Abstract Art Award Winner

Therefore, Zhou Le would absolutely not get involved in this mess.

Even in the most ideal situation, one can restrain their own fans, but there are still many people who impersonate others, say things they shouldn't, and do things that make others hate them.

It's impossible to guard against it.

Sure enough, not long after, all sorts of negative stories about Xiao Zhan from the past were exposed. On the other hand, Wang Yibo remained relatively silent, and his fans were also relatively quiet.

Perhaps some of these conflicts were orchestrated by someone behind the scenes, while others were genuine expressions of emotion from fans. In any case, time passed day by day until "Fame and Fortune" wrapped up filming, and Xiao Zhan had offended a number of people.

The gaming community, the anime community, the fan fiction community, the e-sports community, the voice acting community, the traditional Chinese crosstalk community, and all sorts of other communities—none of them have fared well.

Their actions included, but were not limited to, submitting a thousand reports to platforms such as cloud storage and Zhihu.

However, Xiao Zhan's works were also given a lot of one-star ratings on Bilibili, and other novels were also boycotted for participating in this battle.

In short, it was a massive internet battle that kept Zhou Le extremely busy. The last time he felt there was such a major internet war was during the Baidu Tieba era when everyone was attacking each other's forums.

Meanwhile, many people in real life have started to do some questionable things. For example, when fans are giving online classes to their children, they promote their idols, but some students expose them on the spot, which makes the teacher furious.

People from all walks of life also use their positions to do all sorts of things, but the more they do this, the more disgusted passersby become.

"If we're talking about being smart, Wang Yibo's team is the smartest. Someone is taking the bullets in front, and he's hiding behind. There's nothing wrong with that. I would have hidden too. Anyway, they've made a lot of blunders."

From Wu Yifan at the beginning to Cai Xukun later, and now Xiao Zhan this year, haven't these PR people learned how to handle things?

Zhou Le expressed his incomprehension regarding this.

But Guo Qiling, who was standing next to him, said: "In essence, they are still a bit arrogant. Moreover, the positioning they gave Xiao Zhan was just an idol. It's just that after he suddenly became popular, they can't just ignore everything."

If they can maintain this for another year, they can earn money for another year. Now, New Classics Media and China Literature have a performance-based agreement, and they don't want to give up so easily. Moreover, for them, the more they say, the more mistakes they will make.

What they should do now is lay low for a while, wait until things calm down, then film a few more movies and sing a couple of patriotic songs, and they can make a perfect comeback.

But the prerequisite is that you must be able to protect yourself wisely.

It's clear that Xiao Zhan's fans are not quite able to do that nowadays, and Xiao Zhan himself isn't very proactive in keeping his fans in check.

Therefore, with each passing day, Xiao Zhan's image as an artist and his career value decline.

"Brother Le, have you finished filming your movie? Several people want to invite you out for dinner."

"Several? Who are they?"

"Wang Yibo, Cai Xukun, and Luo Zhixiang, Li Yifeng and the others."

Zhou Le: "."

"Then just say I've been busy filming lately and haven't had time to eat, so I'll postpone it for now. These names sound a bit scary."

"Okay, haha, that's what I said before, but they contacted me again recently, so I'll wait until you finish filming here before we talk about it. But recently, a lot of media outlets want to do an exclusive interview with you, I think it's mainly because of the donation you made some time ago."

"Let's skip this kind of interview and decline it. Of course, if they are interested, we can arrange it."

"Okay, I'll decline the interview for you then. But what about an endorsement?"

"I have to accept endorsements. I'll still choose based on the same old standards. If there's one that's decent enough, I'll take it."

"Okay, I've written it down. I'll send you the filtered list later to confirm. If there are no problems, I'll agree to their request."

In addition, this year's tax return also needs to be filed. I've already asked the company's accounting department to calculate the amount and see how much additional payment we'll need. You might need to handle that for you then.

"No problem, let them calculate it. After that, we'll check with the tax authorities and I'll handle the final amount to be paid."

These words reminded Zhou Le.

Since I started making more money, I have to start paying back taxes.

I neither evade taxes nor launder money, so I have to pay a lot of money in back taxes every year.

Even so, a portion of the money had already been paid when it arrived in the account the previous year.

After all, last year it was discovered that several of his peers had evaded taxes, and many of the more famous ones are still unable to return to the domestic entertainment industry. Zhou Le still remembers this cautionary tale.

I am like a mother hen; I can't keep a few more eggs in my hands now, only to find myself with nothing to lay later.

"By the way, we're having a wrap-up ceremony here. Are you coming? It's a small event, but there will be quite a few people. The whole crew will be there."

"Come on, how could I miss something like this? This is your first time directing and the wrap party is being held, I can't possibly be absent."

"Okay, then I'll have Qi Ling make the arrangements. You can come over once you're done here."

After making the call, Zhou Le received the lists and documents sent by the other party. Some of them were endorsement contracts that had expired, and some were new endorsements that had been secured.

After reading it, Zhou Le had a general idea of ​​what was going on.

The wrap party that followed could only be held on a small scale due to policy reasons. Guo Qiling booked a banquet hall in the hotel, and the entire crew attended, including Han Han.

"Brothers and sisters, I am most grateful to director Han Han for this movie. After the script was abandoned, it was director Han Han who helped me contact several excellent screenwriters, including Li Yashen, Ben Yu, Ke Da, and Zi Mo, to work together on the project."

That's how the script for "Making a Name for Yourself" came about. I also want to thank all the actors and directors for their understanding. This was my first time directing a film, and there were many shortcomings. I am grateful for everyone's tolerance.

My plan was to release it during this year's Lunar New Year holiday. Actually, if it weren't for what happened at the end of last year, I could have released the film during the Spring Festival. However, all the films scheduled for the 2020 Spring Festival were withdrawn and postponed for a year, so I was a little hesitant to get involved in this mess.

Of course, if the competition is too fierce, it might be postponed to next year for release.

Zhou Le did indeed think that way. Releasing a film during the Lunar New Year holiday season at the end of this year would mean less competition, and with a large number of excellent films being released at the end of the year, it would also bring a lot of anticipation to the audience.

As far as Zhou Le knows, "Detective Chinatown 3," which was withdrawn from its theatrical release this year, will be released during the Spring Festival. In addition, Jia Ling seems to be preparing to shoot her first film.

"My People, My Homeland," which was filmed last year, will also be released this year. In addition, the films written and directed by Han Yan, including "A Little Red Flower," "Shock Wave 2," and "Jiang Ziya," which star Yi Yangqianxi and Liu Haocun, "The Sacrifice," co-directed by Guan Hu, Guo Fan, and Lu Yang, "The Eight Hundred," directed by Guan Hu, and "Leap," a film about the women's volleyball team directed by Chen Kexin, will all be released this year.

Furthermore, Zhou Le learned through rumors that Zhang Yimou is also planning to shoot another film this year, with a release scheduled for next year. It's easy to imagine that with so many films released this year, the competition at next year's film festivals will be incredibly fierce.

Therefore, he intends to avoid direct confrontation.

In short, try to avoid competing with those who are truly talented, and take whatever awards you can get.

After Zhou Le finished speaking, Han Han and the screenwriters also went up and said their opinions.

But the main theme is that one's own efforts are nothing. Although they wrote the script, Zhou Le made some adjustments to the script later to make the whole story more complete and vivid.

Later, during dinner, the group sat together and all suggested that Zhou Le's name should be listed first in the scriptwriting credits.

"That's not a good idea. After all, you wrote the script and created the idea. I only made some changes."

Liu Xunzi smiled and revealed his prominent tiger teeth: "The idea is not exactly something we created ourselves. After all, we only adapted it from the Three Elders Case. The biggest credit for the script goes to Director Zhou."

This also reveals the complexities of human relationships.

Zhou Le declined for a long time, but finally couldn't resist and agreed.

He was well aware that these people were indeed very creative, and what they needed now was not awards for their work, but more resources to support their careers.

After the wrap party in the evening, the post-production work will be completed by a post-production company jointly established by Zhou Le and Han Han.

Guo Qiling is preparing to film a new project, where he will continue to play the male lead, while the female lead will be Song Yi, whom everyone worked with in "Joy of Life".

Guo Qiling is quite looking forward to this drama, as it marks his first leading role in a serious big-budget production, as the characters go from siblings to lovers.

"I've found that sometimes doing too well in your career isn't a good thing. There's always something going on at the company, and I also have to film movies. I probably won't have a moment to rest while filming. The company needs to keep producing works. Right now, our company supports more than a dozen teams."

Each team can produce at least one short drama per month; some, like the assembly line teams, are shooting four or five a month—they're so busy they're practically dying.

Zhou Le chuckled: "Are you trying to create a Versailles-like scene here? Other companies are about to go bankrupt, and you have so many projects you can't even finish them all. If word gets out, your competitors will be green with envy."

"Hehe, everyone has their own troubles, right?"

"But what about you, Brother Le?"

"As for me, I'll be keeping an eye on the post-production of 'Make a Name for Yourself' in my spare time, but I can only do it remotely. I'm currently juggling a lot of projects and can't even finish them all."

Tomorrow I'm going back to Beijing to work with director Lin Yufen on casting for the new film. He's already prepared the costumes, props, and sets, and we're just waiting for the cast to be finalized before we start filming. I need to finish filming this historical drama series here first.

I'll probably have to go to Qingdao again in between, as I also have a role in the second part of "The Wandering Earth," and I also have to appear on a bunch of random variety shows.

"I also need to go back and film the play; there are probably still performances in the second half of the year."

"You're too busy. I take back what I just said. My workload is nothing compared to yours."

Zhou Le had no choice; some things were due to personal relationships, and some were related to his own career, so he couldn't refuse either.

After parting ways, Zhou Le returned to Beijing the next day.

Lin Yufen has already finished the script for "Love and Redemption," but to make it easier to remember and spread, he only kept the first two characters of the title.

At the same time, Lin Yufen also selected the filming location for "Love and Redemption," which will be Tianzhu Mountain in Qianshan City, Anhui Province.

Currently, only one male lead, Zhou Le, and one female lead, Tian Xiwei, have been confirmed.

No sooner had Zhou Le returned to Beijing than Wang Sicong called again.

"Le'er, I've already talked to Wanda about your TV series project, and they're planning to invest some money. But have you found the right actors yet?"

Zhou Le knew immediately that Wang Sicong's call to him couldn't have been just about investment.

"Not yet. We've only confirmed the male and female leads so far. We haven't found anyone else yet. We're going back to Beijing to hold auditions, right? Does the principal have any suitable people he could recommend?"

Zhou Le directly said what the other party hadn't said earlier.

Although Wang Sicong has always been perceived as someone who started his own businesses with the small goals given to him by his family, and has been involved in many fields, he has actually been quite involved in Wanda Pictures as well.

After all, besides real estate, Wanda has the most contact with the film and television industry. How could the son of Wanda not get involved at all?

As far as Zhou Le knows, many of the people under Wang Sicong were originally involved in film and television projects simply because of their good relationship with him.

Not only did they make a fortune, but they also lived a life of extravagance and debauchery.

Many young girls without connections want to enter the entertainment industry, and they won't miss any opportunity, no matter how small.

If those below him are like this, one can only imagine how Wang Sicong himself is.

What outsiders can see is only the tip of the iceberg.

Just listening to Wang Sicong talk about his experiences, Zhou Le, who has never been involved in the entertainment industry, would never even dream of such a life.

"Haha, I actually have one."

Do you know Zhang Yuxi?

Zhang Yuxi and Zhou Le naturally knew each other; she was Wang Sicong's ex-girlfriend.

She graduated from a fashion college and later worked as a print model. Of course, her first acting role was in a film invested in by LeEco, which also had investment from BJ Plus, a company under Wang Sicong's name.

"I know, I know. Is she in Beijing now? She can come over for an interview in the next day or two to see what roles would suit her?"

"Okay, I'll tell her. She's in Beijing right now, so I'll have her go there today?"

"Come on over, the auditions start today."

Wang Sicong didn't ask Zhou Le what role he would assign, because he knew that if Zhang Yuxi went on her own, her billing order was hard to predict, but with this phone call, it was certain she wouldn't be placed too low. (End of Chapter)