The first TV series in which Li Xuejian participated was "Li Dazhao" filmed in 1989.
The premiere of the TV series was held in Beijing on October 27, 1989, and was immediately broadcast on CCTV and provincial, prefectural and municipal television stations.
Before this, Li Xuejian still participated in a lot of movies, as early as 1980, he had his first film work "Tianshan Xing".
Stills from "Sky Mountain Trip"
However, it wasn't until 9 years later, in 1989, that he starred in his first TV series.
The filming units of the 9-episode TV series "Li Dazhao" are: Beijing Television Station, Beijing Television Art Center, Qinhuangdao Municipal Party Committee and Municipal Government, Tangshan Municipal Party Committee and Municipal Government. In fact, the main contractor is the Beijing Television Art Center.
After filming "Li Dazhao", in 1990, Li Xuejian became famous in "Longing", which was filmed by the Beijing Television Arts Center, and became a household name actor.
But this does not guarantee that Li Xuejian will adapt to all the characters.
It can be said that even today, Li Xuejian's performance in "Li Dazhao" is a failure, and the reason for the failure, as someone pointed out to Li Xuejian at that time, said that he did not have a sense of leadership in the play.
Although "Li Dazhao" was not successful, in the context of the 1980s, several awards were given.
Li Xuejian's design in "Li Dazhao" is to tilt Li Dazhao to the perspective of ordinary people and highlight the pro-people nature of the characters, but Li Xuejian's performance positioning is obviously a mistake, and Li Dazhao in the play often opens a mouth with an exclamation point, lacking due reaction, it can be said that the overall design of the character carries a kind of wooden characteristics.
The root cause of this is that the overall design of the choreographer is wrong.
The TV series's director, Wang Baohua, was born in 1939 and was previously an actor at the Changchun Film Studio. He has played roles in many long-form films, but the actor's recognition is not strong, and it is difficult to make an impression.
Wang Baohua in "The Gunshots of the Secret Bureau"
Wang Baohua once played Yang Yulin in "The Gunshots of the Secrecy Bureau", that is, the agent who is a little unintelligent, but he is determined to perform his duties, and there are still many appearances in the film, but he can't find a sense of existence.
Later, he played a villain-type role again in the long-film movie "Love Heaven Hates the Sea", and was the only die-hard destroyer in the film.
Wang Baohua in "Love Heaven Hates the Sea"
In 1982, Wang Baohua was transferred to the Beijing Television Art Center as a director, directing the "Comrade Shaoqi" trilogy.
It should be said that Wang Baohua's directing skills are still weak, which also restricts Li Xuejian's acting skills in this TV series.
In the 1980s, TV dramas lacked more effective means in character portrayal, the characters did not have dialogue design, lacked the flash of thought, and did not know how to use language to fight, so the characters in the play were often like puppets, the language was dry, and the action was dull.
When the TV series "Li Dazhao" was broadcast at that time, it was criticized by critics. It can be said that it is an unsuccessful TV series starring Li Xuejian.
We can see a pertinent criticism of this TV series in Chen Xinjian's "Sword Qi Zhen Xin" (Popular Literature and Art Publishing House, 2007 edition):
——For these personality characteristics of Li Dazhao, the grasp in the play is somewhat improper, and it fails to give the audience a complete impression, making people feel that Li Dazhao in the play has an unemberable demeanor. For example, the plot of "Saving the Young Chen Yi at Night" reminds people of Song Gongming in "Water Margin"; for example, "Tianjin Meets Young Zhou Enlai and Deng Yingchao" makes people feel that Li Dazhao is just a loyal elder. It seems that the directors were concerned with Li Dazhao's enthusiasm for caring for the revolutionary youth, while ignoring his spiritual ideas and shining wisdom when disseminating the truth of Marxism. The most regrettable thing is that Li Dazhao and Chen Duxiu agreed on the name of the "Communist Party of China" in the car and translated and explained the "Communist Manifesto" to the young Mao Zedong in the Peking University Library, which best showed Li Dazhao's knowledge and elegance, but the actors failed to grasp it well, only to let people understand Li Dazhao's firm belief, full of enthusiasm and peaceful attitude. The reasons for this may be manifold. As a choreographer, there is a mistake of underexploring the depth of the plot's thoughts, and as an actor, I am afraid that the temperament cultivation itself is a little worse. ——
This TV series can be said to have gathered some of the well-known creators of the Beijing Television Art Center in the future.
For example, the director Feng Xiaoning, who was once in the sky in the future, can only play an unknown art lover in the play, and appears several times as a soy sauce in the modern scenes of the play.
Feng Xiaoning in the play
The heroine in the modern clue is the actress Zhang Liwei, who has passed the popular period at that time. At that time, Zhang Liwei was 35 years old and played a graduate student who focused on Li Dazhao's deeds in the play.
A female graduate student played by Zhang Liwei
The male protagonist in the modern time and space of the play is a sculptor, who knows nothing about Li Dazhao from the beginning, and after Zhang Liwei's role in the ear, he has the latest perception of Li Dazhao, has a deep sublimation of his thinking, and feels Li Dazhao's abundant heart.
However, the embarrassment of the era designed by the TV series is that when the sculptor began to understand Li Dazhao's spirit and feelings, the female graduate student who guided him to approach Li Dazhao's soul chose to go to Japan.
This undoubtedly reflects the reality of the upsurge of the 1980s, and the TV series also reflects the social reflection of that era in the realistic paragraphs.
In the play, Xue Bai, who appeared beautifully in "Yellow Land", played a fashionable young woman, who was obsessed with Japanese and Taiwanese TV dramas, skipped the revolutionary traditional drama stage, and from her mouth, she also said the thoughts of the times at that stage: in this situation of pluralistic world and multiple choices, what road to take.
Xue Bai in the play
Therefore, in the 1980s, the TV series "Li Dazhao" has always run through a modern dimension, that is, the road of China's development pioneered by the master of the play, how to cope with the baptism of the tide of the times.
Therefore, "Li Dazhao" filmed in the 1980s carries the brand of the times, and any historical film is a refraction and reflection of contemporary consciousness in history.
In 2021, a TV series with the same time period as "Li Dazhao" "The Age of Awakening" came out, and what we can see from this TV series is a new spiritual essence, that is: road confidence, theoretical confidence, institutional self-confidence.
We can note that every ten years since the founding of the party, there have been film and television works reflecting the history of the founding of the party.
Let's look back at the era of reform and opening up:
In 1981, the film "Nanchang Uprising";
In 1991, the film "Breaking New Ground";
In 2001, the TV series "Sunrise Oriental";
In 2011, the movie "The Great Cause of Party Building", the TV series "Breaking New Ground", "China 1921";
In 2021, the movie "1921", the TV series "The Age of Awakening".
"The Age of Awakening" differs from previous film and television works on the theme of party building, in that it focuses on the ideological confrontation around the three main cadres of the new cultural movement to show the storm of the times. The most important characters in the play are Chen Duxiu, Li Dazhao and Hu Shi.
The main vein of "The Age of Awakening" is how the new cultural movement inevitably moved towards the implementation of Marxism in China.
The TV series digs deep into the history of this main line, and briefly summarizes the historical facts mentioned in each film and television work of the same theme before. For example, in the film and television works on the theme of the founding of the party, there is indispensable depiction of the love between Mao Zedong and Yang Kaihui, but in the "Age of Awakening", the role of Yang Kaihui does not appear at all, and the psychological agitation of the characters in the play is always concentrated on the three main characters of Chen, Li and Hu, and only the family life of these three people, and the TV series gives a gradual performance from strong to weak.
The position of "The Age of Awakening" is the position of the position we have in the new era.
In contrast, the 1980s version of "Li Dazhao" reflects more of the confusion of the times, and also reflects the ideological fluctuations we had in the early years of reform and opening up.
The heroine of the modern thread in the play studies the history of the revolutionary pioneers, but still cannot resist her impulse to leave the motherland.
Interestingly, Cheng Mei, the actor who played Song Qingling in "Li Dazhao", chose to go abroad after participating in the filming of this TV series for two years, which is the real version of the role in the play.
Cheng Mei played Yuan Chun in the 87 version of "Dream of the Red Chamber".
Cheng Mei in "Dream of the Red Chamber"
Her first TV series to play Soong Ching Ling was Sun Yat-sen and Soong Ching Ling, but the TV series was not broadcast. In "Li Dazhao", she played Song Qingling for the second time.
Cheng Mei left the domestic acting stage and lost her voice.
The TV series "Li Dazhao" also shows the ambivalence of this female graduate student, and uses Li Dazhao to study in Japan to find a defense for himself to jump into the tide of going abroad. The TV series leaves a bright tail at the end, and the female graduate student suddenly appears in front of the statue of Li Dazhao, and the TV series suggests that she has regained her place in the revolutionary tradition after a contest of ideas.
It can be said that the concept that the TV series "Li Dazhao" is more eager to talk about is how to carry forward the revolutionary tradition in the new era, inherit the legacy of the pioneers, and build a prosperous motherland.
This contradiction and confusion has been solved in the era of "The Age of Awakening" broadcast. Li Dazhao's thinking and price have been richly rewarded by the times, and "The Age of Awakening" is based on enough self-confidence to review how the pioneers of that era of ideological awakening laid the main rotation and direction of our era today.
The fashion girls in "Li Dazhao" lamented the traditional culture of the revolution, few people paid attention to it, at that time, the direction of youth's attention was overseas TV dramas, and in the era of "The Age of Awakening" broadcast, we can see that the revolutionary theme of film and television works, but deeply concerned and eye-catching by the audience. The highest-grossing works in the history of Chinese cinema, "Changjin Lake" and "Wolf Warrior 2", both have distinct expectations of the times and the ardent hopes of the nation. The confusion of the 1980s expressed in "Li Dazhao" has been completely clarified at this new point in the reform and opening up to today.
When Li Xuejian designed Li Dazhao's character image, he restored him to an ordinary person, and even used a lot of vulgar colloquial language and body language to reflect the normality of the character, but did not show the character's boldness, courage and sharp personality composition, which can not be said to be an imbalance in the role positioning created by Li Xuejian.
And Li Xuejian's interpretation is also the influence of the atmosphere of that era, that is, to see the ordinary side of historical figures, but not to see their extraordinary side beyond the times, only under the ordinary appearance, reflecting the character's very different spiritual level from ordinary people, can we touch people's hearts and persuade viewers.
And "The Age of Awakening" is precisely under the display of Li Dazhao's ordinary people's emotions, but also reflects the extraordinary and extraordinary side of the characters, so that his spirit is higher than that era, and has always been like a torch, shining into the current China.
The success of "The Age of Awakening" is because it stands in an era of self-confidence, so that it can shape the spiritual temperament of the pioneers of the revolution so extraordinary.