Studio Superstar

The first round of the competition was held in the small theater studio, the same place where the four mentors met them for the first time.

From 5 o’clock in the evening, the live rehearsal officially began.

Chang Yun was in a two-person play while Gu Ling and Jiang Lianlian were both single-person plays. They were called away one after another. It wasn’t until 8 o’clock that Chang Yun was the first to come back and gestured to Xue Xiao.

“It is amazing, amazing! The small theater is much bigger than it seems on the outside. Behind the stage curtain is a track in the place where the scene is set up. They have already built the scene for each play. When the time comes, use the track to directly send the scenery to the front of the stage. It is a super big production!”

Just imagining it was exciting. Once it was 9 o’clock in the evening, Xue Xiao, Zhao Dong and Jin Xiaochen were called to the small theater to rehearse. They saw the busy scene and the scenery on the circular track one by one. Once the lights turned on and the cameras were busy running, Xue Xiao’s heartbeat increased.

The concept of ‘starting from zero’ was pioneered by Studio Superstar but they weren’t the first in China to hold an acting competition show.

Similar shows had long optimized the competition mode and it was very mature. It wasn’t difficult to imagine that in addition to the track scenery and live performance in the early stage, the later Studio Superstar was likely to be transformed into a film and television production mode.

As long as they could stay on this stage, they might become the protagonists of the big screen.

Jin Xiaochen secretly clenched his fists. “We must perform well and stay until the end. In any case, we can’t lose to…”

He glanced vaguely at the Fan Xue trio who came down from the rehearsal site.

By that afternoon, he and Zhao Dong already knew why their group was tripped up.

As an Internet surfer, Jin Xiaochen knew that the water in the entertainment industry was very deep. He just hadn’t expected that this water would one day cover his own head.

It was fortunate that Fan Xue hadn’t caused too much loss to their group at present or Jin Xiaochen would make it big news, even if it meant fighting the show and not recording.

Zhao Dong patted him on the back. “Bring out your best acting skills. This is the best counterattack against them.”

“Wait for me.” Jin Xiaochen gritted his teeth and glared at Fan Xue’s back. “They want us to act badly because of those stumbling blocks? They are underestimating us! I won’t sleep today. I will rehearse all night and kill them!”

Xue Xiao couldn’t help laughing and gave a reminder, “Then you have to be careful that your voice doesn’t become hoarse tomorrow and it doesn’t crack when you read your lines. There is no live dubbing here.”

Jin Xiaochen: “……”

Zhao Dong suddenly laughed. “I still have to sleep. I need enough energy to perform well tomorrow!”

Jin Xiaochen looked at the two of them and muttered, “Brother Zhao and Brother Xue, why don’t the two of you seem to care much?”

Zhao Dong scratched his head when he heard this. “Xiao Jin, it isn’t that I don’t care. Compared to this, I’m actually more surprised that Director Gao would explain this matter to us.”

Zhao Dong might just be a group actor but he usually wandered between the major crews. He saw and heard a lot of dirty things in the entertainment industry.

For example, what Fan Xue did to them. In other variety shows, it was entirely possible for the staff members to turn a blind eye.

What were the three of them? They were a background actor, group performer and amateur.

Who was Fan Xue? His Weibo had almost 10 million followers!

Who couldn’t understand who was more important?

Meanwhile, the Studio Superstar staff… or in other words, Director Gao came forward to deal with this matter. In addition, he talked to the three of them one-on-one and apologized.

It was true that what Old Gao could do was limited but Zhao Dong could fully understand. After all, there had always been a competition for power in the entertainment industry. If this huge show could be completely decided by Old Gao then would he just be the assistant director?

From this perspective, Old Gao might’ve been under a lot of pressure when communicating honestly with them.

The amount of sincerity contained in it wasn’t small.

“Thinking about it carefully, no matter how the filming of Studio Superstar turns out, at the very least, its starting point is sincere. They gave countless small opportunities to us invisible…” Zhao Dong turned his head to Jin Xiaochen. “At this critical moment, we must not be affected by a villain’s mentality. We must focus on acting and we must be worthy of the people who have shown sincerity behind the show. Xiao Jin, do you understand what I mean?”

Jin Xiaochen was stunned.

It was also at this time that Xue Xiao spoke softly.

“The bigger the stage, the more risks and opportunities coexist.” The young man looked directly at the stage under the spotlight and light flashed in his eyes. “But in front of such a big stage, what is risk?”

“The risk is just a stone that you accidentally stepped on while walking on the road.” Xue Xiao turned his head and said seriously to Jin Xiaochen, “This stone might be small or it might be so big that it blocks the way. However, our goal is never to step on the stone hard but to find a way to keep moving forward.”

“As for the stone—” Xue Xiao thought for a moment. “Maybe not long after you left it behind, the wind will naturally sweep it away and the rain will naturally wash it away. By that time, you probably would’ve gone forward a long way and not remember this stone at all.”

At this moment, even Zhao Dong was stunned. He and Jin Xiaochen looked at Xue Xiao in a stunned manner.

Xue Xiao came to his senses and asked cautiously, “…Why are you looking at me like that?”

“Hiss.” Jin Xiaochen fiercely touched his arms.

Zhao Dong rubbed Xue Xiao’s head hard. “Xiao, you are really a bit presumptuous to your bones!”

Jin Xiaochen nodded fiercely. “Brother Xue, you are quite shocking sometimes!”

Xue Xiao: “?”

At this moment, the assistant actors of their group also arrived at the small theater. The staff members called to them and beckoned to them.

Their live rehearsal began.

—

The live rehearsal was much more difficult than rehearsing in the classroom by themselves.

It was because this wasn’t a question of how to act out a story well. They also had to cooperate with the on-site camera cuts and pay attention to their positioning.

Of course, in the first round of the competition, the scenes of the play selected by the show were relatively simple or else one night’s rehearsal time wouldn’t be enough.

Even so, the inexperienced Jin Xiaochen was still tired.

He was surrounded by so many staff members who were shouting and he couldn’t enter the act several times. He was desperately remembering the positions in his head and even forgot his lines several times.

He finally found the right state under the encouragement of Zhao Dong and Xue Xiao and his legs were tired and sore.

They had a scene in their play that required running upstairs.

All the clues in Li Xueming’s mind pointed to someone. He quickly turned his head in horror and what he saw was the scene where Chen Tao stabbed another police officer, kidnapped Zhang Yang and roughly pulled him upstairs.

Li Xueming and his subordinates raised their guns and chased after him, running all the way upstairs. Chen Tao held Zhang Yan’s arm and waist with one hand and held a knife to his neck with the other hand. The two of them stood on the edge of the corridor. There was no wall at the end of the corridor. It was a ‘cliff.’

They practiced this walk back and forth several times until they couldn’t lift their legs any longer.

Jin Xiaochen supported his knees with his hands and panted. “I’m really afraid that when I perform tomorrow, I won’t be able to lift my legs and will directly lie on the stairs.”

“Then you can really go straight out of the circle,” Zhao Dong teased.

Xue Xiao wiped his sweat and walked over to look at the gap at the end of the corridor on the third floor.

In the end, Zhao Dong was going to jump from here—Chen Tao still chose to commit suicide in the end.

Zhao Dong needed to use the posture of his back facing outward to let go of Xue Xiao and fall straight back.

One meter below, the show had placed a huge cushion.

Xue Xiao reminded, “Brother Zhao, pay attention when you fall. Don’t hurt your neck.”

“Yes, okay. Don’t worry, I know.”

After Zhao Dong fell down, the cushion needed to be removed quickly. The cameraman would take a shot of Xue Xiao and Jin Xiaochen looking down from the top of the unfinished building using an upward angle but the scene didn’t end here.

The second when the camera turned off, in other words, the second the screen facing the audience went black, the cushion needed to be moved back and Zhao Dong also needed to climb back immediately.

It was because at the end, he and Xue Xiao needed to play another short ‘memory’ scene.

In general, their group had the most ‘tricks’ among all the repertoires. Many students came over to take a look between rehearsals and felt fortunate that they didn’t challenge Praying Mantis.

It was already midnight by the time they returned to the dormitory.

Chang Yun had fallen asleep a long time ago and his snoring was heaven-shaking.

Gu Ling had turned on the small lamp and was half lying on the bed to read the book he had borrowed from Xue Xiao.

Hearing the door open, he turned around and asked, “You’re finally back?”

Zhao Dong whispered, “Yes, I’m so tired. By the way, has anyone told you when you are appearing tomorrow?”

“I will only go on stage the day after tomorrow. I will rest tomorrow and watch you perform.”

There were 50 people and it wasn’t realistic to record so many performances in one day. The show was divided into two days to record separately.

However, tomorrow was a recording day and none of the staff members would have the energy to rehearse on-site. Therefore, the rehearsals of all the groups were arranged for tonight.

“It is so good. Xue Xiao and I will play tomorrow afternoon but I’m too tired to be nervous now.”

Xue Xiao finished packing up his things and whispered, “Brother Zhao, you go and wash up first. Go to bed early and rest.”

“Okay.”

……

In the dead of night.

Xue Xiao lay on the bed, using the small lamp in the corner to write in his diary. The tip of his pen rubbed against the paper.

Writing in a diary was his habit left over from elementary school. It wasn’t comfortable to write something every day. Sometimes it was really boring and there was no content to record. His thoughts would randomly diverge to write some novels or something.

In this respect, he didn’t just love acting but also ‘creating.’

He was interested in everything related to creation, such as music and painting. He just didn’t have the innate ability to do these things.

He sang off-tune and when drawing, even a kitten could be drawn as a pig. After becoming an adult, Xue Xiao recognized reality and put more energy into words.

For Xue Xiao, acting was a bigger type of ‘creation.’

It was a more three-dimensional, colorful world.

Tomorrow, he would take the world that belonged to him and stand in front of a thousand live audience members and Shen Tingyan.

Xue Xiao stopped writing.

The usually strong and point font was messed up a lot. At some people, he also held his breath.

On the upper bunk, Chang Yun’s snoring was suddenly interrupted.

There was a tickling sound. He rolled over and after a while, he fell asleep more peacefully than before.

Xue Xiao slowly started his pen again.

“What will Teacher Shen say about his performance?”

In the quiet of the night, no one could answer this question.

Xue Xiao closed the diary, turned off the light and lay on his back on the bed.

He wanted tomorrow to hurry up and arrive.

—

On the day of the first round of the competition.

At 6 o’clock in the morning, all the students got up on time and hurried to the dressing room after breakfast.

Jin Xiaochen and Jiang Lianlian were in the same state. They didn’t let go of a single moment to recite their lines and tension was written all over their faces.

Xue Xiao was receiving makeup while chatting with his group of brothers and sisters in the ‘Acting Acting Acting to the End’ group.

In another dressing room, Fan Xue stared at himself in the mirror and kept taking deep breaths.

The team member next to him said casually, “I don’t know how the other group practiced. I didn’t stay to watch it yesterday.”

“What is there to see?” The other person rolled his eyes and wanted to say something. However, the microphone was one and the cameraman’s lens was facing him, so it was difficult to say it more bluntly.

When the teacher was present in class that day, he felt that the other group wasn’t as good as them. It was a group consisting of a group actor and an amateur. It would be strange to act as well as them.

In particular, the one called Xue Xiao. He was a mere background actor but felt like he acted better—yes, this person was the one who was playing Zhang Yang, Xiao Wang.

Xiao Wang was a vengeful person. He thought with a sneer that these three people hadn’t experienced the big stage. Perhaps when the time came, they would have stage fright and act even worse.

He rolled his eyes and raised his chin toward his companion. “Can’t you see how calm Brother Xue is?”

Fan Xue actually didn’t hear what they were saying at all and his whole body was tense.

In this first round of acting, the agent told him that there was no need to worry about how bad his acting was but this definitely didn’t mean to make him perform badly.

It was naturally the best if he could act well.

There were good hype methods and bad hype methods. Fan Xue definitely didn’t want to make a fool of himself in front of a thousand audience members. This meant he had been quite serious in rehearsals these days.

As for the other group…

Fan Xue frowned.

In fact, he never felt that Xue Xiao’s acting skills were better than his own. There was the help of his agent. The assistant director surnamed Gao might’ve intervened but it was enough. At the end of the first round, the other group would’ve received a small pot of blame.

Fan Xue finally relaxed at this thought. He even moved the corners of his lips, revealing a secret smile.

Who told them to run into him?

He would try to act. However, if he couldn’t act, the other group shouldn’t try to use him as a control group to step on him.

At 7:30 in the morning, the 1,000 spectators who grabbed tickets for the show entered one after another.

The auditorium gradually filled up.

Excitement and anticipation filled the studio.

At 7:40, the 50 students who had put on makeup sat down in the actor area near the stage. There was a burst of cheers from the auditorium, among which Fan Xue’s fans were the most excited.

“Ahhh, I’m so nervous, so nervous.” Jin Xiaochen kept shaking his legs.

“The audience is watching. Don’t shake.” Zhao Dong patted his leg.

Jiang Lianlian was a bit anxious. “Other shows let the actors wait in the waiting area. How can this show directly let us sit on the sidelines? This makes me even more nervous. I’m afraid I will forget my words later.”

Xue Xiao reassured her, “Just treat it as watching a movie. Maybe you won’t be nervous when watching and you won’t forget your words.”

Chang Yun sighed. “Xiao, your mentality is so good.”

Xue Xiao thought that he was just overwhelmed by excitement.

There was the sudden sound of louder screams. He instantly straightened his back, clenched his hands and turned his head to look at the mentor seats directly opposite the stage.

Four figures took their seats.

One of them, a slender figure in a white shirt, caught the attention of the audience.

He was in his usual idle posture and today’s Shen Tingyan had his black hair brushed back. Only a little bit was scattered in front of his forehead, revealing a trace of casualness among the strictness, a hint of wantonness in the abstinence.

This face could stand the test of almost any styling, but it was often the simplest and most generous styling that best reflected the superiority of this face.

His lowered eyebrows were a painting. When he felt a certain strong gaze from the sidelines as he was picking up today’s performance catalog, he paused slightly and raised his eyes slightly. He turned his eyes slightly in that direction—

Xue Xiao’s heart trembled.