Rebirth: An Outlier in the Entertainment Industry

Chapter 97 Huang Yiliang's Ambition (Bonus Chapter, Please Vote)

Huangliangmeng Music Company.

"Wow! Your company is quite impressive!" Jiang Wen started his sarcastic remarks as soon as he stepped out of the elevator.

However, the truth is that they were all stunned by the company's decor and office atmosphere.

Especially Teacher Cao, who originally thought that his students were just running a makeshift operation at the studio level.

"It's alright! I think it's just so-so too." Huang Yiliang waved his hand, his tone as indifferent as if he were saying that the weather was nice today.

"If I don't fail my final exams, I'll take over the entire floor upstairs next year, expand the business, and become bigger and stronger!"

Jiang Wen: "..."

I shouldn't have said anything.

"Mr. Huang! Sister Fei and Brother Dong are looking for you. I've arranged for them to be in your office." Zhao Liying, carrying two cups of coffee, ran into Huang Yiliang and his group.

"Okay, you can go ahead and get busy."

Huang Yiliang nodded, then turned his gaze to Xu Jinglei: "Didn't you and Dong Ge come together?"

"I didn't know Ah Dong was coming, otherwise we would have come together."

Xu Cainu shook her head and changed the subject: "Yi Liang, which decoration company did your company hire for the design? Recommend it to me later."

The spacious and stylish rest area of ​​"Huang Liang Meng Music" perfectly captured her aesthetic sensibilities.

"Well, the renovation was done by a regular company, but I came up with the design plan myself. If you like it, Sister Xu, I'll give you the design drawings."

"Oh? That's great! I didn't know you knew design!" Xu Cainu smiled with some surprise.

"I only know a little bit, mainly borrowing from foreign countries." Huang Yiliang cut Jiang Wen off before he could speak.

Jiang Wen opened his mouth, but then awkwardly shut it.

Huang Yiliang's general manager's office.

"Sister Fei, Brother Dong, why didn't you call ahead when you arrived? I could have picked you up."

"Will you pick us up?"

Wang Fei rolled her eyes at Huang Yiliang, annoyed: "You can at least get through on your phone!"

"Why can't I get through? I just called—" Huang Yiliang took out his phone in confusion.

Damn it! Liu Yifei chatted with him via text message and ended up with overdue phone bills.

Telecom companies these days are really something else; they'll cut off your phone service if you owe even a penny.

"Have the finance department top up my phone with 10,000 yuan." Huang Yiliang casually handed his phone to Zhao Liying, who was standing next to him.

"Okay!" Zhao Liying took the phone.

"Mr. Wang, what would you like to drink?"

"No need for that. Have someone prepare some cold drinks and snacks and send them to the screening room upstairs. Oh, and remember to turn on the air conditioning beforehand," Huang Yiliang said, waving his hand.

"Yes, Mr. Huang, I'll take care of it myself!" Zhao Liying nodded earnestly.

Hearing Huang Yiliang's arrangements, Jiang looked speechless: "Didn't you say the upstairs wasn't done yet?"

"That's confidence. I'm sure I can pass every exam, so I've already taken them." Huang Yiliang glanced at Jiang Wen with disdain.

Professor Cao immediately defended his student: "Well said! Students of our Communication University of China should have this kind of confidence!"

Jiang Wen didn't want to talk anymore.

Damn it, this is their territory. It's unwise to fight two of them. Next time you come to my place, I'll show you what I'm made of.

"Sister Fei."

"Jing Lei, what brings you all here?"

Wang Fei, Xu Jinglei, Zhang Yadong, and Jiang Wen were all acquaintances.

Zhang Yadong nodded to Jiang Wen.

Both of them are masters of showing off, just with very different styles.

Dong Ge is a quiet and reserved type of pretentious person, which is quite popular with women;

Jiang Wen is the outgoing and flamboyant type who likes to show off. Whether he's popular with women is hard to say, but most men would want to punch him if they saw him.

"We heard there's a good movie in Yi Liang's area, so we came to check it out."

As she spoke, Xu Jinglei naturally sat down on the sofa next to Zhang Yadong.

She didn't ask Dong Ge why he came; if Dong Ge was willing to tell her, he would naturally do so.

This is where Xu Cai Nu's brilliance lies. She has been a playboy in Beijing's social circle for so many years, and her ex-boyfriends could fill several banquet tables, but every one of them speaks highly of her.

Even a busybody like Wang Shuo.

"Oh—! You're making movies? Right, I forgot you studied directing." Wang Fei slapped her forehead as if suddenly realizing something.

"Let's go together!"

"Let's watch it together!" Zhang Yadong agreed, also curious about what kind of movie this musical prodigy had come up with.

"I didn't direct it. I was mainly responsible for editing and some of the scriptwriting," Huang Yiliang had to explain again.

"Let's go! What are we waiting for? To eat?" Jiang Wen urged impatiently.

"Okay—! The screening room is upstairs." Huang Yiliang pointed to the ceiling.

Actually, Huang Liang Meng Music also has a screening room, but it only has a DVD player for playing music videos.

"Crazy Stone" is a film reel movie, which requires a film projector, and that kind of thing is only available in the screening room upstairs.

"Did you see that? That was Wang Fei!"

"I saw it, and Jiang Wen is there too!"

"You bunch of blind fools, Zhang Yadong is the idol of us music producers! I heard that his production fee for a song starts at this amount now!" A veteran producer mysteriously held up three fingers.

"Thirty thousand?" The blond musician looked on with envy.

"Can't you be a little more classy? It's 300,000."

A group of music producers are jealous.

Although they don't just receive a fixed salary at Huangliangmeng Music, they also receive bonuses for each single they produce.

But compared to Zhang Yadong's income, damn it, I don't want to do this anymore.

Zhao Jian, standing in the crowd, silently noted down the name of the veteran producer, thinking that he should report him to his assistant Zhao after get off work.

Huang Liang Meng Music's rapid expansion and talent poaching inevitably leads to a mix of good and bad performers, something Huang Yiliang is well aware of.

Zhao Liying was in charge of screening employees. This young woman was always busy and gossipy; nothing in the company could escape her notice.

The upstairs renovation wasn't completely finished, but Zhao Liying had clearly tidied it up beforehand, pushing the construction debris in the hallway to both sides.

However, the screening room was already completed long ago.

Zhao Liying prepared drinks and fruit on the small coffee table next to each sofa and chair.

"Not bad, this screening room is great, very impressive!" Jiang Wen rarely said anything nice.

This screening room is decorated like a VIP screening room in a future cinema. The screening room, which is over 100 square meters, only has more than 30 sofas and chairs, making it feel spacious and grand.

"Boss, can I stay and watch the movie?" Zhao Liying asked softly, then added solicitously, "I can also work as your waitress."

"No need to be a waiter. Find a seat yourself, and while you're at it, call over those copywriters from the company too."

Huang Yiliang whispered his instructions.

Although "Crazy Stone" has not yet been approved for release, Huang Yiliang is already thinking about how to promote the film.

If only Jiang Wen, with his big mouth, could help blow on it—

Uh—! Why does it feel a bit off?

"Alright!"

Zhao Liying excitedly ran out to call for people; she was so eager to see her performance in the movie.

Let me preface this by saying this is just a comedy with some original ideas, so don't have too high expectations.

After Huang Yiliang finished speaking, he turned on the projector.

He himself is determined not to watch it again; he was almost sick of watching it while editing the video.

"Zhao Jian, do you see me? That's me on the left. How was my acting?" During the screening, Zhao Liying couldn't help but whisper to Zhao Jian next to her.

"Sister Ying, your acting was superb! You completely overshadowed the person next to you!" Zhao Jian flattered earnestly.

Sister Ying is a powerful figure in the company, so he dared not neglect her.

"Hehe!" Zhao Liying was very pleased with Zhao Jian's flattery.

The person next to her happened to be Yang Mi.

Yang Mi even teased her about this scene.

To be fair, although Zhao Liying didn't have a single line in this scene, she stole the spotlight from Yang Mi with just her body language and expressions.

"Pfft—! Haha!"

Faye Wong has a low threshold for laughter; she laughed non-stop after the movie started.

The other people in the screening room were also laughing.

They weren't unfamiliar with comedy films, but they had never seen a dark comedy like this one, with its dense jokes and multi-layered narrative, that defied convention.

Because this type of film has never existed in China.

Jiang Wen's expression, however, was somewhat solemn.

He can also handle multi-narrative structures, but to manage so many parallel storylines without making it seem chaotic demonstrates his exceptional skill in scriptwriting and editing.

He was about to talk to Huang Yiliang, but Huang Yiliang was nowhere to be seen in the screening room.

Jiang Wen understood this point well; he didn't want to watch the finished film repeatedly, even though he had participated in editing it.

Among China's top directors, Director Chen Kaige is probably the only one who likes to repeatedly watch his own films. It is said that Director Chen Kaige has a player at home that is dedicated to playing "Farewell My Concubine". Whenever Director Chen Kaige lacks inspiration, he will play his most satisfying work to find inspiration.

Ninety minutes later, the movie ended.

"This movie is very well made! It doesn't feel like a debut film by a new director at all," Xu Cainu exclaimed.

Jiang Wen shook his head in disagreement: "No, the directing of this movie isn't necessarily that brilliant. What's impressive is the scriptwriting and editing. It's clearly a film where the script dictates the filming pace."

"Can the script dictate the filming process?" Xu Cainu asked with some skepticism.

"Yeah! Isn't the director supposed to be the most powerful person on set?" Zhang Yadong was a complete novice, and he asked a very uninformed question.

"Of course not. Most Hollywood movies are producer-centric, where the director just needs to translate the written script into visuals."

"Many films in South Korea are script-centric. Whether it's the director, the actors, or even the cinematographer, costume designer, and prop master, everything revolves around the script."

"This creative approach makes it easy to produce high-quality films with low budgets."

Jiang Wen truly lives up to his reputation as a veteran in the film industry.

Although this guy didn't participate in the filming, he has already deduced the approximate creative process of the film from the footage.

"No wonder South Korea always manages to produce excellent low-budget films," Xu Jinglei said with a sudden realization.

"Those Koreans are so stingy! Of course, this kid is stingy too."

Jiang Wen pointed towards the empty seats and said with great certainty, "Believe it or not, the script for this film is definitely no more than 20,000 words long."

Uh—! He's giving Huang Yiliang too much credit.

Huang Yiliang's scripts are all calculated down to the second; not a single minute of ineffective plot is wasted.

"Really?"

Xu Jinglei was skeptical. Her film, "Letter from an Unknown Woman," was adapted from a novel, and the script was already extremely concise. She also filmed over 400 minutes of footage.

"Hehe, if you don't believe me, ask him for the script to see," Jiang Wen laughed.

If Huang Yiliang were there, he would definitely be shocked by Jiang Wen's accurate judgment.

Indeed, although Huang Yiliang is a directing student, he is a staunch supporter of the "script-centric system".

In his blueprint, all film and television workers in his company, whether directors, actors, or even lighting technicians, will have to work around the script.

This allows for strict control over filming costs and facilitates streamlined production, ensuring that the quality of the film is not significantly affected by whoever is involved.

Ideally, you could have a dog tethered next to the camera and act as the director; even that would capture the essence of the script.

"Where is that kid? Is he just going to act like the host? Leaving everyone here like this?" Jiang Wen shouted loudly.

"Here I am! I went to book a private room and got two bottles of good wine—should we cancel?" Huang Yiliang pushed open the door and entered, carrying two bottles of old wine.

"No, no, no, I was just kidding!" Jiang Wen quickly snatched the fine wine from Huang Yiliang's hand.

"Don't worry! I won't drink your wine for nothing. There's nothing seriously wrong with your film. I'll put in a few words for you, and I guarantee it will pass the censorship," Jiang Wen said confidently.

"Come on, I heard that someone has been blacklisted himself, and he's still helping me." Huang Yiliang took Jiang Wen's words as a joke.

"Hey—! You little brat, you don't believe me, do you!" Jiang Wen laughed angrily.

Xu Cainu shook her head: "Jiang Wen made a big fuss, and the higher-ups couldn't not punish him. He still has connections."

"Okay—! Thank you very much, Director Jiang!" Huang Yiliang didn't care whether it was true or not, and just put Jiang Wen on the leash first.

"Let's go! Let's eat first. We happen to have some wild yellow croaker that just arrived by air!"

"That's more like it!" Jiang Wen nodded in satisfaction.

In fact, Jiang Wen really does have this ability.

He didn't ask anyone for help regarding his being blacklisted because he wanted to save face and refused to admit his mistake.

But to stand up for a friend, that's called loyalty. If word gets out, everyone will praise him as a "real man"!

Huang Yiliang was drinking with Jiang Wen and thought the other party had a great capacity for alcohol, but before he even put in his effort, Teacher Cao alone had already knocked Jiang Wen out.

"Sister Fei, is there something you need from me?" Huang Yiliang asked in a low voice.

"It's alright! Our record company sent me to sound you out, you don't need to worry about it."

"But your second album was really good. You always hide your talent from your sister Faye!" Wang Fei was so angry that she wanted to pinch Huang Yiliang.

She and Zhang Yadong had always thought Huang Yiliang's singing skills were just average, but the December 2004 album proved them wrong.