Huayu Entertainment: The Birth of a Succubus Top Star

"Gu, your performance in 'Better Days' was absolutely award-winning. You should prepare well for next year's Golden Rooster Awards and try your best to win it."

We chatted about the Golden Rooster Awards, which just ended recently. Zhang Yimou immediately shifted the timeline to next year and also gave a shout-out to Gu Zhiyan.

"Director Zhang, as you know, I don't come from an academic background." Gu Zhiyan shook his head.

"That's not important. The key is that you have connections in high places." Zhang Yimou pointed his finger up to the sky.

Gu Zhiyan immediately understood what Lao Zhangzi meant.

As expected of the Imperial Advisor, his information network is truly impressive.

The newly appointed Party Secretary and Director of the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television, and the Director of the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection, graduated from Shuangdan University and is a good friend of the old man.

As an aside, the head of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China is a graduate of Tsinghua University.

The Film Bureau was under the jurisdiction of the Central Committee's Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

The newly appointed deputy director and party member of the State Administration of Radio and Television this month is a graduate of the Journalism Department of Shuangdan University. Once you see his alma mater, those who know, know.

This is just the leadership level; further down the hierarchy, there are many more graduates from these two institutions.

Zhang Yimou's claim that Gu Zhiyan has connections is not unfounded.

Gu Zhiyan: It seems that it will be easier for me to win the Huabiao Award.

No, it seems like I'm also playing the "Celestial Dragon" role.

Seeing that Gu Zhiyan understood his meaning, Zhang Yimou continued, "Moreover, I do have some influence over the Golden Rooster Awards... This isn't a behind-the-scenes operation; your talent truly deserves the Best Actor title."

Gu Zhiyan didn't think there was anything wrong with what Zhang Yimou said. If you have the ability, then the rest depends on relationships, right?

But in his opinion, Zhang Yimou was absolutely being modest.

Zhang Yimou has a deep connection with the Golden Rooster Awards. His influence is not only reflected in his unparalleled record of awards, but also in the history of the awards, the direction of the judging process, and the intergenerational transmission of the awards.

He is a true "monumental figure" in the history of the Golden Rooster Awards.

Zhang Yimou holds the record for the most Golden Rooster Awards in Chinese cinema, having won a total of 8 awards to date.

This impressive resume covers various fields, including directing, cinematography, and acting.

However, why does what Zhang Yimou said sound so familiar?

Oh, I remember now, Director Chen said something similar to him not long ago.

A while ago, when Gu Zhiyan was still filming "Si Teng" in Hengdian, Director Chen and Yu Dong came together to invite him to star in a movie.

This film is a tribute to the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Communist Party of China, and it is adapted from the Battle of Chosin Reservoir during the Korean War.

Good heavens, it's *The Battle at Lake Changjin*!

Gu Zhiyan naturally did not refuse.

However, this movie is scheduled to start filming at the beginning of the year, which clashes with "Cliff Walkers"!

Gu Zhiyan clearly expressed the scheduling issue to Director Chen and Yu Dong.

"It's okay, we'll film the other people's scenes first, and then we'll schedule your scenes after you join the crew. At worst, we can reshoot some scenes next winter."

Yu Dong stated that scheduling was not an issue.

Director Chen nodded in agreement.

The reason they were willing to wait was because filming this movie was incredibly stressful.

This film has an investment of over 13 billion yuan, making it the largest production in Chinese film history in terms of scale and cost. It is an unprecedented behemoth in the history of Chinese cinema.

Moreover, this is a subject that no one has dared to touch for 70 years.

Finding a balance between artistic embellishment and respect for history, and avoiding accusations of "nonsense" or "miracle dramas," is a huge psychological burden.

The pressure to achieve a high degree of realism and to tell a compelling narrative is immense.

Although Wu Jing has joined the cast of this film, to be honest, given that Gu Zhiyan poached Wu Jing from "The Wandering Earth" and the poor box office performance of "The Climbers" recently, Wu Jing's box office appeal is much weaker than Gu Zhiyan's.

After the box office failure of "The Climbers", some people have started saying that the success of "Wolf Warrior 2" was because Wu Jing rode on Gu Zhiyan's good fortune.

Without Gu Zhiyan joining the cast, Wolf Warrior 2 certainly wouldn't have achieved such great success.

The problem is that quite a few people actually believe this claim.

Wu Jing: ...

As I said before, people in this circle are very superstitious about metaphysics.

With an actor like Gu Zhiyan, who has never lost a game and whose personal box office earnings are approaching 300 billion, joining the cast, investors, producers, and production companies have gained a lot of confidence.

From this perspective, it seems that Gu Zhiyan is here to "cover the gap".

Yu Dong and Director Chen also had similar ideas.

They certainly didn't want the project to fail.

But if the movie doesn't resonate with audiences, with Gu Zhiyan around, his box office appeal will help minimize the losses.

Since Yu Dong and Director Chen said so, Gu Zhiyan naturally had no more concerns.

Gu Zhiyan really wanted to remind the two of them that there was no need to rush into filming, because the masks would be arriving soon.

Filming was forced to stop for this very reason in my previous life, and was delayed for nearly a year until it was finally restarted at the end of 2020.

But this is something Gu Zhiyan really can't mention.

Well, this delay in filming will give the creative team time to polish the script and improve the quality of the film.

Compared to other film crews, the reason why "The Battle at Lake Changjin" was so greatly affected was mainly because the project was large in scale, had many extras, and required a large number of foreign extras.

After discussing "The Battle at Lake Changjin," everyone chatted casually.

Director Chen brought up the Golden Rooster Awards, saying he could help, and Yu Dong quickly followed suit, saying he could help too.

Gu Zhiyan thought for a moment. With the help of Zhang Yimou, Director Chen, and Yu Dong, and by contacting Wang Changtian and some other people in the industry he was on good terms with, plus Huayi Brothers would definitely not dare to trip him up, the Golden Rooster Award didn't seem so difficult.

Of course, this is on the premise that Gu Zhiyan's performance truly deserves the title of Best Actor.

He didn't want to be ridiculed for being "unworthy of his position."

He wasn't planning on doing anything underhanded; he was just trying to avoid some artificial obstacles.

After meeting with Zhang Yimou, Gu Zhiyan spent the next few days busy keeping appointments with her older and younger sisters in Beijing.

Fairy Sister, Little Fatty, Song Qian, Zhang Hanyun, Cheng Xiao...

And then there's Nazha, who just came back from her quiet life and is seeking comfort.

To Gu Zhiyan's surprise, Lin Yun'er and Li Zhi'en also arrived in the capital with Na Zha.

This story begins a few days ago.

At the time, Naza attended the Mnet Asian Music Awards held at Little Days as an award presenter.

When presenting the award for Best Dance Performance (Solo), Naza read the winner's name in English, but due to pronunciation issues, she pronounced the name of Korean singer Kim Cheong-ha as "Qiong Ha".

This mistake drew laughter and ridicule from the audience and netizens, and also made Nazha a hot topic online.

Afterwards, Nazha discovered that the entire internet was mocking his poor English, and he frequently trended on social media.

Seeing the entire internet mocking her, she broke down emotionally and couldn't help but shed tears.

In the past few days, Nazha has really been "blackened to the extreme"!