Among entertainers, there is a special group of special actors.
They play a particular historical figure or a contemporary celebrity, a leader, and so on. The appearance of the special actor itself has a high degree of similarity with the character he portrays, and in order to achieve realistic restoration, further special makeup will be made.
Among them, the special actor who plays the great man is the most eye-catching.
For example, Gu Yue is a special actor with a high national popularity, and he plays the great Mao Zedong.
Of all the actors who played Mao, Gu Yue was recognized as the closest in appearance. It is reported that Ye Jianying saw Gu Yue's makeup photo at that time and thought that this was Chairman Mao's own photo!
In the end, it was Marshal Ye who personally finalized Gu Yue.
However, Gu Yue did not have any performance experience, so his performance in his debut work "Xi'an Incident" was not too good, especially in terms of temperament, which was quite far away from the Buddha-figure. During the filming, because of the NG too many times, it was also ridiculed by the director Zeng, "Why did this face grow on your face?" ”
Gu Yue then made a lot of hard work, imitating Mao Zedong from various details, including eating, reading newspapers and other small actions. He even "copied all his living habits", eating chili peppers, smoking cigarettes, writing calligraphy, etc.
In the end, Gu Yue was able to merge with the character as she wished. In "Chongqing Negotiations", in the scene of waving his hand on the plane, he played Chairman Mao's demeanor and actions in the slightest, which was amazing.
By the time he starred in "The Founding Ceremony", he was so fascinated that many viewers projected their feelings for Chairman Mao onto him, and some people would write to him to reflect the situation.
Chairman Mao's daughter Li Ne even hugged him on the spot and cried bitterly, which contained endless thoughts about her father, and even more an affirmation of Gu Yue's outstanding performance.
Such pearls and jade in the front also bring a lot of pressure to the latecomers, such as Tang Guoqiang.
In fact, as early as 1978, he was selected as Mao Zedong's special actor. However, Gu Yue's light was too powerful, causing Tang Guoqiang to never have a chance. It was not until 1996 that Tang Guoqiang was favored by the director when he was preparing to shoot "The Long March".
At that time, most people were skeptical about this casting, but Tang Guoqiang finally succeeded with his strong strength, and won the Huabiao Award for Best Actor in one fell swoop.
Tang Guoqiang's appearance is not so similar, relying more on late makeup, and he himself admits, "Gu Yue's appearance cannot be copied." But as a former "cream boy", his handsome facial features are still very plus.
In terms of character shaping, Tang Guoqiang followed the traditional rules of imitation, such as smoking, writing calligraphy, etc., and even the habit of loving tea was also learned.
But he also pioneered artistic processing, such as abandoning dialects, using Mandarin, and between his behaviors, he highlighted his inner self-confidence and domineering, talking and laughing freely in difficult situations, and calming down in good times.
If the ancient moon version of Mao Zedong is infinitely restored, then Tang Guoqiang's version externalizes and enlarges many of the chairman's qualities, and has more dramatic tension.
Actor Hou Jingjian, who is considered to be expected to succeed Tang Guoqiang, has been playing the young Mao Zedong since 2010, portraying the positive energy image of his "hot-blooded youth in a troubled world".
In "The Age of Awakening", he held the newly published "New Youth", with a determined look, in the heavy rain, through the poor and chaotic street market, which left a deep impression.
There are three more famous actors who play Zhou Enlai: Wang Tiecheng, Liu Jin, and Sun Weimin.
Wang Tiecheng has the deepest qualifications, he has been acting since 1977, his biggest advantage is the appearance, Premier Zhou's wife Deng Yingchao saw him, because he felt that it was too similar, and excited to shake hands and tears.
Wang Tiecheng has seen Premier Zhou three times, and he has first-hand information himself, and he himself is quite hardworking, in order to learn Zhou Enlai's southern accent, he once read the tape of the premier's speech 50 times, and finally felt the law.
After the release of the drama "Turning", Wang Tiecheng's performance was too godlike, causing the audience to lose control of their emotions for a while, and the 15-minute play was interrupted by applause 17 times.
And with the continuous appearance, Wang Tiecheng continued to improve, director Ding Yinnan later even found that he even looked like Premier Zhou when he looked down at fried sauce noodles, which was really amazing.
Sun Weimin is known as the most benevolent and benevolent Premier Zhou.
His appearance is actually more like Lu Xun, so he needs to use glue to widen his double eyelids every time, but he is good at imitating micro-expressions, and he is very good at the elegance and intellectuality between Premier Zhou's eyebrows.
The way he laughed was particularly evocative, and some attentive viewers even felt that Sun Weimin's dimples were exactly the same as Premier Zhou's.
Liu Jin should be the most handsome Premier Zhou, with thick eyebrows, big eyes, and beautiful hair.
At first, he did not have the confidence to play Zhou Enlai, because he had played Zhang Xueliang before, and it was Tang Guoqiang, whom he had never met, who called and encouraged Liu Jin to try.
After taking over the performance, he did not completely follow the traditional imitation path, but together with the screenwriter and director, boldly made many bridges, such as "Enlai is angry", "Enlai is drunk", "Enlai is crying", etc., through reasonable imagination, to establish a fuller image of the great man.
Among them, "Enlai Drunk" is regarded as a recognized classic with its vivid performances.
Ma Shaohua and Lu Qi are more interesting, they both play sun yat-sen and then play Deng Xiaoping.
But the former played Sun Yat-sen even better, because the appearance is too close, and the looks and demeanor are also very similar.
And Lu Qi played Deng Xiaoping better.
Not only did he resemble Deng Xiaoping in appearance and demeanor, but the aura emanating from his surroundings was also synchronized with God. According to Lu Qi, this is because he has studied many of Deng Xiaoping's works and understood his thoughts and concepts from the bottom of his heart.
This scene is a classic reproduction, and in just a few tens of seconds of performance, a calm and majestic patriotic leader jumps out of the paper.
In addition, Liu Xitian, who plays Chen Yi, and Wang Wufu, who plays Zhu De, are also very good great actors.
It can be seen that although the special actor who is a great man has his own aura, the effort behind it is also huge.
They spend far more time and energy on figuring out the role than ordinary actors, in addition to the complexity of the role itself, but also in the significance behind it is too great, so that they can not afford to lose, most of the special actors are basically immersed in the life of the great man.
Gu Yue learned mao zedong to eat peppers, eat stomach colic, alcohol allergy Liu Jin, in order to play Zhou Enlai, had to force the wine to talk happy.
In order to pursue a realistic appearance, Lu Qi pulled out his eyebrows in pain, and Wang Tiecheng still insisted on filming after breaking six ribs, only because he felt that his sick appearance was just in line with the weak state of Premier Zhou after cancer in the play.
These are all unimaginable experiences for ordinary people.
The most important thing is that once you become a special actor, it is difficult to play other roles, and it is difficult for the audience to enter the play. Therefore, Gu Yue only played Mao Zedong in his life, and Liu Jin also decided not to take on other plays after playing Zhou Enlai.
It's a very lonely group of performers, with their whole body and mind tied to one character. As Tang Guoqiang said, because great people are too great, they need actors to use their life's work to shape.
But for us, great men are great, special actors who play great men, just as great, and they are all respectable artists.