Chapter 889: The three greenhorns finalize their act!
Translator: Legge Editor: Legge
Liaoning Television.
Someone from the production team suddenly shouted, "Hey, come and see this! A big issue has cropped up at Beijing TV's Spring Festival Gala!"
"What happened?" asked a director from Liaoning Television's Spring Festival Gala as he rushed over.
That person said, "Teacher Qu Haiying's skit won't be happening anymore!"
"Huh?"
"What happened?"
...
Dragon Television.
The executive director stayed silent for a while before saying, "There's no need to consider Beijing TV's Spring Festival Gala in the running anymore."
"Ah?"
"What?"
"Aren't they leading strongly at the moment?"
Some people still did not know about the situation.
The executive director threw the cell phone showing the news headlines on it to one of his deputies. "They're in deep trouble!"
...
Zhejiang Television.
"Director Xu, is the news true?"
"It's true. I just called a friend of mine at Beijing TV to confirm."
"Then they're gonna be in trouble!"
"Right. At this time, where could they find someone to take over the showlist?"
"Perfect, our closest rival is no more!"
...
The outside world was in heated discussions!
But in a waiting room at Beijing Television, it was exceptionally quiet. This place should have been the focus of events, but at this point of time, even a pin drop could be heard loudly and clearly.
Creak!
The sound of a door opening broke the silence!
Dong Shanshan walked in with a face of consternation. "What's the situation?"
Zhang Ye gave a wry smile to her. "Close the door first, close it!"
"I have very weak mental fortitude. Please don't scare me like that, Zhang'er!" Dong Shanshan closed the door as she spoke in an incredulous tone, "The two of us are going to perform a skit? We're going to stand in for Teacher Qu's finale skit act? Old classmate, please don't joke with me this way. Even if we were classmates, should you really be scamming me like that?"
Yao Jiancai said, "Little Zhang was forced into it too. The deputy station head and executive director, along with over 20 others, all came begging Zhang Ye for his help!"
Dong Shanshan nearly fainted from that. "But you still can't promise them something like that!"
Zhang Ye threw up his hands and said, "I don't have any choice. They wanted me to do it no matter what!"
Dong Shanshan dragged a chair over and sat down in front of Zhang Ye. "But it's not like you don't know what the two of us do. We're formally broadcasting graduates, so how could we have performed any skits before! I wonder why they suddenly decided to find you as the replacement? And they even dragged me in as well!"
Zhang Ye coughed and said, "Didn't we use that excuse that time we were late? We said that we were discussing a skit."
Dong Shanshan: "…"
She looked at Yao Jiancai. "Teacher Yao, you must say something about this! What are they trying to do?"
Yao Jiancai laughed. "Since it's already been decided, then the two of you will have to do it no matter what!"
Zhang Ye suddenly turned his head to him and said, "What do you mean the two of us? Shouldn't it be the three of us?"
Hearing that, Yao Jiancai nearly suffered a heart attack. "What? You're even dragging me in?"
Zhang Ye said, "Of course. How can we perform a skit with only two people?"
Yao Jiancai fainted. He had been enjoying the commotion, but turned anxious right at the next second. "Damn, why did you promise them something like that! Quickly tell them that you can't do it and ask to change it to someone else! I've never acted in a skit before either!"
Hearing that, Dong Shanshan could only laugh at their predicament. "This is great. A variety show host, a television drama actor and crosstalk comedian, and a host-cum-math professor-cum-director. Even with the three of us put together, we're amateurs no matter how you look at it. We don't even have a script for the skit, yet we're slated to go onstage for the Spring Festival Gala's finale act. What's more, the time…" She looked at her watch and exclaimed, "There's only 58 minutes left!"
Zhang Ye nodded. "It is what it is."
Dong Shanshan could only look helplessly at this old classmate of hers. "Zhang'er, I know that you've always had a lot of balls, but I never could have expected you to be this ballsy! With the three of us, do you really think that we can do it?"
Zhang Ye replied, "Even if we can't, we must!"
Yao Jiancai sighed, "Hai!"
Zhang Ye composed himself before stating, "Shanshan, let me ask you this seriously. Are you capable of handling the skit?"
Dong Shanshan hesitated for a moment and answered, "I don't know."
"Old Yao?" Zhang Ye asked.
Yao Jiancai answered bitterly, "My main profession is acting. If you insist that I go on, it's not like I can't do it, but I can't promise that it'll be good. The main problem is that I've never acted in a skit before!"
Dong Shanshan latched on to his words and said, "It's the same for me. I can do it if I'm forced to go onstage, but as for how it would turn out…only a ghost would know!"
Zhang Ye abruptly said, "As long as you two are willing to go onstage, that's good enough!"
Dong Shanshan said in a speechless manner, "Can your standards get any lower than this?"
Yao Jiancai questioned, "And where's the script? Where's the script for the skit?"
The three of them immediately went silent.
How worrisome!
The three of them were all more worried than the other!
Especially Zhang Ye, who was the most stressed!
But suddenly, after thinking for a while, Zhang Ye smacked his thigh with great force and said with irritation, "I won't believe that we can't do it! Why can't we handle this? Based on what reasons are we not going to make it?" He turned to Dong Shanshan and said, "Shanshan, you were our most outstanding student back then, taking part in activities and competitions organized by the school and always doing well in them! Whenever the name of Dong Shanshan was mentioned in the past, even students from other faculties would likely have heard of you! Which of the broadcasting major teachers did not give you their highest approval? Isn't it only a skit?! I don't believe you won't be able to handle it!"
Dong Shanshan let out a small sigh. "A hero does not mention his glorious past, but anyway, alright, I'll…give it a try, I guess!"
Zhang Ye looked at Yao Jiancai. "Old Yao, you're the one with the most experience among us. How many years have you been acting? You were already fighting it out in the industry before I was even born. The number of roles you have portrayed should number at least close to a hundred. For example, other than the father-in-law roles you have played, there's also the father-in-law role and the other father-in-law role….OK, I guess you haven't taken on too many types of roles."
Yao Jiancai: "…"
Zhang Ye said, "But your acting skill is absolutely not a problem!"
Yao Jiancai glanced at him. "But of course."
Zhang Ye said, "If I hand you a script right now, I don't believe that you won't be able to memorize it within the hour!"
"The skit's lines?" Yao Jiancai said confidently, "It'll be quite short. I won't even need an hour to remember everything!"
Dong Shanshan added, "If it's just lines, I won't have a problem with it. I dare say that I can handle something as basic as that."
Yao Jiancai looked at Zhang Ye. "You're asking about us, but what about yourself?"
Zhang Ye smiled. "Are you talking about the performance or the lines? If it's about the performance, I have also acted in movies before." In fact, he had even "eaten" a lot of the Acting Skills Experience Books, so he remarked, "As for the lines, Old Yao, when have you ever seen me use a script whenever I host a show?"
Yao Jiancai: "…I nearly forgot how crazy you are when it comes to that!"
Zhang Ye clapped his hands hard. "So if that's the case, do we still have any problems?!"
Yao Jiancai was also getting pumped up. "Hell, let's do it!"
"Let's go for it. We have to do it whether we're ready or not!" Dong Shanshan also understood what was at stake.
Zhang Ye smiled and said, "Right, the three of us are gonna show everyone this time that even if we're amateurs, we can still create a classic skit! Let the three of us show them what we've got!"
Yao Jiancai smacked his lips together and said, "A classic skit? If we can get something out in time for the live broadcast, that would be good enough!"
"That won't do. I'll either not do anything at all or do it to my best!" Zhang Ye declared.
Dong Shanshan looked at him. "But what about the script?"
Zhang Ye replied, "I'm still thinking about it."
As they had too little time to prepare, their conditions for the skit were greatly limited!
#1: The script had to be simple and the lines must not be overly complicated!
#2: They couldn't depend on too many props. Everything had to be kept simple!
#3: There would be three skit performers. Two men and a woman.
#4: The skit must be enjoyable to watch!
Combining all those conditions, they would be highly restricted to the type of skit they could perform!
In Zhang Ye's mind right now were all of his previous world's Central TV Spring Festival Gala skits since its first broadcast. Although there were many bad skits there, there definitely would also be some classic performances over the years, which had been picked out. Those classics were so good that they contained numerous jokes and great humor!
Which one should he use?
That one? No, that would require them to have Scottish kilts as a prop and there wasn't enough time to get them!
How about that one? It wouldn't do either, the props were too big and there wasn't enough time for it either!
Or should he choose that one? Not that either! The other two people's lines were too complicated. Dong Shanshan and Yao Jiancai were not like Zhang Ye. Within an hour, they would only be able to memorize enough lines for a normal skit, but anything more than that would not be possible for them. Besides, they didn't really have an hour left anymore, and they still had to allocate part of the time to get in a dry run!
But then there really weren't many skits they could use!
Almost to the point of none!
Sweat beads were forming on Zhang Ye's forehead. There wasn't much time left anymore. If he had been informed earlier, if only he had a few more days, he could have prepared a lot of skits to be performed, yet now…
He took out his cell phone to check the time.
Instead, he saw the notifications from Weibo, which he accidentally tapped, launching the Weibo app.
The first thing he saw was criticism.
"Boycott Zhang Ye!"
"What sort of lousy lyrics are those, it was terrible to listen to!"
"For a song to cause our national team to lose their match, I'm totally bewildered!"
"Zhang Ye is the scourge itself!"
"I think that our national table tennis team was right to complain. If it weren't for that bunch of Zhang Ye fans helping push that song up the charts, our men's team would not have lost the championship!"
"Supporting the table tennis team!"
"You guys have worked hard!"
"I heard that an issue has cropped up at Beijing TV's Spring Festival Gala. Haha, they deserve it!"
"You people even dared to invite an entertainment industry hooligan like Zhang Ye to perform a crosstalk on your gala? See, this is the retribution you get! This time, Beijing TV's Spring Festival Gala has received more than they can handle! We don't even know if that incident will be resolved yet!"
Reading up until here, Zhang Ye suddenly had an idea!
Hey!
I got it!
Wouldn't that Central TV Spring Festival Gala skit from that year be a good choice?
Remembering that, Zhang Ye suddenly got excited and banged the table. He immediately picked up a pen and grabbed paper to start writing the script for the skit. "Old Yao, Shanshan, I've thought of one already! Come over and see!"
Yao Jiancai was stunned. "So quickly?"
"What's the skit about?" Dong Shanshan rushed over.
Zhang Ye wrote it down as he spoke. This script was not written for himself since he did not have any use for it, but he had write out the lines for Yao Jiancai and Dong Shanshan to memorize.
One minute!
Two minutes!
Zhang Ye related the entire skit to them in double time!
After hearing it, Yao Jiancai was truly shocked and astonished. "This…was written by you just now?"
"That's right! It was a flash of brilliance!" Zhang Ye said, ecstatic. "Hahahaha!"
Dong Shanshan suddenly stretched out her hand and hit Zhang Ye's head.
Zhang Ye was taken aback. "What are you trying to do?"
Dong Shanshan said, "I wanted to see if you'd show your true colors."
Zhang Ye was amused. "What, do you think I'm a monster or something?"
"Even if you're not a monster, you're not far off from one!" Yao Jiancai said incredulously. "That was too damn fast!"
Zhang Ye laughed. "Let's stick to the problem at hand. Do you two think it'll work?"
Yao Jiancai chuckled. "If this doesn't work, what would?"
Dong Shanshan snapped her fingers. "This'll do!"
Zhang Ye said, "OK! It's settled then!"
The three greenhorns instantly clicked!