Dialogue|Zeng Meihuizi: Undercurrents surging by the river of "mistakes"

The reunion with Zeng Meihuizi came on the closing day of the Cannes Film Festival, and she appeared on the rooftop of the Palais de la Cine, looking relaxed and even a little lazy. She squinted and enjoyed the southern French sun, and when foreign journalists saw her, they would unconsciously stop and take a few more looks, which was the most iconic oriental face that would arouse their curiosity.

"I love the city, everything is romantic here." Zeng Meihuizi said with a smile, her voice is hearty, which is diametrically opposed to the image of not talking much and even a little shy in past screen works.

We haven't seen each other for several years, and we've been keeping in touch on WeChat, but this meeting didn't have any strangeness at all. When chatting, she also has no taboos and can express her views most honestly, which is exactly the feeling I yearn for most to chat with artists.

Now more and more viewers know Zeng Meihuizi.

In recent years, her works have frequently appeared in the shortlist of the Cannes Film Festival: in 2018, "The Last Night on Earth" was shortlisted for a kind of attention, and "Pluto Hour" was shortlisted for the Director's Biweekly; In 2019, "The Party at Southern Station" was shortlisted for the main competition; In 2021, "Money Boy" was shortlisted for a kind of attention; And this year's "Mistake by the River", starring her, was also shortlisted for a kind of attention unit.

With such a wealth of entries on her resume, this year is her first time in Cannes. In her words, this is the best arrangement God has given her. Before that, it seemed that she was not ready to come to this temple in her heart, but over the years, she has become mature and more confident, and it is time to accept the review and applause from the global audience.

Zeng Meihuizi debuted very early, and she starred in her first film in 2004. In the following two decades, she has collaborated with a number of experienced and artistically accomplished famous directors, with an enviable resume.

But in normal times, Zeng Meihuizi is indeed too low-key, she is not on variety shows, rarely exposed, and basically some fashion photos and life photos posted on Weibo. Other than that, we don't usually hear anything about her. Looking at her circle of friends, the content is similar, she is like a casual little girl, unrestrained, she can send whatever comes to mind, free and uninhibited.

However, when entering the role, Zeng Meihuizi will completely put away that casualness, she is very serious in her performance, and sometimes even enters an amazing "crazy" state.

This time in "Mistake by the River", she plays Ma Zhe's wife Bai Jie, a pregnant woman. In order to make her belly look more realistic, she actually gave up props and really "ate herself into a pregnant woman", just to make her belly fluid and more realistic.

I remember many years ago, for the work that made her finally win the Academy Award, the character needed to gain weight, she ate five burgers at a meal, weighed so much that she went upstairs to gasp, and gained thirty pounds in one and a half months; Filming the drunken scene in "The Last Night on Earth", she drank more than twenty bottles of beer, and every time she had to drink it all, and she was already dizzy when she finished filming.

Zeng Meihuizi never cares about the number of role scenes, whether it is the protagonist or the supporting role with only a few shots, she insists on using the fullest state to complete the tasks assigned to her by the director. This may be the reason why more and more directors are inviting her, after all, it is rare for people like her to engrave the act of acting in their lives.

The same is true in "Mistake by the River", Bai Jie, as Ma Zhe's wife, every appearance in the movie is more reflective of Ma Zhe's change of mood. But under the interpretation of Zeng Meihuizi, this character is not a "vase", but can give the audience an ethereal, wanting to touch but unable to touch feeling, which is the charm of Zeng Meihuizi's performance.

What made her decide to fight so hard?

In the chat, she mentioned the peculiarities of the profession of an actor, which is mostly passive. Even with the bonus of the so-called "queen", in many cases, you still need to work hard to get opportunities. Especially like her insistence on working independently and not signing any brokerage companies, this road is naturally more bumpy.

starred in "The Mistake by the River", Zeng Meihuizi completely held the mentality of giving it a try to audition for the crew, she didn't know the director, nor did she know the other main creators in the movie, she came completely for the role, but she was such a simple actor, and finally got the role. This also proves that the crew of "Mistake by the River" is indeed a work completed by a group of filmmakers who do projects steadily, and the entire creative process is very pure.

As an audience who has always paid attention to Zeng Meihuizi's performance, the performance in "The Mistake by the River" is accurate and cannot be ignored in my opinion, and we can see that the director and screenwriter have done more valuable enrichment for Bai Jie, a female character, on the basis of Yu Hua's original work.

Of course, because the film has not yet been released in China, our chat this time is not too in-depth, but many of the methods of character interpretation and understanding of the characters mentioned in it can still help everyone understand the creative process of "Bai Jie", and most importantly, may make everyone have a deeper understanding of Zeng Meihuizi.

The road that belongs to actor Zeng Meihuizi has only just begun.

For more on her story, we might as well hear what she has to say.

The following is the self-report of actress Zeng Meihuizi:

1

This year is my first time in Cannes, and although I have been shortlisted for works in previous years, for various reasons, I couldn't make it. This time I felt as if I had grown up and had the confidence to put on crystal shoes like Cinderella and appear in the castle I wanted. It also takes courage, just like loving someone, it is often not particularly easy to make up your mind to meet him, because you need to be prepared to look your best in front of him, and this feeling is common.

This may be a gift from time, slowly helping me to grow, so that you as a woman, more mature in the ideal state, is also just right. In fact, it was not easy to come to Cannes this time, because I was filming abroad, there was no time to prepare, and the dresses were all made by a friend, but many wonderful things happened under such unprepared conditions.

I didn't come to the event much this time, most of the time I wandered the street, I just want to quietly feel the process of coming for the first time, maybe like a child, a new place, want to slowly record the beauty of the place. If I had jumped into a very tight work rhythm, I didn't think I might have performed very well, so I focused only on the premiere and red carpet of our "Mistake by the River".

When I watch the leaves of the Palme d'Or light up on the big screen and our film starts playing, I feel like a little girl has eaten the candy she wants to eat the most. Many of my feelings are described in fairy tales, because my world is a fairy tale. It happened that it was raining heavily from morning to night in Cannes, and the whole atmosphere was very suitable for the opening scene of the movie. After reading it, I felt like I was entering a huge whirlpool, wrapped up.

The origin of this movie is a conversation with a friend before, and they mentioned that the role of the wife in this story is a good fit for me. Then I had the opportunity to go to the director's studio to audition, when the script was very neatly placed on the table, and after I read it there, the director assumed some scenes outside of the story, asked me to improvise and act, and after the audition, the director asked me to go back and so on.

After about a month, I suddenly received the news that I could play this role, and I was sitting at home eating, excitedly and repeatedly asking if it was true? Because it was a very simple audition, and I didn't contact again after that, and I didn't know the creators behind the scenes very well, it was a state of an ordinary audition actor, but I unexpectedly gained this trust. I was very touched because filmmakers take a long time to prepare a project, especially when choosing actors, and I feel very lucky to be able to give me this opportunity in the end.

If I had to describe my role as Bai Jie, I would say that she is pure white and clean. The director also told me that your heart is thinking that you want to continue a life, which is the most important strength of your character. I wrote a character biography specifically for her, such as how she and her husband Ma Zhe met, where they met for the first time, I would have some ideas about the establishment of the relationship between the two characters, as well as the time, place, and emotional changes, and then I would communicate with the director and Zhu Yilong. This character is relatively simple in the novel, not even a name, but it is much richer in the movie, and it is the director's idea to set her as a teacher. The director thinks that she should be a language teacher, maybe also dance and sing or something, that is, the kind of person who can live her life more comfortably.

For Bai Jie, I think my performance is to enrich her with an unknown. I was looking for the feeling of this character, and the director told me to be natural, and I thought carefully, how can I really go with the flow? That may be to face the unknown, follow this smooth state, and comfortably enter the next point in time. In the past, I used to ask very clearly what I was going to do in performance, and to what extent could I do it? But this time the director said nature, I think it is a higher realm. This made me think for a long time about how the area between the unknown and the known can be integrated in performance.

So this performance was the most difficult for me ever. I've always thought that acting as an ordinary person is the hardest part, to be like the people you meet in life, to return to the most authentic nature. Things with performance are actually not difficult, but they can still be achieved through training, sound, and physical interpretation. Whether this time did what I expected, I don't know, I need the audience to judge. But I'm trying to do the character in this natural state.

2

When we filmed the first scene, Bai Jie was already pregnant in the play, and we had tummy props to prepare pregnant women. But the director and I wondered if I could really make my belly bulge without props. Because of the fake belly, it is made of silicone after all, it will appear very hard, but if it is real, it will flow. Therefore, except for the scene where I filmed a family portrait with Ma Zhe at the end, the belly is particularly large, it is the props used, and the stomach in the early and middle stages of pregnancy in the front part is what I really worked hard to gain weight to achieve.

In this process, I also did a lot of preparation to become a mother, including what is the process of a child for one month or two months? This movie is a very big gift for me, because I never thought that I could be a mother before, but after shooting this work, I felt as if I had this wish, how good it is to be a mother, the first time I felt this way, it was quite touching. So the biggest meaning of "Mistakes by the River" for me is to give me the courage and confidence to become a mother.

In order to make the belly bigger, I will specifically select some desserts, that is, the kind that will accumulate in the stomach fat is high, you can really feel that this belly is growing day by day, I even practiced "fetal movement", control my stomach to move, that time really felt "enchanted" for this role, I will habitually enter such an immersive state when filming, let me enjoy it very much, which is a kind of emptiness in my feeling dimension.

But it's a little funny that this time I finally came to the red carpet in Cannes. I just caught up with when I was the fattest, because I can't lose weight quickly yet. Including taking photos on the red carpet, I will also unconsciously support my belly, because in the play, as a pregnant woman, I have to walk with my stomach, which has almost become a subconscious action.

But seriously, the actor I've ever seen to lose weight and gain weight is Zhu Yilong. The first time I met him in the crew and ate with him, his face was still pointy. Later, with the filming process, his belly also began to grow, and the whole person was much stronger. After we finished filming, I met him by chance at an event, and he was so thin that I barely knew him, and I was so surprised that I knew a fake Zhu Yilong before.

It was my first time working with Zhu Yilong, and it was also the first time I met such a well-rounded classmate. I definitely have places where I am confident, and there will be places where I feel inadequate, but his appearance, I feel as if I have met a "three good students", why can a person be so comprehensive? One is dedication, the second is good play, and the third is good treatment of people, these three aspects are very good, it is indeed rare.

 In the crew, we rehearse, often more than ten minutes or half an hour early, the director will let us check the lines. Zhu Yilong is a person who listens to others, and it is very safe to act with him. It's interesting that both of us speak more directly, and if we have any ideas, we will say them directly, and the people next to us will sometimes think: Huh? Why did the two of them suddenly come out with this sentence? I don't know how to pick it up. But the two of us had a very good understanding, and I knew what he wanted to say, and he knew what I wanted to feel like, so he said, "Let's try it like this." The director will also agree and give us great support. So the two of them, one is a film creator and the other is a performance worker, will give others space and take the trouble to try.

Director Wei Shujun also brought me a big surprise, because the color of the whole movie, as well as the atmosphere he controlled, I think it is actually quite difficult. Although I don't know how to be a director, you won't feel a sense of separation after watching the whole film from beginning to end. I read the original novel about one night before, and I felt cold sweat on my back at the end, and the movie did this sense of atmosphere, that strength and heaviness, and the feeling of falling with people. When I saw Ma Zhe's dream in the movie, I sat next to the director, and my whole body began to shake, I really couldn't control it, and my emotions reached the extreme feeling when reading the novel.

Another big surprise is Mr. Kang Chunlei, who plays "Madman", who is also the screenwriter of this movie. Initially I was curious about how he would interpret the character of "Madman", and I watched his performance, which I didn't expect, he got out of what we think of as the safe zone of experientialism, but at the same time reasonably, he presented a very advanced texture. Although the "madman" in everyone's heart is different, the "madman" he played is very recognized by me and very passionate.

3

In the past two years, I have often seen articles or people have asked me. Zeng Meihuizi, where did you go after winning the Academy Award? Why didn't I see you have so much exposure? I didn't see what agency you signed, but I will see you in some film and television works. But in fact, I was always like this before I took the film. I didn't act for seven years because I was a person who got along with myself very naturally. Being a movie queen does not change my understanding of life, so my rhythm is the same as before, including my daily life, my life has not changed at all, I still want everything to be experienced by myself. There are many rhythms in life that need to be felt quietly, and these feelings will help me shape my characters in the future and will also become a valuable experience for me.

But this does not mean that I do not like singing and dancing such an entertaining program, many people do not know, I actually debuted in a girl group, I once won the CCTV National Youth Beautiful Girl Selection Competition Guizhou Division Champion and National Runner-up. These are the experiences of different periods, they remain in time, and now that many things have passed, I want to feel the present. Of course, one day, I may also be active in some different fields, and at that time I may be confident to do these things, just as I am confident that I can come to Cannes this time.

I've played a lot of ordinary female roles, but in my opinion, the most difficult to play is the kind of "androgynous" character, like Mr. Mei Lanfang. When I watched Mr. Mei Lanfang's performance, I felt that it was too exquisite, what kind of body, what kind of effort, and what kind of psychological construction was needed to convey such an ultimate beauty. This beauty, without embellishment, is breathtaking. There is a lot of beauty that I want to conquer you, including the temperament that many of my previous characters showed was to conquer each other, but now I feel that it is unnatural to feel a warmth and strength, which is more advanced and what I strive to find.

After becoming a film queen, I will have relatively more opportunities than before, but not much. I have always been in this industry with a student mentality, including interviews, auditions, including meetings with the crew, all like students. I will cherish any good opportunity given to me. An actor is a passive profession, and the business still has to be fought for by itself. I insisted on not signing a brokerage agency, which actually felt a bit like "performance art", because I used to be alone, and I wanted to see how long I could last like this, even if it was a little difficult, I wanted to try more.

As for the roles you want to play, that's too much. Just like in recent years, I have also taken on comedy, can you imagine me playing a comedy role? I don't believe it myself. But this is the joy of being an actor, there are always too many unknown areas waiting for me to explore, all I have to do is stay curious, follow my set direction, and walk firmly.