Among the eight female film stars, the two queen-level superstars Hu Die and Ruan Lingyu, as well as the first-line female stars such as Liming Hui, Ye Qiuxin, Xu Lai, Chen Yanyan, and Wang Renmei, are the leaders. There is also a female star, she is Yuan Meiyun, who was only 16 years old at the time, was the youngest of the eight female stars.
Why did Yuan Meiyun rank among the top eight actresses at such a young age? You know, Hu Die had been in his debut for 9 years and was 26 years old; Ruan Lingyu had been in his career for 8 years and was 24 years old. Yuan Meiyun is not only young, but only two years into the film industry. It only took two years to grow from a novice artist to a first-line actress in the Chinese film industry. This is really staggering!
Actually, Yuan Meiyun's ability to become popular at such an astonishing speed has nothing to do with her life experience.
Yuan Meiyun was born in Hangzhou, Zhejiang Province in 1918, whose real name is Hou Guifeng. When she was only 9 years old, her father died of illness, and her mother had no choice but to mortgage her to a Suzhou native named Yuan Shude as an adopted daughter. She was worth 500 yuan and was held for 8 years.
Yuan Shude is a super fan, and he wants to recover his investment by training Yuan Meiyun to learn opera. Unlike the other children he bought to learn operas, other children had to curse or even hit them before they would learn, but Xiao Meiyun really liked singing operas. What makes Yuan Shude even more delighted is that this kid does have a talent for singing, and this investment seems to be really profitable.
Yuan Meiyun did not disappoint her adoptive father, she could perform on stage after learning a little more than a year. In addition to Suzhou, she also performed art in various cities including Hangzhou, Wuxi, and Shanghai. Soon, Yuan Meiyun's reputation spread like wildfire, and many famous artists are willing to find her to play with. When Yuan Meiyun was 14 years old,
deeply moved an audience member down the stage when she performed on stage. This person is Shao Zuiweng, the owner of the well-known Shanghai Tianyi Film Company. After watching Yuan Meiyun's performance, he concluded that this little girl is an excellent seedling for filmmaking, and immediately invited her.
Yuan Shude disagreed at first, but he couldn't resist Shao Zuiweng's repeated persuasion, and Yuan Meiyun insisted on boarding a new stage and asked her to try it.
In 1932, Shao Zuiweng directed the movie "Fun Show" and arranged a role for Yuan Meiyun, and Yuan Meiyun did not disappoint Shao Zuiweng and showed amazing potential. Shao Zuiweng liked the talent and immediately asked the company to sign a one-year contract with her for basic actors.
In order to win this new star, Shao Zuiweng spared no expense and asked celebrity director Qiu Fianxiang to tailor a "Little Actress" for Yuan Meiyun. The 14-year-old Yuan Meiyun played the leading role for the first time and it was amazing. After the film was released, the audience was all right This young actress with beautiful appearance, slim figure and unique temperament is full of praise.
In 1933, the Yihua Film Company, hosted by progressive people such as Tian Han and Yang Hansheng, poached Yuan Meiyun away, concentrated the best resources of the entire Yihua, and worked to build her into the company's signature.
Facts have proved that Yuan Meiyun entered the right company at the right time and did the right thing. In Yihua, she first starred in "Escape", "Rage Tide" and other left-wing films that showed anti-aggression and oppression, which conformed to the growing anti-Japanese and anti-imperialist craze in China at that time.
Since then, this type of film will inevitably be interfered by related forces. Yuan Meiyun can't help but shoot some romance films and comedies based on singing and dancing, such as "Fairies in the World" and "Incarnation Girl", etc., from the box office From the point of view, it is undoubtedly very successful. Especially after Yuan Meiyun's "Incarnation Girl" was released, the company has successively shot several sequels because of its popularity.
However, in 1935, Yuan Meiyun caused an uproar in Shanghai because of her bizarre life experience. As early as 1927, Yuan Meiyun's mother was unable to raise her children due to the death of her husband, so she mortgaged her daughter to Yuan Shude as an adopted daughter, and the detention period was eight years. However, in January 1933, his mother was tempted to re-sign a contract with Yuan Shude to formally adopt Meiyun to Yuan Shude's daughter.
From the initial adoption of Meiyun to the resignation of the contract, Yuan Shude’s thoughts from beginning to endIt is nothing more than one: treat Meiyun as a cash cow and make enough money from her. For such a control freak, Yuan Meiyun became more and more unbearable, naturally trying to break free of his restraint. Of course, Yuan Shude refused. He couldn't agree on the two talks, and gradually fell into a deadlock.
Later Yuan Shude came up with a trick to use the power of the media to attack Yuan Meiyun. The argument of Yuan Meiyun's ingratitude in various tabloids has been raging, making the issue of good life experience a hotly discussed public topic. This unexpected situation of
undoubtedly caused great trouble to Yuan Meiyun, who was only 17 years old. Finally, Fan Liangbo, who had always cared about Yuan Meiyun, was in the middle of the mediation, and after the principle of benefit distribution was re-arranged, the matter gradually subsided.
However, the trouble came to Yuan Meiyun again. The young photographer who took pictures of the eight actresses was named Chen Jiazhen. During the process of taking pictures of Yuan Meiyun many times, he gradually became deeply infatuated with the actress. However, in July 1935, when he formally confessed, Yuan Meiyun immediately rejected it because she already knew what she belonged to. The person she loved was Wang Yin, a popular xiaosheng from Yihua Company. It is understandable to refuse no matter what, but this Chen Jiazhen died of illness a year later and still reluctant to part with Yuan Meiyun before his death. After this incident was learned by the tabloid reporters, there was another round of hype, accusing Yuan Meiyun of being responsible for Chen Jiazhen's death.
In short, although Yuan Meiyun became famous when she was young, she encountered a lot of troubles and overwhelmed her.
After the outbreak of the Anti-Japanese War in 1937, although Shanghai had become an isolated island, Yuan Meiyun was still active in the film industry and made many films. A year later, she stayed in Hong Kong for two months and filmed the work "Young Master". However, during this period of the war of resistance against Japan, her most representative works are "Dream of Red Mansions" and "Xi Shi", especially in the former, her brilliant performance by Jia Baoyu has become a classic.
In 1938, Yuan Meiyun officially married Wang Yin who had been in love for several years. When they proposed to get married, Yuan Meiyun's mother and Yuan Shude greatly obstructed, because the financial account that Yuan Shude adopted when he was adopted has not been settled. Wang Yin and Yuan Meiyun had to pay a large sum of money to each of these two financial fans to get married with peace of mind. Lovers finally get married, this should be the biggest reward for Yuan Meiyun, who has experienced the ups and downs in life.
But in 1946, Yuan Meiyun was hit again, this time it was actually a prison! In April of that year, she was suddenly arrested by the police because she failed to register with the authorities for smoking opium. Despite the mediation of various parties, the hiring of lawyer Zhang Shizhao to defend and several court trials, he was eventually sentenced to six months in prison. After being released from prison, she moved to Hong Kong with her husband Wang Yin. After this prison disaster, Yuan Meiyun's spirit was hit unprecedentedly.
Although Yuan Meiyun wanted to make a comeback in Hong Kong, she ruined her acting career because of two words: the first word of
was "drug"-because she often smoked opium, she looked haggard and weakened, and she became a lot older all at once. People in their 30s seem to be in middle age. The second word of
is "fat"-as her figure has become blessed, she has long since lost her vivacious and lively demeanor, but has become a fat aunt.
Just when Yuan Meiyun was sinking, a group of new actresses such as Gu Lanjun and Chen Changhong quickly took the position. Yuan Meiyun had lost her use of abilities, and finally died in 1948, at the age of 30.
After liberation, Wang Yin, Yuan Meiyun and their two children also settled in Taiwan, the United States and other places, but they often cherished the idea of returning to their roots. In 1986, their family returned to the motherland and settled in Shanghai. In 1999, Yuan Meiyun died of illness in Shanghai at the age of 81.
