When a mild-mannered, shy actor needs to play a role that represents "absolute evil," it's more of a professional duty and challenge.
The author | Zhao Yajing
Edited | Ding Yu
Wu Xiaoliang limped into the interview room. The reporter was a little surprised, speculating whether he was injured while filming. As a result, he suddenly said apologetically, "I'm sorry, my feet are numb." ”
The scene suddenly had a comedic effect, and the tense atmosphere began to ease. He is genuine and shy, making it impossible to associate himself with the "villain" role he plays.
In the hit drama "Sweeping The Black Storm", Sun Xing, played by actor Wu Xiaoliang, represents an "absolute evil". With the arrival of the finale, Sun Xing was finally punished by the law, and his life ended with the death penalty.
However, Wu Xiaoliang in life is completely different. He was reserved, gentle and polite, and spoke in a low voice. He may even be nervous about "being interviewed" and feel "embarrassed" for not being able to give a perfect answer.
It makes one wonder how an actor does the performance when a character is particularly far away. For example: How did Wu Xiaoliang complete the role of Sun Xing?
His answer is simple – the duty and challenge of an actor. "I've never challenged such a vicious character, and I wanted to give it a try." Therefore, Wu Xiaoliang completed a professional performance with a little confusion about the role.
After the broadcast of "Sweeping Black Storm", the topic of #Wu Xiaoliang's acting skills was on the hot search, and in the Douban discussion area of the series, there were more than 100 posts related to him. But Wu Xiaoliang hardly looks at these things, Sun Xing is already a thing of the past, a job that has long been completed.
He came back to real life and he loved all the good things around him.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="29" > role that cannot be shared</h1>
Wu Xiaoliang could not empathize with Sun Xing, and this was the case all along.
When "Sweeping The Black Storm" was still in preparation, the producer and Wu Xiaoliang talked about the project. He described the character of Sun Xing to Wu Xiaoliang and called him "the absolute villain". Wu Xiaoliang's reaction at that time was full of question marks: "Why is [this character] looking for me?" ”
Sun Xing is a character who cannot be understood by ordinary people's logical thinking. For an actor, if you can't understand the character, it's hard to convince the audience.
What prompted Wu Xiaoliang to take on the role was a kind of actor's professional sanity, a challenge to a role that had never been tried. When I saw the script, it was already half a month before the start, and Wu Xiaoliang fell into a contradiction again, because "I hate it after reading it."
On weekdays, Wu Xiaoliang will also watch legal programs, and will also have the idea of "what if I play this kind of person in the future". This time as Sun Xing, he also found a lot of video materials. Although these were not directly used, they were supported by the script and were internalized as part of Wu Xiaoliang's performance. "Over the years, everything you feel has some very subtle connections."
Some netizens wrote down three scenes of "marveling at it": the wine table changed its face, the police station watched He Yun, and the state before the death penalty. In particular, Sun Xing's completely collapsed body and tightly locked forehead when he learned that his life was imminent, and the evil and fear of a villain were connected in a few scenes.
When shooting, Wu Xiaoliang relied more on the atmosphere of the scene to enter the state. "What kind of feeling your opponent actor has given you, just try it." Too much pre-design tends to appear deliberate, and more often, he is the result of "improvisation" and "secondary creation". For example, the monologue in which he explains his life in the mirror is the harvest of Wu Xiaoliang's on-the-spot play.
"I liked the scene myself, but I was the least sure, I hadn't tried a performance like this— a person talking to himself in front of a mirror, which was also an improvisational state on the spot, including a lot of improvisation in the lines at the time. There is also (Sun Xing) was a state of drinking at that time. ”
Wu Xiaoliang sometimes feels "screwed". When playing against Xu Yingzi (Yang Yutong), he is worried about scaring the other party - that is not in line with his own gentle personality, but if he does not show enough madness, the atmosphere of the scene is not enough. Before filming, Wu Xiaoliang basically did not contact Yang Yutong and maintained a certain "strangeness" to better stimulate the emotions of the other party.
In terms of clothing, Wu Xiaoliang also reached an agreement with the stylist in the exchange, and both hoped that Sun Xing would "collapse" a little, which was specifically manifested in wearing a large suit. Some viewers commented: "(Sun Xing) wore a suit, and it felt like he was wearing his father's clothes." ”
More details need to be controlled by yourself. In this regard, Wu Xiaoliang analyzed: "The feeling of this character is to rely on Gao Mingyuan's kind of 'high-end bad guy', in fact, he has a certain sense of inferiority. ”
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="138" > madman is crazy</h1>
Today, Wu Xiaoliang talks about Sun Xing, which is a kind of bystander's perspective. He would follow the series like any other audience member, and then be intimidated by some of the scenes in the show, he said: "For example, after I watched 'Sweeping Black Storm', I had to watch two episodes of 'I Love My Home'. ”
After being stripped from the role, Wu Xiaoliang felt that Sun Xing was a person who did not know where his value was at all, and was "a complete madman".
In "Sweeping The Black Storm", because of the unforgivable evil shown by Sun Xing, the plot does not have a richer account of his life. However, in several scenes between Sun Xing and his mother He Yun, the audience will have some discussions about the relationship between mother and child in the barrage.
To some extent, Sun Xing is lacking in love, and he has been asking for his mother. Duan Ni appears in a scene where his mother He Yun (Wu Yue) and "dry son" Lin Hao (Zhang Yixing) interact. Hidden in the darkness, Sun Xing's eyes are fierce, and the audience finds that it is the jealousy and anger of his mother's love being taken away; later, when his mother He Yun celebrates his birthday, Sun Xing takes the risk of bringing a cake to the door to show concern. Even when it came time to be sentenced, Sun Xing hoped to have a word with his mother.
In the plot of the abduction of He Yun, Sun Xing is still asking: "Is it that I am sad to die in front of you, or will he die in front of you that you be more sad?" But in the end, Sun Xing did not get an answer.
Regarding this part, Wu Xiaoliang said: "In fact, he can't find the meaning of his own life in this world, what can make him feel a little presence?" In those scenes, he was trying to find some of his own existence, but he still didn't find it. ”
Because of these incomprehensible behaviors, in the Weibo caption of the clip, Wu Xiaoliang wrote: "A madman is a madman." He said: "Because He Yun said' I die with you', in the eyes of extremists who are physically and mentally abnormal, the so-called living together and dying together may be equated." So he's a completely crazy guy. ”
In addition to the plot setting, the villain's supporting role receives such a high degree of attention, largely due to the acting skills of the actors. For Wu Xiaoliang, it is the duty of an actor to make the role stand, even if more acting experience cannot be applied to Sun Xing, he also tries to "grasp the current state and perform a pure evil".
Of course, no matter what, "I don't think it needs pity and sympathy, and these evil things he did are completely unworthy of them." Wu Xiaoliang told Blog World.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="139" > on the road</h1>
The process of Wu Xiaoliang's participation in "Sweeping The Black Storm" is with confusion and incomprehension. Because it is impossible to empathize with such an evil person, this is not the same as his previous habit of creating characters.
In 2018, he starred in "Under the Sun" directed by Liang Ming. In this literary film, Wu Xiaoliang plays a young man in a small northeastern town , a role closer to life. He complements the character's past and environment of growth. Before starting the camera, Wu Xiaoliang went to the shooting location in advance, felt the temperament of the small northeast city, and made the whole character full from the inside out.
For his outstanding performance in "Under the Sun", Wu Xiaoliang won the Best Actor Award at the Macao International Film Festival "New Chinese Image" and the Best Actor Award in the Rookie Film Competition Section of the Hong Kong International Film Festival.
Prior to this, Wu Xiaoliang had gained a certain degree of popularity with Ding Tai in "Embroidery Spring Knife 2: The Battlefield of Shuluo" and the killer Cao Baoyan in "The Twelve Hours of Chang'an". But more often, the audience will only remember his role, not himself, so that some netizens commented that Wu Xiaoliang is a veritable "drama throwing face".
Wu Xiaoliang felt that he belonged to "God's appreciation of rice and eating". He is not from a science class. When he was young, he was very enthusiastic, loved to play bands, was a "punk youth", and his biggest dream at that time was to become a Rock Star.
In 2004, Wu Xiaoliang was discovered by the casting director while singing in a bar and was invited to play a singer. Without the slightest hesitation, he made his first film, Dancing Without Music.
At that time, for filming, he only thought it was "very fun". In the era when film shooting was still film, actors needed to rehearse repeatedly in advance, but Wu Xiaoliang was never nervous, he described himself as having a momentum at that time, in northern dialect, called "this child is quite rushed." When he was in his early 20s, Wu Xiaoliang was often described in this way. This energy is his energy, getting older, but the energy is always there.
Acting allows him to experience the lives of different people, which is a treasure that other professions cannot bring. But for Wu Xiaoliang, there is no moment to "make a decision", and what to give up and what to insist on does not exist in him. Everything happens naturally, "and the next play comes, and it plays again, and the one that touches and touches becomes like this."
Now that I recall the feeling on the stage, Wu Xiaoliang's face will still involuntarily smile. But about the spirit of rock and roll, he can't remember clearly, the past is placed in the past, growing up, the state of each period is changing, Wu Xiaoliang feels that his state is always "on the road".
"I don't think about it so much, I often tell people, on the road, it feels like a special art. In fact, on the road, it is not necessary to expect so much, I don't have such a big idea. Everyone is living well and studying hard, and I am the same, just a comfortable state. ”
For Wu Xiaoliang, every play is "on the road", just "a footprint". "Sweeping The Black Storm" is no exception, he said: "I am just walking step by step, and when I get here, I will make this footprint better." ”
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="140" > life is always the most important</h1>
Talking about the characteristics of being an actor, Wu Xiaoliang mentioned two key words: one is inferiority complex, and the other is sensitivity.
"The performance needs to be a little bit of a feeling of insecurity, a sense of inferiority. This is very rare, I can't say it specifically, sometimes too confident, but may have certain limitations. ”
Sensitivity is more reflected in the observation of life. After the broadcast of "Sweeping Black Storm", the discussion about the acting skills of Sun Xing and Wu Xiaoliang was extremely high, but he tried not to look at these things as much as possible to return himself to a normal state of life.
"I'm a person who especially likes a normal life, who doesn't like life?"
The composition of life is those "miscellaneous things", nothing more than eating something, busy with something, and then leaving those so-called metaphysical things behind. "Just live a good life." Wu Xiaoliang watches "I Love My Home" twice a year, and the words are almost memorized. "Ask the lord of the vast earth who is sinking and floating, mulchs!" He imitated the lines of Mother Peace on the spot, and laughed at himself.
A passion for acting is everywhere. After watching a good movie, he would immediately stand up and applaud; reading the script of interest, Wu Xiaoliang could not sleep excitedly, and laughed involuntarily in the middle of the night. Waiting until the morning, looking at the time, the agent should get up, quickly called over, "Can I meet the director and talk to him?" ”。
He does not have the "sense of rupture" after becoming famous, and has always maintained the closest connection with life. Wu Xiaoliang grew up in a small town in Inner Mongolia, and when he talks about growing up, he will proudly say, "I am a person with a special childhood, and I have many friends." Those partners who have different paths in life will still keep in touch and not go far.
His confusion is all present and very specific. Usually when creating a role, I don't know if I'm enough and need to communicate with the director. Wu Xiaoliang basically did not have major confusion, "I will change the so-called major to not major." Instead of running away, my mindset is, 'Cough, what a big deal.'"
He never indulged in characters. "I don't have to kill qingqing, I can go back to the hotel at night and get away." It's like going to work and living off work. He still doesn't quite realize exactly when he began to admit that he was an actor. Acting is first and foremost a job, and when the proportion becomes large enough, Wu Xiaoliang clearly knows "I am an actor".
"Life is far more important than work. Work is also a part of life, but what I yearn for is a state of freedom, beauty and security. "He once rode his motorcycle all the way south from Beijing to Xiamen, riding more than 4,000 kilometers. There is no companionship because one is freer. "Stop wherever you want, or you can go to the beach." I can't see it, I'm not alone. ”
He said: "When I don't stop acting, it's possible. It didn't say that I must have done this in my life, I like all the beautiful things around me, I feel very good. ”