Chapter 42 Old Tian Was Right

To sum up today's filming in four words: full of twists and turns.

When Yu Feihong shot the scenes with the readjusted sequence, she was like a fish in water, delivering a performance that completely exceeded her usual standards.

However, once those were wrapped up, it was inevitably time to shoot the dining scene where she had NG'd countless times before.

At first, everyone thought Yu Feihong had finally figured it out. Her acting felt as natural as drinking water and eating a meal, seemingly without the slightest difficulty. Some of the crew veterans even recalled the initial days of Li Xiaoran.

They could not help but marvel in their hearts.

Yet, Yu Feihong refreshed everyone's perception once again—it was one repeated NG after another!

Cao Yang was dumbfounded for a long time. Elder sister, what on earth did you experience during your immersion? Did you somehow enter a fake immersion?

Finally, unable to suppress his rising anger, Cao Yang burst out.

"Yu Feihong, what is wrong with you? Do you know how to look happy? You can't manage a suppressed excitement, but surely you can at least smile? Ask yourself, how much of everyone's time have you wasted? Smile! Smile! Is a simple smile that hard? Who are you sulking and glaring at?"

In truth, this shot was really not difficult. She only needed to push a plate—pushing it toward the male lead sitting behind her husband—and then show a look of involuntary joy, even a simple smile would suffice.

How simple was that.

Yet, as soon as Yu Feihong pushed the plate, she would immediately put on a deeply aggrieved expression, as if she had suffered the greatest injustice in the world, gritting her teeth and utterly unable to break into a smile.

Yu Feihong herself felt there was something wrong with her, and quite seriously so.

The moment she looked at Wu Qihua, her mind would be entirely filled with the imagery from her dream where the two of them slapped each other across the face. The anger in her chest would instantly flare up, making her want to hit someone.

Therefore, when shooting the confrontation scenes with Wu Qihua, she was deeply immersed, performing with effortless ease as if it were the easiest thing in the world.

Just as Yu Feihong took the scolding without a word, someone stepped up to speak on her behalf.

"Director Cao, I don't think you're right. Feihong-jie can't smile, and she probably has her unspeakable reasons. You shouldn't scold her either. As the director, you should care about why Feihong-jie is acting like this..."

Liu Ye was still rambling on when he was abruptly cut off by assistant director Li Mingyi.

"Liu Ye, shut your mouth. The director is giving Feihong notes on her acting. Why are you cutting in? Come over here right now, you and I are going to run lines."

With that, Li Mingyi threw an arm around Liu Ye's neck and dragged him away by force.

Li Mingyi did not know Liu Ye well and was genuinely afraid this guy might be a hothead. With his uncalled-for interruption just now, what if Cao Yang scolded him for being a busybody and Liu Ye ended up shouting right back at him?

That would truly turn into a colossal mess.

How would one even handle it?

Fire him? Then they would have to find a new male lead from scratch, which would severely disrupt the shooting schedule and bring a mountain of troubles.

Not fire him? Where would Cao Yang's authority as a director go? How could he manage the crew properly from then on?

After Liu Ye was dragged away, the entire set fell into a terrifying, pin-drop silence. No one dared to utter a word.

"He's too deep into character. Influenced by the plot, he genuinely sees himself as a champion of women."

Tian Zhuangzhuang remarked deliberately, trying to defuse the awkwardness hanging in the air.

To his surprise, the moment he spoke, a young actress chimed in in a soft voice: "Today, the lighting technician made a joke to Che Xiao, and Liu Ye happened to hear it. He almost got into a fistfight with the lighting tech."

Of course, it was not as simple as a harmless joke.

Dong Xuan and the other two girls were students. Although their own scenes had not arrived yet, they came every day to observe and learn.

The origin of the matter was quite simple: the lighting assistant had told them a few dirty jokes, which was a very common occurrence on film sets.

As for Dong Xuan and her friends, being students from the Beijing Film Academy, the crew members usually limited themselves to light teasing and crude jokes purely for a bit of fun.

If it were other contracted extras or minor supporting roles, let alone harmless teasing behind the scenes, there were plenty of people who would take liberties directly.

Even so, practically no one ever dared to make a fuss. Having finally secured a role, how could they possibly dare to offend the crew members?

At that time, Liu Ye happened to be nearby and overheard those vulgar jokes. He directly chewed out the lighting assistant for disrespecting women, backing the man into an embarrassing corner.

The lighting assistant kept his mouth shut at the time since Liu Ye was the male lead and not someone he dared to offend lightly.

Who would have thought Liu Ye would refuse to let the matter go, stubbornly forcing the assistant to apologize to Che Xiao and the others, which almost triggered a physical altercation.

When Cao Yang learned about the sequence of events behind the scenes, his head ached immensely.

What the hell? After experiencing this immersion mechanic, not a single one of them remained normal.

Yu Feihong was still somewhat better; outside of shooting, she could still chat and laugh with Wu Qihua without any issues.

Yet the moment filming started—oh boy—she acted as if she shared a deep, irreconcilable hatred with Wu Qihua, unable to squeeze out even a hint of a smile.

God knows what her character immersion experience actually put her through.

Liu Ye's case was even more bizarre. Just the day before, he had been so deeply trapped in *Lan Yu* that he could not extricate himself, yet after his immersion experience, he made an extremely clean and decisive exit from *Lan Yu*.

However, the object of his protective instincts had shifted to *Empty House*. In real life, he would subconsciously protect women, becoming a "hothead" in everyone else's eyes.

Combining this with Li Xiaoran's situation, Cao Yang finally managed to summarize a tiny pattern.

Li Xiaoran's immersion had been the deepest, blurring the lines between fiction and reality to the point of near collapse.

Liu Ye's immersion had a slight impact on reality, though not deeply. This was actually easy to resolve; a month of rest would presumably rid him of the influence.

Yu Feihong's immersion experience did not affect reality and was strictly limited to filming moments—and even then, not entirely.

The reason Li Xiaoran had sunk so deeply into her role was because Cao Yang himself had played too rough with his psychological setups, nearly breaking her mental state and causing her to lose the distinction between play and reality during her immersion.

Liu Ye's situation was likely due to the fact that he was already emotionally vulnerable from his previous work on *Lan Yu*, though he had not reached the verge of collapse.

Yu Feihong was completely the opposite case. It turns out that not stirring up some psychological turbulence doesn't work either. Just look at Yu Feihong—nobody knew where her immersion experience went; it was completely random immersion.

Conclusion: The next time he applied an immersion experience, he definitely had to stir up some trouble, ensuring the person's mental state was affected and subjected to fluctuations, though not too deeply—just slightly better managed than Liu Ye's situation.

The problem right now was: what should be done about this anomalous outlier, Yu Feihong?

When she was god-tier, she was truly god-tier; when she was trash, she was truly trash.

Should he try giving her another immersion experience and see what happened?

Cao Yang could not help feeling slightly tempted. Yu Feihong's mental state was currently fluctuating, wasn't it?

It should be, right?

Well, judging by her reactions during filming, it definitely was.

Then should he give it a try?

Give it a try!

Cao Yang successfully persuaded himself.

Old Tian crept over mysteriously and whispered, "Based on my analysis, there is only one possibility for Yu Feihong's current state."

"Oh?"

Old Tian, what have you analyzed this time?

"She's getting older, her comprehension skills are failing, and she's too slow—not as sharp as Liu Ye. Or perhaps we simply gave her too few acting notes, and she hasn't fully grasped it yet."

"Ah?"

Old Tian, you really shouldn't talk nonsense.

"Given Yu Feihong's current state, she probably won't be able to shoot anything today anyway. Why don't you give her some more notes later, focusing specifically on the upcoming scene, and see how it works out tomorrow."

"This... alright."

Cao Yang didn't even know how to explain this. What kind of logic was this? If he administered another immersion experience to Yu Feihong tonight, and she delivered a god-tier performance tomorrow...

Sigh, Old Tian, my brother, it's not like I deliberately meant to set you up...