Yu Hewei talks about pain and fear in the Great Long March

Feet wearing straw sandals will be hot and painful when stepped on.“When filming the Great Long March, Yu Hewei often thought of the Red Army soldiers rushing to Luding Bridge.Most of them are still young people, and they are also afraid and miss their mothers.On November 7, at a creative symposium hosted by China Central Radio and Television, he said that to understand these people’s choices, you must first feel their pain and emotions.

Yu Hewei plays Mao Zedong.He specifically reminded that when we look back at the Long March today, it is easy to think of it as knowing the outcome. But at that time, the Red Army did not know whether it would win in the end or how far or how long it would have to go. Those who rushed towards the Luding Bridge did not know what was waiting on the other side of the bridge.”The Long March back then did not have an ‘omniscient perspective’.“Therefore, he did not want to play Mao Zedong as a person who was always calm and never vulnerable: he would be anxious, sad, in pain, and shed tears.”Let the audience see a person's emotions first before they can understand why he is great.

This year marks the 90th anniversary of the victory of the Red Army's Long March. The Great Long March has been broadcast since October 9. It unfolds the battle of the Xiangjiang River, the Zunyi Conference, the fourth crossing of Chishui, the capture of the Luding Bridge, the climb over the snow-capped mountains, and the crossing of the grassland through the journey of the Red Army.Chief screenwriter Chen Jin, director Zhang Yongxin, chief producer Liu Guohua, as well as main creators such as Yu Hewei, Cao Lei, He Zhengjun, Li Hongliang, etc. reviewed this creation at the symposium.

Regarding the Long March, which has been written about repeatedly, Chen Jin’s first consideration was how to establish a soul for the subject matter.His method is to put thoughts into the story and tell the thoughts in the story well: ideas must enter the characters' actions, emotions and situations, and historical events cannot just be retold in sequence.History itself is dramatic enough, and creators do not need to invent bizarre plots.He hopes to record the story as much as possible and record the history as a story, so that people can re-understand the familiar history.

There are many leaders, and it is difficult to distinguish between them.Chen Jin believes that it is necessary to repeatedly study each person's growth, ideological background and historical role, so that language, personality and emotional expression will have their own origins.In group dramas like Zunyi Conference, the audience should especially understand why a person said what he said at that moment.

Zhang Yongxin uses the big picture to establish the pattern and the small details to see the true feelings to explain his shooting method.The whole play organizes four main narrative lines: why the Red Army shifted its strategy, important meetings during the Long March, the difficulty of dividing troops on the grassland, and the final victorious rendezvous of the multiple Red Army forces.It took eight days to polish this section of the Zunyi Conference.

He would rather the audience remember a little warrior and a blue and white porcelain bowl.In the ear-mu hole, the young warrior reached for the bowl, but failed to touch it in the end.Historical materials did not leave his name, so the crew named this character “Chen Bolin”.The distance of about 30 centimeters between the hand and the bowl, in Zhang Yongxin's view, is the unreachable hope of young life.

In the play, 26-year-old Yi Dangping protects his comrades before dying, 29-year-old Chen Shuxiang shows his determination with a broken heart, and 22-year-old He Bingyan sings folk songs while sawing bones.After 21-year-old Zhong Chibing underwent multiple surgeries, what he cried was "I'm afraid the Red Army won't want me".The director believes that by returning fear, pain and reluctance to these young people, the audience can better understand their situation when making decisions.Mao Zedong's emotional changes are also designed accordingly: the team focused on showing four tears based on historical materials and plots, including crying for the poor people, the injured He Zizhen, and the sacrificed guard Hu Changbao.

“To photograph the Long March, you must fall in love with the Long March, and to photograph the Long March, you must fear the Long March.” Zhang Yongxin said that in addition to the completeness of the incident, we should also remember those who actually lived it.

Cao Lei prepared for the role of Zhou Enlai for nearly a year. He visited the memorial hall, former residence and ancestral home in Huai'an, and repeatedly read materials from the Long March period.After getting deeper into the characters, his feeling is: “Great men are no longer statues of gods, feats are no longer legends, and faith is no longer a slogan.”During the Long March, Zhou Enlai was seriously ill and extremely weak, but he still shouldered the arduous responsibility; Cao Lei had to show determination under his gentle appearance.Zhang Yongxin reminded him many times that he should not just imitate the appearance, but also have to find the character with his eyes.Later, when he saw the audience commenting on his performance with "glaring eyes", he burst into tears and felt that the long preparation had finally come to fruition.

He Zhengjun got closer to the characters through long conversations with Zhu De's descendants and reading historical materials.He said: “History books are too thin to contain their greatness. If we flip through it casually, it will be their lives.The history books are too thick, so we can’t remember their names. We only know that they are called heroes.”The Zhu De he wanted to play was not only commander-in-chief, but also simple, generous, and considerate of the soldiers.There can be differences in appearance, but the spiritual temperament should be as close as possible to the ancestors, and people should not be made into symbols that are always serious and unsmiling.

The way Li Hongliang entered Wang Jiaxiang was more specific.Wang Jiaxiang has shrapnel in his right hip and has been suffering from long-term illness. In order to form a physical memory, he pricked his right abdomen with needles and clamped an iron clip before filming.Later, he felt a dull pain. He suspected appendicitis for a while, but then he remembered: I didn’t have an appendix 20 years ago.“The audience noticed that the characters subconsciously expressed discomfort even when they had no lines, which made him feel that his preparation was not in vain.

However, physical experience does not automatically make for good performance.On the first day of filming, he deliberately lowered his voice to appear weak.Zhang Yongxin asked him to look back at the monitor, and he realized that his voice was not in harmony with the other actors.”There is a difference between the reality of art and the reality of life.“After adjusting the breath and volume, the character slowly became natural.

The project started in July 2021, and the preparation and production took more than five years.Liu Guohua said that the team retraced the Long March route many times, inspected the ruins, and shot in multiple provinces, dealing with complex scheduling and extreme weather; nearly 20,000 special effects shots also put pressure on the intense post-production cycle.Data research, scene restoration and repeated modifications are all aimed at balancing historical reality and artistic expression.Zhang Yongxin revealed that the whole drama was filmed for 457 days, and the notice every day printed the same question: Why is the Long March forever?”

Straw sandals appear at both ends of the story.It opens with Mao Zedong knitting straw sandals under a dim oil lamp; at the end, the Little Red Army on the bank of the Yellow River asks if there will be a long march in the future.Mao Zedong replied: When people live in the world, they always have to walk. The road is endless. No matter when, the ability to make straw sandals cannot be lost.“ Zhang Yongxin also set the topic of the symposium as "The ability to make straw sandals cannot be lost", and used this ordinary daily necessities to understand the whole play.

In the response after the broadcast, the creators especially remembered young viewers.Yang Bei, senior vice president of iQiyi, said that when the Zunyi meeting was shown in episodes 17 to 19, there were many comments about participating online, attending the meeting on time, and writing meeting minutes” in the barrage.A historical conference that mainly relies on dialogue between characters allows the audience to discuss characters and events while watching.