Who Needs a CEO? I Choose Stardom

”Cut! Cut, cut, cut!”

”Han Su! What is wrong with you?! That’s a prop! It’s not a real child! Why are your hands shaking? Go! Go calm down on the side! Don’t come back until you’ve cooled off!”

Ni Bingyan had worked with many directors. Luo Guangkun seemed the fiercest, but in reality, the fiercest of all was the one who appeared the gentlest: Li Yiru.

Li Yiru valued efficiency when filming, but she was also a perfectionist. Even though they were shooting a TV show, her standards for the scenes were on par with a movie’s—in fact, they were even higher than most films!

The visuals had to be beautiful, the emotions had to be right, and the expressions, above all, had to meet her expectations.

The shooting schedule was already tight, and with a set tyrant like her, Ni Bingyan had fought the urge to grab her head and tear at her hair in frustration several times. The only thing stopping her was that redoing her styling would be a huge waste of time.

Seriously, the pressure was even greater than when she was filming *Breakup*.

After all, she had been the second female lead back then, but this time she was the female lead. There was no one taller to shield her; she had to bear all the pressure herself.

”I’m sorry!”

Han Su’s character was supposed to be calm and gentle. As a professional Funeral Master, she shouldn’t have trembling hands while working.

Ni Bingyan apologized, took a deep breath, removed her gloves and mask, and stepped away from the operating table.

The makeup artist came over with a cotton towel and carefully dabbed the cold sweat from her forehead before letting her go to the side to rest.

Ni Bingyan said thanks, then turned to stand in the corner, taking deep breaths while facing the white wall.

”Here, don’t rush. Have some water first.”

Duanmu Li had been with her through so many productions, and this one was truly the most stressful. It was hard not to feel a pang of sympathy seeing her so tangled up in the plot’s anguish.

”Thanks, Sister Li.”

Ni Bingyan took the thermos, unscrewed the lid, and drank some warm lemon water. Only then did her mood finally settle.

*Soul Ferryman* aired two 45-minute episodes a week, with each two-episode arc telling a single story. In Li Yiru’s view, each story was a self-contained film.

The show was scheduled to premiere in twenty days, which meant they had to shoot six episodes before then. That averaged out to one episode every three days, or one full story arc per week. The workload was terrifyingly intense.

Countless TV shows never make it to air each year for various reasons, but this one was a guaranteed broadcast, which made it extremely attractive to actors.

If a project isn’t broadcast, it can’t generate buzz. Even if they receive their full pay on time, it’s still a major disaster for an actor’s career.

So, for the sake of their careers, all the actors were giving it one hundred and twenty percent, despite the director’s foul temper on set, the intense workload, the filming location being a funeral home, and the pay not even being that high.

No matter how many times the director yelled at her, Ni Bingyan never once complained.

The first story was about a family of three who died tragically.

A couple, childless for many years, finally had a lively and adorable child through IVF after spending a tremendous amount of money and effort.

But people would always say the child didn’t look like his father.

At first, the father didn’t take it to heart. But then even the child’s grandfather, unable to grasp what an ”IVF baby” was, would always say the boy wasn’t their blood.

A lie told often enough becomes the truth. The father grew suspicious and paranoid, and the way he looked at his wife was always a little off.

Especially since his wife had been unwilling to be intimate with him for a long time after childbirth, his words, spoken in anger, were often hurtful.

In this environment, the joy the mother had felt after finally giving birth slowly wore away, leaving only endless resentment and exhaustion.

She began to suffer from postpartum depression without realizing it.

She became sensitive and irritable. The slightest thing going wrong would trigger a hysterical argument with her husband, which always ended with the same old accusations—

”Weren’t you the ones so desperate to have a child? Didn’t you have a throne that needed an heir? We finally had one through high-tech means, and now you’re complaining that the crown prince’s bloodline isn’t pure?

”If there wasn’t something wrong with you, would we have had to spend so much money and put me through so much misery? Now the money is spent, I’ve suffered, I’ve finally given birth to a healthy child, and I’ve been a stay-at-home mom raising him all this time, and I’m still the one with the problem?

”Who are you all insinuating things about day after day? If I were going to cheat, why wouldn’t I have done it when I was younger? Why would I start in my early forties? I put my body through hell to have this child, staying up all night feeding him and changing diapers, exhausted to death! Where would I even get the energy for that kind of thing?”

She could laugh off the doubts from outsiders, but the suspicion from within her own family nearly broke her. Her relationship with her husband’s parents completely fractured; not only could they not live together, but she also stopped bringing the child back for holidays.

One day, the couple started arguing again. In a fit of rage, the man violently slammed the child in his arms onto the floor. The child’s head caved in, his body was covered in fractures, and within moments, he stopped breathing.

The child she had endured so much pain to bring into the world had been cruelly killed right in front of her. Even though the killer was the husband she had shared a bed with for over a decade, she turned on him in an instant!

The woman instantly lost the will to live, wanting only to take this demon down with her!

She ran to the kitchen, grabbed a sharp boning knife, and lunged at the man.

The man stared at his dead son, his mind a complete blank.

Seeing the gleaming tip of the blade coming at him, he instinctively snatched the knife away. Then, howling like a wild beast, he stabbed the woman dozens of times.

A neighbor heard the commotion and came knocking. The man snapped back to his senses. Staring at the blood-soaked room, he cradled the bodies of his wife and child, wailing like a wounded animal for a long time. Unable to accept the reality of what he had done, he opened the window and leaped from the 18th floor...

This was the scene they were filming: Han Su performing the encoffinment for the child.

It was a pure and simple domestic tragedy.

The most pitiful one in all this was the child.

He was so young, having come into this world so innocent and unknowing. He hadn’t seen enough spring flowers or learned how to build a snowman. There were so many delicious foods he had yet to taste, so much knowledge he had yet to learn...

And then, it all came to an abrupt end.

Death had come so suddenly.

He probably couldn’t believe, even in death, that it was his own father who had thrown him to his death.

’This is just a prop... not a real child... His caved-in head is a plastic shell, his skin is silicone, his blood is honey, food coloring, and brown sugar...’

Ni Bingyan faced the corner, mentally preparing herself for a full fifteen minutes before she calmed down enough to resume filming.

”Cut! Cut, cut, cut!”

Halfway through the take, the tyrant put her hands on her hips and started yelling again:

”This is a child! An eight-month-old child! Not a mannequin! Can you be a little more gentle with him? Can you not be so cold? Calm doesn’t mean cold! Understand? Go! Go to the side and reflect on it before you come back!”

That was a director for you. She had an answer for everything.

But that’s what filming was like.

Unlike a science experiment where every material could be weighed and measured, acting was like cooking Chinese food. It was all about the ’feel.’ The director would only tell you ’a pinch of salt’ or ’a moderate amount of oil.’ The exact quantities were up to you to figure out. Once you got it, you got it.

Ni Bingyan took a deep breath and drank another half-cup of lemon water.

Having drunk so much water, she had to go to the restroom again.

She stood facing the willow branches in the courtyard as they swayed gently in the wind, taking several deep breaths of the funeral-home air, thick with the smell of incense and joss paper. Only then did she steel herself and return to the set.

She gave a shout to signal she was ready, adjusted her emotions, and started acting based on the ’feel’ Li Yiru was looking for.

This time, they finally got the take.

That one scene took a full two hours to shoot, leaving everyone exhausted.

”Take a half-hour break. Then we’ll continue with the scene of encoffining the couple.”

Li Yiru had shouted her voice hoarse. Despite it being May, she was drenched in sweat from the heat of her exertion.

She chugged an entire bottle of mineral water in one go, then clapped her hands and yelled, ”Extras! Are the extras done with makeup? Check on them! We’re shooting in a bit!”

Ni Bingyan returned to her dressing room and collapsed wearily into her recliner. Staring up at the blue sky outside the window, she, for once, didn’t study or work out. Instead, she let her mind go blank, thinking of nothing at all.