Chapter 20: 020 No wonder they chose her to act
On the way to the costume fitting, Shi Lan handed her phone to Sun Ling and instructed, “I sent a private message to someone on Weibo last night. Today, help me keep an eye out for any replies.”
“Who did you contact?” Sun Ling’s breath hitched, and she immediately felt like she was living on “the edge of a knife” every day.
“No one special, just shared my thoughts about the character design of the secondary female role.”
Sun Ling, somewhat bewildered, opened An Lan’s Weibo and casually clicked on the messages, saw the avatar of the screenwriter from “Smoke Beauty”, and gasped, but quickly calmed herself down. Perhaps the esteemed screenwriter receives too many private messages to notice Shi Lan.
Don’t panic, don’t panic, small scene.
Sun Ling felt that in these few days with Shi Lan, she had completely forgotten what industry norms were.
Every day was spent insubordinately “defying superiors”.
Looking at the female boss again, she entered the makeup room very calmly, with her head held high and her chest puffed out.
Fan Yan, whom Shi Lan was about to portray, was a fashionable and trendy heiress who had studied abroad, so the costume designer was very bold in designing her attire.
Fan Yan’s costume was mainly Western-style dresses, with a few jackets, cheongsams, and even a set of military attire.
Shi Lan, bearing An Lan’s face, was deceitfully charming in a dress, stunning in a jacket, distinctly elegant as a wealthy lady in a cheongsam, and strikingly gallant in riding attire.
Afterward, the photographer arranged for a fixed makeup photo session.
In her previous life, Shi Lan as a well-known hand model was not unfamiliar with cameras, and being a drama enthusiast, she had a natural command over performing. She had participated in world-renowned plays and had received considerable acclaim, but these were during her rebellious teenage years, and once discovered by Elder Shi, were promptly suppressed, hence, they were unknown to others.
Finally, Shi Lan changed into a black riding outfit, her hair styled up, looking majestic and spirited as she went to the set.
Today the crew members were highly alert, first because they were filming Shi Lan’s horse-riding scenes—though supervised, they were still dangerous. Second, they were filming Shi Lan and Gu Chengyu’s scenes together, and it was uncertain whether the sycophantic Chengyu would cause trouble today.
Speaking of the play, “Smoke Beauty” narrates a story during a period of war, where two major families, from being business rivals, experience turbulences, family destruction, and ultimately join forces towards industrial salvation of the nation.
The core characters of the two families were the male and female leads.
Since the drama’s title was Smoke Beauty, naturally the female lead was central, and the story would unfold primarily from her perspective, narrating her legendary life.
And Shi Lan’s character, Fan Yan, was the male lead’s childhood friend, whose existence served to propel the romantic plot of the lead characters.
Shi Lan thought to herself that she was merely expendable both off and on stage, and though she eventually chose to turn away from evil and join the military as a nurse, this wealthy young lady educated abroad certainly had her own spirit, so why did she act as if she’d never seen a man before, chasing after him?
In the drama, she was the one overly spoiled, she caused the troubles, she disrupted the lead characters’ romance, carrying the blame for the whole team.
No wonder they had chosen her for this role.
And it fitted the previous An Lan too well.
Today’s first scene was Fan Yan coming back from abroad, meeting the male lead at the horse track and realizing he had grown into an extraordinarily talented man.
Shi Lan herself felt disgusted, a sense of déjà vu to Yiping.
“The look isn’t bad,” director Tang sincerely praised when he saw Shi Lan at the set, “you should familiarize yourself with the horse riding first. Once Gu Chengyu is done, he will come over for the scene with you. Your assistant mentioned you know how to ride, do you really? Don’t overexert yourself just to save face, and later, when you and Gu Chengyu…”