“Where is this?”
Looking at the people constantly moving around the film crew, Chen Cheng was somewhat bewildered.
Only after quite some time did Chen Cheng finally realize that he had been reborn.
He had returned to the summer of 2005.
The current Chen Cheng was a first-year student in the Beijing Film Academy Acting Department. Because it was summer vacation, his mentor had assigned him an exercise: he had to spend at least a month training with a film crew during the summer.
As an Acting Department student, Chen Cheng had come to Hengdian, hoping to obtain a role.
Unfortunately.
Although Chen Cheng was a student in the Beijing Film Academy Acting Department, not every Acting Department student could obtain a decent role with a film crew.
However, that was not the important point.
The important point was, how had he been reborn?
Damn heavens, you rebirthed me—did you ask me first? Did I agree?
Yes.
Chen Cheng did not want to be reborn.
This was mainly because Chen Cheng had done fairly well in his previous life.
By “done fairly well,” he did not mean that he had become a famous actor or a Major Star.
Quite the opposite.
Chen Cheng’s acting career had developed far from smoothly. On top of that, he had never possessed particularly outstanding talent. Thus, after muddling through the acting field for several decades, he had only managed to become a third- or fourth-tier actor.
If things continued along that path, Chen Cheng felt that even if he acted until he was fifty, he would probably still be a third- or fourth-tier actor.
He might not even—
make it to fifty as an actor.
Later, however, the emergence of short dramas allowed Chen Cheng to thrive.
By a stroke of chance,
when his acting career was going poorly, Chen Cheng entered the short-drama industry.
Thanks to his longstanding fondness for reading web novels and his experience in Film and Television Drama production, he invested in several hundred short dramas within two years.
Although all those short dramas were crudely produced and even looked awkward,
I’m a simple-minded guy, and I love watching them.
The more awkward they looked, the more people watched them.
In just two years, Chen Cheng became a major figure in the short-drama industry, with his short dramas directly bringing his net worth past one hundred million yuan.
By rights, after being reborn, Chen Cheng should have seemed to possess an even greater advantage.
But reality was not like that.
Chen Cheng knew deeply that opportunities did not appear whenever one wanted them to.
Just like now.
Even though Chen Cheng knew that the short-drama industry would explode in the future, it was currently 2005.
Even if Chen Cheng wanted to develop short dramas, the market at present made it impossible.
As for waiting until the future—
there were too many variables in the future.
The short-drama industry itself was one that had suddenly erupted. Its arrival had been sudden, and its rise had been utterly chaotic.
Chen Cheng had managed to carve out a path through the short-drama industry only because he had been exceptionally lucky.
If he did it all over again, Chen Cheng believed he would end up losing almost everything in short dramas, just like many other major figures.
Well, anyway.
In his previous life, plenty of major figures on Qidian had already made money writing books before investing in short dramas.
As a result, they lost so much money on short dramas that they nearly vomited blood, and later had no choice but to return to writing books.
Even the famous Director Wang Jun, after seeing how popular short dramas were and deciding to invest, still lost horribly.
Therefore, Chen Cheng cherished the achievements of his previous life immensely.
Now that he had been reborn, all his previous achievements were gone. Everything had returned to zero.
“What a headache.”
Rubbing his head, Chen Cheng felt somewhat depressed.
After living another life, he had gained a much deeper understanding of acting.
Just like himself.
He knew very well that his acting skill was merely average. It was not particularly bad, but it was not especially good either.
Among the handsome men and beautiful women of the acting industry, his appearance was not particularly outstanding, either.
On top of that, Chen Cheng came from an ordinary family, had no background, and possessed no resources.
If he followed the same path as in his previous life, then even if he did somewhat better, he would still remain around the level of a third- or fourth-tier actor.
The Major Stars were the small portion of people at the very top of the pyramid.
Most people remained unknown. You could not even remember their names.
Even among graduates of professional schools like Beijing Film Academy, only an extremely small minority could become Major Stars.
Many students who spent several years struggling in higher education did not do as well as those working behind the scenes.
Behind the scenes?
A sudden thought made Chen Cheng freeze.
That was right.
If acting was not working out, I could work behind the scenes.
One had to understand—
in the film and television industry, besides actors, there was also a large number of behind-the-scenes personnel who never appeared on camera.
These behind-the-scenes personnel might not look as glamorous as actors, but without them, an entire series of Film and Television Dramas could never be created.
In fact—
if one really wanted to put it plainly, actors did not hold particularly high status in the film and television industry. The true major figures were all hiding behind the scenes.
Directors, Producers, Producers… and the like.
Those Major Stars who appeared publicly and dazzled the eyes of the masses were merely little brothers.
Not to mention those major figures.
Even behind-the-scenes Cinematography personnel, art directors, and makeup artists were people ordinary actors did not dare offend. They still had to respectfully address them as teachers.
That was right.
He would work behind the scenes.
After thinking it over carefully,
since he had been reborn and the acting path from his previous life had been so difficult, he would take the behind-the-scenes path.
As long as he made something of himself behind the scenes—or even if he did not—once the short-drama boom arrived in the future, he could still increase his chances of seizing the opportunity.
…
【System: The host has chosen the behind-the-scenes path. The System is activating.】
Just as Chen Cheng was pondering this, a voice rang out in his mind.
Although the voice was somewhat abrupt, Chen Cheng had produced several hundred short dramas in his previous life. How could he not know that the System had arrived?
Sure enough.
The System interface and the Character Attributes panel flashed through his mind.
Host: Chen Cheng.
Sex: Male
Age: 19
Physique: 55+0.1
Writing: 70
Art Department: 40
Cinematography: 30
Acting skill: 65
Director: 35
Seeing the attributes above, Chen Cheng nodded.
The attributes above were scored out of one hundred, with writing receiving the highest score at seventy.
That was considered a high score. Even an ordinary professional author would only have about that level.
Chen Cheng knew the reason.
This was mainly because he had produced short dramas in his previous life and written far too many short-drama scripts, which had greatly improved his writing ability.
His acting skill was sixty-five—not low, but not high either. It came from more than a decade of accumulated acting experience in his previous life. However, it was merely passable; people still would not remember him.
The other areas were terrible.
For example, Art Department, Cinematography, and even directing were all below forty.
However, the 55+0.1 displayed for physique surprised Chen Cheng somewhat.
What did the +0.1 mean?
The System soon provided an explanation.
【System: As the host trains the body, physique will continuously increase. The same applies to the other attributes.】
Chen Cheng found this explanation relatively easy to understand.
According to what was written above, as long as he worked hard at learning, all his attributes would slowly increase.
At first glance, it seemed normal.
After all, one might think that in reality, as long as one studied hard, one’s abilities in every area would also gradually improve.
But in fact, that was not the case.
Many times, even after reading books and studying hard, one might not necessarily improve.
Yet this data panel clearly demonstrated something to Chen Cheng.
As long as he had enough attribute points, he could raise these values to their maximum.
If his directing skill eventually reached one hundred, even Old Mou would probably have to admit that he was inferior.
Although Chen Cheng still did not dare to be completely certain,
the appearance of such a numerical panel filled Chen Cheng with boundless anticipation.
At the same time,
the System had displayed more than merely a numerical panel.
On another page of the panel, three career paths appeared.
The three paths were the Producer Track, the Director Track, and the acting path.
Each path corresponded to a series of positions.
The Producer Track included: Stagehand, unit production manager, location producer, Production Coordinator, finance manager, production manager, Producer, and Producer.
The Director Track included: script supervisor, Cinematography, Art Department, Set Designer, Makeup Artist, Props Master, Lighting Technician, sound engineer, editor, assistant director, Assistant Director, Executive Director, martial arts choreographer, and Director.
The acting path was gray, presumably because Chen Cheng had not chosen it.
Thus, Chen Cheng had two paths to choose from.
The Producer Track leaned more toward serving the team, serving the actors, and serving the production of films.
Chen Cheng leaned more toward the Director Track.
However, the Director Track did not mean becoming a Director immediately.
Behind a Director was actually a team with an incredibly detailed division of labor.
As for those who became Directors right at the start, they could only dream.
No one was willing to give you tens or hundreds of millions—or even over a billion—to squander as you pleased. It would not work even if you were highly talented.
A newbie had to start behind the scenes and then work up to becoming a Director. This required crossing N levels; reaching the heavens in a single step was absolutely impossible.
In truth, Chen Cheng did not possess much talent either. At most, he had some experience from producing several hundred short dramas in his previous life.
But that experience was completely useless when applied to proper Film and Television Dramas.
Even if his mind contained countless classic Film and Television Dramas from his previous life, it would still be useless.
A Film and Television Drama was completed through the division and coordination of several hundred or even a thousand people. Even if Chen Cheng remembered those productions, he might not be able to reproduce them completely in reality.
Even if he could reproduce them, there were still questions such as who would invest, who would hire him as a Director, what connections he had, whether the production would become popular after release, and whether he could continue working as a Director if it failed to become popular… and so on.
However,
with his experience from his previous life, and considering that he was currently only a student about to enter his second year, Chen Cheng was not particularly anxious about planning for the future.
He had never thought of becoming a Director immediately.
Was there not a whole host of positions on a film crew?
If he could not become a Director for now, he could first choose something simpler.
Perhaps sensing what Chen Cheng was thinking, the System issued him his first task at that moment:
【System: Accept the task and become a Stagehand on a film crew. Reward: 5 physique points.】
Stagehand.
Also known as a Stagehand.
A very impressive position.
In short: a gofer.