A Petty Revenge

So, no matter how hard Lu Heng tried, this part of his work was all in vain.

When Lu Heng arrived at Yanying Studio, he found that apart from Director Fang Kaizhi and screenwriter Yao Suhua, only Rong Xiu, who played the second male lead Han Lusheng, was there.

This came as a slight surprise to Lu Heng—he had thought he would be the earliest one to arrive.

Rong Xiu also saw Lu Heng standing at the doorway of the dressing room, and greeted him with a smiling expression, "Ah, little Lusheng is here. I always said your look was spot on. Look at that, you've really come to play my younger self."

Lu Heng smiled slightly, and called out Brother Rong. He then greeted Director Fang and Yao Suhua as well.

Fang Kaizhi and Yao Suhua both looked a bit awkward. It was probably out of guilt for choosing Zhao Miao to play the young Cen Qiubai. In truth, Zhao Miao's audition performance had not been any more outstanding than Lu Heng's, but the crew and investors had to consider not only acting skills, but also investment costs and returns.

All in all, this was no fault of anyone's skill.

Fang Kaizhi picked up a script from the table and handed it to Lu Heng, saying with a smile, "This is the script for Autumn Dew White, read through it more when you have free time."

This was the first time Lu Heng had received the complete script since confirming his role in Autumn Dew White.

According to the crew's regulations, complete scripts were usually only distributed to some of the main actors. This was mainly to avoid leaking important plot contents during the filming process and causing losses to the production.

Given Lu Heng's status, he originally should only have received the script for his own shooting segments. However, in order to make up for his guilt, Fang Kaizhi ultimately still gave the full script to Lu Heng. He probably wanted to let Lu Heng better understand the character of Han Lusheng after reading the script.

Such a decision was out of trust in Lu Heng's talent and character.

Lu Heng knew this very well, and thanked Director Fang very solemnly. Then, taking advantage of the time before the others arrived, he retreated to the side to read the script.

Although he had watched the finished film of Autumn Dew White in his past life, so much time had passed that many details had become blurred.

This was a tale of romance and glamour intertwined with the flames of war and sacrifice. The male lead Cen Qiubai came from a Peking Opera family, and because of his family's heritage, he became a famous leading actor in the Four-Nine City at a very young age. He used his status to maneuver within high society, constantly scouting for military intelligence and secrets. During this time, he met the female lead Leng Shuang.

Leng Shuang was an intelligence officer of our party, and her arrival in Beijing this time was to steal the treasonous secrets of the major traitor Wu Guowei. However, Wu Guowei was naturally cunning and cautious by nature, making it simply impossible for ordinary people to get close to him. Yet Wu Guowei had one hobby—he loved listening to operas, especially romantic plays.

Leng Shuang and Cen Qiubai decided to use this point to get close to Wu Guowei. Little did they expect that this conspiracy would be leaked by a traitor; not only did Leng Shuang and Cen Qiubai fail to get Wu Guowei's treasonous secrets, but they also alerted the enemy. Cen Qiubai was also arrested and thrown into prison by Wu Guowei under the charge of being a rebel.

To rescue the male lead and the Yunji Troupe, who were suffering an undeserved disaster, the second male lead Han Lusheng, who had secretly harbored a crush on Cen Qiubai, tried every possible means to make Wu Guowei believe that Cen Qiubai was not some revolutionary figure. Wu Guowei released Cen Qiubai from prison, and Han Lusheng urged his senior martial brother to leave the capital as soon as possible. Yet for the sake of the lives and safety of hundreds of our party's intelligence personnel, Cen Qiubai was determined to steal the secrets. Having no other choice, Han Lusheng could only find a way to help his senior brother. He returned alone to Wu Guowei's mansion, sneaked into Wu Guowei's bedroom, and found the document Cen Qiubai wanted in the safe. Yet during his retreat, he accidentally discovered that the document was fake.

It turned out that Wu Guowei had never believed his words at all; from beginning to end, he remained firmly convinced that Cen Qiubai was a revolutionary party member, and the reason he let him go was simply to play a long game to catch a big fish. The document Han Lusheng managed to steal this time was also just part of the arrest plan.

Han Lusheng wanted to tell his senior brother the truth, but he had already been placed under control by Wu Guowei's men. Once he went to find Cen Qiubai with this document, the people tailing him would discover the hiding place of Cen Qiubai and the Beijing revolutionaries.

In despair, Han Lusheng ran up to the city wall, sang an Empty City Stratagem, and leaped to his death.

A Petty Revenge

The preliminary training for Autumn Dew White lasted for over three months in total, and during this period, most of the main creative actors with opera-singing scenes had to join the production crew in advance. In order to better interpret his character, Rong Xiu, who played the second male lead, actually spent over four hours every day learning opera at Yanying Studio.

Serving as Rong Xiu's physical instructor was Ms. Zhu Xiumei, a famous Peking Opera performing artist from Beijing. In order to let Rong Xiu completely restore the authentic flavor of the Peking Opera dan roles in front of the camera, Zhu Xiumei not only placed strict demands on Rong Xiu regarding his posture and singing style, but also suggested that Rong Xiu read more biographies of Peking Opera masters.

Probably because the two of them played the same character, Fang Kaizhi simply stuffed Lu Heng over to Ms. Zhu Xiumei for tutoring as well.

Lu Heng felt that he was basking in Rong Xiu's reflected glory. He had initially been quite pleased about it. However, this sentiment turned into endless complaints once the training began.

Because during the training period, Zhu Xiumei truly treated Rong Xiu and Lu Heng like apprentice disciples learning their craft. Her strict demands were simply enough to make one want to cry. Even though Lu Heng fancied himself as having a solid foundation in martial arts and had learned a few wusheng opera pieces under the influence of his maternal grandfather, he had almost failed to persevere through it.

Suffering hardships for three months, yielding ten minutes of performance on stage.

This was definitely not the treatment a minor bit-part actor in a drama deserved!

The two-thousand-yuan payout was truly hard-earned!

Lu Heng joked to himself to find amusement in his misery. Yet precisely because he had endured extreme hardships, he admired Rong Xiu, who was training alongside him, all the more.

A thirty-year-old man with no martial arts foundation, older than him, and with stiffer bones, had actually managed to practice several dan opera excerpts of Peking Opera to such a state of mastery in the span of just three months.

"Brother Rong, you are definitely thoroughly deserving if you can win the Best Supporting Actor at Cannes with this role."

Amidst his emotional sigh, Lu Heng inadvertently spoiled the future.

Rong Xiu, who was currently pressing his legs, was startled by Lu Heng's bold words. When he recovered his senses, he could not help but smile warmly, "Then I shall accept your auspicious words."

Perhaps due to sharing weal and woe over these past three months, the relationships among most of the creative core of the production crew had warmed up, and they got along with much more tacit understanding than at the very beginning. However, there were still many actors Lu Heng had yet to meet—