After Reuniting with My Aloof Movie Queen Childhood Friend - Chapter 29

At the end of August, with the script nearing completion, Ji Youyi wasted no time and immediately began location scouting.

Location scouting involves selecting the right venues for filming an audiovisual production. Generally, it falls under the responsibilities of the director and the director of photography (DP).

Some production crews got lazy and handed it off entirely to the producer.

Ji Youyi could not agree with that approach.

The producer wasn’t a mind-reading roundworm inside the creators’ bellies. The difference between online guidance and measuring things in person on-site was vast. If you never stepped out your front door, how could you ever make a good film?

Therefore, Ji Youyi rented a van and gathered the crew, including photography, lighting, art department, and a few girls from the production team, to set out together. Actually, it would have been better to bring the sound recordist along too, but seating was limited. Adding any more people would require renting a larger vehicle with a steeper rental fee, so Ji Youyi simply took on that duty herself.

Ji Youyi’s original intention in accepting this project was to return a favor to Meng Xingshu.

She had initially planned to utilize her years of experience in “only knowing how to shoot popcorn movies to rake in cash” to help Meng Xingshu cheat… bah, earn a lot of money. The bigger the hit the drama became, the greater the favor she would return to Meng Xingshu.

Regrettably, she had veered off course midway. Ignoring a pile of trending, bankable topics, she chose a highly challenging theme instead.

Movie Queen Meng had always held a highly respected, venerable status as a performing artist within the industry. Since her debut, she had never filmed a flop, and her name alone carried absolute authority. If her very first project after transitioning behind the scenes turned out to be a failure, wouldn’t that pull her right off her pedestal? That was absolutely unacceptable!

Thus, Ji Youyi had no choice but to adjust her mindset: pinch pennies wherever possible.

Even if they didn’t make a fortune, at least they shouldn’t lose money. While saving as much cash as possible, they needed to guarantee the premium quality of the series to build a solid reputation. This would at least keep Meng Xingshu steady on her pedestal and give her a boost for her next project.

The van drove around the outskirts of S City for nearly a month. Most of the main locations had been chosen, but the hometown of the female lead had yet to be finalized.

At the start of the story, the female lead, Chen Zhen, is already a graduate student at a prestigious university, but she originally hailed from a poor, backward little village. Local mindsets there were deeply feudal, favoring boys over girls. Her family had four daughters before finally giving birth to one son. The fate awaiting the girls was to handle household chores early on, and once they reached the right age, they would be married off in exchange for a bride price.

After barely finishing junior high, her family refused to let her continue her schooling. It was an older sister from the same village who secretly helped her fill out her academic preferences and led her to escape from home under the cover of night. They walked over twenty miles of mountain roads to attend high school in the county seat.

The high school tuition was paid using money that the older sister had saved with great difficulty. The sister told her: “I once escaped just like this, and now I can leave this place forever. You will too.”

Consequently, Chen Zhen buried her head in her studies, tested into an ordinary tier-one university, and left her hometown. After graduating with her bachelor’s degree, she was recommended for admission to a prestigious graduate school.

To Chen Zhen, her hometown was a shackle, a hidden ailment, a kinship bond branded onto her heart by traditional indoctrination, and a ferocious beast chasing closely behind her, ready to swallow her whole at any moment.

However, Ji Youyi had searched several villages and towns in the East China region but failed to scout a single satisfactory location. In the end, it was Meng Xingshu who consulted an acquaintance producer, managing through various connections to get in touch with a poverty-stricken mountainous area in the central region.

The economic landscape of this world was similar to Ji Youyi’s original world.

The orphanage Ji Youyi lived in during her childhood was located in a certain city in the central region, slightly closer than the mountainous area Meng Xingshu had contacted, but it was also very poor.

She always remembered the day her adoptive mother came to the orphanage to choose a child. When asked about “Hong Kong,” “Berlin,” or “Los Angeles,” she knew absolutely nothing about them, she only knew the capital was Beijing. As for what Beijing actually looked like, it was entirely beyond her imagination.

After hanging up the phone, Meng Xingshu relayed the situation to Ji Youyi but didn’t receive a response for a long time. Seeing that Ji Youyi looked somewhat dazed, she didn’t want to disturb her, but since they were currently in a meeting with several pairs of eyes waiting around them, she had to ask again: “Director Ji, how do you feel about it? Should we go take a look?”

“Ah, yes. We’re going, of course we’re going,” Ji Youyi snapped back to her senses and immediately replied.

Meng Xingshu looked at her closely. “You’ve been working continuously for so long, do you want to take a break? You barely slept the past two days.”

“No need.” Ji Youyi waved her hand, tossing her cluttered thoughts to the back of her mind, and began giving instructions for the arrangements. “This place is quite far. The main crew shouldn’t mobilize. Just the producer and I will head over. Teacher Meng, you haven’t rested lately either, so take these few days to get some proper rest. If anything comes up, we can communicate online.”

Meng Xingshu declined. “It’s fine. Online communication always has its gaps. I’m going too.”

“How can that be?” Ji Youyi felt that Meng Xingshu had absolutely no self-awareness regarding her status as a celebrity. “I plan to take the train there with Leilei. We’ll take tonight’s tickets and arrive in that city tomorrow. If we bring a big star like you along, forget about taking the train. I’m afraid we won’t even be able to step foot inside the train station.”

“It’s not that exaggerated,” Meng Xingshu said calmly. “If you’re worried about accidents, how about we charter a plane so everyone can go together?”

Ji Youyi’s mouth fell open. Did this person know what she was saying?!

Heartbroken, she cried out, “Teacher Meng, the budget! Consider the budget!”

How could there be a producer who managed the household like this! Wantonly squandering the investor’s… oh, wait, the investor was herself. Still, she couldn’t do that! Chartering a plane just to go location scouting even a mountain of gold and silver wouldn’t survive such extravagance!

Ji Youyi was now deeply worried about Meng Xingshu’s capability as an independent producer. Thinking back to the movie queen’s past record of gifting a villa to a scumbag, her worry escalated up a level. Being this foolish, won’t she be slaughtered like a pig by other production crews in the future?

She pulled out a piece of scratch paper, slid her chair next to Meng Xingshu, and patiently taught her how to calculate the costs.

“As a producer, you don’t need every single transaction to be crystal clear, but you must have a general number in your heart, otherwise people will cheat you. Look, if we go there by a combination of plane, high-speed rail, and chartered car, the one-way cost per person won’t exceed two thousand yuan. If someone asks you to reimburse an amount far beyond this, there’s definitely a problem. Of course, top-tier big stars insist on flying first class and bring a ton of demands, so their price is calculated separately. That’s why I didn’t want to hire big stars…”

Ji Youyi kept her head down, writing and drawing on the scratch paper as she spoke.

Meng Xingshu lowered her eyes slightly, her gaze landing on the profile of that face which was close at hand. Softening her breath, she replied, “Okay.”

At least the student is open-minded and eager to learn, Ji Youyi revealed a gratified smile.

The few people at the table had been working together for a month and were already used to similar teaching scenes, but every time they saw it, they still had to try hard to suppress their laughter.

The director of photography selected a good angle and took a photo as usual, uploading it to the group chat under the guise of drama promotion.

The art director, lighting director, and the junior producer secretly gave her a thumbs-up, tightening their faces as they typed back replies. 【This production still is shot beautifully! [Applause] Sister Ruan’s skills have improved again! [Applause]】

When the discussion meeting ended, all three parties walked away fully satisfied.

Ji Youyi had originally planned to bring only Meng Xingshu and the production manager, Han Lei, over. However, as soon as she returned to her room after the meeting, Li Zhulan slinked over.

The great screenwriter had been polishing the script in her room during the meeting. She only heard about this afterward and immediately pestered Ji Youyi, insisting on coming along. “Such a far place, and it’s in the mountains. I don’t feel safe letting you guys go alone.”

Ji Youyi was busy packing her luggage and didn’t even look up. “Then I should bring a bodyguard. Why bring you? If we encounter bad guys, are you going to stab them to death with your pen?”

Having filmed for so many years, what deep mountains and old forests had Ji Youyi not visited?

When she was a teenager working as an assistant director for a crew, the chief director only took the money without doing any work, the other assistant directors harbored hidden motives and sidelined her, and the executive producer looked down on her, refusing to allocate funds. In the end, when it came to location scouting, only she and the first assistant camera went. The two girls’ ages combined barely exceeded their shoe sizes. Carrying a pile of equipment, they hitched a ride on a cargo pickup truck to enter the mountains, and they still completed the task all the same.

Ji Youyi packed her luggage for a while without hearing another peep from Li Zhulan. Curious, she looked up, and lo and behold, Li Zhulan was standing there with a slumped face, her eyes brimming with tears, looking as if she were about to cry.

Ji Youyi didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. “That place has hosted who knows how many waves of film crews. What are you worried about? Shouldn’t you be worried about how you’ll dig a hole to bury yourself if someone tries to strike up a conversation with you?”

“So you’re saying you look down on me.” Li Zhulan pouted her lips. “Mommy doesn’t want me anymore, I’m so sad.”

What kind of address was that?

Ji Youyi looked at her speechlessly and agreed to let her come.

After lunch, the four of them hit the road. They chose to drive there, a trip that took about sixteen hours.

The other three all had driver’s licenses and agreed to take turns driving, leaving only Ji Youyi to be tossed into the back seat.

Ji Youyi actually knew how to drive, but that was in her previous world. Traffic safety was of paramount importance. She wasn’t sure if there were subtle differences in driving methods between the two worlds, so she didn’t want to take the risk and didn’t insist. Of course, the primary reason was that the young Ji Youyi didn’t possess a license, otherwise, with her brilliance, moonlighting as a taxi driver wouldn’t be a mere dream.

Deprived of her qualification to drive, Ji Youyi chose to continue working.

With the location scouting mostly done, casting was also proceeding simultaneously. The casting work in film and television dramas was primarily led by the casting director, but the final decision still required the boss’s approval.

Ji Youyi and Meng Xingshu sat in the back seat, flipping through the profiles sent over by the casting director. They needed to select the most suitable batch of people from those screened by the assistant director, invite them for auditions, and fix the final cast.

For the vast majority of crews, the right to speak was firmly controlled by the investors, producers, and directors, but Ji Youyi was accustomed to considering the screenwriter’s opinions. Therefore, after Li Zhulan finished driving a stretch of the road and switched places with Han Lei, Ji Youyi waved her over, calling her to the back seat.

The back seat changed from two people to three. Ji Youyi shifted one slot to the left, sitting right in the center position of the rear seat. The slightly wide distance between her and Meng Xingshu instantly vanished, leaving their arms pressed against each other.

The air conditioning inside the car was blasting heavily, so it wasn’t hot despite being squeezed together.

Only…