The major revolutionary historical drama "The Age of Awakening" is the eighth time that Hou Jingjian has played Mao Zedong. In this play, from being influenced by the "New Youth" magazine to strengthening his belief in communism, the young Mao Zedong presents a process of ideological change that constantly explores the road to national salvation. Although he has played this role several times, Hou Jingjian admits that it is still difficult to perfectly shape the image of Mao Zedong in different periods.
"The Age of Awakening" is Hou Jingjian's eighth time playing Mao Zedong.
Lose more than ten pounds and insist on eating chili peppers
As a tribute drama celebrating the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Communist Party of China, "The Age of Awakening" carries the weight and the responsibility of the actors, making Hou Jingjian feel unprecedented pressure. Since 2010, Hou Jingjian has played the image of Mao Zedong in many TV dramas such as "Iron Shoulder Moral Righteousness", "Mao Zedong", "Autumn Harvest Uprising", "The Great Turning Point" and so on, but the story of "The Age of Awakening" began in 1915, when the young Mao Zedong went to school in Hunan, and later went to Peking University as a librarian, and under the influence of Mr. Li Dazhao and Chen Duxiu, he began to contact Marxism. In his youth, Mao Zedong needed actors to grasp the scale of their performance more precisely and pay attention to richer emotional changes.
First of all, we must ensure that it is "similar". Before filming, Hou Jingjian lost seventeen or eight pounds of weight at a rapid rate, trying to get closer to the youthful Mao Zedong in his slender appearance. Because Mao Zedong is a Hunan native, the play deliberately added a lot of scenes of eating peppers, Hou Jingjian, who is not good at eating spicy, applied to the director to try to find some spicy peppers, and strive to be real, rather than replacing them with vegetable peppers. These details will be of great help to the actors in the performance.
On "Shen Yun", Hou Jingjian believes that the most prominent feature of Mao Zedong is "sincerity" - from the heart to understand a lot of knowledge that is not known, especially after the first time to Peking University, he is full of curiosity and curiosity about this new world. At the same time, he is also a person who is willing to face his own shortcomings, frank and direct, not to pretend; modest and friendly, listen carefully to others, and not blind, will produce his own thinking. "For example, Comrade Mao Zedong liked to read, but he did not blindly study, and when others told him what he did not understand, he would write it down and must have his own ideas."
Therefore, Hou Jingjian grasped a "true" word in his performance, and every subtle reaction must make the audience feel his truth. "When acting, try to think of what Mao Zedong thinks, the heart is full of light, and the distractions are removed, and even do not consider the technique of the performance, but try to 'walk the heart'." This is what Hou Jingjian asks of himself.
0.1 page of appearances for one day
One of hou Jingjian's most impressive scenes was Mao Zedong's first appearance - on the streets pouring heavy rain, the poor small traders and peddlers on the streets braved the rain to sell, the traffickers openly sold their children, the homeless people begged in rags, and the warlords rode their horses to attack the people... Only Mao Zedong, holding the newly published "New Youth", walked against the street.
This scene is only 0.1 pages in the script, and according to the conventional shooting method, it usually only takes one or two hours to shoot. However, the crew mobilized nearly 600 people, arranged a 170-meter-long street, organized a large number of stalls, six sprinklers "rained" at the same time, filmed for a full day, and the makeup and costumes of each extras were carefully and strictly checked.
Mao's appearance uses a series of metaphorical footage.
In Hou Jingjian's understanding, the young Mao Zedong ran in the rain and stepped on the water, which was a desperate backwater, muddy and dirty, but it was stepped on by the young Mao Zedong. Brave the rain to move forward, symbolizing his fearlessness and fearlessness, but also means that the road is tortuous and bumpy. "However, at this time, Mao Zedong had obviously found a way to step through this ditch of rain and meet this storm, that is, the "New Youth" in his arms."
Hou Jingjian admitted that although his role in "The Age of Awakening" is not much, every drama group is filmed as the most important scene. For example, Mao Zedong printed the Xiangjiang Review alone overnight, and in order to stay awake, he stepped on his feet in the basin of water, and sweat soaked his clothes. Hou Jingjian revealed that this scene, which was only a few minutes, was filmed from six o'clock in the morning to the early morning of the next day, plus another scene, which lasted for nearly 24 hours.
Create an image of a great man who can capture people's hearts
In 2010, Hou Jingjian received an offer from the TV series "Iron Shoulders Moral Righteousness", which was his first contact with the role of Mao Zedong. Initially he just tried on a look, but the director thought he was very similar to the young Mao Zedong, especially in a long shirt. Since then, he has begun a relationship with this role for more than ten years.
When he first played Mao Zedong, Hou Jingjian was only 25 years old. In his heart, this role is too special, from a young age, he will listen to his parents talk about a lot of Mao Zedong legends, and when he went to school, he heard it, "I can't find a way, it's a lot of pressure." He confessed. Initially, he could only rely on the basic search for a "similarity" with Mao Zedong to get close to this great historical figure. At that time, the image depiction of Mao Zedong in the early period of film and television materials was basically blank, and Hou Jingjian flipped through a large number of historical materials and books, and through several oil painting portraits of Mao Zedong's youth, he felt his personal charm from the heroism and demeanor between his eyebrows.
In addition, Hou Jingjian also practiced wearing long shirts and explored the detailed connection with the people of that era. "We wear long shirts when filming, and on TV it looks like we walk and do movements very naturally, and usually I have to wear long shirts without leaving my body, as a habit, just like the T-shirtS I wear every day to find a feeling." 」 Just by tying the button of the long shirt, Hou Jingjian repeatedly practiced countless times, constantly buttoning, unbuttoning, and then fastening. In his view, the actor should be very familiar with these details of life habits, while speaking lines in the performance, there are actions at the same time, even the small movement of wearing clothes will make the audience more substitutionary.
Every time he plays Mao Zedong, Hou Jingjian will have a new feeling. "The first time I dared to act, but now I am more and more mature, hoping to reflect Mao Zedong's temperament and character through more details." Today, Hou Jingjian is no longer limited to imitating the "shape-like" Mao Zedong, but has devoted more energy to shaping the image of a great man with personality, characteristics, and more grasping people's hearts.
After "touching" Mao Zedong up close and feeling every important moment in Mao Zedong's life, Hou Jingjian also believes that he is no longer just an actor, but shoulders more sense of mission through the process of acting. "I don't think a person is born to be successful and great. Comrade Mao Zedong suffered a lot, he was able to persevere, and his inner strength and open-mindedness had an impact on me in all aspects. ”
Hou Jingjian plays Mao Zedong stills.
The lines should be "understood" by the audience.
Nowadays, many young people affectionately call Mao Zedong "Mao's teacher", and the tenacity of the young Mao Zedong in "The Age of Awakening" and the strong desire for knowledge have also created his unique character charm. Similarly, this is inseparable from the creative team and actors' control over the youthfulness of the performance method. Hou Jingjian revealed that on the shooting scene of "The Age of Awakening", the director never rushed to start the camera, he would take the actors to sit together and repeat the words of each scene, "After I said this, do you understand?" "That's what they talk about the most. The director requires the actors to read the lines not only to understand and understand themselves, but also to understand the audience and the staff on the spot.
"We've managed to get the sense of being able to pull historical themes into the audience's reality and make young people really like it, which is not easy." Hou Jingjian said frankly. By describing objective and true people and events, expressing their thoughts and thoughts, and showing the hardships they encountered, "The Age of Awakening" allows the audience to truly experience the hardships of the founding of the Communist Party of China, the rough road, and the excitement and joy of China at that time in such an era of internal and external troubles, and the revolutionary pioneers firmly believed in ideals and beliefs, walked out of darkness, and marched toward victory. "In addition to letting everyone watch, a film and television work can also make the audience feel some spirit, which is the original intention and mission of our actors."
Beijing News reporter Zhang He
Edited by Tong Na Proofreader Wei Zhuo
Source: Beijing News