Exclusive dialogue with Hu Ge： An actor who is not willful is not a good actor

1905 movie network feature 182 million, this is 8 days after the first movie starring Hu Ge was released. But the numbers have little to do with him. In another 7 days, on the stage in Beijing, he will be reunited with Patient No. 5 in "Dream Like a Dream" after a long absence.

For someone who lives in Shanghai and works in Beijing, it is also a tale of two cities.

Hu Ge remembers the first time he came to Beijing. In 1994, everything was new and unfamiliar. The Poly Building, where the Poly Theater is located, had just risen on the edge of the Second Ring Road. It was not until 2000 that it was overhauled. It was another 13 years after the mainland premiere of "A Dream Like a Dream".

From 1994 to 2019, not only did the gap between the two cities become smaller and smaller, but Hu Ge went from being a member of the Shanghai TV Little Star Art Troupe to an actor, experiencing life and death, and finding himself in a demarcated trajectory.

"I’d rather stop."

For an actor, self-fulfillment is sometimes a trade-off. If you want to play a certain role, you have to accept the following promotions, interviews, roadshows, and various new tricks.

Hu Ge had an unprecedented exposure in recent years. During the period approaching the release, he appeared on the red carpet of the awards ceremony, at the fan meeting in the studio, in the cameras of countless media, and in Li Jiaqi’s live stream.

After the video of our exclusive interview was released, some fans left a message: "How many interviews did you give?"

This is, of course, the time when an aspiring actor loses himself the most. At the end of the interview that day, we chatted with Hu Ge about an icon actor who has swept Asia. He asked, I heard he doesn’t do interviews anymore? We said yes. Hu Ge added, so what is he not doing? There was a hint of envy in his words.

I don’t know if Hu Ge also wants to be able to hide in the noise after acting in a movie. Some media summed up his choice with a song title: "Sudden Self", he said that was not the case: "It’s not sudden, I think it should be planned for a long time."

The popularity of "Legend of Immortals and Swords" kept Hu Ge trapped in the genre of young heroes for a long time. After "Langya Ranking" and "The Pretender" were broadcast, he suddenly realized that the same problem had arisen again, so he stopped and did not take the play. "I don’t want to fall into that cycle again, so I would rather stop for a while." Hu Ge knew the time and effort it took to come out of an image.

He reflects on himself because he is too rational about his own perception: "An actor who is not wayward is not a good actor, and I think I am just not wayward enough." This, he concludes, is not a good thing for acting.

Reasonable enough to watch any of his works, Hu Ge will habitually find fault, and he still has three points to say about "The Wild Goose Lake". He sees the film and Zhou Zenong’s character as his first step out of the safe zone:

"This role may not be very good for me, but I think the biggest meaning for me is that I have come out, in the area where I was better at or safe, I have come out, and I have come to a relatively unfamiliar field."

Hu Ge said that the release of the film has given him more motivation to take a second step.

"Farther from Cannes"

As a film that premiered at the Cannes Film Festival and was released six months later, walking on the red carpet of the film festival and a film entering the cinema, what kind of behavior would make an actor excited? Calmed down, Hu Ge said that when he went to Cannes, he felt even further away from Cannes.

He reflected that the original intention of making a movie was not to go to an international film festival. The original intention of making a movie is very simple. As an actor, you like to act, and as a director, you like to create, and you want to express your understanding of the world to the audience.

Before leaving Cannes, Hu Ge and the other creators learned the results of the awards. One afternoon, Hu Ge and the directors Diao Yinan and Gui Lunmei looked at the sea in a low mood. Diao Yinan told the two of them earnestly, don’t give up, don’t stop, continue filming, or stick to your dreams, and be sure to cooperate with the new director.

At that moment, in a place that had long been out of reach in his heart, a place that had been conceptualized as a temple of film, Hu Ge was moved by Diao Yinan’s words. In his opinion, a director whose work was snubbed by the judges can still take care of the actors and put forward his own expectations for the future of the film, which is particularly selfless and great.

When the Golden Rooster Awards met again, Hu Ge and Diao Yinan discussed some of their future plans. He said: "In fact, one of my future jobs may also be influenced by the director’s words at that time."

He resumed his thoughts on Zhou Zenong’s role. In his opinion, the fugitive needed to use the final fast run to draw an exclamation point for his life.

"Otherwise, he will always be an ellipsis," Hu Ge added.

"Is this your idea for the next step? Let yourself have a fast running state?" We asked along these lines.

"No, I prefer this part of my journey to be a little faster." Hu Ge replied.

"Looking for an answer"

This is not Hu Ge’s first character to face death. We compare Zhou Zenong to the patient No. 5 in "A Dream Like a Dream". The fate of the two characters is the same, but Zhou Zenong runs forward, but Patient No. 5 is waiting.

The annual "Dream Like a Dream" was like a kind of cycle, experiencing things all over again, saying the same lines and doing the same things with the same actors. The difference was that every time it was performed, the actors would put new experiences on the characters, which made Hu Ge feel that life is about finding answers.

Patient No. 5 had been ill, his clothes tightly wrapped him, his head lowered, and he felt a little helpless in his confusion. Initially, Hu Ge played him, making the part before his illness fun, in contrast to the second half; but this year, he abandoned those settings and became a person who could be seen everywhere in life.

Hu Ge now felt that these settings were not important, what was important was that he found a question mark on Patient No. 5: "Patient No. 5 is looking for an answer, looking for why fate has been so unfair to him, he wants to find an answer, so that he can face death calmly and face what has been brought to him calmly."

These roles made him think a lot. One thing fans know is that Hu Ge has five cats and used to love taking his cats to the set. But now, Hu Ge says he hasn’t taken cats to the set for a long time, because he feels that now he is receiving a very challenging job, and his energy must be concentrated.

But he talked about the cat he met while filming "The Wild Goose Lake", with his head slightly poked and his hands raised, as if he had turned himself into a cat: "It’s a black and white cat, but its pattern is very special like a kitten wearing an evening dress. The middle of the chest is white, the side is black, but it happens to be a V-neck, the four claws are white, and the other places are black. It looks good. I saw it at the scene and liked it very much, so I took it back to the hotel."

With animals with short lives like cats, Hu Ge said that he can finally face this matter: "Because every life is different, not just animals."

I don’t know if this is a change brought about by his characters and experiences in recent years. Hu Ge was a little down when he said this. So we tried to change the topic and said, "It’s like your characters, each state is different, and you have to say goodbye to them after you play them?"

Hu Ge laughed: "It’s not easy for you to come back."

When we look at actors, we always have some beautiful expectations. For example, we want to find the imprint left by a certain crew or character on them; we hope that these works that are so different in our hearts also have a special place in their own hearts. Hu Ge confirmed this beautiful guess.

"When I’m playing a role, I put a part of myself into the role, and when the role is completed, it will actually be in my life forever." This was a very standard answer, but the moment it was said, it seemed very moving.