Latest update October 21st, 2015 12:41 PM
Xu Zheng: Laughing Matters
“To get into the best society nowadays, one has either to feed people, amuse people, or shock people” - Oscar Wilde
In the current circumstances, we are not allowed to take things too seriously. So just laugh it off? This is partially why comic films are selling really well in China.
Xu Zheng has created a new funny business formula in the China film market with his directorial debut LOST IN THAILAND in 2012 and will soon release his sophomore comedy LOST IN HONGKONG.
From a creative actor to an astute director
After acting for almost three decades since his childhood, Xu Zheng chose to become a director.
“Xu Zheng has always wanted something other than acting,” said lots of directors once cooperated with him. Back in 2010, Hong Kong director Raymond Yip was reported that Xu helped him to understand the mainland market during the shooting of LOST ON JOURNEY.
Xu Zheng has more than once explained why becoming a director was a natural choice for him: “I am not that well-built, and I am bald. Somehow, no top-notch director would cast me in the big-budget films, so as an actor I had to wait for my role. I could not actively choose my role, so I thought to myself – I need to become a director.”
Xu Zheng and Wang Baoqiang became a golden partner thanks to LOST ON JOURNEY, boasting 37 million RMB at the local box office, a remarkable figure in 2010. This film was later played during almost all the long distance bus trips in China.
After this success, Xu began to think about making a sequel and ultimately decide to make his own film, due to unsolvable disagreements with the original production company.
His old partner Huang Bo once said: “I am not surprised that Xu Zheng chose to be a director, because he is always so expressive and he has been learning the craft all along.”
Xu believed in sufficient preparation before shooting the film. He detests it when the actors changing the lines on set – he prefers to have all lines fixed during rehearsals. He’d ask his actors to rehearse all the lines and act in front of a DV before the real shooting. The cinematographer will record everything in different angles. This video will then be shown to the whole crew to adjust their acting. Xu confesses he learned this from David Fincher. Show biz pros know that Xu Zheng has watched lines of films, especially genre films.
LOST IN THAILAND directed by Xu Zheng ignited the China film market in 2012 – people had never imagined this market could be so explosive. This film had over 39 million local admissions – a number even bigger than that of AVATAR in China. It also set a box office record of local films – over 1.2 billion RMB, which was renewed this summer by the 3D fantasy film MONSTER HUNT.
Xu discovered that the grassroots economy gradually rose, and the conflicts between a middle class man and a lower class one could be quite dramatic – the Chinese society turned quite classified in the new millennium. So he used a formula blending road movie and buddy film, featuring such conflicts between two of China’s most distinctive groups of people, whose values polarize. Within this frame, a variety of commercial elements can be mixed. He thought this could be his recurring motif.
From theater to television and film
Xu Zheng has started acting since third grade. Acting in theater also took a very important part in his teen years. After graduating from Shanghai Theatre Academy in 1994, he was accepted by Shanghai Dramatic Arts Centre and gradually became a leading actor. Four years later, he won the top theater award as a leading role.
He recalled his theater days when he could tell the audience’s immediate response to his acting. Such memory must have served as an important benchmark when he created his own film in 2010s.
But then the rising star went to act in TV series. Quite different from his past artsy experimental roles, he took part of the Pig Guy in a comic adaptation from a Chinese classic JOURNEY TO THE WEST. This role made him a household name. Also thanks to this role, he came to know actress Tao Hong, who later became his wife.
It is fair to say that he earned this part: This series never received the money that had been promised by the investors due to their lack of confidence in this project, so the director declared to the show biz that anybody who could offer the money would be the leading role. Xu Zheng offered the director all his savings and got the part.
That, nevertheless, was a well-informed decision. He had read the script and thought the role just fit him, despite the simple-mindedness of the Pig Guy. He also calculated the risk – this budget was small, even if the ratings should be lukewarm, it would not be difficult to recoup the investment.
To most people’s surprise, this sunny and funny series with the cute Piggie role turned out to be a hit, and Xu Zheng harvested a huge amount of bonus as well as rose to be a rather famous comedian in the nation in 2000.
In the next few years, Xu continued to play a number of memorable roles in TV series until director Ning Hao cast him in his stylish commercial film CRAZY STONE in 2006. Xu got on the fast track and more film directors came to reach him. But at the time, whenever people talked about China’s iconic comedian, people would first think of Ge You or Zhao Benshan.
People say the contemporary roles Xu takes represent a typical man from Shanghai: smart, shrewd, sometimes melancholic, but always knows what he is doing. In real life, one of his colleagues comments that Xu is very cautious and thoughtful.
He had his time of waiting though, for more roles, more suitable roles. But he then decided the most suitable role he’d get would only come from a film he himself directed.
In 2011, Xu went to pitch a film project in front of Wang Changtian, President of Enlight Media. He presented the story by acting all the roles within 20 minutes, without a script. Wang was quite impressed and agreed to the 25 million RMB budget, at a time when this amount was not a very small budget for a first-time director, when an actor directing a film was uncommon.
Xu was clear that he wanted to make simple, accessible comic film for the young. He once said the middle class had become the pillar of the Chinese society, but there were almost no such films depicting them. His films were devised to portray their midlife crisis in a funny way.
A journey from THAILAND to HONG KONG
Xu and his team took on a crazy journey – first to Thailand, then to Hong Kong three years later. His debut feature LOST IN THAILAND crowned him champion of the local box office and put unimaginable pressure on him. He gained weight, and was deprived of sleep. He more than once said in the public that in China, after the director finishes shooting a film, he still needs to oversee the coloring, editing, marketing, merchandising and even distribution. It is a race against time.
These days, such capable directors would usually be called project managers in China, but Xu dislikes this saying. He emphasizes his favorite thing to do is still acting. Directing films is his way to earn more space for his acting.
From now and then, people would call him a marketing maverick.
This March, Xu Zheng dressed as Steve Jobs hosting a press conference of his new film LOST IN HONG KONG. Also resembling a TED Talk, he used big data to illustrate the film’s possible box office. This press conference was the talk of the town.
This June, he joined a forum co-organized by Sina and Alibaba, which analyzed the potential viewers’ profile of LOST IN HONG KONG, using statistics of the region, age, constellation, blood type of the general audience.
Xu Zheng, however, is not blinded by big data. He tends to use it as a reference, and believes cinematic creation should still be personal, regardless the numbers.
He is understandably busy now, but he keeps the habit of going to the cinema. He’d watch almost all the films that has theatrical distribution in China, even during the intensive marketing period of his new film.
Xu firmly believes that only very local comedies can contend the forceful Hollywood titles. This is also the most important reason why he keeps making comedy films.
LOST IN HONG KONG is still a comic film about a man’s midlife crisis, and Xu’s cinephile complex is exhibited in different ways. It is almost a love letter to Hong Kong, with lots of episodes, lines and music dedicated to Hong Kong cinema. One can see parody of works from director John Woo, Wong Kar-wai, Peter Chan, and Lau Wai-keung. An army of Hong Kong film stars also appear in the film.
Xu Zheng the creative producer
Xu Zheng says many times that SIDEWAYS directed by Alexander Payne and MIDNIGHT RUN acted by Robert De Niro are his favorite kind of films, together with the Coen Brothers’. The hero in Xu Zheng’s films also has identification problem and tries hard to deal with his inner conflicts. But in an emerging film market like China, such serious problems need to be sugared by comic plots. This also wins Xu Zheng more social resources and creative confidence for his films.
Now, besides being a director, Xu Zheng’s got another role – producer.
He likes this role. He confesses, to some extent, the success of LOST IN THAILAND was mostly because he did not take himself as a director; rather, he regarded himself a producer.
In China’s show biz, people always have arguments over power – who’s got the almighty power in a crew. Xu Zheng, however, does not think power was what drove him to be a producer. He frowns upon the fact that China has too few good producers.
In 2014, THE GREAT HYPNOTIST, a thriller Xu Zheng produced won 250 million RMB at the local box office. Its director Leste Chen said he really enjoyed working with Xu – when arguing about creative issues on set, Xu would always respect his decision, but he was never hesitant to be candid. This film made Chen the most successful one among the Taiwanese directors making films in Beijing. He is now developing another film with Xu Zheng as the producer.
Quite aware that most Chinese production companies are targeting the young audience from 18 to 25 years old, Xu decides to make more films for those who live among a web of aging parents, kids, classmates, friends and colleagues. He wants to explore possibilities apart from chick flicks and such, to make films for those who are 30 to 45 years old, who are busy with work or with their family – if there are good films made for them, they might spare the time to go to the movies.
He once said, I wish one day I can work only as a producer, to find directors to work with – more younger and professional directors. I would no longer talk to them as an actor or director, but as a producer. I think this can work.
In fact, his wish might just come true.
Xu has just founded a company Joy Leader, to take care of the talent management of him and his wife Tao Hong, and to develop film projects for the actor couple. He recruited a squad of writers and experienced reporters to do marketing and screenwriting.
Joy Leader has announced to build a cultural brand, not just a few films. Maybe one day it will spot more young talents and nurture the next generation of comedians this market cries for.
Xu Zheng’s new feature LOST IN HONG KONG kicks off in China on September 25, 2015. By Oct. 8, this film has raked in 236 million USD at the box office.
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