Chapter 10: Start the Face Slapping

Shen Jintai, who has been silent for two years recently made a lot of small movements.

“Shen Jintai is really going to make a comeback. The recent hype had been wave after wave.”

“Are you in the DGLL group?”

“Can the cuckoo upstairs not use abbreviations? Every time I visit your group, it takes me a long time to solve your codes!”

“I don’t know why this information is spreading or care about what Shen Jintai is doing now. Even if he hasn’t been unruly, it’s impossible for him to act in the same drama with Bai Yueguang, right?”

“Why is it spreading? Ha ha ha! What else could he do besides rub off the heat from Bai Yueguang in order to make a comeback. The gold powder will CUE Baiyue’s whole family crematorium*!”

* 金粉再CUE白月光的全家火葬场 I have no idea what’s this means. I think crematorium (火葬场) is a slang for something, but I cannot find what it’s referring to.

“Bai Qingquan, with his current popularity, let his nemesis rub heat off him. Don’t think too much about it. It must be fake!”

“Moonlight powder are also shameless. The likes of Shen Touhua may not bother to lift Qingquan’s sedan chair.”

“The information about the TV series is fake, but Shen Jintai’s comeback must be true. His Weibo has just opened again. He hasn’t been active on Weibo for several years, yet suddenly there’s been a huge spike of activity. He must be making a comeback!”

“What’s the meaning behind Shen Jintai’s recent Weibo post? Is it related to his nickname?”

“Hahaha, I can’t believe you don’t even know. It’s true what you said. There’s really is a big red flower on his head!”

“Is he going to rely on self-blackening and whitewashing*?”

* Black: slandering and creating or spreading negative information to defame someone or some projects, usually done by anti-fans. Self-blackening is doing it yourself // Whitewashing = deliberately misleads people in various ways, causing the people to forget a celebrity’s bad past. For instance, a celebrity with lots of scandals may whitewash themselves by doing a lot of charity work. Eventually, people will be overwhelmed with their positive energy and forget their past scandals.

“Can he even whitewash? Gay stone hammer*!”

*Stone hammer (石锤) is slang referring to conclusive evidence. He’s saying there’s irrefutable evidence he’s gay so it can’t be whitewash. Since being gay is taboo in the entertainment industry, he won’t be able to deny his sexual orientation.

“Is there anyone in the entertainment industry more disgusting than him? He bought all those black material to slander Bai Qingquan. Did the gold powder forgot the origin of the name of your family’s Shen Touhua?!”

When Shen Jintai went online, he was scolded so badly he quickly turned off his phone.

His tried-and-tested actor’s tricks didn’t work anymore!

“You still shouldn’t post on Weibo right now. I think many people have guessed that you are going to act in the East Palace.” Li Meilan said on the phone: “Bear it for a few more days. Friday will be the opening conference. We’ll try to make a splash then.”

Before the official comeback, they should remain silent. Shen Jintai’s popularity was currently too low. To get any traction, they’ll need hot spots but too much movement will look abnormal. Netizens will suspect that it’s fake news.

Now that the heat is rising, they’ll break the news directly at the right time. In the past, Shen Jintai had naturally made it to the top of the hot searches before. Li Meilan felt that she didn’t need to buy marketing accounts to push news of his comeback. The natural heat will detonate the hot search organically.

Shen Jintai hung up and read the script at home wholeheartedly. After he finished reading the 20 episodes of the script, he was so itchy that he wanted to continue reading the rest of the story.　　

However, even top-tier celebrities, like Yang Lizhi, would rarely see the entire script when picking up a drama. Sometimes it’s due to confidentiality issues, other times it’s because the script was unfinished. Shen Jintai understood that this was the norm of the industry. However, he was really hung up on the plot and really wanted to see how it’ll develop next.

Impatiently, he searched for relevant information about <The East Palace is Coming> and discovered that this drama was adapted from a well-known IP.

Shen Jintai favorite thing to do when he has nothing to do was read novels. He immediately looked for the original work so he could read it.

“Damn.” The original work was classified as R18 on a novel website!

Isn’t it a color text*?!

* 该不会是篇颜色文吧?！I’m not sure what color text is referring to.

Shen Jintai continued reading the novel and found that it was a conspiracy novel that had a particularly good mix of drama and plot. The author was even more bold and had mixture of both BL and BG*. The plot of the novel was very different from the script version. In the original novel, his supporting role was more important and there are many wonderful scenes that belong to him. These scenes were all arrange for the heroine in the script adaptation.

*BL = Boy’s Love // BG = ? I’m assuming it’s straight love. It was like this in the original text.

This is also reasonable since Yang Lizhi was a top-tier celebrity, they had to give her a much more impactful and heavier role so that she was willing to accept it.

Shen Jintai continued reading forgetting to sleep and eat until he reached the scene between the eunuch Li Xu and the exiled prince. He prided himself in having read many novels, but he was still embarrassed when he read about the eunuch’s penis*. Apparently, the author was an expert in this field because he wrote more than a thousand words about it. He had a hard time continuing.

*The author is using 车 = car in reference to his dick. I’m just going to use the reference translation.

The writing became very salacious. Since the eunuch lacked a penis, the bed scenes described would naturally be a bit different than an ordinary Daimei. The author wrote in great detail of Li Xu’s physical defects and because it how much it aroused the Crown Prince Zhou Ying.

The innocent prince had such kinky taste. My god. Shen Jintai had to put down the phone, not daring to look at it anymore. While on the subject, the person who had the most scenes in the first twenty episodes were neither the female lead, Yang Lizhi, nor the male lead, Bai Qingquan but was actually the third male lead, the Prince Zhou Ying.

Shen Jintai didn’t know who would be playing Zhou Ying’s role.

<The East Palace is coming> was the most expensive costume drama* in China of the year.

*A genre under historical drama. The costume drama is often separated into a genre of historical dramas. Early critics defined them as films focusing on romance and relationships in sumptuous surroundings, contrasting them with other historical dramas believed to have more serious themes.

<The East Palace is Coming> this year is the most expensive costume drama in China this year. The cast members encompassed three generations of old, middle-aged and young actors who were well-known in the industry. Shen Jintai plays a little eunuch who was known for his beauty. He felt like with his current appearance, it was a bit unworthy for the role.

He intended to go to bed early tonight in order to have a good look tomorrow. When taking a bath, he couldn’t help but touch his ass. ‘It’s so soft!” Shen Jintai smiled and kept staring at it helplessly.

He really wanted to…

While he was distracted, the sound of his cell phone ringing brought him back to attention, startling him. He quickly put on his bathrobe and came out. The caller ID showed “old fairy”.

Who’s the old fairy?

A vague memory popped into his mind. The old fairy was Shen Jintai’s stepmother.

When it comes to feelings, Shen Jintai and his stepmother had a very amicable relationship.

He coughed and picked up the phone.

“Xiao Jin,” a gentle and charming female voice cried: “What am I to do?!”

Shen Jintai: “What’s wrong?”

“Our house has been seized by the court. We have to move out by tomorrow.” His stepmother cried in a grandiose tone: “We have nothing left. No home, no car. It’s all gone! You must help your father. He’s going to be unable to survive!”

Shen Jintai frowned: “Stop going around in circles. Just say it directly.”

“Your house is so big just for just yourself to live alone, right? Can you let us move in? When we have money in the future, we’ll definitely move out. It’s not a big deal for adults like us to live anywhere, but your sister is so young. She can’t be allowed to suffer with us…”

Before his stepmother finished speaking, a man snatched the phone away: “Your Aunt Liu is not begging you. She’s telling you that we are moving in tomorrow. Although the house is under your name, it was this Laozi* who bought it for you!”

*Referred an old master. Commonly used slang to referred to say “Your Father”. Basically, it’s saying this great one… but in this case above, the person speaking really is his father.

Before Shen Jintai could respond, the other party hung up the phone. Judging by the tone, it was Shen Jintai’s bankrupted father. He thought about it all night whether he would agree to it or not.

He remembered Shen Jintai in the original work only loved two people in this world. One was Yan Qiuchi and the other was his half-sister.

Shen Jintai was a very ambitious person. If he had the opportunity in the future, he would most likely live with the crew. He would fly everywhere as a star and would rarely return home. Most likely he would live in his home for only a few days throughout the year max. It would indeed be empty. For the sake of the original owner, he did feel a little pity for his little sister.

When the Shen family went bankrupt, he didn’t know how he was able to keep this villa. Although the original owner used to be the top performer in the entertainment industry, he didn’t make much money. He mainly relied on his family’s money for support. Despite the poor relationship between father and son, his father had never been stingy about giving him money.

Shen Jintai checked the balance of his bank card. There was still more than 200,000* yuan left. He went to the garage to look at his luxury cars. There was still an Audi left. For a star like him, it was really a bit too poor. He had more money than this in his previous life when he was a third or fourth tier actor.

*About $31,397 USD at the current exchange rate.

He didn’t want to meet with Father Shen and the others. He felt it would be too awkward. After all, these were the relatives of the original owner, but he had died a long time ago. According to the plot, he died the day Shen Jintai transmigrated over.

Shen Jintai left 100,000 yuan and the car keys at home. He sent a text message to Father Shen, carried his suitcase, and went to a motel.

—

The next day when Li Meilan and Xiao Tang came to the motel to pick him up, they asked: “Why are you staying here?”

Shen Jintai got in the car and said, “Doesn’t matter. No one recognizes me.” No one in the country would expect a famous star like him to be living in a shabby little motel.

Xiaotang looked at the dilapidated building, closed the car door, and said, “At least it’s very close to the crew.”

“What about your house?” Li Meilan knew about his family’s situation: “Was it also seized?”

“No, my dad and the others are moving there, and I don’t want to be a bother and live with them. “Shen Jintai said, “Anyways, I’ll be living with the crew in a few days… By the way, it’ll be covered by the crew, right?”

“It’s written in the contract. Food, clothing, housing and transportation are included in the remuneration. It’s been several days since the contract was signed. If there are no surprises, they will pay a deposit today. They will pay 60% of the remuneration when the filming starts, 30% when it’s halfway done, and the rest when it finishes.”

They didn’t ask for a high salary this time. After all, this was his first job at the start of his comeback. The intangible benefits from being in this drama were more important that will eventually payout in millions down the line.

Shen Jintai didn’t really have an opinion on film remuneration. If he liked the film, even if he didn’t get paid, he would still shoot it. Compared with ordinary jobs, being a celebrity was a lucrative business. If the star was willing to work hard, money would eventually land on their feet.

Shen Jintai was still reading the script in the car. Li Meilan picked up a book and flipped through it. She circled it and made a lot of annotations, some with red-colored pen and some with blue-colored pen. There were notes in the blank spaces written by Shen Jintai so he could reference them to better his understanding of the script when he’s acting. The words were slightly scribbled and intermittent so she couldn’t understand some of them.

Seems like things are looking up. The bankruptcy of the Shen family and the loss of love must’ve hit Shen Jintai hard. The whole person seemed to be reborn and became highly motivated.

While they arrived early, there were already others who arrived earlier than they did. The veteran star Song Wei, who played the queen mother, was the first to come.

The staff introduced him to her, and Shen Jintai respectfully called her Teacher Song.

“So, you are the final cast member.” Song Wei said with a smile: “Whether this drama will be good or not is highly dependent on your role. Director Guo had been looking for a long time to fill it. I didn’t expect he picked you.” The tone was not at all subtle.

Guo Rui himself was very fond of male number two Li Xu and male number three Zhou Ying, so he was very cautious when choosing the actors. When the role of Li Xu was casted, everyone thought it would be some outstanding newcomer, but it turns out to be Shen Jintai.

The circle all knew Shen Jintai’s reputation and acting skills. Everyone understood why he got the role.

Song Wei thought silently ‘With the current situation of the entertainment industry now, anyone could become an actor. If the acting skill weren’t sufficient, the face could still be used as a vase*. Though Shen Jintai looked white and pure, in terms of beauty, don’t bother mentioning the entire entertainment industry, in their crew alone he was simply average-looking.’

*Basically, it means even if the acting sucks, they’ll still attract viewers anyways because they have a nice-looking face.

As the cast started to arrive, handsome men and beauties came in one by one, yet no matter how high ranking they were, everyone was still cordial. The late Yang Lizhi sat next to Shen Jintai had a slightly perfunctory attitude. Among all the makeup, only hers was exquisite and gorgeous. When she tossed her hair carelessly, a wonderful fragrance could be smelled.

The last one to arrive was the director, screen writer, and Bai Qingquan. He was very considerate and gave all the actors and staff on the scene a bag of tea that was famous in the local area. Shen Jintai stared at him from his seat. Bai Qingquan looked very low-key. He wore a simple white T-shirt and jeans and had no makeup on.

Shen Jintai thought despite this, his bare face looks better than others that had on makeup. With a full smile, lush red lips, and shiny white teeth, he truly was a heartthrob.

Because Shen Jintai was the last to be cast, not everyone knew the news so many had faces of surprise that they couldn’t hide. An idol with a bad reputation and average appearance, let alone any acting skills, the only thing similar to Li Xu’s character was the identity of being gay.

When Guo Rui introduced Shen Jintai, he had a very satisfied look. He smiled and said: “Everyone should already know this person, Shen Jintai, is our Li Xu. “

Shen Jintai stood up and bowed humbly: “It is an honor to participate in this play. Please give me your guidance in the coming days.”

Yang Lizhi picked up her cup and took a sip of water, suppressing the urge to flip over a table at this moment. Her current position depended not only on the crew, but also on the actors she collaborated with. The role of Li Xu was male no. 2, and in the later stage was the main villain. She had a lot of scenes with him. Guo Rui had promised her that he would be cautious in choosing the actor and she’d been looking forward to it for a long time only to find out that the result was Shen Jintai.

Shen Touhua… She often did the flower dance at Station B. Moreover, he squeezed out a younger brother from their company, who was much more beautiful than Shen Jintai. In the end, she maintained her celebrity demeanor, pulled her hair, and turned to look away.

Bai Qingquan was sitting on the other side of her. The two of them looked at each other, and Yang Lizhi shrugged.

Many people saw this little gesture. They understood Yang Lizhi’s disdain. Even they were surprised by the result.

It was rumored that Young Master Shen Jintai had a bad temper and a bad personality. The image he gave now looked so warm and peaceful as he gave everyone a smile.

After bankruptcy, the young master also became a slave to the sedan chair, and his life was turned upside down. Many people could sympathize with it.

Under the leadership of the director, everyone got to know each other first, and then they started the script run-through. All the main actors were present, and the supporting roles of the script, which had very few lines, were temporarily played by the staff. When everyone was situated, the formal reading commenced.

Everyone was stunned during this round of reading, because Shen Jintai lines were so good.

The author has something to say:

Shen Jintai: I’m here for the acting.

Everyone was slapped in the face, starting from the supporting role.

I’ve read all the comments yesterday. There are a few little angels who have great ideas. Your wishes will be fulfilled one by one in the later period!