"Journey to the West", as a popular classic, has undoubtedly left an indelible memory in the hearts of many people. Among them, the image of the Monkey King interpreted by the six-year-old child is regarded as an eternal classic.
However, what is little known is that Zhang Jinlai is not the original candidate for the "Monkey King" in director Yang Jie's heart. The choice of this role actually fell to him under the "influence" of his father's six-year-old child.
So, what kind of story is this, and what twists and turns did Yang Jie experience when she was casting?
In fact, the six-year-old Tong Zhang Zongyi once "fought" for the role of his son. Although there have been multiple subsequent versions of the remake of "Journey to the West", the status of the 86 version has never been shaken.
Every delicate expression and vivid demeanor of Liu Xiaolingtong in the play is the result of his meticulous carving. Especially the scene where he is crushed under the back mountain, the spirituality he shows is amazing.
In addition, his interaction with his juniors and disciples also seems very natural and witty, which adds a lot of highlights to this drama. The casting is just right, making it seem as if these characters were born to be like this.
Of course, all of this is inseparable from the careful guidance of the great director Yang Jie. She believes that the six-year-old child is highly malleable, and as a young person, he is more receptive to new things and challenges. This is also an important reason why Yang Jie finally decided to play the role of Monkey King by Liu Xiaolingtong.
But in fact, at the beginning, Director Yang Jie's Monkey King was not a six-year-old child, but another disciple of his father Zhang Zongyi - Liu Jianyang.
Yang Jie once traveled thousands of miles to Shaoxing for the purpose of selecting suitable "monkeys" from Zhang Zongyi's troupe as candidates. While reviewing the information, she noticed Liu Jianyang.
Liu Jianyang's monkey opera is among the best among his peers, and he has been learning since he was a child, and is known as the "Monkey King of Jiangnan". At a young age, he was mentored by many masters, and at the age of 16 he was apprenticed to a six-year-old child.
Over the years, he has won many awards, so Yang Jie has high hopes for him.
However, this expectation came to naught under Zhang Zongyi's intervention. Because when Yang Jie just got off the train, he met the six-year-old boy Zhang Zongyi and his son Zhang Jinlai.
Although Yang Jie was anxious for casting, Zhang Zongyi asked his son to take Yang Jie on a tour with hospitality. Under Yang Jie's repeated requests, Zhang Zongyi expressed his desire to let his son play the Monkey King.
Although Liu Xiaolingtong finally won the role, Yang Jie still had a little "regret" in her heart, because Liu Jianyang, whom she liked more, didn't even meet in person.
However, considering that there are many candidates for the role of Monkey King, and all of them are actors who are proficient in monkey opera and have a good reputation, Yang Jie's "pickiness" is also understandable.
In the process of finding the actor of the Monkey King, Yang Jie can be described as having a hard time. She first set her sights on several monkey opera masters, among which Li Wanchun, the "Northern Monkey King", was one of her first choices.
Li Wanchun's monkey opera was enlightened by Yang Xiaolou, and he practiced basic skills hard since he was a child. Later, he studied under the Peking Opera master Zaitao and further improved his monkey opera level.
Zaitao not only taught him to imitate the form and movement of monkeys, but also emphasized the spirituality and anthropomorphism of monkeys when they imitate humans. This makes Li Wanchun's monkey opera unique, and works such as "True and False Monkey King" and "Antiy Club" are widely circulated.
However, when Yang Jie found Li Wanchun to discuss filming, the two sides had serious disagreements over Sun Wukong's costume.
Li Wanchun insisted that the Monkey King's costume must be "face-painted", while Yang Jie believes that film and television dramas are different from operas, and painting faces will affect the audience's sense of closeness and substitution. In the end, the two sides parted unhappily.
In addition, Dong Zhihua is also one of the candidates for the Monkey King in Yang Jie's mind. As a martial artist of Peking Opera, he has a solid foundation and is especially good at sticking.
His "Havoc in the Heavenly Palace" amazed foreign audiences. However, because Dong Zhihua's schedule was too full at that time, he and Yang Jie's schedule could not coincide, so the two sides had no chance to cooperate.
Later, Yang Jie considered letting the "Southern Monkey King" six-year-old child try, but unfortunately he was too old to act. Finally, before accepting the six-year-old, Yang Jie also interviewed and mentored him to ensure that he was qualified for the role.
In this process, we have seen a director's rigor and dedication to the work, as well as her own insistence and standards for the selection of roles, which is also one of the important reasons why "Journey to the West" can become a classic.