Chapter Thirty-Three: Rain Play

  "Li Rui is coming." Just then, Xu Ziyao spoke up and also beckoned to Li Rui.

  "Director Xu." Li Rui walked up to Xu Ziyao, his face still wet with cold sweat.

  Xu Ziyao looked at the sweat on his face and coldly snorted "Comfortable?"

  Li Ruijin didn't say anything.

  "Do you really think it's that easy for a newcomer to get the applause of the movie emperor and queen? You're thinking too simply! Who is Chen Daoming? Such a person who loves to show off his feathers, not everyone can afford to perform at such a high price! A picky person like him would applaud, you have to start by putting Lin Xiao on the enemy's side!" He scolded in a low voice.

  Li Rui gritted his teeth, his eyes filled with hatred. Xu Ziyou looked at him and occasionally glanced at his cheek, her tone turning cold "How did you feel about the scene just now?"

  "It's incredibly powerful, far surpassing what I had imagined." Li Ruijin said begrudgingly, but truthfully.

  "The crew won't humiliate us." Xu Ziyao leaned back and said calmly, "Chen Jialin went to find him just now, probably about this matter. Fortunately, it's a night show, no one is here to watch, otherwise your face would be lost big time."

  "Wait for the director to call 'action', don't add any extra lines. He's just venting, it'll be over soon. Just get through this scene safely. You and him only have one confrontation scene, there will be plenty of opportunities later."

  "Got it." Li Rui's teeth grated with a "ka-ka" sound, the three words squeezed out from between his teeth.

  Being suppressed by a movie emperor is nothing, being suppressed by a senior is also nothing, but it's being suppressed by a peer! And not even on the same level!

  And that person is his only opponent! The one who has fallen down before!

  How can he swallow this insult!

  "Lin Xiao!" His voice was a little off-key now, looking at the people around him, no matter how he looked, he felt like they were mocking him.

  "Ready!" Five minutes later, Chen Jialin raised the loudspeaker again.

  Lin Xiao swept a glance at Li Rui, coincidentally meeting the other's gaze, the resentful and venomous expression inside was self-evident.

  “A！”

  Have to say, although Li Ruijin is not a good person, he is quite professional. As soon as the camera starts rolling, his expression immediately changes into "Wei Dongting".

  Everything that had just happened seemed to have never occurred. He repeated the lines once again, and with the experience of last time, this time he started with full force, immersing himself into the stage to the greatest extent possible.

  "More into it than before." Lin Xiao said in his heart, and he also restrained a lot.

  One take and one release, compared to the completely crushing form just now, this time Li Rui actually performed some highlights.

  "Cut! That's a wrap!"

  When Chen Jialin said this sentence, Li Ruijin even trembled all over, he had just fully entered the play and hadn't completely withdrawn yet.

  "Pack up and move to the big tent on the east side, there's another show tonight." Chen Jialin put on his clothes and left, while the staff member hurriedly informed everyone present.

  After about a minute, Li Ruijin recovered normally, his gaze at Lin Xiao seemed to pierce through him.

  The two brushed past each other, he didn't say a word, and Lin Xiao suddenly spoke up.

  "We're all newcomers, what's the point? Are you saying that a newcomer's life isn't hard enough?"

  "You don't know shit!" The scene still had a lot of people, Li Rui's voice was very low, he turned his head around, his eyes were so angry that they were slightly red, the muscles on his cheeks kept twitching, and he growled in a low voice.

  "If it weren't for you! If it didn't have you! This play would absolutely be my breakout role! I'm the most dazzling person in this new generation of plays!" He clenched his fists and let out a loud "Hmph!", as if he wanted to swallow Lin Xiao Sheng whole. "I've struggled for so many years! More miserable than you, who just debuted and already has someone backing you up!"

  "In the first year, I went to find Xu Ziyao, he didn't even give me a glance! He's my younger uncle! I've done everything for the elderly, from serving tea to pouring water! Accompanying wine and bosses! After doing it for so long, I've finally reached this point today! How can I be suppressed by you!"

  Lin Xiao quietly listened to him venting, and when he finished growling, she said "At least you still have a company contract. If you try one company after another and none of them sign you, it's like being driven out by a plague god. After playing the role of shit, urine, and fart for a few years, every time there's a big or small event, there will definitely be an old 'brother' who comes to pull you in as background. At that time, you'll think it's a blessing to have good plays to perform."

  "There won't be just Lin Xiao, there will also be Li Xiao and Wang Xiao. If your acting skills don't improve, even the best opportunities are useless. Once your acting skills improve, which play isn't an opportunity?" He said calmly, "And you don't have to make yourself sound so miserable, who hasn't done those things before?"

  Li Ruijin glared at him with red-rimmed eyes, her gaze piercing for a full minute before she suddenly burst out laughing, like a snake slithering out its tongue.

  "Yes, I admit it, I'm not as good as you. But I'll seize every opportunity to surpass! As long as we're of the same generation, I absolutely cannot allow him to stand in front of me!"

  Lin sighed and said, "Originally, I thought we were clear. It seems you're not willing."

  Li Rui sneered gloomily, "Of course, of course I'm not willing! Let me tell you, we're not done yet!"

  The last four words were spat out through gritted teeth. After finishing speaking, he turned around and walked away from the scene.

  Lin Xiao shook his head, saying that it was pointless to say anything to someone like that.

  In this circle, every year there are as many people joining as the sea, and those who live more miserably than Li Rui are everywhere. Those temporary actors who have eaten but have no next meal are among them. However, those who can become popular are one in five hundred, and those who can stay popular for a long time are even rarer, one in five thousand.

  Those who don't lay a solid foundation always think they lack opportunities and that's why they're not successful. People like this will never be able to climb up.

  He vividly remembers that Huang Bo, who officially debuted in 1996, shot to fame with box office numbers ten times higher than his total for the previous thirty years within just three years, and even won an award within those three years.

  "Opportunities are always reserved for those who are prepared." He muttered a famous quote and walked towards the other side of the scene.

  After finishing this scene, his part here is not much. There are still two big ones and some small ones, such as showing up in certain scenes, which can be shot at any time, and sometimes he even guest-starred as a temporary actor.

  His scenes were finished quickly, and three days later, they started filming the rain scene.

  Cami hasn't come since the first day, and even going to her place can't find her, but thanks to what he and Xu Ziyao said, some low-level door gods and little ghosts didn't come to bother him.

  He also knew that CAMI's role was limited to this point and that the other party couldn't accompany him every day, nor were they a nanny.

  But with this awareness, when I received a message from CAMI saying he had already returned to Beijing, I still couldn't help but smile wryly for a while.

  On the grassland, people in the crew unconsciously relaxed a bit. Many people organized to go out and "build relationships" at night, of course, all from different circles. Lin Xiao was a regular guest, and many people asked for his phone number.

  When he finished attending the party, he sometimes thought of that night which was both laughable and pitiful. However, when he received Qin Xin's phone call, he was still startled.

  "How did you get my phone number?!"

  "Uh...... I asked...... aren't you happy?" Qin Xin's voice was still so "timid."

  Lin Xiao sucked her tongue and the beauty asked if you are happy or not, even if you're not happy, you'll be happy. However, regarding private phone calls being leaked through someone else's hands, it's still a bit annoying.

  "Are you not going to Ulan Bator?" he asked.

  "There are only a few shots of me here, maybe the last one..." Qin Xin said for a while and then stopped talking. The two of them fell into silence, both involuntarily thinking back to that night's events.

  "If nothing's wrong, just hang up. I'm at a party here." Several people had already come to urge Lin Xiao, who was holding the phone and not speaking.

  Just as he was about to hang up, Qin Xin's voice came on again "That... thank you."

  "It's nothing, just a small matter." Lin Xiao also didn't clarify whether it was about getting drunk or being taken advantage of by someone else. After all, girls also need to save face.

  "Hmm... let's have dinner together when I arrive."

  "Probably the schedule won't match, I only have two shows here, it should be over in a week or so, and then I'll go somewhere else. Keep it for now, just remember."

  "Then... shall we go to Hengdian after this?"

  "Go."

  He hung up the phone and joined the party, everyone had a lot to drink and the conversation was open.

  "Lin Ge, I heard you have a rain play tomorrow?"

  "Yes, it's our first time seeing a rain play!" "Let's talk about it then? Let's also figure out some things in advance."

  Many people followed suit, these are all people who often ask him questions, taking him as a know-it-all.

  "Alright, let's talk about it then." Lin Xiao chuckled and said "Actually, filming in the rain is the most difficult. The bigger the rain, the greater the challenge. It can be divided into two types: bare-faced and waterproof makeup. In the rain, the weather is definitely gloomy with not much lighting to adjust. Moreover, the rain makes the actors look very disheveled, it's extremely hard to perform well in such conditions."

  "What's your play tomorrow, Lin Ge?"

  "There's waterproof makeup, and it's just a little rain." As he spoke, Lin Xiao suddenly furrowed his brow.

  He thought of something.

  Li Rui has been quiet for the past two days, but after really getting in touch with him once, he knew that the other person was even more clingy than Liu Songde.

  Both of them have a common characteristic, that is, they are very hard to trample on. People with this kind of temperament, who hold grudges in their hearts, will bite back at the first opportunity. Moreover, Li Ruijin has more real power than Liu Songde. Now, being on someone else's turf, he doesn't think the other side will let go of tomorrow's opportunity.

  And as he put on makeup, he thought of Liu Yiyi. Although the last time they had made up was very "safe", perhaps it was his intuition from the previous life, but he always felt that this safety was too fake.

  There are too many things that can be done with rain, the director only looks at his own shots and doesn't care about other shots. As long as the real camera gives him some fancy moves, the lighting is slightly biased, and in the end, it's possible that no one can recognize who he is. Greatly affecting his recognizability.

  This technique is very skillful and won't become a bad shot that must be re-shot, but will only become a barely passable mediocre shot.

  When almost everything is done, when the director reviews the footage, he will naturally not re-shoot because of this kind of mediocre shot, and can only make do with it.

  Many newcomers who thought "only big-name stars are important roles" have lost out on this. In his previous life, he himself had also suffered from this.

  But when the makeup artist joins forces with the lighting engineer, it's enough to make him look ten times uglier! This isn't an idol drama, Chen Jialin would never take it so seriously!