On 8 August 2024, weibo of movie “The Hutong Cowboy” announced that the movie will be released on National Day, 1 October 2024. The movie is directed by Ning Hao and Xu Lei , starring Ge You , Li Xueqin , Yang Haoyu , Liu Mintao , and Wu Lei. It is a sequel to the feature film “Hello Beijing” (in the movie “My People, My Country” in 2019) and “Beijing Good Man” (in the movie “My People, My Homeland” in 2020).
Summary of the movie according to Douban: Taxi driver Zhang Beijing (Ge You) is not successful enough, and everything goes wrong. Even the speech he carefully prepared for his son’s (Wu Lei) wedding was replaced by his stepfather (Jia Bing). Full of resentment, he had an argument with single mother Xiaoqin (Li Xueqin). Unexpectedly, his anger was filmed by passers-by and spread across the Internet and unexpectedly became popular. The sudden attention made Zhang Beijing gain everything he wanted before. However, after experiencing the absurd ups and downs of fame and fortune, Zhang Beijing finally realized that the warm and true feelings of fireworks and the world are what he really needs.
In this movie, Wu Lei will make a special appearance as Zhang Xiaojing, Zhang Beijing’s son. Ge You and Wu Lei will play father and son for the first time and people anticipate what kind of encounter will be there.
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 Galaxy 