Text/Yangcheng Evening News All-Media Reporter Hu Guangxin’s legendary costume drama "Pearl Curtain and Jade Curtain" starring Zhao Lusi and Liu Yuning premiered on November 1 and became the fastest drama to reach 10,000 views on Youku in 2024. "Pearl Curtain and Jade Curtain" is

Text/Yangcheng Evening News All-Media Reporter Hu Guangxin

The legendary costume drama "Pearl Curtain and Jade Curtain" starring Zhao Lusi and Liu Yuning premiered on November 1, becoming the fastest drama to reach 10,000 views on Youku in 2024. "Pearl Curtain and Jade Curtain" is positioned as an "ancient Chinese jewelry business road movie". It tells the story of Hepu pearl diver Duanwu (played by Zhao Lusi) who escapes from the pearl quarry and meets Yan Zijing (played by Liu Yuning), a businessman from the Western Regions, and Zhang Jinran (Tang Xiaotian), a businessman from the Western Regions. ), who struggled all the way and eventually grew into a famous businessman. The framework of "Bead Curtain and Jade Curtain" is still the popular "heroine's revenge" in recent years, but in terms of story construction, the play avoids the old routines of "house fight" or "palace fight" and instead falls into the "business war" ", and unfold the story based on the routes of the Maritime Silk Road and the Overland Silk Road, trying to bring a refreshing feeling to the audience.

Recently, "Pearl Curtain" chief screenwriter Fu Tian, ​​director Xie Ze, and historical consultant Cao Jiandun accepted media interviews to share the creation story of this ancient female entrepreneurial legend.

Ordinary people’s counterattack stories

If you don’t deserve to be a “Virgin Mother”, you won’t have a “Golden Finger”

“Pearl Curtain and Jade Curtain” is the story of a “big heroine”, telling how the pearl diver Dragon Boat Festival counterattacked all the way to become a famous businessman. Chief screenwriter Fu Tian said frankly that costume dramas with female protagonists have been popular for many years, but "Jade Curtain" hopes to bring a new feeling to the audience. When shaping the role of Dragon Boat Festival, she captured a key word: ordinary. "Duanwu did not have a noble background, nor did nobles always look upon her with special eyes. She was just one of thousands of ordinary people. Duanwu could develop the courage to face everything, pursue what she wanted, and be the best version of herself." The issue of rejuvenation was taken into consideration in the creation and production of "Bead Curtain and Jade Curtain". "Not only is the protagonist young in age, but also young in mentality. The heroine must break the decadent stereotypes, which is in line with the goals pursued by young people today. It is consistent. Therefore, the heroine, her opponents and friends are mostly energetic and young-minded people. They can still hold their heads high and face the next challenge bravely after experiencing failures and losses."

Director Xie Zeze said that he did not want to portray Duanwu as a "Madonna", but to enrich her growth line: "In the beginning, Duanwu was a slave, like a soulless body. Later she gradually found her She wants to live a better life, have her own career, and be able to help others. This is a very satisfying line. Everyone has their own predicament, and I hope that the tenacity and perseverance of the characters in the play to overcome difficulties can impress the audience."

The original novel "Kunshan Jade Curtain" is shorter and does not have a particularly complete story. . When adapting the story, the creative team focused the story on the theme of "business", which not only allowed the character of Duan Wu to break away from old routines such as "house fights" and "palace fights", but also allowed her to broaden her horizons through the process of doing business and achieve goals. personal growth. Futian said: "Compared with most female themes in ancient costumes that start from adversity such as home and then start the plot from marriage and love, the Dragon Boat Festival in "Jade Curtain" faces a real desperate situation from the beginning. So she is eager to go out. Looking at the wider world, she later became a jewelry merchant, but she was never a slave to money and wealth. She could give up a lot to pursue what she thought was more worthwhile. This is a manifestation of the heroine's independent personality. "

The heroine's vision is not limited to love

The emotional line and the growth line complement each other

In Futian's view, "independence" is an important trait that distinguishes Dragon Boat Festival from most female characters in ancient puppet dramas. She hopes to create a truly independent female protagonist who is not dependent on men in "Jade Curtain": "In many ancient puppet plays, even if the heroine seems to be standing very tall, her vision still remains on love. After finishing it, I still feel that the heroine is relying on men. Our drama wants to create a woman whose vision is not only about love, but also about business and the world."

In the first three episodes, Duan Wu escaped from the pearl quarry and was in danger, but she refused Zhang Jinran's company without hesitation, thinking that she could not become a free and independent person by his side. "Duan Wu's situation It was decided that she would treat emotions as a luxury product: 'Can I depend on him for the rest of my life? ’ ‘Am I going to have to rely on his sympathy from now on? ’ She prefers to rely on herself to find the foundation of life. "

In the follow-up story, the relationship between Duan Wu and the two male characters Yan Zijing and Zhang Jinran also breaks away from the common routines of idol dramas. The attitude of the "overbearing president" Yan Zijing towards Duan Wu is more to temper than to protect. In the story In the early stage, he was ruthless on the surface, but actually created many opportunities to train Duan Wu, and secretly taught her business skills and business strategies. Bachelor Zhang Jinran acted as the "voice of conscience", so that Duan Wu would not forget kindness on the road of revenge and business. For example, in order to sell red coral to jeweler Feng Wuniang, Duanwu falsely claimed that red coral has the function of protecting marriage. Zhang Jinran stopped it in time and believed that people should be treated with sincerity in business, which finally made Duanwu and Feng Wuniang become good friends. , Dragon Boat Festival's emotional line and growth line complement each other: "In the early stage, Dragon Boat Festival will indeed be written as a 'thief'. She is not a eldest lady, and she does not have that good knowledge. But she is like a sponge, constantly absorbing things to enrich herself. "

In Futian's view, the "female+" theme will become the next trend in domestic dramas. When shaping female characters, we must integrate the characteristics of the times and abandon the dross of the past. "Our first female dramas started in the 1990s. For example, "Desire" focused on love and marriage; later it began to talk about gender emotions; then it talked about the harem and the workplace; now more and more people think that women's careers are also important. When we are making costume dramas, we must learn from the excellent qualities of women in traditional culture and abandon the outdated dross. We should not make the female characters in costumes look more feudal and decadent than modern people. "

Design story based on Silk Road

Guangzhou becomes an important stage

Lingnan audiences will find that many familiar place names and products appear in the plot of "Pearl Curtain and Jade Curtain". The key to the story - Hepu Nanzhu, that is, Guangxi The pearls produced in Hepu are now also a famous product in Guangxi; after the Yan family caravan led by Yan Zijing left the Cui family pearl quarry in Hepu, it docked at the dock in Guangzhou. Many important plots took place in the important birthplace of the Maritime Silk Road. 1 - Nanhai Temple . For example, when Yan Zijing first arrived in Guangzhou, he held a poetry meeting here and made a name for himself; after that, he participated in the Poseidon Festival and had his first head-on conflict with his rival Cui Shizhang in Guangzhou. After it came to an end, the Yan family's caravan went north by boat to Shaozhou, which is today's Shaoguan. In the following story, the protagonist Dragon Boat Festival will go all the way north to the Western Regions and discover the mystery of his life experience; at the end of the story. In this chapter, she will arrive in Yangzhou, the most prosperous commercial city in the Tang Dynasty, and grow into a successful businessman here.

It is reported that the business route in the play is based on historical data and planned according to the transportation routes of the Tang Dynasty. Cao Jiandun, the historical consultant of the play, professor and doctoral supervisor at the School of History and Culture of Henan University, introduced that the play refers to Yan Gengwang's "Transportation Illustrations of the Tang Dynasty", Zhang Xingxang's "Compilation of Chinese and Western Transportation Historical Materials", Tan Qixiang's "Chinese Historical Atlas" and related According to the research results of the book, the story of "Pearl Curtain and Jade Curtain" is a three-part story. "Guangzhou is the starting point of the business journey, and we have laid out the story here in great detail." We have done research in Guangzhou. Where is the Guangzhou port? How do feudal merchants do business here? How many trade routes are there from Guangzhou? etc. "

However, "Pearl Curtain and Jade Curtain" is a fictional story after all, and the creator also made certain choices between the fiction and reality of history.The story is blurred into a story of the Tang Dynasty, without specifying which era it is. Futian said that this approach can give greater freedom to creation: "We have researched that the routes of the Silk Road were different in the early, middle and late Tang Dynasty. The Tang Dynasty's attitude towards pearl fishing also changed from time to time. For a period of time, pearl fishing was prohibited, and for a period of time, pearl fishing was carried out in order to make money. Therefore, we concealed the specific era when creating "Pearl Curtain and Jade Curtain". The overall presentation is a kind of atmosphere of the prosperous Tang Dynasty. "

avoids the disconnection between emotion and story.

The image style pursues real

and uses the Silk Road as the story clue, which unexpectedly gives "Pearl Curtain and Jade Curtain" a game feel. But Futian also said that simply running around the map and completing tasks would make the story seem thin and boring. She hopes that the story of "Pearl Curtain and Jade Curtain" can be richer and thicker to avoid the look and feel of a unit drama. "The setting of running the map brings us challenges. The advantage of unit drama is that each unit is very compact, but sometimes it limits the development of the story. Therefore, we make corresponding choices and designs in the core events and plot tasks . In addition, it is more important to always create around the theme of business war, and put the emotional line and destiny of the characters in the story to avoid the disconnection between emotion and story."

In terms of filming, the underwater scenes of "Pearl Curtain and Jade Curtain" were harvested. Many good reviews. Director Xie Ze said: "We truly created a seabed." The crew found a swimming pool and deepened it to five meters; more than ten tons of sea sand was transported from Hepu to spread on the bottom. Since the actors had to keep their eyes open underwater, the crew strictly controlled the cleanliness of the water and basically changed the water every two days. Xie Ze said: "I insisted on filming these two underwater scenes. The first scene is a very beautiful seabed, and the latter one is an extremely eerie seabed. The seabed may seem beautiful to you at first, but in fact it is full of dangers. "Pearl slaves risked their lives to fish for pearls, but they were killed casually after landing, which made the sea full of misery."

Director Xie Ze said: "I am not running for "Pearl Curtain and Jade Curtain". Shooting with ancient puppets, I hope this drama will be realized. "In terms of setting and image style, he strives for authenticity. "For example, the design of the bilge of the ship. The original design was very big, like a palace. I don't want this style. I think the real cabin is very low and low. It was for slaves, so it has to be crowded. Everyone sleeps in it. In the gap between goods. The starting point for working as a novice must be like this, rather than living in a comfortable environment. This low level brings a lot of trouble to the staff, there is no place to put on lights and get off the plane, but I think The authenticity of the shot is the most important, and all difficulties should be overcome.”