Author | Nanfengchuang Reporter Lu Chi
Duty Editor | Huang Mingting
When she was forty years old, Liu Yan suddenly realized that she had to make a decision - whether she wanted to live alone in this life.
She was used to living alone, and even just because she was so used to it, some kind of vigilance radar in her was activated again. She was always like this, wary of things that were too comfortable and static, and wary of people taking advantage of leisure opportunities. And work will enrich her as always and soothe all her little anxieties and loneliness.
This spring, she was recording "Chengfeng 2024" in Changsha and had to live in a dormitory with multiple people. Living alone for many years initially made Liu Yan a little uneasy, worried that she would not adapt. But later, a kind of mutual understanding and care that "only mature sisters can have" surprised her. Even the time to use the toilet was distributed harmoniously among the sisters.
After more than ten hours of recording the program, Liu Yan came to the interview lounge. She was wearing a black knitted vest and black pants, but her whole person was filled with brightness. She smiled and shook hands with me. Even though she is very tired, her full energy is still contagious to others.
One day ago, I saw Liu Yan at the recording site of the second performance stage. Her team with Chen Lijun, Sa Dingding, and Chen Haoyu was the first to appear. When Liu Yan suddenly appeared in the center of the stage, everyone became restless. A large number of spectators gathered from the unseen corners to the dance floor to cheer for Liu Yan.
No one doesn’t know Liu Yan. Even if he doesn’t come specifically for her, he is still willing to stay for her. "What's different about Liu Yan?" many people asked, attracted by her magnanimity and confidence.
Over the years, Liu Yan's changes are obvious to all. She has been breaking through herself. She is seen and remembered not only as a professional host, but also as Sun Sanniang in the costume drama "Menghualu" and "The Beneficiary" Yue Miaomiao, who made her nominated for the Golden Rooster Award for Best Actress...
Looking back on the road she has traveled, Liu Yan found that perhaps in her twenties and thirties, in order to protect herself, she would deliberately hide some "thorns" or even change them A character that makes others uncomfortable and hinders her future in others' eyes, but now Liu Yan doesn't think so. She feels that she is very precious. She told Nanfengchuang that as long as the thorns don't hurt others, you can keep them.
A few days later, Yang Tianzhen, who was invited to serve as the promoter of "Chengfeng 2024", interviewed Liu Yan and asked her, "If Now if someone offends you in person, what will you do?" Liu Yan replied without hesitation: "Just fight back." This sharpness and toughness made her a hot topic.
In life, this kind of sharpness occasionally caused Liu Yan to be ridiculed as a "gangster" by friends, accompanied by the catchphrase "That's not necessarily the case." Liu Yan always subconsciously stands on the opposite side of a thing or a point of view and thinks, "Is it really like this? Is this feasible?"
So, from this perspective, maybe it is not her who has changed, or maybe it is not her who has changed. , not just her. The changes in environment and time have allowed Liu Yan to release his resilience, confidence, authenticity and magnanimity.
01
"Hexagon Warrior"
"Chengfeng 2024" invited Liu Yan many times in previous editions, but she never came.
At first, she was a little nervous because she was not a professional singer or dancer. She is not afraid of losing, but worried that she is not capable enough. "This stage is a competition stage, how can I make do?"
Until this year, she suddenly felt that she had to let everyone see, "Who is Liu Yan?" Who else can Liu Yan be?
Liu Yan has been in the industry for fourteen years starting from her hosting career, but in her opinion, many people know about herself, but “don’t know what you have done specifically. What is your masterpiece? What are you good at? My My identity as an actor may have been recognized, but my stage performance has not yet been recognized.” When
performed for the second time, their team’s song selection was the most difficult for the entire stage. Dance from beginning to end, and you have to be blindfolded for the second half.On the last day before the performance, while rehearsing with the dance group, Liu Yan, who was too involved, didn't realize that he had fallen many times until others noticed a lot of bruises and scars on his body.
What impressed her even more was the original song originally scheduled for the first performance called "Hexagonal Snowflake". Snowflakes may not be the hardest, but they are hexagonal and, to use the current buzzword, are like "hexagonal warriors." This touched Liu Yan, "A woman, no matter what age she is, can touch you in the direction you like in the career she loves, and can show different aspects of you." This is what she hopes to do in "Chengfeng 2024" appeared.
From host to actor, Liu Yan has been known as the "Desperate Sannyasin" for many years. As long as there is an opportunity, she will seize it with all her strength. She needs to be seen, needs to be acknowledged. Especially in the first two years when she started working as a host, when she had the heaviest workload, she had 7 regular programs and 4 weekend programs, but she refused to let go of any of them. Her mobile phone was on 24 hours a day and she almost never asked for leave. Even during the Chinese New Year, I was working. The only time she asked for leave was because she had a fibroid tumor in her breast, and she went to the hospital for surgery alone.
She regards all opportunities as life, "I want you to be impeccable and there is no reason to replace me." Just like Liu Tong, vice president of Enlight Pictures, once described Liu Yan: "a rock", hard and unbreakable, just like her name.
Liu Yan was like this when he first started drifting to the north more than 20 years ago. She caught a cold as soon as she arrived in Beijing, which lasted for more than a month. "But I didn't take medicine. It was like I had to fight the cold to the end."
In those years, she had a realistic need to fight for her life. The mother was diagnosed with rectal cancer. For an ordinary family, a serious illness can often make the first sensible child shoulder the heavy burden. In order to save money for her mother's surgery, Liu Yan participated in the host selection contest jointly organized by Anhui TV Station and Guangguang Media in 2005, and received a bonus of 10,000 yuan.
Later, Liu Yan recalled himself at that time: "If you put 10,000 yuan in front of me now and ask me to do something, I will think there is something wrong with your brain. But if you put 10,000 yuan in front of me then, If someone asks me to do something in front of me, I might just do it. "
She is a person who doesn't think too much. Once she makes a decision, she will give 200% of her effort. Just like the old saying in her hometown of Hunan, "It's hard to be patient, annoying to be patient, and arrogant to be domineering." And to use her own description, she is a bit of a "twisted" girl. When she was the host of Guangguang, she didn't want to just be a co-star who had to pretend to be stupid and laugh. She tried her best to use her brain and strength.
In recent years, feminist trends and the relatively abundant female images in the literary and art market have allowed more and more women with public visibility to speak out and lead the way. Liu Yan, who has been plagued by prejudice for many years after her debut, also began to talk about the gender dilemma she had experienced in interviews. She said openly, "I don't want to be an objectified female artist, and I don't want to be someone who can be teased by anyone." Liu Yan".
"But why do you feel internal conflict? Are you a person who is completely incapable of internal conflict?"
I asked this question again during our interview. Without hesitation, Liu Yan said, "If I were (a person prone to internal friction), I wouldn't be alive now." She was glad that she had been a "very unkind" person since she was a child. "I can't be gentle," she said with a smile. , I feel that this is quite suitable for being an artist.
The back of the heart is not completely "insensitive", but may just be a self-adjustment of mentality. Liu Yan feels that she has the most beneficial mentality, which is "not to think the worst of others."
"If I had a pair of eyes that could see through everything, I would know that all the truth is so cruel, and I would definitely not be happy."
02
reversal
Sun Sanniang was determined to change.
In the 2022 costume drama "Menghualu", Sun Sanniang, played by Liu Yan, was born in a lower class, was abandoned by her husband and disliked by her son, and was reborn after death.From hoping for a successful child to self-awakening, to earning a phoenix crown and a beautiful woman on her own, Sun Sanniang's character, resilience, courage and transformation have transcended the times and are closely aligned with today's female consciousness.
For Liu Yan, Sun Sanniang has a special status in her acting career. Along the way, Liu Yan, like Sun Sanniang, has shaped himself in a solid life of fireworks, but in his heart he has a bold and free spirit of the world. After the filming of
, Liu Yan wrote to Sun Sanniang in a letter to encourage her and himself: "Others will always make random judgments, or express kind sympathy towards us, but we do not need to pity, and we will never bow to other people's opinions. Sanniang, we must continue to walk firmly on the path of life we want! "
Like many characters in the past, she and Sun Sanniang completely empathized. Sun Sanniang "drifted" in Tokyo in the Song Dynasty, and Liu Yan "drifted" in modern Beijing. Their characters were shaped by their experiences. They both understood from the beginning that they had to make their own way.
In fact, she has always been the kind of actor who uses her life experience to fit the role. In "Diaosi Men", which she collaborated with Dapeng for the first time, she played the role of a foot-cleaning girl from Beijing. She spoke Mandarin with a Hunan accent and recounted the hardships of working: "I have been in Beijing for three years, and I have been working here. I didn't make much money by washing people's feet. I had to rely on me to support my family, so there was nothing I could do. Who told me that I didn't study hard when I was a child? If I had worked hard, I might have been able to get into college. Apart from the script, because it was too real and emotional, it was eventually retained in the feature film. During the filming, Dapeng listened to these words and cried for the first time in a comedy.
Liu Yan’s character is somewhat similar to her own experience. "Beijing Drift Girl" is the role she can most embody in the early stage. The ups and downs, scars and pain from the past nourished her sincerity and instinct of being self-taught in the role. For an actor, these two are much more important than skills.
It wasn’t until 2022 that I encountered “Meng Hua Lu”. When I saw the script for the first time, what Liu Yan wanted to play the most was the protagonist Zhao Pan’er. "She is good at everything and has everything." Later, she asked her mother which character she liked best, and her mother also liked Zhao Paner.
But there is no other way. "Actors are passive." If someone comes to you and you get an acting role, it's a blessing.
Fortunately, Liu Yan finally began to have the right to choose. She became aware of and understood the female life that she could interpret, and she also had the ability to get rid of the previous image labels.
She hopes to be like her favorite British actress Kate Winslet, who "changes her appearance, temperament and status to get closer to the character", or one day be able to play a female character like her favorite American TV series "The Good Wife" , "It's amazing. She (they) have many shortcomings and will make mistakes, but she has tenacious vitality and a very attractive personality."
More than twenty years ago, one day in 2012, Liu Yan made a mistake in the early morning A Weibo post by Yidian said: "If I had to choose between 'Little Birds' and 'Independent Women', of course I would choose the latter. In fact, men don't have to be too afraid of me. I'm not as scared as you think." Strong, I’m just relatively independent and sometimes use a man’s thinking to consider problems.”
She has not hidden any Weibo posts or comments.
03
Best Actress
In 2018, Liu Yan stopped acting for a while. At that time, she had just experienced the major blow of her father's death and went to a language school in Los Angeles to study for a period of time. One day, her friend Dapeng suddenly found her and invited Liu Yan to act in another drama with him.
This time, Liu Yan ushered in a female character who truly made her visible and had an inherent sense of independence and value - the female anchor Yue Miaomiao in "The Beneficiary".
This is also the character that Liu Yan tore open and showered with his flesh and blood. A low-class girl who drifts north alone puts on a charming and charming appearance in order to survive. Only those who really get close to her can see her inner self.But both Liu Yan and Yue Miaomiao knew that in a jungle society, being able to rely on false appearances to make a living and profit for oneself was already a tacit and basic rule of survival for adults.
In the play, for the sake of love, Yue Miaomiao goes to participate in the chili eating competition. In order to stimulate a real physiological reaction, Liu Yan added mustard to the raw chili peppers. The double stimulation made her blush and shed tears.
The climax of the live broadcast was in the last live broadcast. Facing the camera, Liu Yan took off the makeup on his face and the wig on his head while confessing in Hunan dialect: "Today is my last live broadcast. Let everyone see that I don't wear makeup." I'm from Hunan. When I was older, I wanted to leave home and go to Beijing. I suffered a lot and got deceived a lot, but I finally found a place where I could be real. As a person of mine, I have always said that I am 24 years old in my birth year, but no, I am 38 years old. I will start a new life in the future..." She seemed to be crying and smiling, with a haggard face.
Liu Yan at that time was indeed 38 years old. On and off the screen, she once again connected herself with the character.
At that time, Dapeng said: "This scene seems to be Liu Yan's documentary. She has no script, so she speaks for herself." After saying that, he turned to Liu Yan and said, "You can win the Best Actress Award." Liu Yan didn't believe it. .
At the end of 2019, at the 11th Macau International Film Festival, she won the Best Actress for Yue Miaomiao.
In fact, Liu Yan knew that he had talent from the time he first started acting. If nothing else, at least her many years of experience as a host have laid a certain foundation for her lines. She can "speak the words quickly and recite them quickly."
But as she performed more and more dramas, she slowly entered deeper waters and gradually discovered that "it is impossible for people in real life to speak as smoothly and logically as the host." She gained the ability that she had never thought about before. professional perspective.
In 2021, Liu Yan played a woman from a lower-class background and a miserable life experience in an anti-Japanese TV series. In one scene, she had three of the most famous dishes in the city brought to her. For a character who had never eaten anything good since she was a child, the script required Liu Yan to perform "so delicious that she cried." So Liu Yan really ate, cried, and told his past tragic experiences.
But as she continued to act, she got stuck. She found that when a person was eating, crying, and expressing her lines fluently, her emotions were interrupted, and she could not balance the expression of emotions and lines. "But I didn't have the rhythm and detail processing of a performance at the time. I was stuck there and felt very uncomfortable. I asked why I couldn’t cry. I’m a very good actor in crying scenes. Why can’t I cry?”
At this time, the opponent actor Wang Xueqi said something next to Liu Yan: "He said the words didn't really matter at all." Liu Yan suddenly "enlightened", "Lines cannot hinder your performance, they can only assist your performance." In the context of that scene, emotion came first.
"Only at this time did I know what a real performance is."
04
不愿
When he was forty years old, there was a period of time when Liu Yan would often wake up alone in the early morning for no apparent reason. There is an hourglass counting down. What should I do today? Should I still plan my life? Will I live alone in the future? "Maybe it was because I was too free during that time." At that time, Liu Yan's father passed away, his mother fell in love, and his brother also had a third child. The cohesion of the family has decreased compared with before, "but I am still alone."
Liu Yan did not shy away from admitting the loneliness she occasionally felt, and her yearning for love and marriage. She also looked forward to being a mother, but this kind of thing, like a good role, is rare. When it comes to "love", everyone is passive, and Liu Yan is no exception.
Over the years, she will not allow herself to spend too much time and energy thinking about these future things. Once she notices signs of anxiety, she will consciously pull herself back to the most familiar state: getting busy.
She thinks she is not working so hard now and is "much better". However, over the years, her agent will still complain to her, saying that she is tired and wants to retire. "He said why are you so energetic? He said you are four now." Now that you are a teenager, you should enjoy your life and travel more to the outside world.”
Liu Yan’s last trip was to Xishuangbanna with his family during the Spring Festival, but it was also because he happened to have work and needed to visit places.
For Liu Yan, her family is her extremely important support at all times. When she was young, her parents never stopped Liu Yan from doing anything or making any decision. "They completely trusted me." She herself had longed to become a mother, but she knew more clearly who she was now and what was most important. In 2022, Liu Yan took her mother to participate in a reality show "Let's Go!" "Mom", Liu Yan advised mothers to put "self" first in the ranking of "self, parents, children, and partners."
Until now, although she has not established a family of her own, her brother's family has become a harbor behind her. My brother's three children are all named after Liu Yan.
In fact, the name "Liu Yan" does not have any special meaning. It was changed by Liu Yan himself when he was a teenager. Her original name is Yangliu, and Yang is her mother's surname. The parents had agreed early on that regardless of whether they were boys or girls, the first born would take his father's surname, and the second born would take his mother's surname. Liu Yan also had an older brother. But "the name Yangliu is too common," so she changed the "Liu" from "Yangliu" to her surname, and her parents did not object.
Liu Yan's frankness is reflected in her unwillingness to use popular and cutting-edge doctrines to dress herself up. She has always openly admitted that she longs for marriage and family. There is no need for the anxiety of forty-year-olds at the age of forty. avoid. The old saying "no confusion at forty" is difficult to achieve, but now Liu Yan believes that the so-called "spiritual independence" should mean "even if there is confusion, even if you can't solve it, you will no longer struggle with it."
She learned A moderate insensitivity, this is to allow herself to concentrate on the present moment and retain the vivid vitality that makes her still willing to stay and stop.
After the interview, she walked out of the recording studio. There was a circle of fans outside the studio in the dark night, not all of whom were waiting for her. Liu Yan ran into a large Akita dog being petted by several girls outside the fence. She couldn't help but softly exclaimed in surprise, "What a big Akita dog!" After a few more steps, some girls gathered around outside. Only then did he recognize Liu Yan through his laughter, and immediately exclaimed, "It's Liu Yan!"
Even if someone isn't waiting for her specifically, he will always recognize her and be willing to treat her with enthusiasm and laughter.
-end-
Editor | Wu Qing
Typesetting | Promise
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