Hong Kong Entertainment 1979: A Beating Up the Manager at the Start

The filming went much more smoothly than expected. The sports meet plus a few school exams were all completed in just two and a half days.

Li Jiangbo was not surprised by this efficiency. He already had the shooting scenes in his mind. If it weren't for the fact that Rosamund Kwan was a novice and needed Li Jiangbo to teach her step by step, he felt that it would only take two days to finish shooting.

When they finished work that evening, Li Jiangbo, Wang Jing, and Johnnie To sat down together to check the filming schedule for the next day.

Li Jiangbo patted the progress chart in his hand, "The scenes of the sports meet and exams are almost finished. Tomorrow we'll shoot the indoor scenes, which are more important."

Wang Jing nodded. "You can tell from the storyboard drawn by Director Li. Besides, the school only gave us three days. As long as we can finish filming, that's fine."

Johnnie To echoed Wong Jing's words, "Director Li's preparations were thorough; otherwise, it wouldn't have been so fast. By the way, I see there are scenes with Shi Jieqiang and Shen Dianxia later on; they should be notified to join the crew tonight, right?"

Li Jiangbo nodded, "Okay! They're just making a cameo appearance, so let's focus on filming their scenes tomorrow and let them finish work early."

Wang Jing gave a thumbs-up and said, "Director, great job!"

Li Jiangbo smiled bitterly to himself. How could he not be magnanimous? Shen Dianxia was a pillar of TVB. How could he not give them a break?

The next day, at 8 a.m., the crew started work early.

Li Jiangbo and Wang Jing were leading the crew and actors in rehearsals when Johnnie To anxiously approached and whispered in Li Jiangbo's ear, "Director Li, Shen Dianxia and Shi Jieqiang can't make it."

Upon hearing this, Li Jiangbo's brows furrowed immediately. He turned to Du Qifeng and asked in a deep voice, "What's the situation with these two?"

Johnnie To gave an awkward smile, "He said he had accepted another film role and couldn't coordinate the schedule, so he couldn't act in it. But..."

Li Jiangbo glared at him. "Get to the point. Stop being so long-winded."

Johnnie To had no choice but to lower his voice, "I heard that Manager Chen arranged this role for you, and he even warned you to be careful."

Upon hearing this, Li Jiangbo frowned even more deeply. He hadn't expected Chen Tianfang to be so persistent. Since Chen Tianfang wanted to cause trouble, he would see what tricks Chen Tianfang had up his sleeve!

However, the most important thing now is to find replacements. Although these two characters don't have many roles, they are the contrasting figures in the movie who can see ghosts and those who can't.

The scene where Uncle Fei discovers Scholar Zhu, leading to the burning of Scholar Zhu's rope, is especially crucial and cannot be omitted.

Finding someone at the last minute posed a challenge for Li Jiangbo.

Johnnie To cursed under his breath, "Damn it! Is this how you treat people?! Director Li, it's my fault. I didn't coordinate the actors' schedules properly."

Li Jiangbo waved his hand, comforting her, "Sigh~! It's like the sky wanting to rain, or a mother wanting to remarry. How others choose is not something you or I can decide, so how can you blame yourself?"

He rubbed his temples, pondered for a moment, and suddenly saw Wang Jing shouting loudly not far away, which immediately caught his eye.

"You go ahead and get busy, I'll figure out what to do with the actors."

After Johnnie To left, Li Jiangbo called Wang Jing over.

As Wang Jing walked over, he saw Li Jiangbo rubbing his chin, looking at him with ill intent, which sent a chill down his spine.

He quickly asked, "Director Li, what did you call me here for?"

Li Jiangbo sized up Wang Jing for a moment, then suddenly said, "Brother Jing, how about you take over the role of Uncle Fat?"

Wang Jing was stunned upon hearing this, and asked incredulously, "You want me to act? What about Shi Jieqiang? Isn't he coming?"

Li Jiangbo sighed, "She's not coming. She's taken on another role, supposedly arranged by Chen Tianfang."

Upon hearing Chen Tianfang's name, Wang Jing's face turned green, and he asked in a low voice, "What's going on? This kid's still after you!"

Li Jiangbo did not answer his question. "You see, as long as Uncle Fei is honest and simple, that's enough. With your physique and your usual carefree attitude, you're more than qualified for the role."

Wang Jing stroked his chin, debating whether or not to take the role.

He decided to act, but he had never acted before and didn't know if he could meet Li Jiangbo's requirements. He had seen Li Jiangbo scold those actors for half an hour at a time.

He didn't want to miss this opportunity, since it was a rare chance for him.

Just as Wang Jing was struggling with his decision, Li Jiangbo pressed his advantage, saying, "You don't want Chen Tianfang, that loser, to laugh at us, do you? Hurry up, I still need to find you a partner."

Wang Jing gritted his teeth and said, "Fine, I'll act it out."

Li Jiangbo patted him on the shoulder and laughed, "That's more like it! Props! Props!"

A moment later, the props manager arrived. "Director, what's up?"

Li Jiangbo pointed at Wang Jing and said, "Go and take the assistant director to change his costume."

After the two left, Li Jiangbo called Zhao Yazhi over.

It took a lot of persuasion to convince Zhao Yazhi to agree to play the role of the dormitory supervisor.

When Wang Jing and Zhao Yazhi changed their clothes and came to him, Li Jiangbo immediately felt that he had made the right choice.

With a mustache stuck to his mouth, wearing a baggy costume, and lecherous eyes, Wang Jing looked every bit the sleazy old man.

Zhao Yazhi, however, was a bit lacking. He called in a makeup artist to stick a beauty mark on the corner of her mouth and had a long hair added to the beauty mark. Thus, a dormitory supervisor who subverted people's perceptions was born.

Li Jiangbo added a gesture for Zhao Yazhi: after each beating of Wang Jing, she should stroke that hair with her hand.

Zhao Yazhi also thought it would be fun, so she agreed.

The current scene is: Uncle Fat, played by Wang Jing, is repairing the sewers when he sees a rope moving in the room and is then pranked by falling off the ladder to the ground.

Wang Jing, dressed, climbed the ladder. The wooden ladder wobbled precariously, making it seem as if it couldn't support Wang Jing's large frame.

This made the people below really nervous for him, but fortunately, the camera finished filming without any major incident.

In the next shot, Li Jiangbo specifically had several layers of foam padding added to the prop to prevent Fei Jing from getting injured when he fell.

When it came to Zhao Yazhi's scenes, Li Jiangbo was worried that she wouldn't be able to act them out.

Unexpectedly, she performed exceptionally well when acting opposite the fat uncle, and at first glance, it seemed like she was playing herself.

That fierce and assertive nature of hers completely controlled Uncle Fatty.

Li Jiangbo nodded repeatedly. This time, having Wang Jing and Zhao Yazhi step in was the right choice, especially since the two of them standing together were particularly amusing.

One was fat, short, and sleazy; the other was thin, tall, and fierce; their physical appearances were quite comical.

In addition, Wang Jing's occasional antics kept Leslie Cheung, Cherie Chung, and Rosamund Kwan laughing non-stop.

The school scenes have been filming for three days and are still not finished, but the crew will have to move to an amusement park to film tomorrow.

The main reason for filming was to take advantage of Monday when there weren't many people at the amusement park, so that we could shoot some scenes. Otherwise, we would have to extend the filming period.

Just as the film crew arrived at the amusement park, something unexpected happened.

The staff member in charge of the perimeter rushed up to Li Jiangbo, "Director Li, Director Li, something bad has happened! There are gang members outside who want to see you."

Li Jiangbo's face darkened, and his heart tightened. What was bound to happen had finally arrived.

I wonder if this group was hired by that bastard Chen Tianfang. If so, things are probably going to get very badly over.

Li Jiangbo lowered his voice, "How many people came? Which gang are they from? Are they carrying any weapons?"

"Four, the one in the lead is said to be from Yisheng."

Upon hearing this, Li Jiangbo's heart skipped a beat. It was exactly what he feared!

He took a deep breath, patted the staff member on the shoulder, and said, "I'll go check on it. You tell the assistant director to keep filming, don't stop."