He has made 40 plays in 10 years. Because of the rapid popularity of "Running Man", he performed "The King of Many Faces" in "Shadow"
reporter of this magazine Chen Juan
Zheng Kai
actor, born in Shanghai in 1986. Graduated from the Acting Department of Shanghai Theatre Academy. In 2007, he starred in
's first film "Run, You Have A Lover", and formally entered the entertainment industry. In 2014,
participated in the reality show "Run Brother" and became popular because of it. Representative works include "To Youth
", "Private Customization", "Predecessor Raiders" and so on. Recently, starred in the movie
"Shadow" directed by Zhang Yimou.
Zheng Kai lay back on the sofa in the last row of the VIP cinema, closed his eyes and said nothing. It was almost 9 o’clock in the evening at
. The night outside the building was thick. He was exhausted after spinning for a day, but he couldn’t stop at
-in another theater, the audience was watching his movie, and he wanted to
stood on stage, thanked the audience, and interacted with the guests, "like attending a wedding."
This day is the premiere day of the movie "Shadow". As the lead actor, Zheng Kai is undergoing a "
test" and he feels a little nervous. In fact, he had joined the Venice Film Festival and the Toronto Film Festival with director Zhang Yimou before
. "Most of the feedback he got was pretty good
. Of course, it was mainly the recognition of director Zhang Yimou because they are familiar with the director." After a 5-minute break for
, he took a deep breath, got up and walked to the temporary "interview room". Under the light of the lamp
, his eyes were bright and full of energy.
"I have been waiting, and finally there is a character who can tell everyone that Zheng Kai can act in addition to running fast
." When he said this, Zheng Kai looked back. Behind him is the
poster of "Shadow"-his protagonist, Peiliang, dressed in an ink-painted textured long dress, raised his sword with his right hand, with sharp eyes on
, which is completely different from his previous "little cheetah" image of the sun and joy. This feeling of
is when you see a person who is both you but who is completely different from you appears on the screen
".
lived in the body of a substitute
Two years ago, in "The Great Wall" directed by Zhang Yimou, Zheng Kai played a "man standing next to the king
"-the Privy Council special envoy, Mr. Shen. In just a few shots and no more than 5 lines of
, he performed the image of a scheming and flattering civil official. On the day when the play ended, Zhang
Yimou gave him a big hug and booked the next movie. So, this is the second film "Shadow" that
has collaborated with. The original inspiration of
"Shadow" came from the screenwriter Zhu Sujin's "Three Kingdoms·Jingzhou", which intercepted the story of
Zhou Yu and Guan Yu Yishi and Yixu fighting for Jingzhou. The original blue
of the film was based on the relationship between Zhou Yu, Guan Yu, and Sun Quan. Later, during the process of discussing and modifying the script of
, the relationship between the characters changed, and Zhang Yimou decided on the theme of "Standby"
. Place the background of the story in the overhead world. In this world, Zheng Kai
became the king of Peiguo-Peiliang. The whole story of
is not complicated. Peiguo and Yanguo are opposed to each other. The governor of Peiguo is severely injured by Yanguo general Yang
. He secretly controls his stand-in to fight with Yang Cang in an attempt to retake Jingzhou City. At the same time,
has a power struggle between Peiliang and Ziyu within Peiguo. The various forces are intertwined. Every
person has his own desire...
"In the beginning, Peiliang's reference was Sun Quan, but later it was not If you play Sun Quan, you don’t need
to play him.” Zheng Kai said, “The comparison will return to the stylized performance, let the audience enter the
seat, there is nothing new. I don’t like sticky performances, and the director doesn’t want it. Later. Just
let yourself fly a little bit more freely".
Deng Chao plays two roles, Ziyu and his stand-in are in Jingzhou. Peiliang does not have a substitute, but there are many
faces. "People spend a lot of time in front of him, and he deposes Ziyu as soon as he appears on the stage, teasing him
in the hall. He looks crazy and stupid, like a faint king, but he is good at calculating, with a black belly and vicious belly. .At the same time,
also cares about Peiguo, and also cooperates with Ziyu to recover Jingzhou. It can be said that the double is a substitute for him at
Hidden existence."
, a "multi-faceted king", is the "ideal character" Zheng Kai has encountered since entering the industry.
. During the filming, he chewed up the biographies of the characters and the mentality of the characters over and over again and again
He wrote full notes on the script. In addition to studying his own role, he also pondered the content of the
expression in the film, "The shadow and the real body are not equal, they have a primary and secondary relationship. It is generally believed that the shadow of
is a service. This drama shows that there is another possibility that the shadow can kill the real body against
." From the very beginning, Zhang Yimou set the tone of "Shadow" as "a movie". Shakespeare’s great tragedy "
", so the whole movie is full of "drama." As the king of Peiguo, many of Zheng Kai's plays
are completed in the hall. The hall is covered with ink-style veils with books on it. The writing brush is big
, dancing with the wind. Many people think that the picture is beautiful and poetic, but behind the ultimate beauty is the sadness
. As the senior film critic Mei Xuefeng said, "Zhang Yimou takes the simplicity and etherealness of black and white
in ink landscape paintings. Changing the courtyard becomes a kind of monotony and depression with nowhere to go. He used the colorless black and white of
to express the innocence of human existence and the unavoidable violent
conflict.”
Zheng Kai’s most impressive scene took place in the last 20 minutes. Jingzhou City was recaptured and his sister Qingping died.
On the battlefield, Peiliang invited Ziyu (actually his substitute Jingzhou) and his wife Xiao Ai. After
, Ziyu wearing a mask appeared in danger. As the plot continued to reverse, the story was pushed up by
Climax. In the fierce language confrontation, each took off their masks to reveal their true colors, revealing the erosion of human nature by power and desire. In the end, Pei Wang, who originally thought to control the overall situation, and Ziyu, who was in control, both fell. Under the sword of Jingzhou.
and this is exactly where the film attracts Zheng Kai-everyone has many aspects, "Like the Taiji gossip picture in the film
, gossip means black and white, which is black. White; but it also circulates with each other
. There is white in black, and black in white. In fact, it mainly expresses the changeable nature of humanity. There is no absolute good or bad of
.
, a little fish struggling to swim forward,
, is not just a show. The performance is good, but also very hard. "This is Zhang Yimou's evaluation of Zheng Kai. When filming "
Shadow", Zhang Yimou required every actor to have a skill. Sun Li played the piano, and Zheng Kai
was calligraphy. Zheng Kai recalled that during that time he had every day. They practiced calligraphy, and followed professional
teachers to study cursive script, writing the character "Pei" and "Taiping Fu". So, there are pictures of Peiliang
drinking and making fun, splashing ink and swaying in the film.
is in the show business circle, Zheng Zheng Kai has always maintained a stance of rushing forward.
When he was studying in the Acting Department of Shanghai Theatre Academy, Zheng Kai was the famous "advertising king
". At most, he can receive 6 advertisements a month and 4 years of college education. Later, he received hundreds of
advertisements. Perhaps because of the appearance of Youth Sunshine, most of his shots were FMCG ads, such as McDonald’s, KFC, Pizza Hut, Wangzi Milk... For a while, he walked on the street. You can see yourself everywhere on
. However, the advertisement of
did not pave the way for Zheng Kai to enter the performing arts circle. After graduation in 2008, he started to drift north with the curiosity of
, just like “a piece on the Huangpu River” Growing up fish, I want to see what the fish under the imperial city
eat". After arriving in Beijing, he signed a contract with Huayi, and set himself the goal of
from the beginning: to shoot at least three or four works every year. The second year In college, Chen He, "the brother who slept on the upper bunk
", became famous in one fell swoop because he starred in "Love Apartment". In the same period, Zheng Kai
was still playing tricks in various idol dramas, and also in some unknown movies. I played the protagonist of
...like "the little fish was thrown into the river and soon disappeared", Zheng Kai concluded by himself
.
used the trial experience accumulated during the shooting of commercials, and Zheng Kai ran among the various crews. At that time, he kept
looking for opportunities to play. He has his own set of audition methods-bring a notebook and use PPz
to sell himself to the director, just like commercial promotion. "It's completely mechanized work, explain
let go of their anxiety. "At that time, what Zheng Kai worried most was that there was no play to play. One time at
, he went to a trial, and waited from morning to midnight. What he waited for was a statement from the director: Don’t wait for
.
"At that time, the idea was very simple. , Can’t stop, as soon as this industry stops, it means leaving. "
Zheng Kai said, he is like a small fish that doesn't want to be wrapped in mud and sand. He swims forward, swims to a wider area of
, and then jumps out of the water with all his strength to bask in the warm sun.
At the end of 2012, Zheng Kai was filming in Qingdao, and was notified that Feng Xiaogang's crew wanted him to try out
. The first reaction was "Wow! Can it work? "The next day, he took the earliest flight to Beijing and went straight to the director's studio. "As soon as I entered the audition room, I was a little nervous. Generally try
play is very simple, one table and two chairs. Director Feng was very serious, and he turned on the lights and posted the microphones, and the three cameras
were facing you. "He played the same scene 7 times. On the third time, Feng Xiaogang left
and walked forward to talk about the play. Zheng Kai knew it was done. On the Spring Festival of 2014, Feng Xiaogang's "Private Order" was released, which became the Lunar New Year. The popular movie
. Zheng Kai plays the psychic anesthetist Ma Qing in the film. He is silly, funny, gags, and
realizes the dream of others. Among them is the driver played by Fan Wei who wants to realize the "dream of honest officials", Zheng
Kai turned into his driver, put on a tunic suit and black-rimmed glasses, and seriously tricked him. What is rare for
is that he has a good grasp of the contrast and laughter.
is because of "Private Custom", Zheng Kai said A little fish finally "jumped out of the water." After that, his
life went into the fast lane: he participated in the reality show "Run Brother" and quickly became popular with
, and he became known as "Little Cheetah" because of his fast running. No.; starring in the "predecessor" series of movies
, he played the role of Yu Fei, the love scene player in the film, on the surface of uninhibited love for freedom, in fact,
is innocent and emotional. After three "predecessors", Yu Fei continues to grow, Zheng Kai Yezhen
has a role of his own.
slows down and is still running
Since his debut in 2007, Zheng Kai has filmed 40 dramas. "What is the concept of 40 dramas? The average production cycle of a movie of
is 3 months, that is to say, 12 months a year without a holiday, at most
can shoot 4 movies. For 10 consecutive years. This is my 20 to 30 years old. "
has many works, but the role types are relatively single-urban males and rich second generations. What directors value
has always been the temperament and appearance of his sunny boy, including the "predecessor
" series of movies that later made him a hit. He himself had struggled with it himself, and wrote in his blog: I thought that youth and vitality were my signature and capital, but I did not expect that one day it would become an obstacle to
on my way forward.
Slowly, Zheng Kai I figured it out, and I can’t be too demanding of myself. When he was studying in the theater, his graduation thesis titled "On the Relationship between the Personal Charm of an Actor and the Charm of a Character",
wrote about the "male god" in the article. Robert De Niro-an American actor who has been nominated for Oscars for films such as "Angry Bull"
and "The Godfather".
"The relationship between roles and appearances and acting skills continues to cut, and De Niro is also in Gang gang,
tough guys established a foothold before starting to try comedies. "Zheng Kai said. Now he finally understands
. "Anything can be performed" is not the only criterion to measure a good actor. Being able to perform on a
drama is also a proof of himself. "So I have to do it first. Occupy the "pit" that is good at
, and then jump to other "pits" to try. "
In May 2017, he stepped onto the stage of "Starry Sky Speech" and gave a speech with the theme of "Mr. Almost
". "Almost spirit is not not fighting. But when you have worked hard for a long time, but still can't reach the distant goal you want, can you try another way,
? Or go slowly, not so eagerly. "
Because of the "almost" theory, Zheng Kai started to slow down and enjoy life. Last winter,
followed the crew in Seville, SpainWhen filming "High Aspirations", after dusk, the town was extremely quiet at
. He took Chen Qiaoen and Zhu Zixiao to play mahjong and taught them hand in hand. After killing
, everyone detained his mahjong and prevented him from taking it away; "Run, brother
", he took a lot of photos of his friends because he likes to take pictures... "This is also a kind of simple happiness for
." Zheng Kai said.
“People cannot be too willful, sometimes they need to compromise with reality, but sometimes they must persist.” After the interview with
, Zheng Kai got up and habitually stretched his body back a few times. He cheered up and
was ready to take the stage again. Seeing his leaving back, his feet hurried, he still feels like the agile cheetah of
. Once he exerts his strength, he runs hard.
