Entertainment: 1990

Chapter 91 Heart Trap
Zhang Yan spent two days with the Three Kingdoms drama crew, blatantly asserting his sovereignty before preparing to return to the capital.

As they were leaving, many of the actors were reluctant to part with it. Sun Yanjun, who played Liu Bei, held the rearview mirror and said emotionally, "Without this car, it will be difficult to eat donkey meat sandwiches again."

Although the actors' salaries are not very high, they are not so poor that they cannot afford to eat. The main problem is that they live too far from the city and cannot make it in time.

So Zhang Yan's main activity these past two days has been taking actors who weren't filming to the city for a shopping spree. He made five or six trips back and forth, bringing back more than two hundred donkey briquettes alone.

Before getting into the car, Zhang Yan pulled Chen Hong aside and repeatedly reminded her: "That Zhang Guangbei who plays Lü Bu always turns red whenever he sees you. He's definitely up to no good. You must be on your guard and make sure he doesn't take advantage of you!"

Chen Hong barely managed to hold back her eye-rolling, secretly criticizing Zhang Yan for being such a hypocrite—spending his days indulging in debauchery while simultaneously wanting to keep her tied to his waistband.

But this is still better than Zhang Yan indulging in debauchery while ignoring her completely.

So Chen Hong eventually obediently agreed.

Zhang Yan drove out of the mountain valley and went to the most authentic old shop in the city to buy two jars of freshly braised donkey meat, along with dozens of baked buns.

Although Baoding donkey burgers are more famous, most of the donkey burgers you usually eat in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region are actually from Hejian. This is mainly because Baoding donkey burgers are made by slaughtering and braising the donkeys on the spot, while Hejian donkey burgers can be prepared in advance, making them more suitable for vendors to sell.

Upon returning to Beijing, he first sent one jar to Professor Shi Tiesheng, and then took the other jar directly to Moyan Culture, where he treated Guo Chuanlin, Zhang Peiren, and others to a delicious feast.

After half a month of selection, Zhang Peiren has finalized ten songs for his debut album. Except for the Black Panther version of "Dream Back to Tang Dynasty", the other nine songs will be recorded from scratch.

He is currently coordinating with Baihua Recording Studio to bring together all nine bands for a single recording session.

After chatting idly for a while, when Zhang Yan was about to go home in the afternoon, Guo Chuanlin called him back and said, "Xiao Zhang, Dou Wei will probably be back in a few days. Let's get together then and give him some advice."

Got~
Looks like I need to do a thorough cleaning of the car, at least the condoms hidden under the seats need to be removed quickly.

Back downstairs at the apartment building.

Zhang Yan was crouching down, trying to catch the 'balloons' in the passenger seat, when he heard someone knocking on the car window a few times.

Looking up, I saw it was Yu Hua.

"Brother Yu?"

He hurriedly got out of the car, puzzled, and asked, "How did you know I was back?"

"At noon, Mo Yan, Su Tong, Liu Zhenyun, and I ate donkey meat sandwiches at Tie Sheng's house."

After Yu Hua finished speaking, she hesitated for a moment, but still reluctantly handed over an envelope.

"WTF?"

Zhang Yan took it, unfolded it, and saw a stack of RMB inside. He frowned and asked, "Brother Yu, what do you mean by this?"

"Means nothing."

Yu Hua sighed and said, "Chen and I... your sister-in-law and I discussed it and felt that this amount of money was too much. I took one thousand, and the rest..."

Before he could finish speaking, Zhang Yan patted the three thousand yuan on his chest and said nonchalantly, "What's the big deal? Just take it without worry. Advertising pays a lot anyway. Tao Hong got six thousand. You're a writer with some fame, so four thousand isn't excessive."

Upon hearing that the young girl had received six thousand, Yu Hua gasped in shock, but then, considering that she was selling her art and her body, he felt much better.

Clutching the money, he exclaimed, "No wonder Mo Yan and Su Tong are both vying to adapt their novels into screenplays; the film and television industry is truly lucrative!"

In fact, bestselling novels can earn a lot of money. Zhang Yan could earn about 30 yuan from two books. Of course, there was no need to say this in front of Yu Hua.

Seeing that he didn't intend to refuse any further, Zhang Yan didn't bring up the money again. While gesturing for Yu Hua to go upstairs, he asked him if there was any progress on the novel.

"Ah~"

Yu Hua had just put away the money with a sense of pride when the joy of 'losing and finding' was dispelled by this topic. He shook his head helplessly and said, "To be honest, I only wrote two words in a few days: 'Living' - I thought I had a good draft in mind, but the thing I wrote just doesn't feel right."

These words sound strangely familiar.

By the way, it seems that a certain middle-aged author often uses this reason to ask for leave.

However, Yu Hua seems to have truly encountered a bottleneck.

"Don't rush, take your time."

As Zhang Yan opened the door, he comforted her, saying, "There are many pure literary novels that take ten years to perfect."

"I can't wait that long."

Yu Hua smiled wryly, "If I can't get past this hurdle in six months, I'll have to write something else first." That's actually quite a long time.

If it were Zhang Yan, he would probably give up after two months at most.

"actually……"

Pushing open the door and entering, Zhang Yan was about to say something more when he suddenly noticed about a dozen condoms on the desk, roughly arranged in the shape of a heart.

Without a doubt, this was Chen Hong's doing.

This is probably both condoning Zhang Yan and reminding him not to cause any big trouble, and it also implies that a person can have an affair, but one's heart cannot.

Tsk~
Thinking back to how he had repeatedly told Chen Hong not to give Zhang Guangbei a chance to take advantage of him when he left the film crew that morning, Zhang Yan felt somewhat ashamed.

But ashamed as he was, he would definitely do it again next time.

As for any passionate scenes, don't even think about it!

He casually opened the drawer, swept all the condoms into it, and then gestured for Yu Hua to sit down, saying, "Brother Yu, since you can't write your new book, how about changing your mood?"

Yu Hua asked curiously, "Change your mood? How do you do that?"

"The guy who shot our commercial has a script he wants to turn into a movie. I revised it a bit, but I still feel it's not deep enough. If you have time, you might as well give it your feedback—don't worry, I definitely won't let you work for nothing."

"Don't!"

Yu Hua hurriedly said, "You might as well let me do all this for nothing; that way I'll feel more at ease."

"Then I'll have him send you the script later?"

"to make!"

Yu Hua readily nodded and said, "It just so happens that I also want to see what a movie script is like. Maybe we can adapt one into a movie sometime in the future."

He was somewhat traumatized at noon today.

Mo Yan's "Red Sorghum" won numerous awards after being adapted into a film, and now Su Tong's "Wives and Concubines" has been adapted into "Raise the Red Lantern," which won the Silver Lion Award at the Venice Film Festival and is poised to become a dark horse.

With these two successful examples, Yu Hua was quite eager to adapt the screenplay.

The two chatted idly for an afternoon, talking about literature and gossip in the entertainment circle. In the evening, Yu Hua insisted on treating them to dinner, so they found a nearby place to eat hot pot.

In the evening, Yu Hua returned to his rented room after a hearty meal and drinks.

His girlfriend, Chen Hong, heard the commotion and immediately came out to greet him, asking somewhat nervously, "How did it go? The money..."

Although the two agreed after discussion that they should return most of the money, it did not mean that they were truly willing to give up the money.

Just as we guessed, it's untouched.

Yu Hua took out the envelope, flicked it, and said, "I also took on another job, helping someone revise a script."

"Zhang Yan is really generous."

Chen Hong breathed a sigh of relief, but quickly added, "You absolutely mustn't take any money from them this time."

"rest assured."

Yu Hua said helplessly, "Anyway, 'To Live' hasn't produced any good work, so I might as well use it to refresh my mind."

Upon hearing this, Chen Hong suggested, "I've read your drafts, and while the sense of immersion is quite strong, there's also a strange sense of distance—have you considered switching to the first person?"

"First-person perspective? Me?"

Yu Hua was muttering to himself when suddenly his eyes lit up. He rushed over, picked up his girlfriend, and started spinning her around: "First-person perspective, haha, how come I didn't think of that! Hahaha, this book should be written in the first person!"

That very evening, Yu Hua wrote over 8,000 words in a burst of inspiration.

The creative passion remained the next day, but Zhang Yan had already sent over the script. Yu Hua thought it was more important to repay the favor first, so he put his own writing aside and started helping to revise the script of "Hair Messed Up".

He didn't change the overall structure; he mainly optimized the dialogue and added one or two jokes that he thought matched the script well.

Although these are all minor changes, upon closer examination, the depth of the script and the refinement of the dialogue have clearly reached a new level.

(End of this chapter)