How many past events have been, as if it was just yesterday, how many friends have been there, as if they are still around.
Now humming this touching melody, it still feels like yesterday, but the years are hurried, and that good memory is more than 30 years ago.
At the end of the 1980s, after ten years of reform and opening up, the living standards of the Chinese people have been greatly improved, and the masses' pursuit of spiritual and cultural life has also been increasingly improved.
A group of people sitting in front of the TV set to watch the program scene has gradually become a history, the TV set with an annual growth of 30% into the Chinese people's families, and the program creation at that time is far from meeting people's needs, this supply and demand contradiction is quite sharp, but even so, literary and artistic creators for content creation, did not relax the standard because of the tight market, produced many classic works that are enjoyable.
TV drama as the highlight of the TV station, shouldering the biggest burden of ratings, looking back on the year, there is no other entertainment project, after the end of a day of hard work every day, the only happiness is to stay in front of the TV set and enjoy a comfortable time. If you encounter a blockbuster drama, it is even more early to prepare everything, sitting in front of the TV and watching the pre-broadcast advertisement.
"Longing" is a landmark drama in the history of the development of Chinese television dramas, which created a miracle in ratings that year.
In 1989, if the Beijing Television Arts Center did not make a 50-episode TV series in a year, Beijing Television was faced with the situation of no drama to broadcast. Zheng Xiaolong, then the director of the center, took on this difficult task.
Zheng Xiaolong summoned screenwriter Li Xiaoming, writer Wang Shuo, deputy editor-in-chief of October magazine Zheng Wanlong and others to gather at the Jingmen Hotel in Beijing to let everyone give ideas together.
In the discussion, everyone thinks that to shoot a girl with clear eyebrows and good looks, everyone must love to watch, and we must focus all the advantages of women we think are focused on her alone, both to make her full of advantages and to let her go through hardships.
Li Xiaoming summarized according to the suggestions of everyone's discussion and wrote a 70,000-word story outline "Longing for Sixteen Years".
Zheng Xiaolong hurriedly called the director Lu Xiaowei, who was filming in other places, and asked him to complete the work at hand and immediately rush back to Beijing to shoot "Longing".
Zhang Kaili regarded her grandmother as the prototype of Liu Huifang
After Lu Xiaowei returned to Beijing, he was left with only three months of preparation time and immediately began to work on casting. Initially, he wanted to find Zuo Ling in "Love Full of Pearl River", Liu Huifang's gentle and skillful image, which was very compatible with Zuo Ling. However, because the famous Zuo Ling did not have a schedule, the crew could not wait, so they had to look for her again.
Director Lu has successively met many actresses, including many well-known actresses at that time, but in terms of image temperament, she has not been satisfied.
On the other hand, the shooting team has been formed, the scene has been set up, and here Lu Xiaowei is still struggling to find Liu Huifang.
Five days before the start of filming, Lu Xiaowei suddenly thought of a person, she was Jia Yulan of the Coal Mine Literary and Labor Troupe. But he pounced again, and Jia Yulan went abroad.
Extremely disappointed, Lu Xiaowei had to go back to the house, he flashed a figure in front of his eyes when he went downstairs, and the leader of the group introduced that she was also a very acting actor in the group. Lu Xiaowei asked what it was called, and the leader of the regiment smiled slightly: Very unknown. However, he has made two movies, "Eight Women Throwing the River" and "A Man and a Woman".
What should come will always come when it is most needed. This person is Zhang Kaili.
When Lu Xiaowei invited Zhang Kaili to star in "Longing", she refused to do so, because at that time, the literary troupe had just arranged for Zhang Kaili to be the protagonist and rehearse a drama. Zhang Kaili heard that she was going to shoot 50 episodes, dragged on too long, and she didn't necessarily become famous after acting, she felt bored, and the group didn't want to let her go to film.
Lu Xiaowei then walked around the coal mine literary troupe, and after half a day of rotation, he still did not get any results. At lunchtime, I happened to meet Zhang Kaili again at the staircase.
Zhang Kaili looked at Director Lu who had not eaten and said: Director, come in and eat some food, I don't have anything good here, just a bowl of noodles. Lu Xiaowei shouted with joy: This is Huifang, this is Liu Huifang speaking.
Zhang Kaili later said that in the darkness, it was my grandmother who fulfilled me and Huifang.
The reason why Zhang Kaili is so kind is because her grandmother planted a seed for her. Someone came to her grandmother's house to ask for food, and she gave the only meal in the family to someone else, while she drank white water and pickled vegetables.
Zhang Kaili's grandfather's brother's child, whose mother died when she was eight months old, had a grandmother with five children, but she thought that she could not give it away, and she would have to raise this child no matter how difficult it was. This experience similar to Liu Huifang in the play has made Zhang Kaili always feel that her grandmother is Liu Huifang in the real world.
As soon as "Longing" was broadcast, the people of the whole country knew Zhang Kaili overnight, and for a time the whole country loved Liu Huifang, the whole people scolded Wang Husheng, and everyone sighed Song Dacheng.
People's pursuit of Liu Huifang is by no means like the current fans love traffic stars, but from the bottom of their hearts to her sincere love. Many viewers have conflicts with their families, and even pick up orphans on the side of the road, they all come to find Zhang Kaili, and everyone has equated her with Liu Huifang.
Later, Zhang Kaili sometimes wore more beautiful clothes to perform on stage, and after stepping off the stage, the audience pulled her aside, pointed at her and said: Huifang, how did you change, the original you are not like this!
Because Zhang Kaili suddenly reached the peak, for a long time, she could no longer have a role to surpass Liu Huifang. It also gradually faded out of the audience's sight.
Nowadays, middle-aged Liu Huifang has changed huifang's image in many TV series, played a spicy mother, and presented a different Zhang Kaili to the audience. If this is changed to that year, seeing Liu Huifang become like this, she must not be scolded to death!
Li Xuejian starred in the red half of the sky for Bao En
The "Desire" crew had limited funds at that time, and naturally had to be compressed in terms of actor salaries, and when it came to the bigger actors in the film, it was Li Xuejian.
At that time, Li Xuejian was already a pillar of the Air Politics Repertory Theatre and had won the Plum Blossom Award, and Li Xuejian did not like the image of Song Dacheng, because he created a tall heroic figure on the stage.
And what made him make a performance in "Longing" was only out of the psychology of repaying gratitude.
In that year, Li Xuejian was seconded from the amateur propaganda team in Yunnan to the Second Artillery Literary troupe and ran a dragon set in the drama "The Great Cause of a Thousand Autumns". But the drama was eventually shelved, and Li Xuejian also faced the fate of returning to the Yunnan army.
It was hard to come to Beijing, pinning the hopes of the whole family, so it was very unwilling to go back. At this time, the director of "A Thousand Autumns" wrote a letter of recommendation to the Air Politics Repertory Theatre, and in this way, Li Xuejian's fate changed from then on.
This director is the father of Lu Xiaowei, the director of "Longing".
Although Song Dacheng did not like the role of Song Dacheng, he readily agreed out of the mentality of repaying favors. Originally, Song Dacheng was a supporting role, and there were not many scenes, but in the process of shooting, the script was constantly revised, and Li Xuejian played Song Dacheng as the protagonist, and also made him popular throughout China. This is a bit like Chow Yun-fat's cameo in "The True Colors of Heroes", but also playing a supporting role as a protagonist and becoming famous in Hong Kong in one fell swoop.
Sun Song was afraid of unemployment to play Wang Husheng
The casting of the male protagonist Wang Husheng is much easier than looking for Liu Huifang.
At first, Lu Xiaowei thought that Pu Cunxin's appearance was more in line with the image of Shanghai intellectuals, but he did not have a schedule, so he found Sun Qingrong, the director of the office of the experimental drama troupe, and asked his friends to help him introduce an actor.
This fat water can first flow into the fields of outsiders, so Director Sun recommended his son Sun Song to Lu Dao. Lu Xiaowei came to visit, planning to inspect Sun Song, and as soon as he entered the door, Sun Song's mother, Han Ying, pulled the curtain of the door and said: Oh, Director Lu is here.
Lu Xiaowei listened, isn't Han Ying the best candidate for Aunt Liu in the play? As a result, the role of Aunt Liu was finalized on the spot, but for Sun Song, Lu Dao did not know very well.
One day it was raining heavily, Zhao Baogang and Lu Xiaowei said, let's test Sun Song's loyalty. Lu Xiaowei then asked Sun Song if he was free now, and Sun Song immediately said that he would arrive immediately. Sun Song rode on his bicycle and braved the heavy rain to see Lu Dao, and the whole person was drenched in soup chicken.
The director saw that Sun Song was quite honest and sincere, so he decided to let him play Wang Husheng. And why did Sun Song make such a big determination to play this role? Of course, he didn't expect the show to be on fire, and he made this decision because he heard that the TV series was going to shoot 50 episodes, almost a year. If you can successfully take over this play, you will avoid the situation of not having a job in a short period of time and going around looking for a play.
The explosion of this drama made Sun Song a celebrity for a while, but the reputation was not very good, because at that time people often equated the role with the actor himself. When Sun Song was looking for a blind date, he had to pretend to be playing Song Dacheng. And for a long time, he couldn't open the drama road, and the plays that came to him were all of the same type as Wang Husheng.
How popular was the show at the time?
After more than a decade of intense filming, plus two months of editing, "Longing" finally aired before the end of 1990. At that time, as long as there was a TV set at home, it would definitely be on time and watch an episode without landing.
When it premiered on Beijing Radio, it set a record of 92.8% of the ratings, and when it was replayed in various places, some places broadcast seven or eight episodes a day at the request of the audience, and such a grand viewership could not be experienced by the younger generation.
During the broadcast of the show, the national crime rate dropped by 30%, and the Ministry of Public Security awarded a special award for the crew: the best award for maintaining social order.
The reason why "Longing" will trigger such a high response in society is because the play uses realistic techniques to organically integrate life and human nature into the social background at that time, stimulate people's expectations for a better future life, and the desire for love, family affection and friendship, and show the true power to the national audience for the first time. The song "Good People Live In Peace" sang the voice of every ordinary person.
The peak effect and rating myth created by "Longing" is a product of an era, and it has been proved that only grounded truth, goodness and beauty can become truly great works.
A play that explains the confusion of the year,
A group of people, seeing the beauty, ugliness and kindness of human nature,
A love affair, warm and long years,
The desire for the peace of a good man's life makes people laugh and cry,
The true power of not being whitewashed makes people hate and love,
If you think that the crowded alley is just an exaggerated description,
That's because I didn't go through that era and missed 50 episodes of "Longing"!