Behind the main building of the Beijing Film Studio sat Soundstage No. 1, covering an area of five thousand square meters and reputed to be the largest in Asia.
Behind the soundstage lay a vast open lot flanked on both sides by residential quarters. At the moment, the clearing had been walled off by temporary hoardings, taking on the look of an active construction site. Workers bustled back and forth, and the rough outline of an old street was already beginning to emerge.
This was the set being built for *Rickshaw Boy*: Xisi Pailou Street. Since the Ming dynasty, it had been a bustling thoroughfare packed with shops and crisscrossed by a steady stream of carriages, horses, and pedestrians.
Chen Qi and Li Wenhua stood off to one side watching the workers build. After observing for a bit, Chen Qi spoke up. "Director Li, should we hold another meeting to discuss the female lead?"
"Discuss what?"
"To see who's suitable!"
"..."
Li Wenhua rolled his eyes. "Take another look at your own character description. The female lead suffers from a congenital deficiency, is frail and sickly, and practically lives on medicine. To avoid burdening anyone else, she has remained unmarried well past the typical age.
"She has arched eyebrows, delicate eyes, and a gentle, clever nature. Though she knows no martial arts herself, her grasp of martial theory is unmatched. After being rescued by the male lead, she develops feelings for him and guides him in the finer points of Tai Chi, with the two treating each other like brother and sister... Does that even need a discussion? Every stroke of the pen spells out 'Gong Xue'!
"Xiao Chen, I really have to wonder.
"When other people write scripts, the production team has to scour high and low to find the right actors. Why is it that when you write a script, the actors look as though they grew straight out of your descriptions?"
"Heh heh, probably just a coincidence!"
"One person is a coincidence. Two, three, four people—that's still a coincidence?"
"Then how would you explain it?"
"Forget it. After decades in this industry, this is the first time I've actually started to believe there's something spooky in this world."
"So do you agree to cast Gong Xue as the female lead or not?"
"Change the script, and I'll agree," Li Wenhua snorted.
In times like these, the status of a screenwriter truly shone. Once a screenplay was finalized, no director could touch it unless the screenwriter made the alterations himself. Chen Qi beamed inwardly. Being an intellectual in the 1980s really was fantastic; you didn't have to crawl on the ground...
"Director Li!"
"Xiao Chen!"
Just then, someone ran over to report. "Several actors have arrived. They're waiting over at the guesthouse."
"Right, we're on our way!"
With that, the two hurried over. Climbing up to the fourth floor of the guesthouse, they found several doors propped open. Stepping into the first room, they saw Yu Hai and Sun Jiankui unpacking their belongings.
"Coach Yu! Jiankui!"
"You're finally here!" Yu Hai said. "This is our first time in a film studio. Everything's unfamiliar, and we're nervous as can be."
"Strangers on the first meeting, friends on the second. Don't worry about unpacking for now—let me introduce you to your colleagues!"
The two led them into the second room, where Ge Chunyan and Huang Qiuyan sat chatting.
Chen Qi gathered everyone together and smiled. "Come, come! This is Comrade Yu Hai, head coach of the Shandong team! Comrade Sun Jiankui... These two are from the Beijing team. One practices Baguazhang, and the other wields twin broadswords."
"Hello, hello! We ran into each other at the National Games."
"Coach Yu plays Chen Zhengying, and this is Xiao Tao, your daughter's personal maidservant. As for you two, you could say you're Prince Duan's retainers—one guards the third floor, and the other guards the fifth. Take some time to get acquainted."
Sun Jiankui and Ge Chunyan exchanged a glance without any ripple of awkwardness. Martial arts were an athletic sport, after all, and competitive sports separated men and women into their own events. If men and women actually fought each other, that'd be called *[Uncensored] Fallen Female Investigator*...
Meanwhile, in the third room, Li Lianjie, clad in a blue tracksuit, was complaining to Wang Qun. "Those Hong Kong folks really aren't dependable. They said they wanted me for *The Shaolin Temple*, but before I could even become a monk, they're having me do Tai Chi first. What kind of nonsense is that?"
"Since we're already here, we might as well shoot it. A movie is a movie."
"It's not the same!"
Li Lianjie sprang onto the bed, as nimble as a monkey, and whispered, "The daily stipend for *The Shaolin Temple* is one yuan. They haven't decided how much *Tai Chi* will pay yet. If it's only fifty cents, over several months that's dozens of yuan less!"
"That big of a difference?"
Wang Qun began to care as well. Even though he was the eldest senior martial brother, when it came to making money and financial sense, Li Lianjie had the sharpest head on his shoulders in the entire wushu team.
His father had passed away early, leaving two older brothers and two older sisters, all supported by their mother's meager wages. He was fortunate enough to get into the wushu team, where his years of service started accruing when he was only eleven. Having to earn money to support his family from childhood, he took these matters very seriously.
As an aside, there were always rumors regarding his grandfather's identity, but without a shred of hard evidence...
"Chatting, are you? How's the room?"
Just as they spoke, Chen Qi, Yu Hai, and the others walked in. Li Lianjie sprang off the bed in a flash, radiating warmth. "It's great, really great! It's my first time staying at a film studio's guesthouse, and it feels wonderful."
Yu Hai joined in the conversation as well.
The martial arts circle was small, and those who could compete in national tournaments were even fewer. Everyone knew of each other, even if they weren't close.
When Li Lianjie heard that Yu Hai was playing Chen Zhengying, he grinned. "Then you're both my master and my father-in-law! Please look out for me!"
He showed a sharpness far beyond his years, yet in some ways he was exceedingly blunt. After chatting for a few moments, he called Li Wenhua out into the hallway and asked in a low voice, "Director, how much is the daily stipend?"
"Uh..."
Caught off guard by such a direct question, Li Wenhua replied, "*The Shaolin Temple* pays one yuan, so naturally we'll pay one yuan too."
"Is that one yuan for us leads, or does everyone get one yuan?"
"The crew treats everyone equally. Everyone gets one yuan!"
"Oh, got it!"
Li Lianjie nodded and headed back inside.
Watching from the side, Chen Qi didn't talk with him much. There would be plenty of opportunities later, but from those few brief exchanges, he had already taken the measure of the young man's character. He sighed inwardly; no wonder the guy ended up turning out the way he did.
Character truly determined destiny.
When he filmed *The Shaolin Temple*, he made one yuan a day. Later, when he shot *Kids from Shaolin* and *Martial Arts of Shaolin*, it was raised to two yuan a day. But those Hong Kong extras could earn fifty dollars a day just lying on the ground playing corpses.
To earn that fifty dollars, he even put on makeup and played a corpse himself.
At the time, someone in Hong Kong offered him three million dollars per film, but the wushu team refused to release him. Under such stark contrast, it was inevitable that resentment and ideas would brew.
People called him selfish, calculating, a sophisticated egoist—none of that was surprising; human nature was simply like that. His real controversies came from his later string of actions: the One Foundation, his religious ventures, and other sensitive matters not worth elaborating on.
After meeting the actors, as soon as they stepped out of the guesthouse, Li Wenhua sighed. "A stipend of one yuan a day is the highest in the country. A tall tree catches the wind; who knows how many people are green with envy!"
"Only mediocre people escape jealousy. It's totally normal."
Chen Qi didn't mind in the least. He smiled and said, "Right now, the most important thing is to make a great movie. In the face of our art—err, foreign exchange—all reactionaries are paper tigers!"
"You're certainly more carefree than I am. Alright, let's make a great movie!"
...
Yuen Woo-ping wouldn't join the crew until filming officially began, so the current phase was intensive training.
The cast were all non-professional actors, so they needed to be taught some fundamental film knowledge. Thus, as spring blossomed across the capital, the main cast and crew arrived at the Beijing Film Studio one after another, forming a training class of over a dozen people.
Li Wenhua was the group leader, and Chen Qi was the deputy leader.
The group consisted of national wushu champions and runners-up, with the lowest ranking among them being a provincial champion. Ji Chunhua was the only one without any notable honors. The fellow felt a bit embarrassed and could barely hold his head high, but he felt a heavy weight on his shoulders: he was here representing Zhejiang, and he couldn't let his province down!
The others felt roughly the same. Whether from Beijing, Shandong, or Guangxi, they were determined to bring honor. Humiliation here meant shaming their hometown!
Sensing this spirited, soaring morale, Chen Qi was positively beaming. *Where could you ever find a scene like this in the future? On those wretched film sets I worked on in my past life, every single scene except the kissing was done by stunt doubles!*
*Fight scenes were all slow-motion special effects. Actors couldn't even twirl a sword properly, and none of them had any poise when walking, slouching along like Da Mimi lugging a turtle shell on her back.*
*Now this is what you call dragons and tigers gathering in the capital!*
Chapter 85