Behind the cool and dense plot of the micro-short drama, there is a performance that is compressed to the extreme. For many actors, filming short dramas is an "expedient measure" to provide a guaranteed income, but for other actors, this is a track worth digging into.
At the end of the year, the mini program skit craze continued.
In the past month, the news that many micro-short dramas such as "Wushuang" have exceeded 10 million yuan or even 100 million yuan within a few days of their launch has detonated the attention of the outside world to this industry. Recently, "Yunshen Doesn't Hear the Deer Song" was launched for 10 hours, and the delivery consumption exceeded 10 million yuan, which means that its income has also exceeded this figure.
Although the micro-short drama earns a lot, the evaluation it gets is polarized. Those who like them can watch 100 episodes in a row to decompress, and those who hate them are angry at their shoddy production. It is worth noting that the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television is carrying out a one-month special rectification work for online micro-short dramas, and many practitioners also said that micro-short dramas need to focus on creating high-quality products.
For the audience, the actors in the short drama are becoming more and more important, not only for their appearance, but also for their acting skills.
Some viewers said that she only watched short dramas made by two actors, "because the plot is better, and they act naturally and unpretentiously." Some people even sorted out the dramas starred by their favorite skit actors and made a list to recommend on social platforms.
A short drama recommended by netizens. /Screenshot of Xiaohongshu
But in the face of the short drama, the actors have mixed tastes in their hearts. On the one hand, the performance of the short drama is complained about the lack of depth, and if the actor has the filming experience of the short drama, he may be deducted points if he participates in the TV series and movie audition in the future, so they are often ashamed to mention it;
Ma Qiuyuan is the latter type of person. This girl born in 1999 and graduated from economics accidentally entered the short drama industry, and gradually became known to the public with works such as "When I Was a Stand-in, My Monthly Salary is Million" and "Accidentally Flirting with the Wrong People".
What happens when an actress from a non-academic background starts making skits and starts? New Weekly chatted with her.
Ma Qiuyuan. (Photo/Provided by the interviewee)
When the online article becomes a short drama
After the excitement of the paid micro-short drama industry attracted the attention of capital, people from all walks of life poured in. In the past, online literature companies, short video companies, and advertising companies have all made short dramas.
Ma Qiuyuan was one of the first people to come into contact with this kind of short drama. When she was in college, she joined a radio station and a drama club, and she did like acting, but she never thought she could actually be an actress. At the end of 2021, she originally planned to take the graduate school entrance examination in accounting, but she didn't get in, and it happened that her classmates introduced her to a short video company, and she began to appear in information flow advertisements.
At the beginning of 2022, the company that has been working with her entered the short drama industry, and Ma Qiuyuan also naturally started filming short dramas. Before this, she only had a vague impression of short dramas, "I only know that short dramas have a lower cost and a shorter shooting cycle." What she didn't know was that this would soon become an outlet.
When paid micro-short dramas first started, they were mainly based on male frequency themes, and Ma Qiuyuan originally filmed male frequency short dramas. "The first time I filmed, my colleagues had been working together (shooting commercials) before, and I thought it was quite interesting", but soon, she found that the characters she came into contact with were "relatively single and weak".
In male frequency dramas, there are often multiple female characters who like the male protagonist at the same time. (Picture/video screenshot)
But at the very least, it's a formed drama that looks closer to her dreams, so she decided to keep filming.
Ma Qiuyuan filmed four or five male frequency dramas in a row, and found that they were all the same routines. "The male protagonist is a small person counterattack, and the female character looked down on him at first, and then revealed the identity of the male protagonist or was saved by the male protagonist once, and he loved him to death. As an actor, Ma Qiuyuan feels that these roles lack room for breakthroughs.
At the same time, the market for women's short dramas is gradually emerging. When filming a female frequency short drama for the first time, Ma Qiuyuan found that the female frequency drama was fuller in terms of storyline and male and female characters. "When I read the script, I thought this was what I wanted. Therefore, she did not take on male frequency short dramas anymore, and chose to deepen the female frequency short dramas.
In the female frequency short drama, the heroine's character is more full. (Picture/video screenshot)
For micro-short dramas, Ma Qiuyuan has his own understanding. "When you watch the drama, don't you all want to see the ending quickly? The short drama can be watched in an hour or two, and the content is more attractive. People like me, who have read online articles before, accidentally found that the plot of the online article was made into a short drama, and it is easy to become curious and read it. ”
Those short dramas that can become hits must not only attract the audience within a few seconds, but also retain the audience. "Whether this drama has really made a lot of money, whether it has been filmed with heart, and whether everyone's acting skills are online, the audience can really feel it. ”
A performance that tests the sense of faith
In women's frequency short dramas, you can often see such a setting: the heroine mistakenly recognizes the domineering president as her blind date, and the two get married directly. The president pretended to be an ordinary person and cultivated a relationship with the heroine, and only in the end did he "drop the vest" and reveal his identity. As for why the heroine hasn't seen the photos and names of the blind date, it doesn't matter, as long as the plot is "sweet pet".
"Flash marriage" is a common plot element in female frequency short dramas. (Photo/Short drama "Accidentally Flirting with the Wrong Person")
In the eyes of many people, the plot of the short drama is very suspended and embarrassing. An actor once said: "The lines of the short play really test the actors' sense of faith, and every time they finish, everyone 'picks their toes' together." ”
But Ma Qiuyuan obviously belongs to the type of actor with a strong sense of conviction. She has been reading romance novels since junior high school, whether it is "Yilin" and "Aiger" magazines, or online articles such as "The Domineering President Falls in Love with Me", and now she has read almost all the online themes corresponding to short dramas. This makes it easier for her to empathize with the character.
"The plot of the short drama may be more exaggerated, but because I am used to reading online articles, I can feel the emotions of the characters, and I also know what emotions the readers and audiences want to see. ”
The TV series "Love as the Camp" and the short drama "Accidentally Flirting with the Wrong Person" are both adapted from the online article "Wrong Flirting". (Photo/Screenshot of Jinjiang webpage)
Ma Qiuyuan knows very well that the premise of an actor's ability to play well is that the role can stand. After experiencing completely different themes, she slowly understood what she wanted and began to pick scripts in a targeted manner. "First of all, the three views must be correct, and the second is that I can read this character and understand the logic of her behavior. ”
In the crew, the actors have no concept of time, do not distinguish the day of the week, and there are no holidays. In order to reduce costs, the filming cycle of a short drama is generally 7-15 days, and more than 14 hours a day will be filmed, and some crews even have to shoot for 16-18 hours. For this reason, Ma Qiuyuan has practiced the ability to fall asleep upside down, and after the end of filming, "as long as there is a place to lie down and lean on, he can fall asleep."
Such high-intensity shooting, as well as the characteristics of short dramas that focus on fast pace and ignore the logic of the plot, are likely to make actors lose the opportunity to polish their acting skills. An actor posted that he had acted in 4 short dramas in a month and a half, and he began to be unable to remember words, perform mechanically, and even couldn't get into the role.
An actor posted about his status in a skit. (Photo/Screenshot of Xiaohongshu)
However, vertical skits compress the screen space while also magnifying the details of the actors' performances. Under the exaggerated plot, whether the actor's acting skills can be convincing or not almost determines whether the audience stays or not.
If you want to act in a short play, it's not that simple. Ma Qiuyuan has come into contact with actors who have changed careers from long dramas, and many of them also find it difficult to adapt to the performance of short dramas. Due to the tight filming time, the actors have no time to brew emotions at all, "crying immediately when they say they cry, and laughing immediately when they laugh, which especially tests the speed and ability to enter the play".
"The long drama pays attention to the gradual progression, and the performance is complete. Short plays are short, flat and fast, and the performance needs to be in place immediately, and without an intermediate process, it is easy to float on the surface. However, the audience has gradually demanded the perception of short dramas, and everyone is now trying to rely on the performance method of long dramas. ”
How far is it from the high-quality of short dramas?
Behind the cool and dense plot, there are homogeneous character settings and performances that are compressed to the extreme. After the filming of short dramas became popular, there were quite a few short dramas that took the initiative to find Ma Qiuyuan, most of which were the roles she "played", which was more like a repetition. "I also hope to be exposed to more complex characters and themes, and I hope that the stories I will appear in are no longer limited to love and love, but I haven't found a suitable script yet. ”
In the past two years, Ma Qiuyuan has filmed 30 short dramas. "Do you know? In the previous short dramas, they were all names like 'this president (cut) is going to divorce me' and 'that president (cut) is crazy', which is so similar that it's hard to remember. But she always remembers the breakthrough characters she chose, and she loves their resilience and "the ability to heal the audience."
Stills from costume skits. (Photo/Provided by the interviewee)
Some media revealed that when auditioning for some horizontal screen dramas and movies, the participation experience of vertical screen short dramas was instead deducted points. Still, actors don't have much choice a lot of the time.
An actor posted: "Of the 100 announcements, 95 may be skits." "This number may be exaggerated. The New Weekly reporter counted the group news on the mini program "Actors Guild", and among the 54 recruitment notices released in the past 5 days, about 60% were vertical screen short dramas.
In the short term, vertical skits provide job opportunities for at least a considerable number of actors. And non-professional actors like Ma Qiuyuan were also able to step into the showbiz and realize a dream. "At least in the field of skit drama at the moment, I have the ability to pick scripts, and I know exactly what I want to play. ”
With the increase in the popularity of Ma Qiuyuan's starring short dramas, some long-form drama crews began to take the initiative to contact her. "I think they can find me, they must have met me through the skit, so the performance experience of the skit didn't deduct me points. The most important thing is that my performance can't be as flashy as it was when I first started out in the industry. I realized this problem early on, and concentrated on honing my acting skills, after all, strength is the most convincing. ”
Sometimes, in order to prepare, Ma Qiuyuan will record the audition video by himself. (Picture/video screenshot)
Ma Qiuyuan never felt that skits were "low". "I've always said that my soil is in short dramas, because I didn't come from a professional background, and I was lucky to be able to act, so I don't care if I can be seen. Perhaps for many other actors, making short dramas is a "stopgap measure" to provide a guaranteed income, but for her, it is a track worth exploring and cultivating for a long time.
She can feel that there are some people in this industry who take skits very seriously. "Every team I work with now wants to make something that can be called a 'work', not as a way to make a quick buck, and I believe that skits will get better and better. ”
When Ma Qiuyuan first came into contact with short dramas, she almost joined the group seamlessly, and now after a short drama is finished, she will rest for a day or two before going to the next crew. "In the past, the filming cycle was seven or eight days, but now there are more and more about 15 days, or even longer, and everyone will slow down a little to ensure the state of the actors. ”
In addition, Ma Qiuyuan also observed that the short drama industry is becoming more and more professional. From the staffing, the level of service, to the shooting equipment, and the post-editing style, they are all being upgraded. "At the beginning of 2022, in the crews I contacted, the camera assistant had to be the location manager, and the makeup artist had to be the costume stylist. But now everyone has a clear division of positions, and the scene is orderly. ”
Recently, traditional film and television companies have entered the micro-short drama industry, and various long and short video platforms have also launched relevant support policies. The industry has gone through the stage of savage growth in the early stage, and everything seems to indicate that the high-quality of micro-short dramas is not far away.