Chapter 553 Reunion with an Old Friend Turning around, Shang Yechu exclaimed with delight, "Uncle Li!"
The visitor was Li Zhenxiang. During the filming of "The Mute Woman," Li Zhenxiang played Yongfu, Xiaoyue's father. Since then, Li Zhenxiang has felt a closer connection to Shang Yechu. Although he wouldn't consider her his daughter, she is different from his other co-stars.
During the filming of "Tianban," Li Zhenxiang also played a comrade of our Party. Unfortunately, he did not have any scenes with Shang Yechu. The two only met briefly a few times on the set of "Tianban." Li Zhenxiang gave Shang Yechu a bag of homemade cured meat and sausages, and Shang Yechu gave Li Zhenxiang a box of tonics. After that, they never crossed paths again.
Now, while filming "The Heavenly Emperor," Li Zhenxiang has been unexpectedly recruited by Shao Guangji. This is truly a pleasant surprise.
Li Zhenxiang stepped forward, looked Shang Yechu up and down carefully, and said with a smile, "You've grown up beautifully, a young lady now."
"Still pretty? You've painted yourself into a weasel." Shang Yechu gently touched her face and laughed. "Uncle Li, why are you here so early this time?"
In "The Heavenly Emperor", Li Zhenxiang and Shang Yechu finally had a few scenes together, but it was far from time to start filming.
“Your aunt dried these hawthorns,” Li Zhenxiang said happily, holding up the cloth bag in his hand. “She asked me to bring them to you. Women are so thoughtful! She said you look thinner, probably because you’re not used to the food in Taiwan and are hungry, so she told you to eat more hawthorns to stimulate your appetite. I don’t see where you’ve lost weight…”
Shang Yechu hurriedly took the heavy cloth bag, opened it, and saw several plastic boxes, stuffed full, neatly stacked inside, bright red and quite attractive. A smile involuntarily spread across her face: "You've come all this way, why bring anything else..." she muttered, repeating classic polite words as she clutched the bag in her hand.
The two chatted as they walked. Li Zhenxiang said, "I was originally in another production, but the deal fell through on the first day of filming, and the project was cancelled. Director Shao invited me, so I came."
"They can't just break up after filming starts?" Shang Yechu blurted out, her eyes darting to the dried hawthorns in the bag. She was genuinely hungry after a long day. "Is the director sick? Did the producer go bankrupt? Did the actors raise their fees?"
Li Zhenxiang waved his hand: "It's even more insane than those. The male lead, female lead, second male lead, and second female lead, four people brought nine screenwriters to the set, and they had to revise the script on their first day. You wanted to add scenes, I wanted to add scenes. What's that thing called? 'Highlights,' right, right, everyone wanted to add highlights. A script with a total of thirty-six episodes, and they kept adding more and more, how could it not fall apart?"
Shang Yechu swallowed hard, finally pulling her attention away from the food: "Doesn't the director care?"
Li Zhenxiang said with a wry smile, "Xiao Chu, do you think everyone is like Shao Guangji and Xu Hanwen?"
Shang Yechu understood: "It's an idol drama."
"Oh, looks like you've heard about it too," Li Zhenxiang said in surprise. "Aren't you making movies now? How do you know about the current trends in idol dramas?"
Of course, it's because a few years later, this kind of script-altering shady business will be known to the entire internet and become an unspoken rule in the industry.
“Our company has encountered something similar,” Shang Yechu said vaguely. To be honest, although she was already a semi-film actress, she still kept a close eye on television drama production teams. “Uncle Li, could you show me how exactly the changes were made?”
Li Zhenxiang wore a pained expression: "Let me put it this way, I play the male lead's father in the film, an old demon lord. Logically, this new demon lord should defeat me and take the throne, right? No way! The male lead insisted on adding a scene where I whip him, leaving him covered in blood, saying it's some kind of battle-damaged beauty..."
"Pfft!" Shang Yechu burst out laughing in perfect unison. "So, are you going to smoke or not?"
“So what? What else can we do!” Li Zhenxiang sighed. “The female lead also wants more scenes, a scene where I kidnap her and force her to hand over some kind of magical artifact. The second female lead is a demon witch, so we need to add a scene where she betrays me, I lead 100,000 demons to surround and kill her, and then she unleashes her ultimate attack. I, the Demon Lord, do nothing all day but revolve around those three!”
Shang Yechu laughed out loud this time: "Looking at it this way, it's a good thing the talks broke down. You'll still get your pay, and you won't have to spin the top anymore."
As soon as an actor joins the production team, the crew will pay a portion of their salary in advance. Although the process is a bit complicated, in the end, it's definitely a good thing – getting paid without having to do any work.
Li Zhenxiang was amused: "The male and female leads are both from the investors, and I don't even know who the second male and female leads are working for, but they all act like big shots. They pull and shove each other, and in the end, it all falls apart. A bunch of bullshit! How many big names have I worked with? You, Teacher Qi, Teacher Xue, Shi Shan, none of them are like them."
What was meant as a joke suddenly brought Jian Xiaojun to Shang Yechu's mind, and her heart sank. A screenwriter with attribution rights was already considered a prominent figure in the industry. Yet, in a confrontation with a celebrity, she still suffered repeated defeats.
Shang Yechu's smile vanished instantly. Fortunately, they arrived at the dressing room. She said goodbye to Li Zhenxiang, arranged to have dinner together that evening, and hurriedly went inside to remove her makeup.
Time always flies when you're on set; before you know it, it's April.
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