novelraw Chapter 353: He Isn’t Even as Good as Chen San
Chapter 353: He Isn’t Even as Good as Chen San
Chapter 353: He Isn’t Even as Good as Chen San
Gu Zhiyuan felt a sinister fire burning in his chest, wanting nothing more than to tear this script that humiliated him into shreds.
He bent down, picked up the instant noodle box, and casually tossed it into the small mountain of trash already piled in the corner.
After doing this, he picked up the script again.
His fingers tightened, the edges of the paper already beginning to curl and deform.
But his hands were shaking violently.
The strength to tear it apart had been drained away as if by magic.
As if possessed, his trembling fingers turned to the second page.
Under the dim yellow light, he began to read.
At first, his face was full of a cold sneer.
What kind of crap is this.
The protagonist "Chen San," in order to sneak into a film set, disguises himself as a food delivery guy and ends up knocking the director's wig clean off.
Lowbrow.
Chen San plays a corpse in a period drama. Because he's too nervous, while the protagonist is delivering a long, emotional monologue, he lets out a loud fart.
Toilet humor.
Gu Zhiyuan cursed inwardly as he read.
"The screenwriter who wrote this stuff doesn't understand what film is at all. This is an insult to art!"
He read quickly, wanting to find more garbage within it that he could look down upon.
Until he flipped to a certain page.
[Scene 13, Take 7.]
[Location: Exterior of an ancient battlefield, Winter.]
[Chen San plays a scorched, withered tree, covered in mud, motionless.]
[From dawn, until dusk.]
[The director calls wrap, the film crew leaves, no one remembers him.]
[Chen San stands in the biting wind for six hours, frozen stiff. He crawls out of his "tree" disguise and limps after the last set assistant's van.]
[Chen San (with an ingratiating smile): Bro, my boxed meal...]
[The set assistant impatiently tosses a lunchbox down from the van.]
[The lunchbox falls to the ground, vegetables and rice scattering everywhere.]
[Set Assistant (O.S.): Eat it or don't!]
[The van drives away. Chen San stares at the food on the ground for a long time.]
[He squats down, picking up the rice that didn't touch the mud, putting it bit by bit into his mouth.]
Gu Zhiyuan's cold sneer froze on his face.
He snapped the script shut, his chest feeling terribly clogged, almost suffocating.
He frantically rummaged around the room, finally fishing out a crumpled cigarette pack from a sofa crevice.
He shook out the last bent cigarette, taking several tries to light it.
Smoke swirled.
But what appeared before his eyes wasn't his own pigsty of a room.
It was a glittering, gold-and-jade banquet five years ago.
He held a wine glass, bending at the waist to toast a fat, greasy investor.
He said every sweet word imaginable, boasting about his script to the heavens.
The investor listened, took his wine glass, and then poured the entire glass of red wine over his head.
"Director Gu, this little thing of yours, you dare call it art?"
"You, just like your movies, are a joke."
The whole table erupted in uproarious laughter.
He just stood there then, wine dripping from his hair, a forced smile still plastered on his face.
"Manager Li is absolutely right, I'll revise it, I'll keep revising until you're satisfied..."
The cigarette butt burned his finger.
Gu Zhiyuan snapped back to reality, viciously stubbing out the cigarette butt on the table.
Agitated, he opened the script again, wanting to use the later trashy plotlines to overwrite the memory just now.
But the more he read, the heavier his heart sank.
Three in the morning.
Gu Zhiyuan suddenly jumped up from the sofa, pointing at the script.
"Idiot!"
He was cursing the Chen San in the script.
Chen San had his boxed meal kicked over, yet the next day he still went back to that crew to be a cannon fodder extra.
Chen San, for a role with two lines, acted as a slave for the assistant director for a month, washing his stinky socks.
Chen San was swindled out of all his savings, slept under a bridge, and the next morning, still got up to practice his lines facing the river.
"No backbone! Waste!"
He cursed and cursed, but his voice grew hoarse, vaguely choked with tears.
That idiot named Chen San, trampled into the mud, could still get up the next day and continue dreaming of being an actor.
What about him, Gu Zhiyuan?
He'd even sold the courage to dream, leaving only hiding in this garbage heap, hoping for a damn lottery ticket!
Even worse than a spineless waste in a script!
He flipped to the last page of the script.
[Scene 99, Final Take.]
[Location: Chen San's rented room.]
[Chen San has just received his first-ever Best Supporting Actor award.]
[He returns home, no wild celebration, no party.]
[He walks to the mirror, looking at his reflection.]
[He carefully lifts the trophy, then, facing the mirror, practices smiling.]
[Not the proper, appropriate smile from the awards ceremony.]
[But a smile that truly belongs to him.]
[He smiles once, thinks it doesn't look good, too fake.]
[He smiles again, thinks it looks too stupid.]
[He practices, over and over, again and again, how to "truly be happy" in front of the mirror.]
[Finally, he smiles.]
[Smiling, tears begin to fall.]
This scene completely crushed Gu Zhiyuan.
He didn't wail, didn't roar.
In that moment, the world before his eyes distorted.
The old posters on the wall, the trash on the floor, the dim yellow light all faded.
An silent lens appeared before his eyes—the "Chen San" in the mirror was crying,
and outside the mirror, his own figure from five years ago, drenched in red wine yet still forcing a smile, slowly overlapped with "Chen San's" silhouette.
He could no longer stand. His body went limp, and he crumpled, curling up as he fell back into that pile of trash reeking of sour decay.
The script remained tightly clutched in his hand.
He didn't sleep all night.
When the morning sunlight pierced through the dust-covered window,
illuminating the room, the beam of light seemed especially harsh.
Gu Zhiyuan sat on the floor, eyes bloodshot, his appearance haggard and withered.
Eight in the morning.
"Knock, knock, knock."
The knocking on the door sounded right on time.
Gu Zhiyuan's heart jolted. It was the landlord coming to evict him.
He dragged his heavy body, shuffling to the door.
He pulled it open.
The person standing outside wasn't the landlord with the mean, meaty face.
It was that young Film Emperor.
Jiang Ci.
He had come alone today, wearing a simple windbreaker,
holding two cups of hot soy milk and a bag of freshly fried youtiao.
Standing at the doorway, looking at the garbage dump-like scene inside,
looking at the man before him with greasy hair, unshaven stubble, and sunken eyes.
He seemed utterly blind to all this wretchedness.
He extended the breakfast in his hand forward, using a tone as natural as could be.
"Eat it while it's hot."
The aroma of the food drifted into Gu Zhiyuan's nostrils.
It was the scent belonging to the mundane fires of life.
Gu Zhiyuan didn't take it.
His voice hoarse, he extended the crumpled script he had been clutching, handing it back.
His eyes were dull, devoid of any light.
"Take it away."
"This role... I still can't accept it."
Gu Zhiyuan looked at Jiang Ci, forcing an ugly smile onto his face.
"Do you know who I am? I'm Gu Zhiyuan, the industry's cursed lamp, box office poison."
"Don't come to me. I lose money on every film I make, who in the industry doesn't know that?"
"You're red-hot right now, do you want to get a taste of being washed-up in advance?"
"I'm already used to rotting in the mud. You're different. Get lost, don't come and dirty your future."