Entertainment: I just want to be the boss behind the scenes

Chapter 303 It’s decided to be you, Mr. Meng!
"Song Zhi? Oh, yes, she is an artist of your Arclight."

Hou Hongliang naturally remembered Song Zhi. As the first project after the company's independence, the success of "The Disguiser" directly established the status of Noon Sunshine.

And "Yu Manli" played by Song Zhi is one of the most outstanding characters and will naturally not be forgotten.

"This project is indeed in the casting stage recently. In the past few days, the crew is still communicating with the team of the female lead actor..."

Hou Hongliang's answer seemed irrelevant, but it was a euphemism for saying that the female lead had already been chosen.

But Meng Bai didn't care. Since there was no female lead, the second or third female lead with good personalities would be fine.

Song Zhi had previously gained a lot of popularity and attention with her two supporting female roles in "The Disguiser" and "Sparrow", and she has also starred in several TV series in the past two years.

But on the one hand, the quality of the script was not high, and on the other hand, her image and temperament were a bit weak. As a result, the evaluation of her as the female lead was not as good as when she played the supporting actress before.

To put it bluntly, the heroine's momentum is not enough.

Instead of continuing to force herself to play unsuitable "female leads" for the sake of status, it is better to choose "supporting actresses" with good roles and personalities in big productions.

As a big-budget project of Noon Sunshine, the quality and popularity of "The Story of Minglan" are naturally no problem.

Moreover, the subject matter is a costume drama about family intrigues, which is a good opportunity for her to broaden her acting range and transform herself, so that this girl doesn't have to complain every day that she only receives scripts for spy war dramas.

Seeing that Meng Bai did not force the heroine, Hou Hongliang also breathed a sigh of relief.

It’s not that he doesn’t like Song Zhi, but the crew has already communicated with Zhao Liying’s team, so it’s really inconvenient to change people.

But since it doesn’t require a female lead, it will be much easier.

Roles like "Fourth Sister Molan" or "Fifth Sister Rulan" are very suitable for Song Zhi's image. You can choose the one that suits you when the time comes.

After deciding on the role, Hou Hongliang couldn't help but fall into deep thought.

Just want a supporting female role, do I need Meng Bai, the boss of Arclight, to come to me personally and talk to me?

Perhaps, this is just a "testing the waters".

The other party's real idea might be to take this opportunity to explore whether there is any possibility of cooperation with Noon Sunshine, so they deliberately use such a small matter to implicitly release goodwill.

It’s not that Hou Hongliang deliberately thought too much.

If Meng Bai was just a "well-known screenwriter" or ArcLight was just a new company, it might really be that simple.

However, given Meng Bai and Hu Guang's current status and influence in the industry, as the head of a film and television company, Hou Hongliang had to think deeply about the possible hidden meanings behind the other party's actions.

What's more, as a leading team in the film and television industry, if ArcLight really has the idea of cooperation, it will also be a good thing for Noon Sunshine.

After thinking for a while, Hou Hongliang took the initiative to say with a proud smile: "Speaking of which, we haven't seen each other for a long time. After the meeting is over, how about we have dinner together in the evening?"

Meng Bai was a little confused when he received the invitation suddenly.

He naturally didn't know what Hou Hongliang was thinking, otherwise he would have told him. He didn't have any extra thoughts, he just happened to meet him today, so he just mentioned it by the way.

However, he did not refuse the other party's temporary invitation.

We are all in the same industry, our tracks are quite different, and there is not much competition, so it is always good to have more friends.

What's more, Noon Sunshine has good connections in circles such as Mango TV, Shanghai Circle, and Magnolia TV.

For Arc Light, who is now planning to develop into a TV series, this is also a goal worth making friends with.

Since each of them had needs, the dinner was planned for the evening amidst conversation and laughter.

While the two were chatting, almost all the people attending today's meeting had arrived.

The person in charge of today's meeting on the Radio and Television side is still Director Nie, who I have dealt with many times before.

To be precise, he should now be called "Director Nie". At the beginning of the year, there was a wave of personnel changes in the Radio, Film and Television Bureau, and he was promoted to deputy director. He is now in charge of the development and review of the domestic film and television industry.

Today's opinion meeting is mainly aimed at the "Several Policy Opinions on Supporting the Prosperous Development of TV Dramas" newly proposed this year.

Regarding the new policies involved, we will seek opinions from major film and television companies and video platforms.

There are a total of fourteen items, such as strengthening support for main-theme and reality-themed works, optimizing TV drama cost allocation, standardizing TV station ratings statistics models, supporting domestic dramas to "go overseas", etc.

Well, these policies seem to be quite comprehensive, but in fact they are all old problems and nothing new.

Including Meng Bai, most of the people present today are mainly concerned about the adjustments to the web drama.

Everyone hopes that the policy on online dramas will remain the same as the other policies.

Unfortunately, everyone's guesses were wrong.

“…coordinate the management of TV dramas and online dramas, apply the same standards to them…strengthen the content control before programs are released online, and further strengthen the main responsibility of platform websites…TV dramas and movies that have not obtained a license issued by the radio and television department shall not be broadcast online.”

There was an uproar at the meeting.

The "Taiwan and Internet unified standards" policy that everyone has been worried about for two years has finally been released.

According to this policy, all future "key online dramas" will not only have to be submitted for review before going online, but the review standards will also need to be the same as those for TV dramas.

What is considered a “key online drama”?

According to the latest standards set by relevant departments at the beginning of the year, all online dramas with a production cost exceeding "500 million" and "100 million online movies" that are promoted on the homepage of mainstream video platforms are included.

With the current development scale of the online drama market, the cost of any well-known online drama is basically no less than 1000 million.

This standard basically covers all projects produced by major companies and video platforms.

This has shaken the foundation of the online drama industry.

After all, compared to TV dramas, one of the main advantages of online dramas from the very beginning is the broader subject matter and simpler review mechanism.

Now that we have to meet the same standards as TV dramas, what’s the point of the online drama model?
Therefore, as soon as this policy was announced, the three video platforms on the scene, as well as film and television companies such as ArcLight, whose main business is online dramas, raised objections.

Fortunately, today's meeting was originally intended to provide suggestions to a group of practitioners.

Seeing that the heads of various companies present were so excited, Director Nie immediately said that they could discuss the specific implementation of the policy later.

"How about this, it would be a bit chaotic if everyone speaks their own language. We will then hold a small discussion meeting for each specific policy. Everyone select three to four representatives to present their opinions," said Director Nie.

With these words, the situation calmed down a little.

But then, another question arises: who should be chosen as the representative?

The three video platforms must each provide one candidate, and the remaining candidates must be found from the film and television companies.

The heads of each company were all thinking deeply in their hearts.

First of all, this “representative” must have a high status in the industry and cannot be a small company.

Secondly, it has to be influential, so that at least everyone can understand it.

Then the main interest still has to be in the online drama, so that his position can be guaranteed.

After screening through so many requirements, it seems that there are only a few left who meet the requirements.

For a moment, the eyes of the leaders of each company at the scene tacitly turned to the young figure sitting in the front row.

It’s decided to be you, Mr. Meng!
(End of this chapter)