Chapter 299: Awards Ceremony
This year’s Golden Horse Awards ceremony was officially held. The nominated actors and directors all had the opportunity to compete with their rivals for that single throne. Yu Linna had gotten in through the back door. Originally, with her status, she was not qualified to enter, but Director Wang Weifan had spoken a lot on her behalf to the organizers, even bringing up her identity as the Wenqing author, Shion. Only then did the organizers politely let her in.
It was true that Shion-sensei’s popularity was not what it used to be, but she was still famous in the industry. It was not an exaggeration to say that she had brought a new trend to the novel world. Most importantly, the scripts she had written for The Smile of the Rose and Wulin Kitchen Maiden both had a certain level of popularity. Even people in the film industry recognized these two works.
Out of respect for Shion-sensei’s wishes, they did not publicly announce her name, nor did they publicize it greatly. They just arranged for her to be in a small corner to watch this Golden Horse Awards ceremony.
This year, there were many nominated films and stars. Generally speaking, the judges favored art-house films, and commercial films rarely entered the nominations. Because in the eyes of many judges, commercial films were just popcorn flicks. Besides being exciting, they had no substance. Some films might have a very good plot, but that was all. Therefore, almost none of the works with huge box office success in recent years were shortlisted. Even Nangong Ying, who had won many honors in commercial films, came away empty-handed.
Tang Yumeng was fortunate enough to meet Director Wang Weifan. Under his guidance, her acting skills were fully displayed in the film, and she left a deep impression, making the audience have a deep impression of her. Many viewers were disgusted with her, which showed that her portrayal of the character was very convincing, and thus she was nominated. Tang Yumeng was only in her early twenties this year. To get a nomination was truly not an easy thing.
After the awards ceremony began, the hosts interacted on stage, creating some atmosphere in front of the cameras and promoting the nominated films. And after that, they entered the award-giving segment. They respectively described the nominated films, and then began to announce the winners in each category.
“And now I announce that the winner of this year’s Golden Horse Award for Best Supporting Actress is—Dream Life, Tang Yumeng! Congratulations!”
Clap, clap, clap!
Amidst the applause, Tang Yumeng walked up to the award stage in surprise. It was only after Yu Linna reminded her that she realized she was the winner. Come to think of it, it was truly incredible. A year ago, she was a flop actress with no roles to play and no way out. In the blink of an eye, she had won Best Supporting Actress. This was truly a surprise.
After receiving her own trophy on stage, she still couldn’t quite believe it, almost dropping the trophy from trembling.
“Mmm… actually, I didn’t prepare an acceptance speech, because I didn’t expect to win. In any case, I am really grateful to Director Wang for his cultivation. Thank you. It was the effort of everyone in the crew that completed this film. Without everyone’s hard work, I would not have been able to get to where I am today. I cherish this hard-won opportunity. The role of Wang Qingqing is not the female lead in the film, but she is the female character with the most screen time. My main task was only one, and that was to make the audience hate her. I was quite worried at first. I was afraid I couldn’t act like a bad person, but fortunately, I was hated. Thank you, everyone in the audience. I hope that in the future, you will like me as a person. I will continue to work hard.”
After a self-improvised speech, Tang Yumeng walked off the stage with her trophy, her face flushed. After sitting down, she spoke to Yu Linna incoherently. It was clear that she was very excited to have won this award.
“Linna, do you think I’m dreaming?”
“You’re not dreaming, Senior Sister Yumeng. You’ve succeeded. Look, this belongs to you.”
The Golden Horse Award for Best Supporting Actress was a recognition of an actor’s acting skills in the industry. Although its weight was not as heavy as that of the Best Actress award, it was not light either. Such an award, even the young fresh meat and starlets in the entertainment industry were not capable of getting. Tang Yumeng had used her strength to prove that she had this ability, and she was only 21 years old. To get this award at such a young age was a kind of affirmation for her.
It was believed that in the future, no one would not look for her to act.
Tang Yumeng was still immersed in her win and hadn’t come back to her senses. Yu Linna had already turned her attention to the stage and continued to watch the awards. She was genuinely happy for Tang Yumeng. She still remembered that when they first met, she had said a sentence to her: “Because of a dream, so I persist.” It was precisely because of this sentence that Yu Linna had embarked on a new journey and became a novelist.
Now, Tang Yumeng’s efforts had also been rewarded. She was genuinely happy for her.
“Next, the winner of this year’s Best Director is—Dream Life, Wang Weifan, congratulations!!”
Director Wang was already in his fifties, but he was still active in the entertainment industry, continuing to make films for the audience. In recent years, he had transitioned to commercial films, but the films he made were terrible, always flopping at the box office, to the point where no investors would look for him to make films. Now, he had returned to his roots and created a Dream Life, declaring to everyone that he was not old yet, and your big brother will always be your big brother.
“It’s been a long time since I’ve been up here. I kind of miss it. I remember the last time I was up here, it was probably twenty years ago, right, the time of Cornfield.”
As soon as he came up, Director Wang Weifan joked a little, and everyone laughed. But after laughing, everyone also felt sad. Everyone knew that Director Wang Weifan had not had many noteworthy works since entering the new century. A few years ago, there might have been a few commercial films. These commercial films were imported to the United States and got a box office. The most glorious time was when his film was nominated for an Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film. Although it didn’t win in the end, it still brought glory to the country. After that, he went downhill, never to be as glorious as before, his box office getting worse and worse. A few years ago, the Yangtze River, which he had co-produced with Hollywood in the United States, had lost a lot of US dollars, completely ruining his reputation.
Now, he had returned like a king again, telling everyone that he was not old yet, he had just been resting.
“Living to this age, what storms in life have I not seen? I have seen the most brilliant sunrise, and I have also seen the afterglow of the sunset. Glory and decline are often a matter of a single thought. No one can guess what you will become. In these past few years, I have indeed done many things wrong. I have always wanted to make some contribution to the domestic film market, to promote the development of our Chinese films. But sometimes I have to admit that the world is no longer ours. The young people are driving our films, are fighting for our films. I am old. I no longer belong to this era. Thinking of this, it still hurts a little. I am old, but I don’t want to quit. I still want to continue filming, to do more for Chinese films. I can’t make high-grossing movies anymore, and I can’t film them anymore. But I want to do something for this market, for our films, even if it’s just a little.”
He talked about his past and some of his experiences on stage. Among the directors and actors present, his seniority was there. Even if he wasn’t the oldest, he wouldn’t be the least qualified. Therefore, everyone in the audience listened to him. Including the big shots in the entertainment industry, everyone was paying close attention, not daring to be distracted.
“I once thought I couldn’t make a good work, until one day, after having a meal with a friend, I was walking outside. My mind was full of troubles, and I didn’t know what to do. I sat down on a park bench and found a crumpled piece of paper at my feet. Perhaps it was fate. I didn’t pick it up and throw it away, but instead opened that crumpled piece of paper. On that paper was an article of about a thousand words, a story, a story about a frustrated youth wandering in a big city. Yes, you guessed it right. This was the original draft of Dream Life. I still have that piece of paper. Because this story gave me inspiration, I immediately wrote this script. This is the origin of Dream Life.”
Everyone present was surprised by his words. The reporters were even more dumbfounded. No one had expected Director Wang to say such words. Wasn’t he indirectly telling people that this story was not written by him?
Actually, after calming down, it didn’t seem to be the case. Director Wang had said that this was just a thousand-word article. Everyone knew how long it was. But to adapt from such a short story and extract a film script that was over an hour long was definitely not a simple matter. There were also many examples of manga and novels being adapted into films in the industry. Director Wang had just done something similar, and no one paid too much attention to it.
It was just that no one had expected Director Wang’s movie to come about this way. Because since he entered the directing profession, Director Wang’s film scripts were basically original, with no examples of adapting novels.
“I don’t know who wrote this article, but I want to thank you, thank you for your story, thank you for your story that I picked up. But I also feel guilty. I took your creativity. I apologize to you. I’m old, there’s nothing much to care about, but I want to find you. You are a very talented person. Your talent should not be buried like this. That’s all for my speech. Thank you.”
Director Wang Weifan took his trophy and walked off the stage. He was not afraid of what people would say about him, nor was he afraid of how the media would evaluate him. He was old and didn’t belong to this era anyway. But he wanted to discover new talents, to cultivate young people. If he could contribute to the film industry, he would do anything.
Sooner or later, there would come a day when he could no longer film. He didn’t want to not even have a decent successor when that day came.
…
Yu Linna watched this scene happen in a daze. She knew that the news the next day would definitely be on the headlines. But at that moment, she couldn’t help but feel strange. The thousand-word paper that Director Wang had mentioned… how did it seem a bit like something she had thrown away before?
“Linna?”
“It’s nothing… I just feel a little strange. I feel like this story is very familiar.”
Yu Linna said absent-mindedly.
When she had failed to be selected before, she had casually written a story. That story was only a thousand words long. After that, she had thrown the crumpled paper away.
Could it be that… that story was related to her?
But this was too much of a coincidence. It was a bit impossible.
Yu Linna also had a headache.
This development, which was like a story, was too dramatic. Director, are you sure nothing will happen if you play like this? Anyway, Yu Linna felt that the matter was definitely a big deal. And in fact, that was indeed the case. The headlines the next day reported on this matter. Director Wang was also on the hot search, and everyone had mixed reviews about this matter. How the original story of this script came about, everyone was quite concerned. The discussion about whether it was an art-house film or a commercial film also occupied the top spot in terms of topic heat.
