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Exclusive Interview of Leung Choi Yuen: Continue to harvest; Continue to grow
Just like his name: a ‘choi’ (talent, material) and a ‘yuen’(far, long distance), as producer, Leung Choi Yuen’s handling of the creative aspect of a series possesses a strong keenness as well as a sense of responsibility. First of all, towards the use of “original material” in a series, from the onset he adheres firmly to the principle of creativity and innovation. He does not like to produce sequels or to replicate his work, but continues to challenge new boundary. Also, in another aspect, besides fulfilling tv’s entertainment requisite, he hopes that in each and every one of his series to examine certain aspects of life, thereby leaving a deeper effect on its audience.
Creativity
As a producer, the use of subject matter must be innovative. I feel that audience needs a constant injection of freshness and originality, so customarily I don’t like to shoot sequels. Like how it is with a martial arts move, if you repetitively only use one move, if continues, other people will detect your series path. Therefore, I like to continually experience new things, moreover, it will also be a learning process for me. This year, for the whole year, I have two series broadcasted. One is “7 Days in Life”; the other, “The Times and Life of a Sentinel”. Between modern drama series and ancient drama series, I prefer modern, its subject matter is broader because most of the stuff happen around us; more real life. As for ancient drama, we need to gather more information. Unlike the ancient drama productions in Mainland where history experts or specialists are invited to participate, we can only depend on ourselves to do our best for the series. 7DIL involves more modern elements. Its inspiration came from 2003 SARS incident. At the time, I thought if use this event to shoot a comedic series, to have a story about all the people quarantined inside a hotel, this series will be very different and interesting.
Difficulty
I feel that Qing Forbidden City is filled with materials suitable for dramas. There is a plethora of subject matters that can ignite the imaginations, and lots to write about. But producing this kind of series is extremely difficult because Hong Kong itself is extremely restrictive to filming, not like filming in Mainland where there are many choices of scene sites to choose from. Also Hong Kong has a more city feel to it which will affect the actual shooting. Furthermore, our scene sites are limited to only some woods and rivers etc, of course, TVB has its own ancient drama scene sites, hence for post production we incorporated some special effects into the series. Undoubtedly, it is definitely more difficult to shoot an ancient drama series than a modern one. Also another reason is that in this series, many of the actresses are originally from overseas, so their education and culture backgrounds are different, hence, making it more difficulty for them to absorb their lines. So before the production commenced, they were given some special training. Also, the HK audience’s knowledge on Chinese history is comparatively limited, as they did not have a comprehensive education (on it) so what they know of it may be superficial. Scripting this kind of more indepth Qing Dynasty story may not appeal to the general audience. So to film this kind of historical drama series, we have to consider many things beforehand, will the audience accept it or not? Are the thespians up to it? How much work can the behind-the-scenes colleague handle? Thus, comparatively, the whole shooting process can be extremely arduous. Nevertheless, though exceptionally arduous I still want to experience so as to find a balance in my produced series repertoire. Furthermore, there is a bigger market for ancient drama series in Mainland China.
(What is the most difficult scene to shoot?) The most difficult scene to shoot is the usurpation court scene, also my longest ever shooting of a scene, in all, the shooting took 7 days and 7 nights to complete. The cast members were all totally immersed in their characters; felt a kind of anguish of being unable to extricate themselves.
TBC
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