There is a kind of life at the age of 19, with only a vague desire, and I can’t tell what moved me. Wu Lei has made it very clear, “I can’t imagine a life without acting.” Reach out and grab, step forward and do it. This is what an interesting life is like.
Wu Lei watched the stage play “War Horse” last summer and took the subway home on the way back. Wearing a baseball cap, a black mask, a cross-body bag, black trousers and a black and white striped shirt, there were not many people in the carriage, so there was no need to worry about being recognized. “It’s so late, everyone on the subway is looking at their phones, no one is looking at you. It doesn’t matter even if I’m recognized, I’m not… a wanted criminal, right?” He smiled slyly.
He recorded a short video for himself, like a trophy of stolen time. “All the anxiety comes from myself. It’s okay to be recognized, but I still want to travel comfortably. I long for some quiet time alone.” He once had a seven-day vacation, alone in the mountains, riding a horse and chopping wood. The morning sun shone on the sides of all objects, including leaves, green mangoes, stone steps and grass.
After that, when he entered university, he went to military training, morning exercises, playing ball games, and eating in the cafeteria with his classmates. He could always tell which window and which dish were delicious. He doesn’t need to wear makeup in class, and the acting department teacher doesn’t allow it. He enjoys appearing without makeup.
Like all people of his age, he is also keen on digital products. Recently, he has been shooting vlogs to record his life and travels. Under his lens, there are sunny beaches and exotic customs along the way, the playground and horizontal bars at sunset, and the tranquility brought by the stacks of books in the library. “I am also following the trend,” Wu Lei said, “It’s very interesting to record some small clips in this way.”
He also wrote a diary when he was a child. At that time he was more inclined to record his life, thoughts, what movies he had filmed, what difficulties he encountered, etc. “Text is a good form. It is powerful and requires patience, and video is the most direct method at the moment. Sometimes when I look back, I recall my state of mind and emotions at the time. From the initial embarrassment and small mistakes, I gradually got used to it and let it go. Sometimes I don’t know what to say, but I really want to share, so I repeat one sentence: “I’m doing this now…”
Draw energy from the character
When he was young, filming was very simple. He laughed when he was happy and cried when he was sad. But child actors are very different from adult actors. Under the systematic teaching of the school, Wu Lei learned theoretical knowledge and rethought his performance. As an “old actor” who has been acting for more than ten years, he has recognized the torment that must be faced in performance creation.
“Every time I act, I feel like acting is like being sick. It is uncomfortable and hard to endure, but just like being sick, you have to cure it. Every time I act, I feel like I am cooperating with a doctor to treat my illness. I tried my best to achieve the effect the director wanted. When they thought my performance was up to standard, my illness got better and I felt much better. But every time I finished filming, I didn’t hope that this serious illness would get better. I don’t think the treatment was thorough enough.”
He also draws energy from his own roles, and sometimes hopes to be like Li Cu in “Sand Sea”, who has a mischievous side, is afraid of right and wrong, but still bravely walks into the desert. From a confused student who didn’t know what was ahead, to a behind-the-scenes mastermind who protected his companions and marched forward, he completed the transformation from a boy to a man. As it says – making yourself a new self is a long story.
Q&A
How long did it take you to learn the song “We Are All Dreamers” performed in the Spring Festival Gala?
From the time I received the job, I learned songs, rehearsed, recorded and prepared tapes, and did live broadcasts. I have been practicing singing for three months. After all, singing is not my specialty, and I don’t have as much confidence in it as acting. The Spring Festival Gala is in front of Chinese people all over the world, so of course I want to prepare better, so I sing whenever I have time
Was that short dance difficult for you?
Although it looks simple and short, I actually practiced for six hours. Compared to learning a new fighting move and practicing a move with the martial arts instructor, it took me much longer. I also put my best effort into the dance at the birthday party, and after I finished it, I felt that I’m still an actor after all.
Have you set small goals for yourself this year?
I don’t really like small goals like daily check-in. I think everything should go with the flow, and as long as I move towards my big goal, things will get better and better.
What do you do in your spare time between filming and studying?
Listen to music, play games, read books, play basketball. This year, I went to college, so I read professional books and extracurricular readings recommended by teachers. The school will give me a reference book list. Before going to bed, I read my favorite books, usually novels, biographies, etc.
In the vlog, it says that men must carry a wallet. So what do you think are the three things that a tough guy must have?
I think about this question mainly when I am traveling. I will definitely bring my wallet, headphones, and mobile phone. Of course, a tough guy may not wear headphones, but he will also bring a grateful heart.
Why do we have such an obsession with wallets when payment is becoming more and more convenient?
As for wallets, I feel a little safer to have cash on you. And most importantly, you need to bring your student card to enter and exit our school. Without a student card, I cannot enter the school at any time, and we also need to swipe the card to enter our dormitory. Although the dormitory teacher is always very happy to see me. “Oh, are you going to film?” I said, “Teacher, you saw me yesterday…” Sometimes, before I even took out my card, the dormitory teacher opened the door.
Share your experience in choosing headphones and burn-in*.
I usually bring two pairs of headphones when I go out, and I have already adjusted them very well. I have chosen headphones that I’m very satisfied with, and they are good enough to make me “cool down”. So I would like to say to audiophiles that if you have the financial means, you should upgrade in one go, and don’t upgrade bit by bit, which will waste too much energy and money. Of course, it’s also good to keep working and earning money, and get closer to your dream headphones step by step.
Wu Lei likes to joke about his age. He is less than 20 years old this year, and he said, “I have been mentally 50 years old since I was a child.” He laughed at himself. In another interview, he officially announced that his mental age is still 35. But his thoughtfulness is recognized by the industry. After 14 years in the industry, he has participated in more than 60 works, and three works were released to the audience in 2018 alone. Although he has always denied it, Wu Lei is like an “old actor”. Only in the intervals between magazine photo shoots, when he would unconsciously twist the tassels on his sweatshirt with his fingers, or wave at the camera with his innocent smile and clear eyes, you would realize that he is still a teenager who has just reached adulthood.
I don’t want to be a stupid actor.
“What is the standard of a good actor?”
“The most important thing is dedication,” Wu Lei answered without hesitation, “of course acting skills are also important.” No one has ever doubted Wu Lei’s dedication.
When filming “Shadow”, it was midsummer. He wore armor weighing more than 15 kilograms (30斤) and practiced swordplay every day. A set of martial arts shots could be shot 17 times with wires. When filming “Sand Sea”, Wu Lei stayed in the desert for two months, climbing mountains and crossing rivers, sleeping in the open air, and still felt sorry for the director who got tanned. He is used to the hardships of acting. When he was five years old, he played the role of Nezha, and he put on a bellyband and filmed a water scene in the middle of winter, and his whole body was red from the cold. Since then, Wu Lei has been mentally prepared for the hardships and fatigue of acting, “Once you start on the road of acting, you can’t give it up.”
This is also the path he chose. When the crew came to the art school to select actors for the role of Little Nezha, they didn’t think of looking for students from lower grades. Wu Lei, who was still in the lower grades at the time, was dissatisfied. The crew’s car started, and he chased after them and knocked on the car door, “Brother, I’m also shooting commercials, how about you take a couple of pictures for me?” He introduced himself temporarily and recorded a video. Unexpectedly, he was noticed by the director and got his first role in his life.
At such a young age, he has been injured many times while on set. “During filming, I was so nervous that I didn’t feel the pain, and I didn’t get stitches when I got cut, which caused the flesh on the wound to grow, and the scar has not fully healed to this day.” Another time, he got a burn on his left hand during filming, but he just wrapped it with a layer of gauze and continued filming.
He was often scolded by directors because he brought his usual mischief to the set. Wu Lei described himself as a child as “too noisy, didn’t know what acting was, and didn’t take acting seriously.” When he was a child, all he had to do to act was to be obedient, smile when he was happy, and cry when he was sad. Having mastered this trick, Wu Lei has never delayed the progress of the crew.
But gradually, he realized that “acting is a very serious and ritualistic thing.” Wu Lei called this process “a natural process.” “Growing up in such an environment, I was influenced by many excellent predecessors around me who worked hard for acting. I couldn’t help but be attracted by their enthusiasm, which made me want to become a good actor.”
“I can’t say I’m precocious. I knew what I liked at a relatively young age.” Wu Lei called this kind of like as his luck.
He has had a heroic complex since he was a child. He is a die-hard fan of Ultraman and Marvel movies, and is obsessed with saving the earth. Spider-Man and Iron Man are his favorite superheroes.
Before he got the role of Xiao Yan in “Battle Through the Heavens”, Wu Lei had already read the entire novel. When he heard the news, he first thought he would play the role of Xiao Yan when he was a child, but he never expected that he would play the role of Xiao Yan as an adult. Looking back, Wu Lei’s excitement and surprise were beyond words to play the leading role of his favorite novel.
However, as someone who truly understands the role and loves heroism, he feels that Xiao Yan in the novel is not down-to-earth enough, “too powerful, too passionate, and too forward-looking.” In his opinion, a real character, no matter how brave, will have his own fears and cowardice. So when performing, he is more concerned about making Xiao Yan’s behavior more reasonable and fuller.
For actors, growing up in the crew, it is easy to form a fixed performance routine, making acting a skillful technique rather than a sincere expression of emotion. Wu Lei realized this very early and deliberately made his performance full of freshness and gave each role a different feeling.
Although he grew up in the crew and his life experience is relatively simple, Wu Lei usually reads books and watches movies when he is free to enrich his experience and feel a richer life. On the way to the studio, he was reading Thoreau’s “Walden” in the car.
“I am a person who cannot stop. I like new things and can’t stand a particularly boring and stereotyped life.” Acting gave him the opportunity to experience different lives.
Wu Lei has never considered any options other than acting for his life, “I will never stop being an actor in my life.”
“Which character do you think is most like yourself?”
“The characters I play are not similar to myself,” Wu Lei teased himself with a laugh, “I’m just an ordinary person, I can’t do that. If you insist on saying who looks more like me, I think I look more like myself when I was shooting for magazines.”
“So I particularly enjoy the completely different experience that filming brings,” he quickly added.
The future is promising
In 2018, Wu Lei entered the Beijing Film Academy with the first place in the acting major in the country, and his acting career entered a new stage. In the 2018 Forbes China “30 Under 30 Elites” list, the 18-year-old Wu Lei was the youngest actor on the list.
Compared to when he first joined the crew at the age of five, actor Wu Lei now has a deeper understanding of acting.
“An actor’s sense of faith is multi-faceted. The first is the faith in the role. You have to believe in the role and believe that you are the role. The second is the faith in yourself. Believe that you are a good actor and believe that there are beautiful things around you. You have to be very upright and very firm, and stick to your original intention in this industry.”
Debuting at a young age and playing classic roles means it is difficult for him to get rid of the label of “child star”.
Four years ago, after Nirvana in Fire was broadcast, 16-year-old Wu Lei expressed his views on the label of “child star”: “Every actor doesn’t want to be stereotyped, so I really want to grow up, leave behind the identity of a child star, and show a more diverse and mature image of a man. I hope that in the future audiences can evaluate me as a good actor, that’s enough.”
Now, four years later, Wu Lei no longer cares about labels. “I don’t mind the labels on me. Because the labels are put by others, I just need to be myself.”
“I don’t think it’s necessary to be deliberate. If everyone thinks I’m manly, I’ll be satisfied. But if everyone thinks I’m just a kid, I won’t be angry. It’s enough for everyone to have the impression that I’m a good person. I’m more concerned about everyone’s impression of my character/role.”
His thoughts on acting have never changed – the evaluation he most hopes to receive is “actor”, and if he must add an adjective, it would be “good”
The process of becoming an adult seems to be a flash for him, but it also seemed like he had been waiting for ten years. Growing up among adults and working with them, he also experience the hardships and responsibilities of adults earlier.
“Age is just a number…” Wu Lei frowned, “I still want to make myself more sincere, protect the people around me that I want to protect, and do what I want to do.”
Wanting to protect the people around him, maybe this is why everyone praises Wu Lei for his “high emotional intelligence”. In the crew, he is polite and humbly learns from the director and other actors; when participating in the show, he always takes good care of the people around him; occasionally, when faced with the host’s teasing, he can cleverly resolve the awkwardness with a few witty remarks.
This sincerity and consideration is also reflected in his treatment to fans.
In order to give fans a surprise at his coming-of-age ceremony, Wu Lei practiced singing: “I originally refused. An actor should act. I even thought about rehearsing a big play, but the team rejected it. I can’t invite everyone to a tea party if I don’t sing or dance, right?” But at the birthday party, he who originally didn’t want to sing, sang and danced, played the guitar, danced with a sword, and used all his skills to fulfill the wishes of his fans.
A bold fan asked Wu Lei: “When are you going to marry me?” He replied calmly: “My parents are here today, so don’t we also count as people who have met their parents?”
Wu Lei himself did not think it was special to be evaluated as having “high emotional intelligence”. “As an adult, isn’t it my duty to be more considerate of other people’s feelings?” Just as he takes acting as a profession for granted, Wu Lei also takes protecting those around him as a habit that is taken for granted.
Wu Lei considers himself not to be a person with an idol burden, but he never denies the importance of appearance for an actor.
“After all, actors act with their faces, and appearance determines a person’s acting to some extent,” Wu Lei was very frank about this. “But what’s more important is the ability and acting skills. After all, there are so many excellent actors in the world who can rely on their ability and acting skills to play a role that is completely different from themselves.”
“Have you ever imagined what you’ll look like when you’re 40?”
“I’m definitely much more handsome when I’m 40! As a man, I must have more experience and inner qualities, to be more charming and mature.” After saying this, Wu Lei tried hard to give a mature smile.
Wu Lei is an “old actor” with 14 years of acting experience. In the TV series “The Legend and The Hero” filmed in 2005, he played “Little Nezha”. Although he was not the leading actor, his cute image still left a deep impression on the audience: oval face, “Afu” hair (阿福头), small braids tied with red ropes on both sides of the head, black eyes… Later, those audiences who like Wu Lei kept looking back on his growth experience and found that “cute” and “smart” were Wu Lei’s most indelible marks.
“Smart, clever, cute, generous, gentle, and virtuous.” When we asked Wu Lei which words could describe his qualities, he very generously said six in a row.
It was early fall in New York. “New York was still as bustling and busy as ever”, Wu Lei said. On the day of the shoot, Wu Lei landed in the United States at 5 a.m., arrived at the hotel at 8 a.m., and started doing his makeup and hair for our shoot at 10 a.m. Like those hurried pedestrians in Manhattan, Wu Lei is on a tight schedule. “I didn’t have time to have fun last time, and I didn’t have time to have fun this time either.” Wu Lei had been to New York before for work, so this time he felt more familiar with the city. Being an artist requires frequent business trips, but Wu Lei is very good at adjusting himself. “One good thing about going abroad as an artist or working in a foreign country is that the crew will take you to the most fun and prosperous places, so I had fun every time I took a break from filming,” Wu Lei said.
Our shooting that day was on a 20-story rooftop, and Wu Lei was very excited about the tall buildings in front of him. At the end of the shoot, we interviewed him in a moving car, and Wu Lei once again showed the playfulness and curiosity of a teenager. When passing by several trendy buildings, Wu Lei suddenly jumped from one side of the car to the other. Looking at the buildings that were receding rapidly, he began to describe his impressions of each building. He has a sense of spatial design. “Seeing the house built from scratch gives me a sense of accomplishment.”
Wu Lei was born on 26 December 1999, and is not yet 20 years old. Being immersed in the crew early on made him more calm than his peers, but his strength lies in not letting this calmness cover up the youth and sharpness of the teenager. In this shoot, he tried bangs. Wu Lei is a frequent magazine cover star, but he said, “I feel more and more that I’m not very good at taking photos… I’m actually quite shy and embarrassed when I pose for photos.” He is still more accustomed to acting. During the fifteen minutes of our interview, “performance” and “actor” were the two words he mentioned most. These are the coordinates of his current life and the identity he wants to be remembered for in the future.
1. Apart from acting, I haven’t done anything very passionate
Wu Lei became famous at a young age and has become a familiar face in TV dramas. He played the cute and ignorant young boy Yang Liulang in the costume idol drama “The Young Warriors”, the naughty, lively, and sensible Tang Buku in the sci-fi sitcom “Home with Alien”, and the seemingly lazy but actually hidden* Hu Yifeng in the youth inspirational drama “Whirlwind Girl”… Since he entered the industry in 2005 as “Little Nezha”, Since he entered the industry as “Little Nezha” in 2005, Wu Lei has been wearing the character’s clothes and has been watched growing up. He once raised a dog named “Sanlang”, but later he had no time to take care of it, so he placed it in a friend’s house for foster care, but Wu Lei always treats it as a friend he miss.
**: 深藏不露 is a person who has knowledge and talent but is reserved and does not like to show off his or her talents in front of others
Wu Lei often spent his childhood and teenage years on the set. He said that when he first came into contact with this industry, he had no idea what acting was. After several experiences, he realized that it was a profession. “I feel that this industry is a process of gradual learning and exploration. Every play and every role is a preparation and a foundation. If I say that my acting skills have improved, I should thank all the works for touching me.” In an interview in 2018, he said this. When he was a kid on the set, Wu Lei would cry every time the filming was finished. He couldn’t bear to leave those people he spent every day with. He still hasn’t gotten used to this separation, but he has grown up.
In 2014, Wu Lei, who was less than 15 years old, filmed Nirvana in Fire. The TV series was broadcast the following year, and its reputation and ratings remained high. With this work, he won the Outstanding TV Series Award at the 30th China TV Drama Feitian Awards and the first place in the 19th China Top 100 TV Series at the Huading Awards. He played the unforgettable Fei Liu in the series, which had a significant role.
Fei Liu is handsome in appearance. Although he is mentally handicapped, he has preserved the innocence and beauty of human nature. As the personal bodyguard of the male protagonist Mei Changsu, he is highly skilled in martial arts and loyal. Even when fighting with his opponent, the lines he said were also hilarious: “You are not funny.” In short, Fei Liu is the youngest and most lively character in the exciting political drama. His lack of worldly wisdom and occasional coquettishness are rare and interesting. In the process of shaping this role, Wu Lei also gave full play to his advantages: his youthful spirit fits Fei Liu’s agility, and his natural and flexible expression management fits Fei Liu’s childish nature… In the end, Wu Lei completed the task brilliantly, and made more screen audiences realize that this “young actor” has a rare acting talent. With this role, Wu Lei won the Most Popular Newcomer Award at iQiyi Night and the Most Potential Actor Award at the National Drama Festival that year.
During our brief interview, Wu Lei expressed his pride in being an actor several times. “I don’t think there is anything I’m more proud of than the title of an actor,” Wu Lei said. “Apart from taking on roles, I haven’t done anything very passionate. I feel very excited when I decide to take on each role. I look forward to it and feel very excited.”
2. Representative of the new generation of filmmakers
After Nirvana in Fire, Wu Lei’s popularity grew, and he was handed more scripts. He said that he had been studying and working in the crew since he was a child, and there was no room for him to rebel, so he had to use all his “dissatisfaction” to choose the right to play. “I turned down some plays I didn’t like and took the ones I liked. Sometimes I think there is a rebellious attitude and uniqueness in it.”
In recent years, Wu Lei has been running forward. In the TV series “Tomb of the Sea”, adapted from Nanpai Sanshu’s novel “The Lost Tomb: The Young Chapter – Sand Sea”, he plays Li Cu, a high school student who was originally impetuous and impulsive, but eventually grew up after desert exploration and conspiracy tests. On video websites, the show received 100 million online views within 5 hours of its release, and by the time the finale was aired, this figure had finally exceeded 5 billion.
Afterwards, Wu Lei played the role of Xiao Yan, a talented fighting spirit practitioner in the costume martial arts drama “Fights Break Sphere”. Director Yu Rongguang said in an interview: “Eighteen-year-old Wu Lei and eighteen-year-old Xiao Yan both have firm and sunny eyes, so they are the best choices to play Xiao Yan.” In fact, Wu Lei read the original novel a few years ago, and he was moved by the character’s youthful ambition at the time. “Xiao Yan is what a hero should be like, passionate, tough and persistent.” Wu Lei had a lot of fighting scenes during the filming, and he had to fly around carrying heavy props every time. When the series started airing, Wu Lei was as nervous as when he took the role, but he knew that this attempt was worth it. Coincidentally, “Fights Break Sphere” premiered on Hunan Satellite TV on September 3, 2018, and that was the time when Wu Lei enrolled in the Beijing Film Academy. He saw an advertisement for “Fights Break Sphere” on the tables in the school cafeteria, and excitedly took a group photo and posted it on Weibo. “My name was on almost most of the tables, which was actually quite embarrassing. I felt a lot of pressure.”
As a child star who has been watched since childhood, Wu Lei does carry more expectations than actors of the same age. In the minds of the audience, he seems to always be the young man who is wandering at the age of 18, dressed in bright clothes and riding a horse. In 2018, Wu Lei was admitted to the Performance Department of Beijing Film Academy with the first place in the art examination. At the opening ceremony, Wu Lei spoke as a representative of the freshmen. He said that when he first started acting at the age of five, he relied more on the camera to capture his state. Later, he found that being completely immersed in the world of the character and forgetting the existence of the camera was a very novel and wonderful experience. He also talked about the charm of acting. “You can experience many different lives with one life, this is what attracts me most about acting,” Wu Lei said.
Still in September 2018, the movie “Shadow” starring Wu Lei was released. In this martial arts action film directed by Zhang Yimou, Wu Lei plays Yang Ping, the son of the imperial general Yang Cang. Yang Ping was successful at a young age and followed his father to fight on the battlefield very early. On the set, Wu Lei used a very long and heavy sword for the first time. Although it was very strenuous, he still wanted to have the feeling of being one with the sword. In one of the fight scenes, Wu Lei needed to hold the sword and cut through the puddles on the ground to chop at Qingping, played by Guan Xiaotong. This action seems simple, but it requires upper limb strength and a sense of balance. In the end, Wu Lei fell 17 times before completing this shot. Such selfless dedication was also appreciated by Zhang Yimou. At the film press conference, Zhang Yimou praised Wu Lei generously, saying: “This child is able to endure hardships, is humble and studious, and is very hardworking. He is a representative of the new generation of filmmakers.”
Wu Lei is really demanding about the details of acting. During the interview, we asked him, “If you have a time machine, how old would you most like to be?” Wu Lei answered very frankly, “Actually, I don’t have any idea. I think it’s good now. I feel that every moment of the present makes me feel very happy, so I won’t go back.” But soon he remembered something and added, “Every time I finish shooting a scene, I want to take a time machine back to before shooting this scene, because I feel that I’m not good enough and can be better.”
3. Be a good actor and a good person
In the past two years, Wu Lei has often been asked about his age. He has just become an adult and will soon be 20 years old. On 23 December 2017, he held the “L.E.O” coming-of-age ceremony in Shanghai. At the beginning, he wore a white shirt and black pants and performed a “monster-fighting” martial arts for the audience. Wu Lei refused this kind of appearance at first. He felt that his dancing skills were not good. But later he was convinced because this arrangement could include the important roles he had played. He laughed and said that this was a review of his more than ten years of career.
We asked Wu Lei, among all the young heroes he has played, which one is closest to him. He modestly said, “I’m just a young actor, how can I be similar to them?” However, Wu Lei also admitted that since he played all the roles, there would be some overlaps, and he would still be moved by the qualities of the characters. For example, he would be moved by Li Cu’s unyielding and bravery in the face of force majeure in “Tomb of the Sea”, and he would also be infected by Xiao Yan’s rebellious spirit in “Fights Break Sphere” who refused to bow to fate.
After many years of debut, Wu Lei has his own definition of a good actor: “First of all, you must be dedicated to your work, and secondly, you must be able to play the role well and have a variety of faces. For example, if you can play roles with different personalities and different positioning, and you can stand out and be recognized by the audience, I think you are a very good actor.”
When Wu Lei just turned 18, he was asked in an interview, “What kind of world do you think adults should have?” His answer seemed very mature: “I don’t think adulthood is a ‘right’, it doesn’t mean you can do a lot of things you couldn’t do before. I think adulthood is more like a symbol of ‘responsibility’. When you grow up, you will have more abilities and you will have to take on more responsibilities.”
He used to say that he would go skydiving and get a driver’s license when he turned 18, but now two years have passed and he joked that he was “still a man with nothing”. “So I think I have to let nature take its course.” At the age of 19, he has become more mature and has a more comprehensive view of things. If he wants to list the happy things, it is that he has taken on a few more favorite dramas. For example, recently, he has been hanging out with the crew of “Cross Fire”. This web drama directed by Xu Hongyu tells the story of a young e-sports player who keeps moving forward after countless repetitive training and countless setbacks. Wu Lei plays the male protagonist Lu Xiaobei in it. As the drama is still in post-production, Wu Lei did not reveal more details.
Wu Lei said that every time he immersed himself in a role, his personality would tend to be more like that of the role, and it would take some time for him to get out of that character. Wu Lei was also subtly changed by the young heroes he played – “Maybe without those roles, my personality would not be so confident and talkative now.” He believes that his mental age is also affected by “them”.
“Most people say that I’m a little more mature than my age. I am actually 35 years old now… but it’s a bit silly to say that my mental age is 35. It’s okay if I say it as a joke, but if I say it seriously, it seems like I’m pretending to be profound.” Wu Lei realized this and quickly became skilled in acting cute, “I’m actually three years old, no more.” When we were about to move on to the next topic, he seemed to be still immersed in thinking about his age. He suddenly said excitedly that he had found a better answer. “Because I have played many, many roles and experienced many, many different lives, my mental age should be the sum of their ages divided by the number of roles I have played.”
We asked Wu Lei: “You have played so many roles and have been famous for so many years. Which moment made you feel like your dream has come true?” Wu Lei said that every time he signed a contract, he would place unlimited enthusiasm and expectations on the new play, because he felt that every time he took on a role, he would yearn for it. Although older audiences often say to him, “I grew up watching your plays,” Wu Lei has a clear understanding of his own position. “Acting is a never-ending process. Everyone can act, and everyone has different ways of acting. In fact, you have to keep learning and always keep the heart of an apprentice.”
In just over a month, Wu Lei will be 20 years old. He has no particular ambitions for the remaining six months, he just hopes to live peacefully and smoothly. As for what he aspires to do in his life after turning 20, his answer is quite simple: “Be a good actor and a good person.”
At the end of the year, we start to summarize the gains and losses of the year. Vogue Me’s December issue launched the topic ME’s 2019 emotional keywords. We have summarized the top ten emotions that appeared most frequently among young people this year. Today we will reveal the first of them, the annual emotional keyword for cover character Wu Lei – stability.
The intensity of emotions seems to be assumed to be inversely proportional to age. When it comes to 20 years old, the ups and downs of emotions are probably always intense, good and bad, like a stone that breaks the calm surface of a lake. The bigger the waves it stirs up, the more energetic it is. I met Wu Lei, who is about to turn 20, with my predictions about what a 20-year-old’s emotions should be like. The key words did not fall within the expected range, but it was satisfying. The key words did not fall within the expected range, but it was satisfying.
Age does not apply to the above assumptions, because Wu Lei’s stability is consistent throughout.
Stable Career
Acting as an Actor is My Destiny
“Acting may be my destiny. If I weren’t an actor, I really don’t know what I would do.”
Wu Lei starred in his first commercial at the age of 3, made his screen debut at the age of 5, and has been in the industry for 17 years. He is a boy that everyone has watched grow up. This kind of intimacy that is naturally built up over time not only brings extra love from the audience, but also attention and expectations. There are many children who grow up in the halo, but not everyone can clearly distinguish between true and pure love and giving back to the outside world’s excessive expectations. Is being a good actor really motivated by pure love?
In 2014, 15-year-old Wu Lei could answer this question. If when he was a child, the praises from the crew were more or less “a cute and smart kid”, then starting from the filming of The Return of the Condor Heroes that year, Wu Lei truly felt the difference between “being recognized” and “being liked”.
“Because I debuted relatively early, everyone in the crew calls me Wu laoshi. Although I know that 80% of them are joking, the feeling of being recognized by everyone is very gratifying.” When the efforts I put in as an actor are sincerely rewarded by everyone, from the encouragement from the director to other actors, the joy in their eyes and the sparks that collide in the cooperation, these things begin to truly stimulate the idea of ”becoming a good actor” and turn it into a belief.
In 2018, like any other high school student, after a year of getting up early and going to bed late to prepare for the college entrance examination, Wu Lei was admitted to the Beijing Film Academy and began his college life. It is hard not to wonder, for a kid who grew up on the set and in the crew, after more than a decade of acting experience, can the theory and practice on campus still excite him?
College student Wu Lei gave an affirmative answer. “In fact, the only difference between me and normal children is that I knew what I wanted to do from a young age. Most people start to do their favorite jobs and start a career after graduating from college. The difference between me and others is that I entered the industry I like early, nothing else is different. So I’m still excited about college life. Learning professional knowledge in school and learning how to enrich and improve myself are very helpful for the performance that I love.”
The staff who has been with Wu Lei said that the older he gets, the stronger his love for acting becomes, and the clearer he is about what he is doing and what he wants to do. He also thinks more unconsciously. He watches a wide range of movies and art works. Absorbing nutrition, broadening boundaries, and considering one’s original intention as an actor. In an era when original intention is widely discussed, the criteria for consideration have become uncertain.
As an actor, it is an ideal state to fully achieve self-satisfaction, director’s expectations, and audience’s feedback, but most of the time, the three are in conflict with each other. When you have achieved your own and the director’s expectations but are still not understood by the audience in an ideal way, should you explain?
Wu Lei spent a little longer thinking about this question than the others. If we have to choose one of these three as the standard to measure actor Wu Lei’s performance, it seems difficult to establish.
“If you feel that a work has met your expectations and the director also thinks it is good, but the audience’s feedback is not so satisfactory, I think that is my own problem. I used to have the urge to explain to the audience, but it is better to reflect on myself. In the final analysis, I must have done something wrong to cause this situation.” It can be seen that he was seriously looking for his feelings as a viewer in his memories, and then comparing them with his expression as an actor. The conclusion is that Wu Lei chose not to respond with the argument that “you just can’t understand my work.”
“If the audience can’t understand a work, then the work is meaningless. I don’t act to amuse myself.” This is probably my favorite answer when we talk about acting, an answer that may be misinterpreted, but it is powerful. Expression is the original intention of actor Wu Lei. He clearly knows that although there is no right or wrong in the form of expression, it is something that should be insisted on to find a suitable method within the scope of one’s ability.
Emotionally Stable
An emotionless formidable e-sports player
“Besides being an actor, how would you like others to introduce Wu Lei?” “As an e-sports player! Haha.”
Sure enough, no matter what era or form electronic games appear in, they have always firmly controlled the hearts of boys of all ages. I have seen too many male classmates who either howl in battle or kill with red eyes when playing games, so I can’t help but be curious, what does e-sports player Wu Lei look like? After a day of getting along with him, I confirmed that when Wu Lei plays games, if you don’t look closely, you probably don’t know he is playing games. He is so calm that it seems like the game is not fun.
“When I play video games, I’m very serious. I will analyze data, observe the enemy’s attack methods, reflect and review. Unlike others who play games for fun, I play games to win, and I’m very serious. It is actually very similar to acting.” Unlike the excitement of the virtual world in games that many boys are obsessed with, what attracts Wu Lei most about games is that “playing games well actually requires a lot of skills, teamwork, data analysis, etc. It is not a particularly easy thing.”
“Don’t get carried away, don’t show off, play it safe” is the missing option in the 20-year-old emotional prediction form, but it is truly reflected in Wu Lei’s emotional coping from childhood to adulthood. For Wu Lei, who grew up almost in front of the camera, pressure is an unavoidable theme. While the audience is rating his performance in front of the camera, the outside world is also curious about his life behind the camera. With the development of the Internet, there is no privacy now, let alone losing control, Wu Lei has never even subconsciously released negative emotions.
“I do feel that the attention from the outside world can be a pressure, which can be both good and bad. As an actor, of course I want to be noticed, but I’m used to it. People will ask you what the difference is between you in front of the camera and behind the camera, but the camera really exists in most of my lives. So the Wu Lei in the camera is the normal Wu Lei. “He doesn’t use games as an outlet to relieve stress, nor does he need to. Wu Lei’s stress relief system is all about competing with himself.
“Many times, pressure is self-imposed. The outside world will have an impact on us, but we still put pressure on ourselves. When acting in an important scene, the pressure is particularly great. There is no way to relieve it, it will be fine after the performance. Facing the pressure directly is the only solution.” In addition to solving his own pressure neatly and simply, not transferring the pressure to others is one of the things that people admire about Wu Lei during the filming process.
The day of the shoot was the first time Wu Lei met Céline. The time was short and the shoot was intensive, so the makeup and hair styling times were staggered to improve efficiency, so the two had no time to get familiar with each other in advance. It would be a lie to say that he wasn’t embarrassed at all. Fortunately, “shooting for magazines is different from acting. It’s the same as the NBA. Acting is like the playoffs and you have to be serious. Shooting for magazines is more like the All-Stars, just for fun.” Wu Lei’s kindness and friendliness made people feel that everything was not just politeness. He greeted people naturally and taught Céline simple Chinese. When the two of them started laughing at each other in front of the camera, it felt like a “click” between them.
“Besides being an actor, how do you want others to introduce Wu Lei?” The e-sports player gave a more serious answer: “It would be nice if people introduced Wu Lei as a pretty OK person.”
Steady
Zero-conflict energy release
During a break in filming, I asked Wu Lei’s mother: When was he the most rebellious since he was a child?
His mother thought about it seriously and gave me an unexpected answer: now. When I asked Wu Lei a similar question, he answered: the upcoming 20th birthday is not much different from the 19th birthday. Instead, “after my 18th birthday, I really felt that I had grown up.”
For Wu Lei, turning 18 not only means a grand birthday party, facing the fans’ love head-on and giving back seriously, but also means legal adulthood, a node where he begins to be completely responsible for his own words and deeds; it means starting a new college life, clarifying the direction of his performance and working hard; it also means that the time he will spend away from his hometown Shanghai will only get longer and longer, and the unfamiliar circles he needs to enter alone will be wider, and the thinking that comes with it will be more frequent. This also explains why his mother feels that Wu Lei’s rebellion has only just begun. Wu Lei is clever and straightforward, and his mother was always by his side when he was young, so he could more or less grasp and find the right balance. After turning 18 and starting college life, he inevitably had to take charge of everything himself.
His mother’s worries are not unnecessary, but I can feel that when Wu Lei is gradually finding and releasing his own energy, he may be rebellious, but he has direction.
He understood the freedom at this moment as “eat whatever you want, shoot whatever you want, do what you like, and don’t force yourself to do things you don’t like.” It was an answer that came out of his mouth, just like answering what he had for lunch today. The content was simple and flawless, and there is no room for doubt.
Putting aside every aspect of Wu Lei as an actor on the screen, regarding Wu Lei himself, I recorded this day’s interaction with him with many questions and blank feelings. After watching all his video interviews and text conversations in the past five years, his cleverness, quick response, sunshine, and love of joking can be felt across the screen. But perhaps it is because the energy he conveys is too positive that it is hard not to be wary and guess that it is “too good to be true.”
In order to get rid of the interference of vigilance as much as possible, we did not record the conversation throughout the day. After chatting for a while, he went to change his clothes for the photo shoot, and I immediately typed down the content of the conversation.
I remember very clearly that there was a video shoot of Wu Lei, and the director gave intense instructions on how to perform emotionally. I was typing in the back room, and heard deafening roars from the studio across the wall, followed by the director’s “cut” and a satisfied “bravo”. The whole audience burst into applause, and that was the first time everyone was touched by his explosive power.
After the shoot, he went backstage to change his look and passed by the cubicle where I was typing. He crouched down and quietly approached me from behind, pretending to peek. When I turned around and he found that he had failed, he just laughed and went to change his clothes. Like a boy in middle school who failed to pull a prank, his childlikeness is oozing out. Not only the contrast between these two moments, but also many times, Wu Lei makes people feel that this boy is a tangible existence, not a perfect mannequin in a wax museum. When he needs to focus, he can do it in one take, and when he turns around, he is naughty like a 20-year-old boy who doesn’t need to hide. When the makeup artist held an umbrella for him in the glaring sunlight on the rooftop, he turned around and naturally looked into the other person’s eyes and said “thank you”. When there was a small incident in the middle of the shooting and a scene needed to be re-shot, he didn’t frown, but comforted the on-site dispatcher first, saying “I’m OK”.
There are many people on the set, and the team is not only new, but also mixed with English, French and Chinese. Sometimes when he was waiting for shooting instructions or scene setting, he was the only one in the brightest spot in the huge studio. His eyes were not wandering, his hands were not uneasy, he didn’t ask anyone to pass him water or play with his phone. He just stood naturally in the bright spotlight, and he was relaxed.
I can’t say if this is a habit of facing the attention from the outside world, but Wu Lei, who remains at ease under the blazing attention, will be particularly OK facing the countless uncertain possibilities in the future.
Wu Lei rushed into the room, his hair looked messy.
He was called up at 6 o’clock this morning, and set off from home before 7 o’clock. The car drove for more than an hour, or perhaps close to two hours. Wu Lei, who was sleeping all the way, could not give an exact time. Finally, he arrived at the “Dishui Lake” more than 70 kilometers away from the center of Shanghai. This distance makes it hard to believe that you are still in Shanghai, but Dishui Lake does belong to Nanhui, Shanghai. This lake is “younger” than Wu Lei, who was born in 1999. It is purely “out of nothing”. It is an artificial lake created by enclosing the sea and is in a perfect circle. Even though he was born and raised in Shanghai, Wu Lei is not very familiar with this place. He walked slowly to the window, looked at the calm lake not far from the window, and said to himself: “Oh, this is Dishui Lake.”
Not hearing anyone’s response, Wu Lei turned around and looked around the room again, then chose a sofa and lay down on it. “It’s too far, I need to rest for a while.” He added calmly, “I’ll wake up in a while.”
Perhaps this not-so-conscious state is very suitable for this interview. The topic we are discussing is about “party”, but at this moment we are sitting in a hotel room, the makeup artist and hairstylist are busy, there is no “party” atmosphere. I can only say to Wu Lei directly:
“Okay, why don’t we imagine a party of yours, what will it be like?”
Wu Lei still looked at the mirror and hesitated for a moment.
Next, we will enter an unknown party, which is also “created out of nothing”. In Wu Lei’s words: “The unknown is the most interesting thing.”
“Who to invite?”
“Friends who called in the middle of the night.”
Mention the word “party” and we may think of the scene in F.S. Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, or, for most post-millennial visual creatures, the memory of the film by Baz Luhrmann. Gatsby’s grand parties take up the entire third chapter, detailing the list of visitors to Gatsby’s mansion, and in Fitzgerald’s words: “Every morning you wake up to a world of indescribable splendor and promise.”
In his blue gardens, men and women flitted like moths among laughter, champagne, and stars… Caterers came down from the city with hundreds of feet of canvas tents and countless colored electric lights… Before seven o’clock, the band arrived, not just a five-piece band, but a full-fledged team, with oboes, trombones, saxophones, violins, cornets, piccolo, treble and bass drums, everything you could think of…
“Wait a minute.” Wu Lei shook his head and quickly stopped his endless imagination. This was not what he called a “party”: “If… only this can be called a ‘party’, then ours should be called a ‘tea party’.”
What does a tea party mean? Is it a group of people sitting together and chatting quietly?
“Almost. I don’t like noisy places.” The 20-year-old Wu Lei has a deep voice, “I don’t like crowds either.”
Aren’t parties supposed to be social events – getting to know another group of people through a group of people, getting to know his friends through friends, drinking and chatting, and expanding personal connections.
“This deliberate way of getting to know people…” Wu Lei doesn’t like that kind of utilitarianism. “It’s best to get to know people by chance. It’s more interesting to become friends without any reason or purpose.” He mentioned that when he was in college, he was taking a public English class. A classmate quietly sat in the last row near the corner, which was also Wu Lei’s favorite seat. Wu Lei believes that this classmate can’t immediately recognize him with a mask and a hat on. The two boys chatted about games and then made an appointment to go to the cafeteria for lunch. This is what he called a casual acquaintance – if you want to be friends with Wu Lei, “first don’t think about ‘how to become my friend'”.
I said, in case Wu Lei organizes a party, it might be a “Slumber Party”.
“After work, a group of people gathered in someone’s room to eat barbecue and drink something together.” Then we took a closer look at Wu Lei’s pajamas. His pajamas are made of pure cotton with plain patterns, a complete set. “In my sister’s words, they are ‘sunset red pajamas’.”
Wu Lei thought about organizing a horse riding trip with his friends. Horse riding is one of his favorite things to do, but it is difficult to find like-minded friends in this regard. Everyone seems to be afraid of horses. Wu Lei tried to invite them, and the answer he got was: OK, let us know when you finish riding, and we will have dinner together.
The number of people in the party will be about ten, super small.
Too many people would be awkward, Wu Lei carefully selected the people who would attend the party. He is a cautious, considerate, observant host who tries his best to make all the guests comfortable: “When I call friends together, everyone must like each other and know each other. I will not make any one of them awkward.”
Most of his friends are from the film and television industry. To be his friend, it is very important that they “don’t gossip”.
“Don’t tell others about your affairs or what you said.” Similar things have happened before, so Wu Lei can’t help but worry, “If it’s a reliable friend, everyone can speak freely. I’m not a person who gossips behind others. Of course, if it’s my friend, I will definitely want to know about him – if there’s no desire to know, we can’t call him a friend, right – but it’s important to keep other people’s privacy secret.”
Most of his friends are older than Wu Lei, and some are so close that they can confide in each other, and they are called “friends who call in the middle of the night.” “At that time, when the phone rang, I didn’t even need to look, I knew it was him.” With this trust, Wu Lei is happy to play the role of a listener, “Many times, many people just lack someone to talk to – He can’t be sitting on the toilet and talking to himself, I just need to listen quietly. They don’t really need my advice. Just like when I need to talk, I already have the answer in my heart, but I need a word of guidance from someone I trust.”
What about you, will you share your secrets and thoughts with others?
“Maybe… it was only once or twice.” Wu Lei showed a maturity beyond his 20 years, which is very consistent with the public’s impression of him. He is rational and introverted when encountering difficulties. “I am willing to find a way to solve the problem instead of repeatedly entangled in the problem.”
“What do you want to eat?”
“You had to eat it blindfolded”
We have all seen Wu Lei’s cooking skills (across the screen, through a Vlog): he dug out an old mobile phone, set up two cameras, and methodically filmed the entire process of making a Western breakfast with skillful techniques and clear procedures.
“I have shown my best skills!” Wu Lei announced to everyone. “I searched for cooking tutorials on Bilibili, and then followed the steps in the tutorials – I also played around a bit. This was completely forced during the epidemic, because I couldn’t order takeout.”
Before this, Wu Lei never touched the kitchen utensils. This breakfast is the result of two months of “training”.
May I ask, is there anything else you can order on Wu Lei’s menu?
“Sorry.” Wu Lei smiled awkwardly but politely. “Frying is my main method of cooking. I fry steaks and lamb chops. As for stir-frying, I’m not so good at it. Stir-frying requires a lot of attention to what to put in first and what to put in later, when to put them in, and how long to stir-fry… When it comes to frying, I only need to focus on one thing. As long as the ingredients I buy are good enough, it won’t taste bad no matter how I cook it.”
As a very nice host, Wu Lei has also met “customized requests”. Once, Wu Lei showed off his cooking skills at home to entertain friends. “They said that the food was delicious, but you had to eat it blindfolded.”
On a whim, he made pasta, but it was not in tomato sauce. Wu Lei mixed cream mushrooms himself. The “guest” asked to add eggs, and Wu Lei tried his best to satisfy him. He added eggs and mixed them together, and finally it became a mess.
“It smells and tastes good!” these “food critics” commented, “It makes up for the visual ‘loss’!”
Wu Lei was particularly happy during the retelling process, and he didn’t mind the harsh food reviews at all. If there was anything he really disliked, it would be the finishing touches of cooking:
“Washing dishes. I can’t accept that I have to wash dishes after cooking. You will find yourself spending the whole day in the kitchen. In the morning, I have to cook, wash vegetables, and cut vegetables for an hour, which is already very tiring. When it’s time to eat at noon, I have to wash the dishes first – I don’t have that many dishes. After dinner at night, sometimes I really don’t want to wash the dishes, so the first thing I do the next morning is to wash the dishes! I just woke up and I’m still in a daze. I don’t want to wash the dishes at all.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Don’t keep scolding. Don’t keep praising.”
“I watched CrossFire!” At this unknown party, someone would probably raise their hand and mention this drama, “It has a pretty good reputation.”
Wu Lei was quite proud about this topic: “It means everyone is enjoying my performance!” In return, he slyly revealed a little behind-the-scenes secret: “Do you know what we were playing when we were performing the scene where we won the ‘championship’? Minesweeper and cards! Hahaha.”
But it’s good enough. Just pay attention to one thing: don’t keep scolding him, and don’t keep praising him.
“Anyone would feel uncomfortable if you attack me, but I would also feel embarrassed if you keep praising me.” Wu Lei rarely showed shyness, and immediately changed his expression to a serious one. “Of course I know that as an artist, I live in flowers and applause most of the time. This kind of thing will definitely be addictive. After all, where is the success of an actor reflected? When others say that you act well!”
Wu Lei has always been vigilant. He was used to hearing a saying since he was a child, “honest advice is unpleasant to the ear”, so much so that he believed it too much, and sometimes he even thought that all the insults against him were for his own good. As he grew up, he gradually realized that “some people simply don’t like me.”
Friends feel sorry for Wu Lei. Why let those people ruin his mood!
Instead, he tried to comfort his angry friend: “This is part of an artist’s job. When you appear under the spotlight, you become a target for emotional venting. If you act well, you make everyone happy; if you let everyone scold you, doesn’t that also relieve other people’s pressure?”
This is not just talk. Wu Lei knows that no one who attacks without reason really understands him. They are just scolding the character “Wu Lei” – a public figure played by him. Is that him? Not entirely.
He can distinguish between reality and fiction, front and backstage.
That’s why when someone suggested “Wu Lei, please give us a show” at a party, he declined politely and showed a cold attitude, leaving no room for negotiation. The person who gave the suggestion must not really understand Wu Lei. His friends will not force him. He is an actor: “Performing on stage is out of my comfort zone. I feel uncomfortable doing anything other than acting.”
He is suitable for facing everyone in various roles, and he pushed “Wu Lei” to perform on stage: “Sorry, I’m not good at this.”
Truth or Dare: The Invisible Stand Army
Before the magazine shoot started, we asked Wu Lei the “truth” question.
At this moment, he is staying in the RV. Next to the RV is Nanhui Beach and Donghai Bridge. On the hottest day since the beginning of the dog days of summer in Shanghai, staff are setting up the scene on the beach. There are several long tables covered with white tablecloths and various snacks on them. Parasols have been put up, casting shadows on the beach. Gold glitter paper covers the entire wall, and there is a disco ball… The empty beach creates a surreal feeling. Occasionally, tourists passing by look curiously. Perhaps they think there will be an open-air party here.
The speakers blast out music, and the sound waves do their best to drive the atmosphere. If you connect Wu Lei’s playlist to Bluetooth, you should hear Japanese ACG (Animation, Comics, and Games) music. Most of the time, Wu Lei doesn’t need to know what the lyrics are, the music will take him back to a certain anime scene, maybe losing a loved one, maybe reuniting with a lover, maybe being seriously injured, or maybe a Jedi counterattack…
The emotions in the story give him strength.
With this kind of music, it is very suitable to answer this question in the truth – what does the role bring to you?
Wu Lei thought of an anime called “JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure”, in which there is a superpower called “Stand“. He feels that after each performance, it is like having a Stand. “They protect me and accompany me. If I lose motivation or feel tired, the character will tell me, ‘Wu Lei, you can do it.’ I need to be as courageous as the character. When I play a role, I gain a friend and a mark on myself.”
So he wrote the answer behind the question: Courage.
Maybe, there really is an invisible army of “Stand” behind him.
A little memory, the scenery recorded by eyes
Wu Lei, the host of “Open Air Party”, appeared on the summer beach.
Looking at the sea, he suddenly said: “My mother took me to see the sea when I was a child.” The sea around Shanghai is actually similar, earthy yellow, not clear blue. But this did not dampen Wu Lei’s playfulness. He put on a loose shirt, swung his sleeves and ran towards the sea, breaking away from the photographer’s command…
He really wants to travel. When talking to his friends this year, the thing he regrets most is that he can’t travel.
“Originally I had a vacation,” Wu Lei started planning this vacation last year. “I would take my parents to an island first, then go to Japan alone, and if there was still time, go to Europe – but because of the epidemic, everything went down the drain.”
If work is not counted, Wu Lei’s only official solo trip was the “seven-day tour” two years ago. “So far, I have only traveled alone this once, the only time in 20 years.”
He was 18 years old that year, and just after the college entrance examination, Wu Lei felt that he should take a break. He told his agent to take some time off, without any special reason.
“People still need to spend some time with themselves,” he said again.
The team didn’t know where he went specifically, and Wu Lei arranged the trip himself. The hotel is located on the Kawaguchiko Mountain. As soon as you open the curtains, you can see the entire Mount Fuji standing in front of you. It often rains in the mountains, and there are always rain boots and umbrellas at the door. The room key is old-fashioned and comes with a whistle. There are all kinds of birds in the forest. When you blow the whistle, the birds will fly over.
I’m beginning to understand why Wu Lei doesn’t like crowded parties. He won’t go around calling out to friends. He likes quietness and freedom. If possible, he would rather avoid the crowd and enjoy some alone time, even if it’s just hiding in the room to play games or watch movies.
He originally wanted to book a hot spring hotel, but he heard that there were a lot of Chinese tourists in that hotel and was worried that he would feel uneasy. “When I travel, I don’t like to check in or make any plans. I just do whatever I want today and whatever I want tomorrow. I choose a place with good scenery and walk around the hotel every day, and I’m satisfied.”
Occasionally he would go down the mountain and stroll around the local town. It happened to be the summer festival. “There were spontaneous performances by residents. Although they were not professional enough and I could not understand what they were singing, I could feel their happiness.” This idle state reminded him of a time when he was filming in Hengdian. He took a walk with his assistant on impulse and met a street performer. He stood by and watched the performance. “It was not until the next day when I read the report that I found out that my entire walk was filmed. Even me scratching my head and picking my nose were photographed.”
Outside of work, Wu Lei not only does not want to be photographed, he also doesn’t like taking photos.
A friend wanted him to share some travel photos. Wu Lei flipped through the album on his phone and said, “I just took some random photos of the scenery. They are not pretty. It takes time to take good photos. I just picked up my phone and took some random photos. I just took photos of what I saw, not for the purpose of taking good-looking photos.”
“People today are used to using cameras to record their lives, but eyes are the best tool for observing the world. The most beautiful scenery is seen with the eyes and remembered in the heart, not recorded by a camera.” He paused and added, “After all, the pixels of a camera are not as high as those of the eyes.”
The End of the Party
The party scene on the beach has not been removed yet. The sea water behind is unaffected and rolls on its own. The sun is still dazzling. “As children we lived in a world of eternal light—heaven was near us, as real as the beach,” Graham Greene wrote in a book.
But no matter what kind of party it is, it will eventually end. The music will eventually stop, the atmosphere will eventually cool down, and friends will eventually wave goodbye.
Wu Lei is used to separation because he has been in the crew since he was a child.
“Comrades who often spend three or four months together and develop revolutionary friendships have to separate. This is the norm in life.” He recalled a line from his character Lu Xiaobei in “Cross Fire”, “No one can accompany anyone to the end. But I still force myself to look forward. That’s it, all we can do is cherish the present.”
On the beach where there were no guests, he waved to the camera.
A Japanese song about wind, mountains, sea and youth was played in the interview room. Wu Lei hummed softly, his voice was clean and the melody was lyrical, which had a magical power to calm and relax people. Isn’t this the tune that young people in their early twenties would like?
“Sorry, please turn down the volume a little, we are ready to start the interview.” I said to the staff on the scene. “Don’t you like my songs?” A joke came from behind my head. Wu Lei’s slightly teasing opening remarks livened up the atmosphere. The greeting of the first meeting made me realize that the young man in front of me might be a little different.
When Wu Lei played Nezha in the 2005 filming of “The Legend and the Hero”, he was only five years old. In the play, he played a clever, courageous and cute little devil king, which made everyone remember this handsome and talented actor. Since then, he has received many invitations and almost spent his childhood on the set. “The first time I felt grown up was when I was very young.” Wu Lei emphasized, “Once when I was filming a scene, I suddenly realized that the adults around me didn’t treat me as a child, but as a work partner. At that moment, I felt very accomplished, as if I had gained the respect and recognition of the brothers and sisters around me.”
While growing up, Wu Lei took on various costume dramas. In the 2015 drama “Nirvana in Fire”, he played Xiao Feiliu, who is a good friend of Mei Changsu (Hu Ge). The audience was amazed at the natural expression of the characters’ true feelings, but they didn’t know that it was their second collaboration. With his outstanding performance in the drama, Wu Lei won the Most Promising Actor Award at the 2015 National Drama Festival. After that, he passed the selection process and was chosen to play the role of the young general Yang Ping, participating in the filming of the film Shadow directed by Zhang Yimou… Although he does not have the rich experience of his predecessors, the young Wu Lei was praised for his outstanding talent and humble hard work. A bright and handsome boy under 20 years old, leaping out of the screen under the spotlight.
For Wu Lei, pressure always comes before age. He accepts pressure with pleasure, internalizes it into action, and does not shrink from it. This means growth.
Last spring, Wu Lei announced that he would join the crew of “Cross Fire”. This inspirational web drama, which is mixed with youthful passion and sci-fi, may be a new starting point for his career. In the play, Lu Xiaobei, a high school student who dreams of becoming an e-sports player, is invincible in the gaming world, but an unexpected accident ruins his dream of joining a professional team. In the entertainment industry, most of the roles played by young actors are ordinary roles. If you want to challenge some unconventional characters, the key to outlining the image is the psychological preparation in advance, which is also inseparable from the actor’s interpretation of the meaning of the lines and the control of body language.
Gamers in real life are different from e-sports players. They trained day and night with high intensity and repetition, and were repeatedly hit by failure, but they never gave up. In order to play the role of Lu Xiaobei, a young e-sports player in the play, Wu Lei has obviously made sufficient preparations. “I watched a lot of documentaries related to e-sports, trying to figure out the real state of the teams during training, drawing on their unique movements and language, and restoring them to the screen.” Wu Lei gestured excitedly. E-sports must be the heroic dream of this big boy buried in his “secret garden”.
After the web series was released, netizens commented that “the young man is particularly suitable for playing a young man”, and Wu Lei’s acting skills also surpass his actual age, with natural emotions. In the play, he seems to have really become Lu Xiaobei who has been in a wheelchair for eleven years. He is a professional in e-sports and is also very good at wheelchair acrobatics. He is so skilled that he can do acrobatics with his wheelchair.
Fans and audiences applauded Lu Xiaobei’s performance. Netizens mentioned his acting skills, saying that his emotions were on point, and that many micro-expressions and small movements in details were just right, as if this character and this story really existed. “Because Director Xu Hongyu requires the performance to be natural, and Director Xu gives the actors a lot of room to perform. As I acted, I felt that I was immersed in the film. Filming was just like life. I felt that I was not playing a role, but living on the scene. It is completely different from the costume dramas I filmed before. It can’t be said that it is easier to act in modern dramas. It is closer to a real experience in real life.
Not only is he facing an audience with a more realistic experience of the characters and storylines, but he also has to try to bring out the rich flavor of life and authenticity on the screen without leaving any traces. Wu Lei understands what kind of test he is facing. “The character I played needs to sit in a wheelchair. I carefully learned how to use a wheelchair and carefully observed how people who actually use wheelchairs operate, from how to push the wheelchair to where the balance point of the body is…
As he said, “When I was a kid, I didn’t think about the day or the moment when I would grow up. Dealing with the adults on the set, their understanding of the characters helped me grow subtly. I had not originally intended to take such a long vacation. However, the energy of the universe, in a surprising way, last winter and this spring, allowed everyone to take a quiet vacation in their own place. During this period, I stayed at home and had a very different life experience from before. During the epidemic, I stayed at home. I watched a lot of movies, read a lot of books, spent a lot of time with myself, and gained a new understanding of myself, and thought a lot about individuals, life, and social life. “
This year is the most extraordinary year for many people, and the actors must feel it even more deeply. From working on the set day and night and interacting with people freely, to staring at the ceiling at home all day and rarely seeing people. Wu Lei rarely has time to be alone and talk to himself. In addition, he also shared his usual “way to relieve stress is to listen to music, play games, and watch movies. Having a time and space of your own, a world of your own, and then doing what you want to do, is very stress-relieving and makes people relax and comfortable.” In this state, it is easier for people to concentrate. Only clean empty bottles can store more living water. This is especially important for actors. What seems simple to ordinary people is different for actors. Whether he is filming or attending an event, there is always a lot of excitement around him, and Wu Lei is also an experienced person.
From ancient costume dramas to modern dramas, when asked about his considerations for the next work, Wu Lei answered, “I want to try many roles, not limited to type or personality. It depends on the script, the character setting, and the dramatic collision of the character in the script. What attracted me more was the overall feeling of the script, the resonance the characters gave me, and the sense of immersion.”
Regarding the Dazed shoot in Shanghai, Wu Lei said frankly, “I didn’t deliberately try to show you a certain side of me. I just stay the same as always.” He increasingly wants to present his true self, looking forward to “showing a different side of himself that he may not even know himself is in a certain angle or state of shooting.” Of course, he said, “sometimes the ideas are great, but they can’t necessarily be shown, and that’s fine too.” It’s rare to be in this state. The fast pace of the city always chases people, and you don’t know where you will appear in the next second. Just go with the flow.
Youth is the best endorsement for Wu Lei. As the cover character of Dazed, Wu Lei’s views on youth culture are also very direct. “Youth culture is always the most contemporary and fashionable culture. I have always felt that youth culture and young people are an eternal topic. In every era, the most avant-garde and trendy ideas of young people are constantly changing. I’m in this group, and I’m constantly learning while performing. “
After the interview, the handsome boy who spoke slowly and elegantly seemed to be more than just the Wu Lei on the screen. He likes to have his own space and he likes to do things quietly.
Farewell to “Lu Xiaobei”. In the new semester, let senior Wu Lei accompany you to conquer the stars and the sea
Recently, the online drama “Cross Fire” ended. Wu Lei used a line from “追梦赤子心” to bid farewell to Lu Xiaobei, putting an end to this period of youth – “It is better to burn out than to linger on, and for the beauty in your heart, do not compromise until you grow old.”
Perseverance, vigor and progress, not being swayed by so-called stereotypes, and interpreting life in the way they like, this is Lu Xiaobei, Wu Lei, and all young people of Generation Z. It is the beginning of another September school year, with the stars and the sea in front of us, and the cover boy of Nylon’s new issue – Senior Wu Lei will accompany you to fight together.
Although summer is coming to an end, the story of dreams is still going on. When you were watching CrossFire, did Xiao Bei often make you cry and laugh, and sometimes you wanted to shout: “So handsome!”? Sometimes, like Tang Monk*, chicken soup comes to mind. I can sum it up in one sentence: “There are thousands of northern chicken soups, and there is always one bowl that suits you.”
*Tang Monk here is Tang Sanzang, the main character of The Journey To The West that was accompanied by Sun Wukong.
Of course, as long as everything to the game scene, you can prepare yourself to scream. Okay, let’s stop playing around. In fact, the reason why we are moved by Lu Xiaobei in “Cross Fire” is because of his liveliness, tenacity, unremitting pursuit of his dreams, and the enviable friendship he developed with his teammates and friends along the way.
During our meeting with Wu Lei in the September issue of NYLON, we also had an in-depth chat with him about Cross Fire, a work that made him want to post an 18-grid Weibo to commemorate its completion, and the changes that the role of Lu Xiaobei brought to him.
In addition, Nylon also invited five young boys and girls – Su Hang, Yoii Wang Youyi, Sen Wung, Long Yi, Qiu Ming AKi, to start a weekend camping with Wu Lei ⛺️! What is the most precious and beautiful quality of Generation Z? What is the most admirable lifestyle for young people? Let Sanshi brother* tell you in detail!
*Sanshi didi (Sanshi younger brother) is a nickname for Wu Lei. This is because the character “磊” from his name (吴磊) is composed by 3 stones (石). That’s why Wu Lei also called as 三石 (Sanshi).
Persistence, passion, and vigor. He is a member of Generation Z and also himself
With a sunny smile, sometimes joking, and sometimes listening attentively to the staff’s introduction to the filming, this youth idol who has been involved in the entertainment industry since the age of 3 has undoubtedly demonstrated all the good qualities that Generation Z or today’s young people should have.
“Sometimes I want to make myself more mysterious, but sometimes I want my presence to be noticed by others. In short, I think Generation Z is a very active but difficult to define group.”
Since starring in his first commercial at the age of 3, Wu Lei’s cute image and full acting talent left a deep impression on the director at the time. He then appeared in many film and television dramas including “The Young Warriors” and “Heroes Come from Young Age”. With his extraordinary talent, unremitting efforts and vigorous enterprising spirit, he has left his steady footprints in the entire industry.
Wu Lei, sitting on the chair at this moment, shows the childishness and vigor unique to his age. “I’m not as profound and thoughtful as you think,” he said jokingly when we asked him to describe what kind of personality traits young people should have today.
But having spent his childhood and teenage years in the ever-changing entertainment industry, Wu Lei is undoubtedly more calm and steady in dealing with people than many of his peers. He knows how to be grateful and is more willing to work hard for his ideals, which is also related to the training and teachings given to him by the industry.
“Every work I perform in, or every character I portray, is a choice I make, and I look forward to every new experience,” Wu Lei said. For a young actor, the success or failure of a work actually determines, to a certain extent, his/her career development in the next few years, or even the direction of his/her entire acting career.
With the popularity of many film and television dramas such as “Fights Break Sphere” and “Tomb of the Sea”, Wu Lei’s increasingly rich and solid acting skills have repeatedly won recognition and affirmation from professionals and the public.
From urban dramas to fantasy works, Wu Lei is constantly learning the philosophy of life while exploring his acting path. “I always remind myself to stay true to my original aspiration and to keep my original ideal. This is my motivation to move forward, and it is also what this industry has taught me about being a person and doing things.”
Wu Lei, who is still in the stage of exploring life “freely”, believes that he has a responsibility to young fans. “As public figures, we (actors) should set the right example for young people today. While gaining the love of fans, we should work hard to do what we should do and become better.” When talking about the fans who have always given him encouragement and care, Wu Lei smiled. “When I think of them, I will be more determined in the direction I want to go. They give me the strength and courage to move forward.”
With personality and edges. His treasure boy Lu Xiaobei
With the popularity of “Cross Fire”, Wu Lei’s mature and youthful acting skills have once again become the focus of people’s attention. After creating many popular images, Wu Lei today admits that his judgment and consideration of works have become more objective. “The script is what I value most when judging a work now. It’s back to the work itself. As long as the plot and character setting interest me, even if it is challenging for me, I will not hesitate to ‘face the challenge’: in addition, a team that gives me a sense of security and enough trust will also allow me to go all out to experience the lives of the characters in the play.”
As Wu Lei himself said, as he gets older, roles with increasingly complex plots and increasingly angular personalities are the ones that most inspire his fighting spirit and desire to perform. In the hit TV series “Crossfire”, which is about young people struggling in the world of online games, Lu Xiaobei played by Wu Lei is such a flesh-and-blood character, the passionate young people of today. “This is a youth film based on e-sports, but at the same time, it also reflects the real psychological activities of many contemporary young people. The complex and intricate plot is certainly attractive, but the sincere interaction between the characters is what really touched me.”
Wu Lei thinks that Lu Xiaobei in the play is full and lively. Like many young people, the companionship between him and his teammates and friends on the way to pursuing his dreams is the fulcrum and skeleton supporting the entire work. He also believes that this kind of mutual support between teammates and friends is the most valuable emotional treasure that should be cherished and protected in our lives.
Wu Lei, who has been extremely talented and worked very hard since he was a child, seems to see his own reflection in Lu Xiaobei, “He (Lu Xiaobei) is the character who gives me the most courage. Perseverance is his character.” The most striking feature among them is that whenever I feel tired, I will feel the strength he gives me.”
Dare to speak up for his own ideas. His definition of fashion
Speaking of fashion trends topics that young actors of Wu Lei’s age seem to be very concerned about, this big boy in comfortable clothes once again reveals his uniqueness as a young man of Generation Z. “I don’t think that paying too much attention to appearance is a must for young actors today. A truly “fashionable” person should respect his or her own ideas, make himself or herself more comfortable and confident. This is the definition of fashion in my mind.”
Wu Lei, who dresses comfortably and low-key in private, is extremely concerned about environmental protection. Whether he is participating in the National Geographic’s “Planet or Plastic?” themed road run or calling on young people in public to make their own contributions to the ecological environment around them, this positive and sunny young actor has never forgotten his social responsibilities. In his words, “When small forces come together, we can create huge waves.”
Wu Lei believes that his support for environmental protection and his call for young people to bravely pursue their dreams are all due to his most authentic and natural mentality. As a representative of Generation Z, he also believes that young people today should not blindly cater to other people’s ideas, but dare to speak out for their own opinions. This is a trend and coolness that transcends superficiality.
“Chasing your ideals and being carefree are both ways of life. Whether you choose to strive for success or just be comfortable and do what you set your mind to do, you deserve respect.” Wu Lei even said that even now, in the fast-paced life, he would leave himself enough space to breathe, pause, and reflect before starting again.
Even though he wanted to give himself more time to relax and settle down, his love for acting and his tenacity from the heart always made him spend more time than others to figure out and polish a role he loved. When we asked him how his personality has changed, Wu Lei replied with a humble smile that his personality has not changed much.
But he breaks through himself in each work, devotes all his efforts to it, and then continues to accept new challenges. It is hard not to see his increasingly mature transformation, not only in his acting skills, but also in his mind.
Perhaps from another perspective, Wu Lei today is indeed no different from his original self. He still guards his persistence and original intention in pursuing his dream. When the industry and the audience applaud and embrace him, what he gives back is always more and better than others can imagine.
Good and better are the questions facing 20-year-old Wu Lei. Becoming a good actor and a better person is the answer he wants to give.
Hengdian World Studios in Jinhua City, Zhejiang Province is one of the three places Wu Lei is most familiar with. The other two are places near his home and near his school. Wu Lei, who started his acting career at the age of five, is very familiar with this most famous film and television base in China. He knows how to get around by bus and where there are delicious restaurants. This place seems like a hidden city. The world around it is changing but this place remains the same. He said that returning to Hengdian was like returning to his hometown. “The streets are still familiar, and the people are still familiar.” This is probably the daily life of an actor.
Wu Lei’s life seems to have been written into the word actor very early on. The first TV series he starred in when he was a child became the beginning of his acting career. “I think my acting career has been a tortuous journey, and each role is a small turning point. So my acting career is like an electrocardiogram, because each role is a transformation and turning point for me.” On the other end of the line was his voice imitating the electrocardiogram. It seemed that at that moment he had slightly shed his deep thoughts about his identity as an actor, revealing his playful nature as a teenager.
It seems that no actor has found the acting method overnight. He grew up in the crew, and those tricks and key points that seemed like martial arts secrets were taught to him by those more experienced actors through words and deeds. So he also began to think from the perspective of the character. “When I was a child, acting was more about imitation. The director told you what to do, and you just tried it. Now I will set a lot of frameworks for myself. I will really want to create a character, and then put myself in the shoes of this character and think from the perspective of this character, trying to integrate him into my own ideas, or design his background for this character, hoping to give this character more emotions and more different aspects.”
When he is not filming, he stays in his room watching old movies. Sometimes The Shawshank Redemption, sometimes Al Pacino’s performance in Scent of a Woman. He has watched these clips many times, “because those clips are so attractive to me and can give me strength. They let me see that an actor can actually convey such strong emotions and power to the audience through his performance. I feel that I have also been inspired and healed.”
It seems that when chatting with Wu Lei, we can’t avoid the topic of acting and actors. When asked about pleasing himself and pleasing others, he going around in circles and finally come back to acting. “I think these two things need to be connected, because if you feel happy pleasing yourself, you will try every means to please yourself, and you will forget the feelings of the people around you, and sometimes it is inevitable that you will be a little self-centered. But if you want to please others too much, you will forget yourself, and then you will lose yourself. So I think there should be a balance between pleasing yourself and pleasing others. I think this is actually one of the jobs of an actor. Because the role you play should not only realize your own value, but also be recognized and loved by the audience, so that this role can be objectively vivid and natural” As for Wu Lei outside of the actor, he doesn’t care so much whether he is liked by everyone.
I often wonder if a person will get tired after repeating the same work day after day for more than ten years? However, Wu Lei’s answer was still full of the passion of a young man. He still had a lot of curiosity about himself as an actor. “Sometimes when I’m acting, I often feel surprised at myself. I found out that I actually have this side and this kind of emotions. It’s been a long time since I’ve really been angry or sad. These negative emotions are actually rare in my life. But sometimes when I encounter such a scene, after I finish acting, I also feel that I actually have this side of myself in my body.” It is this passion and enthusiasm that has made this young man grow into “people” on the screen who are within reach.
Putting aside the macro topics of acting, what touched Wu Lei in life were the ordinary and trivial daily life. Those moments that made him feel like he was “really living”. “For example, a moment when you’re talking and playing with your friends, a moment when you’re alone looking out the window and hear the children playing downstairs, a moment when you’re laughing with your friends while playing games, or a moment when you’re washing dishes while cooking.”
Become an actor with great enthusiasm, and then live an ordinary life. It seems that there has never been a second different choice in his life. When asked, “If you could choose a new way of life, what kind of life would you most like to try?”, he only said, “I haven’t thought about this question. I like my current life very much.”
There are thousands of roads in this world, but please keep walking along the one you choose.
Wu Lei: A Young Man Restraint and Love for Freedom
Wu Lei, who just celebrated his 20th birthday, has reached the “20s” of his life. On the road to adulthood, Wu Lei always maintained his passion for acting. He said, “Nothing can attract me more than acting.” Although Wu Lei is becoming more mature in the eyes of the audience, he still has a youthful vibe. He longs to experience the unfettered and free moments, and is willing to stick to what he wants to do. This cool boy is moving forward step by step with his feet on the ground.
On his 20th birthday, Wu Lei finally got his long-awaited driver’s license. He wore a yellow birthday hat and pink cartoon glasses and smiled very proudly. He had been waiting for too long, but he was not particularly excited. He calmly opened the door of the driver’s seat of the business car and drove the driver back. This first trip as a driver was not smooth. Wu Lei was stuck in traffic on the 5th Ring Road for more than an hour, and his foot was so weak when he stepped on the brake.
Due to his busy work schedule, Wu Lei took two years to get his driver’s license and almost missed the deadline. He also likes extreme sports. He wants to go skydiving in New Zealand the most. He especially wants to experience the feeling of freedom of falling freely in the air, but unfortunately he has never been able to do so.
Wu Lei became famous at a young age. Many of his life plans were constantly disrupted by various jobs, just like learning to drive and getting a driver’s license. Sometimes he really wanted to go on vacation, but he “failed again and again.” Fortunately, acting is the moment when he is most focused and enjoys it. When filming the TV series “Cross Fire”, there was a scene where the team won. Lu Xiaobei, played by Wu Lei, hugged his teammates to celebrate and at the same time also ready to accepted the moment of failure together. He said, “At that moment I felt like I was really a professional player. I really had a group of teammates who were united and loving. Sometimes you can’t tell whether they are your friends, your colleagues, or your teammates in the team.”
Wu Lei has been in the crew since he was a child, and he can feel the passion of his predecessors for acting every day. When the seniors finished a scene, the staff on the scene couldn’t help but applaud. This passion attracted him.
In real life, Wu Lei is also a person who “loves to act”. During interviews, he can always make people around him laugh. But sometimes, he prefers to be alone and do what he wants to do.
Actor Wu Lei is very stubborn. Every scene is important to him. In “Adoring”, there is a scene where the blind Chen Leyun, played by Wu Lei, walks to the school gate. His mother is holding a white shirt behind him to send him off. Chen Leyun turns around and gives his mother a thumbs up. At this moment of turning around, Wu Lei and the director had different opinions on whether Chen Leyun should smile or not. Wu Lei insisted on smiling, while the director insisted on not smiling. No one could convince the other, so they shot two versions before making the final decision. For Wu Lei, such scenes happen in almost every play.
In “Adoring”, Wu Lei plays a blind person for the first time. In order to prepare for the psychological process of this role, he visited the blind. During the conversation with them, he found that although they have lost their sight, they are still very brave and sunny, and bring beauty to others in their own way. Acting is Wu Lei’s way, and he hopes to bring beauty to the audience in his way.
Compared to when he was 18, Wu Lei feels that he is more patient at the age of 20. He was admitted to his ideal university and is “moving forward step by step with his feet on the ground.”
Conversation with Wu Lei
Men’s Uno: Do you think your mentality has changed since your 20th birthday compared to your 18th birthday?
Wu Lei: My mentality is actually not much different. I had just turned 18 at that time, and I was thinking about how to take the college entrance examination and the art examination. Now that I have been admitted to my ideal university, I’m in a state of mind to study hard, be down-to-earth, and move forward step by step. Maybe I’m more patient and mature now than I was then, and I’m calmer. As I get older, I feel that I’m becoming more and more clear about what I want.
Men’s Uno: What do you want most for your 20th birthday?
Wu Lei: Just do what I want to do, act in the roles I want to act in, and meet the people I want to meet.
Men’s Uno: Although you are growing slowly, what are the things you always want to stick to?
Wu Lei: People change, but what I don’t want to change is my dedication to my work. I don’t want to change in this aspect. I hope I can always do my best when filming or preparing for a play, and give my all to a role very carefully and patiently.
Men’s Uno: Have you ever done anything crazy to get into character?
Wu Lei: There is nothing crazy, it is almost the same, because different roles have different preparation methods. In “Adoring”, I played a blind person, so I looked up a lot of information about blind people, spent a lot of time practicing some of the blind people’s posture, and then understood their inner world; when I played “Cross Fire”, I also spent a lot of time preparing for the role, because that character also had some disability. But if it is a very ordinary character, there are actually many points about him that are worth pondering. No matter how big or small the challenge of this role is, there are many things worth pondering. It takes a lot of time. I spend a lot of time thinking about each character.
Men’s Uno: How long did it take you to prepare for the role of Chen Leyun in “Adoring”?
Wu Lei: You never feel like you’ve taken too long to prepare for a role, you know? You never feel like you’ve prepared enough, you always feel like you’re almost ready, but you’ll still wait a little longer before joining the crew.
Men’s Uno: If you are not preparing for a role, do you occasionally act?
Wu Lei: I would act for fun at school, and sometimes at home I would act while reading the script. I’m also a person who loves acting in my daily life
Men’s Uno: Do you get frustrated when you don’t act well?
Wu Lei: Every time after performing, I always feel that I could have done better, but the director is satisfied and OK. This is a repetitive thing. Because I always feel that I can do better, I feel a little regretful, but I think actors are beautiful because of these regrets.
Men’s Uno: Is there a goal you want to achieve?
Wu Lei: I have a very passionate and persistent attitude towards exploring the role, but as for the positioning and requirements of the role, I just hope to bring beauty to everyone through my work.
Men’s Uno: Do you consider yourself a stubborn person?
Wu Lei: In some aspects, yes. For example, when acting, I’m particularly stubborn about some things. When I read the script, including during auditions, I would repeatedly confirm a point what I want, and I would repeatedly tell the director what I want. In most cases, the director will think that this idea is good. Sometimes the director will also think if it’s feasible, then I will have some exchanges and communication with the director, which may last for a long time. Often in this case, we will shoot two versions because no one can convince the other. I think this is a good thing, because actors have requirements for their performances, and directors also have requirements for what they want.
Men’s Uno: What was the last time this happened during filming?
Wu Lei: This happens in every drama. But most of the time, the two people’s ideas can be combined. Only once in 20 times, for example, will you think that you are good this way and he is good that way, so who will be chosen? When no one can make a choice, we will shoot both versions.
Men’s Uno: Which animal do you think your personality is most similar to?
Wu Lei: I want to become a horse. I think horses are cool, handsome and free. The kind of horse that can run freely.
Men’s Uno: Is it important for you to be a cool person?
Wu Lei: I think it’s more important that my character is cool, because I myself cool.
Men’s Uno: You started acting at a very young age. Have you ever thought about what your other life would be like?
Wu Lei: I have thought about it, but I just can’t imagine it. I once joked with my family that with my personality, even if I didn’t become an actor, I would probably will also make my debut. Who knows, right? If I really didn’t want to be an actor, I would probably do a design job. For example, architect is very attractive to me. I was addicted to reading architecture books for a while. I still prefer to do creative work.
Men’s Uno: Actors are under a lot of pressure. Are there times when the pressure is so great that you can’t bear it?
Wu Lei: Everyone has such moments. Even if there is no pressure, people sometimes get irritable for no reason. So just adjust yourself.
Men’s Uno: Do you like to be alone when you are under a lot of pressure?
Wu Lei: Sometimes I like to be alone and do what I want to do most. I’m very efficient when I’m alone. You can read 25 episodes of the script in a day, but you can only read 5 or 10 episodes in a day when you laugh and joke with many people. The same is true for reading and playing games. Sometimes I can think through a lot of things when I’m alone.
Men’s Uno: Have you ever had a moment when you particularly wanted to escape from your current life?
Wu Lei: I sometimes want to go on vacation. Although I’ve been “trying but failed again and again” (in terms of having a vacation), I’m fine. I think work is a good thing and I like working.
Men’s Uno: Do you consider yourself a workaholic?
Wu Lei: I guess so.
Men’s Uno: Now that you are 20 years old, will you think about your life plan?
Wu Lei: Because the profession of an actor is full of unknowns, it is difficult to really plan anything, and you can only take it one step at a time. If I were to talk about a longer-term plan, I have already embarked on the path of an actor, and my plan is to act well and be a good person.
Men’s Uno: Besides acting, is there anything else you want to do?
Wu Lei: I don’t have anything else I particularly want to do right now. I’m also a “master of backing off”. In fact, there is really nothing that can attract me as much as acting.
Wu Lei is in His Prime, Young Man that has Become Adult*
*及冠 means Crown. In ancient China, a man will have a ceremony wearing a crown when he turn 20 years old, which means he has become an adult.
“Youth” is not only an age stage. It is also a unique mark of this age: cheerful and vigorous. Young people are often curious about the world and are full of longing for the unknown. Although Wu Lei has just turned 20, he is already an experienced actor with nearly 15 years of experience. Due to the tight schedule, the filming started before 7 am, which meant Wu Lei had to prepare for the filming at 5 am. At the shooting site, he looked a little tired. In the cold winter morning, the light shines on the handsome eyes of the young man, and everything around him is warm. When the interview started, Wu Lei immediately restrained his somewhat lazy state. His eyes were clear and sincere, and he shared his story with us in his clear voice.
On his 20th birthday, Wu Lei released a set of film photos. In the photo, the young man in white stands on the snowy peaks. His eyebrows are like paintings, his eyes are like ink dots, and there is a smile on the corners of his lips. He has lost some of his youthful immaturity and gained a touch of trustworthy maturity.
From the time when he was a little boy playing the cute and clever little Nezha in “The Legend and the Hero”, to his teenage years where he played the 19-year-old Li Xiaoyao in “Pal Inn”, the hidden** senior Hu Yifeng in “The Whirlwind Girl”, and the intellectually disabled guard Fei Liu in “Nirvana in Fire”, to his adult life where he played the ill-fated genius Xiao Yan in “Fights Break Sphere” and the impulsive adventurous high school student Li Cu in “Tomb of the Sea”. For more than a decade, Wu Lei has continued to bring new works and new roles to meet the audience. The style of the work and the character’s personality are very different. Wu Lei’s acting skills are always on point, and the audience in front of the screen have also witnessed his growth along the way.
**: 深藏不露 is a person who has knowledge and talent but is reserved and does not like to show off his or her talents in front of others.
Although he already has a rich acting experience, Wu Lei is still full of expectations and awe for acting. Being young is not an invincible asset for him. On the one hand, he is pleased that he still has a lot of opportunities to learn and try, but on the other hand, he is also worried that his lack of experience will limit his ability to perform roles, and he hopes to accumulate and learn more comprehensively. When asked about his future plans, his answer was surprisingly simple: “To act well and be a good person. I will hone my acting skills and improve my basic skills. I have to work hard.”
Contrary to his handsome and gorgeous appearance and his unique experience as a child star, Wu Lei is steady and down-to-earth in real life, and he always defines himself as an “ordinary person.” He believes that all the characters he has played had extraordinary experiences. Those extraordinary lives are impossible for him to have in real life. Using the character to participate in other people’s stories and enriching your own experience while talking to the characters is also a wonderful journey of life. The boy is active and loves the new and interesting world. He enjoyed his performances in “Fights Break Sphere” and “Tomb of the Sea” very much.
At the time of the interview, Wu Lei was promoting the movie “Adoring”. In this movie, Wu Lei plays Chen Leyun, a talented fencer who suddenly becomes blind. How to play a blind person, how to show the psychological gap and despair of the character after he becomes blind, how to show the difference between a blind person and a sighted person through action, these are all difficult problems.
In order to overcome the difficulties, Wu Lei visited and observed blind people in advance, experienced the lives of blind people, and fully immersed himself in his role. Even the actors who were acting opposite him were blurred in his eyes. Wu Lei joked: “My eyes were always out of focus when I was acting, and I was always immersed in my own blindness. Others were just blurry figures, and I couldn’t see clearly how they were acting. Everyone was a mosaic in my eyes.” In “Adoring”, Wu Lei and Zhang Zifeng acted together, playing a pair of childhood sweethearts. Wu Lei said that the atmosphere between the two of them was relaxed, and Zifeng was a very nice person.
Perhaps it was because the staff member’s mobile phone suddenly rang with a ringtone similar to the sound of a game that gave Wu Lei inspiration, the topic suddenly jumped to games. If acting is the most frequent topic for Wu Lei, who is not talkative, then games are his second most active topic. Like every boy of his age, Wu Lei likes games and e-sports, so when he mentions the TV series “Cross Fire”, Wu Lei seems to have pressed a mysterious switch, and the frequency of his talk can even be doubled. “I really want to introduce Lu Xiaobei. He is a person who is in a wheelchair but is very good at playing games. This role is very complicated, and it is really fun for me to play it.” When he said this, you could feel the light in Wu Lei’s eyes, which was the excitement that was hard to conceal when he talked about how his favorite things and his career could be cleverly integrated.
Wu Lei cherishes the relationship between his colleagues in the crew. In his opinion, the most important thing for an actor is to maintain enthusiasm in shaping the character, and the second is to have confidence, not only in oneself and one’s role, but also in colleagues in the crew, believing that everyone can create excellent works together. In addition to being busy in the crew, Wu Lei also participated in many variety shows. Talking about the recently aired “The Inn”, Wu Lei said that the most useful skill he gained during the recording was riding an electric tricycle. Seeing that the writer (journalist) was amused, he emphasized seriously: “Really, this skill is very practical. We often use electric tricycles to pull large equipment or props in the crew, and I ride better than some professional staff!”
Even with his rich acting experience, Wu Lei is still touched by every wrap-up. For him, every time he plays a play or a role, he enters a different body and experiences a different life. When the play is finished, he is separated from the role and loses the body in the play. He will feel a sense of loss and emptiness. Wu Lei describes it as “the feeling of graduating from junior high school”: “Finishing a role is like graduating from high school. Although everyone says goodbye to each other, you actually know that this may be the last time you see each other in your life; the same is true when you leave the play. You know that you can never return to his world and you can never work with the crew again. Sometimes you feel lost and the feeling is very complicated. Of course, you may meet familiar people in the next play, but the state is different from this play.”
For Wu Lei, the biggest challenge in life is always acting. After reading the script and seeing the particularly difficult scenes, Wu Lei will be mentally prepared to challenge the difficulties. On the day of shooting, he will be very excited when he walks from the lounge to the set, like a soldier rushing to the battlefield, fighting to play a good role.
After each work is released, Wu Lei will take the initiative to understand the audience’s evaluation and cares about the overall performance of the work. He is grateful for the good reviews. As for the bad reviews, he will also carefully record and analyze them as a reference for future performances. He defines the relationship between himself and his fans as a relationship of mutual companionship and growth together. The presence of fans always makes him feel relaxed and powerful. When he feels that the work is hard, he will think: “Fans are also working hard to support me, I can’t let them down”.
Outside of acting, Wu Lei is just a simple boy. His wardrobe is filled with loose and comfortable clothes. Outside of work, he wears whatever he wants. The only thing that can be associated with fashion is a variety of hats. When he need to vent his stress, he listen to music, play games, read books, or go for a run. He switch to the random play mode to enjoy the random surprise. He will be very happy if he randomly listen a song that he like.
Wu Lei has no particular preference for movies. He will watch any movie that has good reviews. The more special ones are “The Intouchables” and “Scent of a Woman”, one of which gave him the strength to keep going in adversity, and the other made him appreciate the charm of acting. “I really like Al Pacino. When you watch the works of a great actor, you will be yearning for it,” Wu Lei said. “Of course, I will also watch the works of my favorite (Robert Downey Jr.)” Wu Lei playfully added his own recommendation.
20 years old is really the best time of life. The purest curiosity and natural sensitivity about the world still exist, and there is also the tolerance and responsibility cultivated in the process of growth. If the young Wu Lei is an unpolished jade, the current Wu Lei has begun to emit a soft glow under the polishing and nurturing of time. His early fame did not make him lose his clear self-awareness. Sincerity, steadfastness and simplicity are still his most precious qualities. Just as the audience who grew up with him expected: Wu Lei has grown into a gentle and steady gentleman, but in his bones he is still a fearless and cheerful boy.
Q&A
What was the last movie you watched in the cinema? What are the most memorable scenes?
After the filming of “Adoring” was completed, I watched “The Wild Goose Lake”. The part about the gangsters’ sports meeting made me laugh, and the part about them at the station and the restaurant left a deep impression on me.
Among Marvel heroes, besides Iron Man, who is your favorite superhero?
Doctor Strange.
Will you update the VLOG that has been inactive for a long time?
There is still a plan to update, but I just haven’t found the right time.
Do you stay at home or go out to relax during your break?
Both are fine. I stay at home more than the average person, but if I want to go out, I can go to a faraway place by myself.
Share your secret to controlling your body shape with your fans?
I can control myself freely. I won’t gain weight even if I eat more and exercise less, right? (Writer: Fans will be angry if you say that, right?) Haha, it’s no use to make fans angry.
Wu Lei Galaxy 