Entertainment: I am the peak

Chapter 484 Shu Chang Soars to the Sky
Li Chen and Fan Bingbing turned "we" into a viral internet meme, which even reached the United Nations—the Secretary-General and his wife also took a photo with "we" in the title.

Liu Yifei was a little jealous: "You didn't even make it public, and you just proposed."

"That's a bit unreasonable of you." Li Qiutang, who was playing a private server of Legend of Mir where spending money made her feel like a king, looked up and said, "How about we take a group photo now?"

"Go to hell." Liu Yifei ignored him. "Stop playing around and come with me to look at the venue setup. I made a selection, and now you say you don't like it."

"I like everything you chose." Logically speaking, this is a major life event, but Li Qiutang doesn't seem as enthusiastic as Liu Yifei.

"If you keep messing around, I'll get angry. You're not marrying me, are you?!"

"Okay, okay, I'll look at it with you." Li Qiutang put down his phone, sat down, and put his arm around his wife. The two of them looked at the wedding venue setup plan together.

"This is nice, it's covered in flowers, it looks beautiful."

"This one is good too, I like this lawn."

"This looks good..."

“You think everything looks good,” Liu Yifei interrupted him.

"You want me to say it."

"Get out of here, get out of here, I can't count on you at all." Liu Yifei pushed Li Qiutang away.

Li Qiutang calculated that it must be because the time was approaching that Liu Yifei was in such a bad mood. Li Qiutang didn't provoke her and obediently walked away. She wanted to continue playing games, but she thought that Liu Yifei would probably be furious if she did nothing but play games. So she said, "I'm going to the study to look at some documents."

He went to the study to play games.

It wasn't entirely about playing games; Li Qiutang was also actually working.

Liu Yifei sneaked to the door of the study and heard her husband muttering inside. She couldn't make out what he was saying, but it sounded like they were discussing the promotional plan for the summer movie season.

Normally, Li Qiutang doesn't need to be involved in movie promotion, but with the release of "Monkey King: Hero Is Back" this summer, which is Autumn Pictures' first completed film in the animation field, Li Qiutang can't afford to ignore it.

The company had never promoted animated films before, and many people in the company had not yet changed their mindset, so Li Qiutang had to personally oversee many things.

"I've already said that 'Monkey King: Hero Is Back' is an animated film for all ages. Don't bring over that kind of childish propaganda approach."

"How can Sun Wukong not be a hero? Iron Man is a hero, Spider-Man is a hero, so why isn't Sun Wukong a hero?" Li Qiutang was almost driven crazy by the publicity, and she just couldn't understand it.

"Don't think that children can't understand. Children are more complicated than you think. Do you think children only think about swallows wearing flowery clothes? Children actually want to be heroes more than adults."

Liu Yifei pushed open the study door and saw Li Qiutang talking on her phone. She put a glass of water on the table and sat down.

The problem facing the marketing and distribution of "Monkey King: Hero Is Back" is a matter of trust. The market generally does not trust domestic animated films, and no amount of shouting about how good the film is can help.

In order to regain this trust, Li Qiutang decided to do a publicity plan that she had never done since starting her business in the fall—a large-scale advance screening.

"We need to hire theater managers, but we also need to hire online influencers. With millions of followers, a single word from them can be more effective than us working ourselves to death offline. The general environment for domestic animated films is one of distrust, which we can't change, but we can first get these influencers and professionals to like them and let them promote the films for us. They can bring a group of viewers to the cinema."

"When will the pre-sales and ticket subsidies for the summer movie season begin?" This step requires the cooperation of ticketing platforms and cannot be decided by Qiu alone. "We will definitely prioritize major ticket markets such as Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, and Shenzhen. We will supply whatever the platforms supply."

Ticket subsidies have their merits. If no one watches domestic animated films, what's wrong with using ticket subsidies to attract audiences?
"That's all for now. You guys need to come up with a plan as soon as possible. It's almost June, and the publicity campaign is about to begin." He then hung up the phone.

Liu Yifei, who was nearby, overheard the conversation and asked, "Are animated films really that difficult to make?" Li Qiutang shook her head: "Extremely difficult. Our market research revealed that nearly half of the audience isn't interested in domestically produced animated films. Their perception of them is still that they're only for young children, like 'Pleasant Goat and Big Big Wolf' or 'Boonie Bears.' Even the relevant government departments, despite saying they're strongly supporting the animation industry, still think animation is only for kids." This kind of stereotype can't be changed overnight.

“I’ve arranged for someone from the wedding planning company to come tomorrow, so you’re not allowed to use work as an excuse!” Liu Yifei said.

"Okay, I'll stay home with you tomorrow."

…………

To become popular, one definitely needs to rely on TV dramas.

Shu Chang's hard work has finally paid off, as she received a Golden Horse Award nomination—the only actress from the post-85 generation to be nominated for Best Actress at one of the three major Chinese film awards.

She played a minor role as a supporting character in "Brotherhood of Blades," which was neither particularly good nor bad. "For Love or Money" flopped, but "Fleet of Time" grossed over 5 million to nearly 6 million yuan, turning her career around and putting her far ahead of her peers.

In March of this year, the drama "The Glamorous Imperial Concubine" starring her and Huang Xiaoming was broadcast. She played the female lead Rong Jinxiu. From the premiere to the finale, the ratings never dropped below 1, and it always remained the number one in its time slot, with an average rating of 1.994.

But this show wasn't a huge hit.

Finally, she got to see "The Journey of Flower" air!
Judging from the viewership data, "The Journey of Flower" is not as good as "Cruel Romance", but its broadcast effect is much higher than the latter!

A true overnight sensation!!!
It's just as good as Yang Mi's "Palace" and "Swords of Legends" back then.

Shu Chang isn't without hit shows; both "Magic Phone" and "Lotus Lantern" were huge hits back in the day, even though they aired on CCTV. But their broadcast impact just wasn't as good as "The Journey of Flower"!

This is the advantage of fantasy and historical romance dramas, and this is the value of Hunan TV – it must be admitted that, with the same data, Hunan TV is more valuable than other channels.

Shu Chang's Weibo followers were refreshed every second, and the number was increasing rapidly.

Shu Chang was previously at the top of the second tier, roughly equivalent to Nini. After the huge success of "The Journey of Flower", she completely rose to the first tier, and became a top-tier star!
To put it bluntly, this is ascension.

What's the most crucial thing? The most crucial thing is that Shu Chang has more than just "The Journey of Flower". Next month, there is another drama called "The Legend of the Wind" which will be released during the summer season. It is a spy drama, and she plays the female lead, Li Ningyu. The industry believes that this drama will continue the myth of "Lurking" and "Before Dawn" achieving both high ratings and critical acclaim.

Countless contracts from businesses are flying to Shu Chang, and her commercial value is skyrocketing!
Various platforms and film and television companies have also extended olive branches to Shu Chang, hoping to invite her to star in their productions.

Shu Chang is incredibly popular!
After "The Journey of Flower" became a huge hit, the roles that Shu Chang played when she was a child were brought up again by both new and old fans, who said that Shu Chang was their childhood goddess and that she had "acted in so many hit dramas" in the past.

It may sound like hindsight, but there's no doubt that Shu Chang is now a sensation!
Liu Yifei was genuinely happy for her.

"I can't contact her now. She's so busy every day that she doesn't send messages or answer the phone." Liu Yifei complained to her husband and mother about her best friend while having lunch at home.

Li Qiutang said, "She's a top star among the post-85 generation now, why would she play around with a married woman like you?"

Liu Yifei was amused.

"Finally, I'm famous. I've finally made it through the tough times." Now that her best friend is famous, she won't want to get plastic surgery on her face anymore.

Li Qiutang wasn't worried about Shu Chang not having enough opportunities later on. "The Journey of Flower" was enough for her to live off for a lifetime. As long as she continued to act steadily, it was unlikely that her status would decline.

Liu Xiaoli said that Shu Chang seized the opportunity and soared to great heights.

(End of this chapter)