Working on side jobs, working on CPs, and "chasing stars" offline... Why did they come to the Citizen Art Night School to learn screenwriting?
Do all those who come to take screenwriting classes dream of being screenwriters? How should screenwriting courses be taught? This year, the Shanghai Citizen Art Night School has a new film and television script writing class in the spring class. Reporters from Jiefang Daily and Shangguan News visited them several times to learn about their stories.
Walking into the screenwriting class is like walking into a college student classroom. The instructor and young screenwriter Wang Jun sat at the lectern and gave a PPT speech. Most of the students were young, mostly female, and most of the boys sat in the back row.
Is the purpose of screenwriting classes to train screenwriters? "Some people like to watch movies and TV dramas, and they can better appreciate the works by understanding some creative methods and rules. There are also people who like to write. After mastering the screenwriting creative mode, they can try to write scripts themselves." Wang Jun believes that white-collar workers come to night school more for training hobby. Compared with sports and fitness courses such as yoga and dance, as well as life and leisure courses such as flower arrangement and tea art, screenwriting courses are quite mentally demanding.
Wang Jun's PPT is full of practical information, including professional screenwriting theories such as the "McGuffin" and "Save the Cat" that appeared in the movie "Galaxy Writers". He will intersperse a large number of film and television drama cases and interestingly interpret some highlights and character relationships, from "A Dream of Red Mansions" and "The Legend of the Condor Heroes" to the American drama "Westworld", the Korean drama "Reply 1988", and then to the hot topics in recent years. "Nirvana in Fire", "Lotus Tower", etc., which are broadcast, not only throw out knowledge points, but also lead students to review the works and relax their brain nerves.
Sometimes, Wang Jun will "operate" on his own works and talk about the difficulties encountered in creation and how to solve them. After all, no one knows the details of the play better than the screenwriter himself. "Has anyone seen my "Wonderful Destiny"?" When talking about how to make the protagonist attractive, Wang Jun used this work to dissect himself. In the audience, a voice whispered, "I have seen it. I have read it three times." all over."
The online drama "Protect Our City Lord" broadcast in 2023 is Wang Jun's masterpiece. When the drama was launched on iQiyi, it was the most popular on the site and also achieved excellent results in Thailand, South Korea and other places. Many students said that they are fans of this show. When it was mentioned that the sub-plot must promote the main plot in order to have meaning, Wang Jun "spot-checked" on the spot: "In "Protect Our City Lord", which episode of the sub-plot of the assassin and the princess played a role in promoting the main plot of the story?"
When talking about the sense of fate, some students immediately thought of "The Wind and Cloud", which is exactly the example to be cited later. Sometimes students’ answers to questions asked in class will surprise the teacher. "With different work and growth experiences, the feedback given is completely different, which can be used to collect and study the ideas and needs of different groups of people." This is Wang Jun's first time giving a class to a general audience, and he also hopes to use audience feedback Come and support screenwriters in their creation.
Compared with college students who work as screenwriters after graduation, these white-collar workers understand life better. In the scripts they write, there will never be a suspended plot of an ordinary migrant worker renting in a high-end villa. In Wang Jun's view, rich work experience and life experience are very important for screenwriters. This is what the students themselves have. After learning the basic creative methods, they have the opportunity to create excellent works. "Whether you can eventually join the industry depends on everyone's idea. It is best to treat it as a hobby. Only by becoming a hobby can you stick to it."
The pull-up explanation of the movie "Three Evils Everywhere" ended in a hurry before the end of get out of class. The students in the front row stretched, and many students were still unfinished and gathered around to continue discussing the plot with the teacher. The two female students walked into the elevator while chatting with smiles. They exchanged ideas on how to quickly make dinner on the way to class after get off work and "recommended a delicious rice ball restaurant nearby."
This year’s Citizen Art Night School’s 112 courses were fully booked within 10 seconds, and the maximum number of people online at the same time was 730,000. Expo baking classes, zero-based handmade leather goods classes, introduction to violin playing, introduction to piano, introduction to dubbing performance, electronic piano, guzheng, whole body 8 courses including cycle fat-burning exercises were sold out in 4 seconds.
When the reporter reported this number, student Jiu Xiaoyi said calmly, "Maybe it's because I've been grabbing concert tickets, so it's much easier to grab them than at a concert." This is the fourth time she has grabbed a favorite course at the Citizen Art Night School , before that she also learned improvisation, introduction to acting and film and television, film and television makeup, etc., and has almost opened up the entire industry chain. "I have always liked shooting things. As long as there are courses related to film and television, I will take them." Jiu Xiaoyi said.
However, there is a special reason for signing up for the screenwriting class this time. Jiu Xiaoyi is a fan of online dramas. She watched "Protect Our City Lord" written by Wang Jun repeatedly. She also saved a line written in classical Chinese in her mobile phone, and even printed it out to annotate and recite the entire text. "It's so well written." "When I watched it for the first time, I felt like I was reading "The Master"," she added, "This is the first time I followed a drama because I liked the screenwriter. I used to watch dramas because I liked the face of the male protagonist."
Jiu Xiaoyi showed the "annotated and recited full text" line fragments saved on his mobile phone. Photo by Zhong Han
"Can I take the liberty to add something?" After hearing the reporter's interview about the significance of Wang Jun's course, Ms. Yan, a student, took the initiative to step forward. She works as a teacher in a vocational school and writes children's literature in her spare time. "I have already published a novel in "Youth Literature". If I have the opportunity, I would like to ask the teacher to take a look at my work and see if there is any possibility of adapting it into a film and television adaptation." "Of course, I can also recommend industry resources to you." Wang Jun said. After a few classes, Ms. Yan felt inspired a lot, "Especially about the film. I used to watch movies by myself and forget about it after watching it. I wouldn't pay attention to these details. But for people who write, these details are often more important." important."
The students in the screenwriting class come from various industries such as marketing, medical education, finance, creative copywriting, teachers, food research and development, etc. In private, they are all a group of slash youths. A medical education and science popularizer with a strong desire for expression has published more than a dozen novels on Qidian Chinese website. "Writing novels is more tiring than doing my job. I spend all my time thinking about them when I go to bed at night." With a background in science and engineering, she came to the screenwriting class to remediate professional writing skills. "I want to make this kind of self-entertainment creation more meaningful, so that amateur 'self-entertainment' can also produce something valuable."
A student engaged in the landscape design industry is considering changing careers, "When "Flowers" was on the air, I saw someone sharing the scene modeling he did for "Flowers" on Weibo. It was very beautiful. I can also model, so I thought I will gain exposure to relevant industry knowledge in class and try to see if it is possible to engage in related work in the future.”
Jiu Xiaoyi works in the IT industry. After taking the screenwriting course, she can almost turn herself into a crew member. However, she feels that if she really wants to enter the industry, the superficial knowledge she currently has is not enough. "I have a friend who is in a film and television company and plans to make mini-series. If I have the opportunity, I will work part-time to learn how this industry works."
Although most of the popular works are based on surreal fantasy themes, Wang Jun is very "realistic" when teaching creative concepts. He told students that attractive characters need to be close to the audience, and then create more different ones. Features. "Everyone should observe more characters and the people around them. Maybe there are some points about the people you hate that would be interesting to put in the work." Some students think that compared with screenwriting skills, the skills in this subject are more important. The creative concept conveyed in the class is, "As the teacher said, we need to create some characters who believe in light and have hope. This is also a beautiful image that I want to see in current film and television works."
The students come from different industries and have different purposes for coming to class, but most of them have experience in writing novels or stage plays, and they gather together because of their love for literature. "Everyone can only live once, but you can write novels and live another life with the characters you write." After a student said this, Wang Jun nodded deeply.
