing, writing lyrics, and singing, how much could one person's "creation" possibly amount to?
Even Li Kang, the "writing machine" rumored to be able to write tens of thousands of words a day, cannot maintain his inspiration and creativity at their peak all the time. Moreover, composing music and writing lyrics are much more demanding than ordinary articles. Li Sishi is only a little over seventeen years old at most. Even if she started writing every day from kindergarten, she still couldn't accumulate this much work...
Moreover, many of the lyrics in this work require a certain level of life experience to write.
If such songs are attributed to Li Sishi without any planning, they will either be easily questioned as being ghostwritten, or they will have to wait until Li Sishi has grown up and matured for many more years before they can be released.
It's also impossible to assign some song resources to someone else—in this situation, the fewer people who know, the better.
Therefore, after keeping her promise and entrusting these song resources to her deceased friend, Li Sishi immediately gained a huge music library. Although some parts may be missing due to errors in Li Sishi's memory and manuscripts, firstly, Li Sishi might be able to recall some more and continue to add and revise them in the future; secondly, even this "incomplete" music library is enough to compete with some top-tier record companies.
There are a lot of good songs here, and if managed well, it could potentially be produced by a top-tier record company.
Thus, Zhuang Menghua, who now possesses such an unexpectedly vast music library, gradually developed the idea of taking over Huasheng Records. The production of TV dramas is inseparable from music. She didn't compete for it before because she lacked resources, manpower, and energy. Now that she has a rising star like Li Sishi and a large amount of resources, it would be wrong for her not to seize the opportunity to fight for power and profit.
In particular, the Chen couple, who had previously been used as pawns by those elders, switched sides to hers. With the intelligence and undercover assistance provided by the couple, Zhuang Menghua and Lu Yiting were quite confident in their takeover of Huasheng.
The proposal included an additional condition for Li Sishi to provide the song resources: it required her to give up what belonged to her.
Part of the income will be donated to charity... Lu Yiting couldn't help but laugh: "Ah May is really too honest and upright. I don't know if this is good or bad for her."
With Li Sishi's intelligence, it wouldn't be difficult for her to deduce the amount of money that could be obtained after these song resources were manipulated—she was willing to give up such a large sum of money, which truly shows her loyalty, integrity, and commitment to her promise.
"Although people say that honesty and integrity will eventually lead to begging, with you and me by her side, she will definitely not end up like that, but will rise to great heights." Zhuang Menghua also chuckled.
Although Li Sishi's refusal to conform to the "original talent" label made her a little angry, this final choice was indeed more promising and lucrative, and it also proved where her bottom line lay...
After calming down, Zhuang Menghua was actually pleased with Li Sishi's final choice—even though people say it's hard to be a good person, when interacting with others, who wouldn't want the other person to be a good person with principles?
As long as she doesn't suffer from both intellectual and emotional instability like Huang Qianyan at certain times and refuse to listen to advice, Li Sishi's development potential is much greater than that of the previous heavily promoted talent. She can succeed in both the music and film industries, and her popularity and fame are more than just a combination of factors.
Having roughly guessed Zhuang Menghua's meaning, Lu Yiting's smile deepened: "That child certainly deserves to be cherished, otherwise you wouldn't have agreed to let her cause trouble at the opening concert of Project Sun..."
"It's been ten years since this TV series was adapted, and it's about time to prepare for a remake," Zhuang Menghua said meaningfully, then slowly exhaled. "However, the previous major adaptation took a risky step and succeeded by chance, and then the actress who pioneered a completely new way of acting suddenly passed away. It's very difficult for those who remain in this world to compete with those who have already left."
"This time, having her portray the character from the original novel is simply to make her more acceptable to the audience and viewers. By leveraging the influence of Yue Ji and the lingering popularity of previous TV dramas, we're opening up another avenue for her..."
Although the 1983 version of Qing Rong subverted the character image in the original work, it was more distinctive, bolder and more extreme than the more "neutral" character setting in the original work, and it was also more suitable for the presentation effect of the TV series pace. Although there was a lot of criticism from the beginning, it also won a lot of applause at the same time.
After winning this risky move, she encountered this kind of story that is difficult to compete with. Whether Li Sishi plays the role of the little demon Qing Rong in the 1983 version or the little fairy in the original novel, it is highly likely that she will be putting in a lot of effort and getting little reward.
Her men
It's not worth enduring so much criticism for a resource that isn't exactly top-tier. It would be better to strive for a more widely recognized role as Fairy Yunya. While the 1983 version of Fairy Yunya received praise in Hong Kong and from that old man, the way it was handled when it was introduced to the mainland was immature. The dubbing and background music were subpar, and it failed to achieve the same level of popularity as the first version, so it wasn't very well-known in the mainland.
Now that TBL's martial arts series TV dramas are dubbed in Mandarin, they are selling very well in mainland China and other places. If Li Sishi wants to pave the way for opening up markets outside Hong Kong with a classic martial arts character, then she has to choose a role that most people will praise for her performance, rather than a role that has already become a shining gem and is considered too difficult to handle...
Meanwhile, Li Sishi, who had just gotten off the plane and then transferred to a bus, was unaware of Zhuang Menghua's thoughts. However, her "Qingrong cosplay" was originally just intended to be a version of the original character, making it easier for people to accept her as a substitute singer of that half of the classic song, rather than intending to declare war on Zhong's version of Qingrong. So, in a way, her thinking was in line with Zhuang Menghua's.
It has to be said that the schedules of Hong Kong celebrities these days are really tiring, and their bodies are really "healthy".
Even someone like Li Sishi, who maintains about six hours of sleep a day to ensure her growth and development, was finding it hard to cope with the various modes of transportation she had to take throughout the day, and started to feel drowsy... Meanwhile, there were quite a few other celebrities on the bus who had reportedly been filming night scenes until two or three in the morning the day before, chatting casually.
"What? Sleepy? If you're sleepy, take a nap. I'll wake you when you get off the bus." Le Yun said with a smile when she saw Li Sishi's droopy eyelids.
Among all the people in this car, his youngest apprentice was the youngest and still a minor, so he needed to be taken care of.
"I... I think I can still hold on..." Li Sishi yawned, feeling as if she was becoming more awake.
"We'll start rehearsing as soon as we get off at the stadium. I looked at the seating chart, and when we sing the Cantonese version of the theme song, besides me, Hanyou will be standing next to you..." Leyun glanced at the seating chart in her hand, and her smile became meaningful.
Li Sishi looked up at the speaker in front of him, who was chatting animatedly with his two friends—or rather, the other two were listening blankly while he was talking non-stop, and quite loudly at that.
Hou Beihua was filming a movie at the time and couldn't come, thus narrowly escaping the situation. So only Huo Gucheng and Ling Chen, the two "younger brothers," remained on set, where they were caught by the elder brother, the audio equipment expert Han You, and both...
Forced to endure this mental torment.
Logically speaking, someone as loud as this speaker should have run out of ammunition long ago, but when Li Sishi looked down, she immediately saw the enormous plastic water bottle that this guy was holding like a treasure in his arms, which looked to be at least 5 liters in size...
Can that thing even be called a water cup? Can it?!
A typical insulated water bottle only has a capacity of about 2 liters, right?
The standard capacity of a water dispenser bottle is 5 gallons, which is less than 19 liters—so he's essentially carrying a quarter of a bottle of drinking water, or two and a half thermos flasks of throat-soothing tea in his arms. Given that this type of tea has the effect of moisturizing the throat and refreshing the mind, it's practically like he's activated an unlimited battery and unlimited energizing mode...
"I'll take a nap and wake me when we get there!" Li Sishi immediately tilted her head and leaned back in her chair with utmost seriousness.
Her master, Le Yun, has an extremely penetrating voice, and the volume of the audio equipment manufacturer, Shang Hanyou, is particularly loud and deep. She is the protagonist of the opening theme song, and she can't let the "armor-piercing bullet" and "high-pitched cannon" next to her steal the spotlight!
"This kid is really determined." Le Yun shook her head, both amused and exasperated, and leaned back a little to close her eyes and rest.
When the bus arrived at the stadium in the afternoon, Li Sishi and the others hurriedly got off the bus with their luggage and began the first round of rehearsals with the help of their respective assistants.
They didn't wear performance costumes during the afternoon rehearsal because they had to go to the hotel for a press conference after the simple rehearsal, so they didn't have extra time for a full-on rehearsal.
After resting for a while, Li Sishi, holding the microphone, mustered all her strength and withstood the attack from the left and the right. Then, without stopping, she was ganged up on by three tough guys: Long Sheng, Li Zongcheng, and Zou Huayan...
Fortunately, this time she sang the Mandarin version of the theme song "Rainbow After the Storm" with the three big shots. As a supporting role who was almost a harmony, she didn't have to work as hard as before. In particular, although the melody of the Mandarin version of the theme song is basically the same as the Cantonese version, there are some changes in the arrangement and lyrics. The style has changed from melodious and soothing to exciting and high-pitched.
Unfortunately, there are ways to make things work without having to go all out.
To make matters worse, when you're already exhausted and hungry, you happen to encounter three powerful figures whose voices are as formidable as their physical strength...
"Seize every minute of life / Go all out for the dream in our hearts / How can we see a rainbow without experiencing wind and rain / No one can succeed easily..." The chorus of the Mandarin version of the theme song, paired with the drum set, is already deafening just from the master of rhythm.
A star-studded lineup is worlds apart from a newcomer lineup!
As Li Sishi, who was singing along with the backup singers until she was hoarse, gradually changed her gaze from "I must be in the center" to "Can you let me off the stage?"...
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