Under the hype of traffic, singing, appearance, and human settings, domestic reality shows have always had room to play, and drama was once defined as high cold and niche.
Recently, iQiyi has produced a new reality show, not many people pay attention to it, but the Douban score has soared all the way to 9.2 points, becoming the "variety dark horse" at the beginning of 2021.
"Drama New Life"
The convener of the program, Huang Lei, a well-known national actor, filmed "April Day on Earth" in Wuzhen that year, and formed an indissoluble relationship with Wuzhen.
After that, he began to participate in the drama "Crush on Peach Blossom Garden", this performance is 15 years, before and after at least six or seven hundred plays, during which Huang Lei also acted in many TV series, such as "Little Joy", "Little Parting" and so on, but his enthusiasm for drama only increased.
Huang Lei once said that if he only did two things in this life, one of which was the Wuzhen Theater Festival, then the other must be to perform "Crush on Peach Blossom Garden".
Under his convocation, he found a group of big names who played theater, these people are the bearers of the domestic theater industry, some of them are drama actors, some are prop masters, some are directors, but for audiences who are not familiar with theater, they are almost all "newcomers".
For example, Liu Xiaoye, nicknamed "Comedy Maniac", has appeared in more than 6,000 plays in his masterpiece "Opinions on the Life of Two Dogs".
Wu Bi, graduated from Beijing Dance Academy, drama actor, cross-border god, judge of Wuzhen Drama Festival, participated in "Crush on Peach Blossom Garden", and was previously a top five contestant of "Happy Comedian".
Liu Xiaoyi, first an actor, then turned into behind the scenes, worked as a director and props, and was the Chinese director of the world-class stage play "War Horse".
There is also "all-round dramatist" Zhao Xiaosu, Ding Yiteng, a doctor of the Department of Chinese Opera Performance, and Liu Tianqi, the champion of the last Wuzhen Drama Festival.
Among this group of people, only Xiu Rui, the audience still has a little impression, of course, everyone may be more familiar with his partner Qiao Shan, who has frequently appeared in variety shows or movies in recent years.
The former "Love Laughing Room" and "Waste Wood Brothers" made the two people a little fire.
The first task the program team threw them at them was to find answers to the question of "whether drama can make money", which is also the connotation of this show.
Because if you just watch the theater actors rehearse, this is nothing to watch, it is better to buy a ticket to go to the scene to see, so this show focuses on the problem of "how to survive the dramatists".
Drama actors are different from traffic stars, traffic stars shoot an episode of TV series with hundreds of thousands of salaries, a TV series is often tens of millions of income, drama actors are completely different, they are really "poor".
According to Liu Xiaoye's words, filming drama can indeed earn money, basic life is no problem, it is impossible to get rich, but it can live.
In 2020, the situation is special, and cinemas, concert halls, and theaters have encountered an unprecedented cold winter.
Many actors have to nibble on the old books, spend salaries, spend performance fees, and 40-year-old Liu Xiaoye's savings are still less than 20,000.
Liu Xiaoyi was originally an actor, and later he couldn't make money, so he simply sold kebabs, but as long as he knew that there was a scene to shoot, he was busy running back to filming.
Since Liu Tianqi won the championship in the last session, he has opened a training institution, but his popularity is limited, and there is no publicity team, only one student has been recruited, and he has a salary of 3,000 yuan per month.
Coupled with some scattered performance fees, it is less than 50,000 a year, and for a person who drifts north, 50,000 yuan can only barely maintain food and accommodation at best.
Some people may say that this show is selling miserably again, and the domestic reality show can't talk about something else?
But the truth is so, the average drama actor rehearsal a day is 200 yuan;
The workers who install the table are paid 300 a day, and in the case of bad environment, the day is 50 to 80.
After a round of conversation, Wu Pi couldn't help but complain that his family had worked hard to provide for himself to go to college, and now, after a round of struggle, he actually only deserved to live?!
In fact, this also reflects another problem, as ordinary people, sometimes, dream chasing and survival can not be carried out at the same time, sometimes even chasing dreams for a lifetime may not have a response.
Therefore, they have to earn living expenses for the team and themselves through drama in the show.
The first task was to perform a children's drama for the scene of a factory near Wuzhen, the performance was good, the factory allocated funds to sponsor, the time was tight, from conceiving the script to rehearsal to running-in, they only had three days.
The accommodation provided by the program group for the group of 7 is quite simple, a broken shed, 7 camp beds, a few small stoves, and even tables and chairs.
There is no funding, can only be in the nearby field to pick vegetables, buy vegetables and cook their own problems, can save the province.
But the 7 people seem to have long been used to it, assigning their own tasks and starting a life of studying the script while chai rice oil and salt.
This is also the most interesting place about this reality show, "real" and not "show".
Liu Tianqi contributed a blueprint for "The Story of a Chicken Farm" to everyone——
A chicken is not willing to be only an laying hen, she has a dream, wants to see the sea, but no chicken understands her, and finally she bravely took the first step and completed her dream.
The story is simple but very allegorical, how to choose between ideal and reality?
The program team brought them master-level heavyweight guests, Lai Shengchuan, a Chinese dramatist, "Crush on Peach Blossom Garden" and "Treasure Island a Village" are all his works.
In the program, Lai Shengchuan is the director of the art committee, responsible for checking and making suggestions for the 7-person group of dramas.
Although they are all old drama bones in the theater industry, in the first rehearsal, Lai Shengchuan still pointed out the problems for them, did not dig deep into the core, and lacked the points that touched people's hearts.
This time is less than 18 hours before the official performance.
Re-change the script, adjust the props, everyone sat around to discuss, thinking, as a director Liu Tianqi is under great pressure, nervous to hide in the corner to support the wall to vomit.
Although this is only a children's drama, a drama that may not have sold well, the 7-person group did not deal sloppily, every line was carefully polished, and each scene ended to resonate with the audience.
As producer Tan Na said, the most fundamental original intention of creating this variety show is to let more people see the talents and shining points of these drama workers through such a popular form of variety show.
In the first episode, there is more than an hour of content, all produced by the small talk of seven people, and those humorous dialogues hide the "theatrical Easter eggs" that the audience will want to discover.
It is no exaggeration to say that the effect of that night's performance was surprisingly good, when the protagonist chicken led the sailors to the sea and shouted: "You see-"
A child in the audience blurted out that "the sea" !!!
When the protagonist sees the sea, the excitement that is difficult to hide makes many viewers can't help but cry, the sea represents poetry and far away, and laying eggs is real life.
The dramatists substitute their feelings, they are the chickens who struggle to chase their dreams, although this road is difficult to walk, they still unswervingly go on.
As Huang Lei said, tonight we are all the protagonist chickens, may our dreams see the sea.
It is gratifying that the topic of "outside the drama" that circles the ratings is no longer the topic of "outside the drama", "the drama is 1, the back of the 0" makes this variety show have a more professional background and a higher value pursuit.
As dramatists, they are the biggest treasure of this variety show, and their pursuit of art deserves our applause.