CSGM - Chapter 12
Chapter 12: The Former Agent
Did Chu Xi even know what she was saying?
What did she mean, "don't overcomplicate things"? Her proposed solution was the hardest one of all!
No, it wasn't just hard. To be precise, it was completely impractical!
The Director smiled knowingly and reiterated, "The camera operators are off duty. We can't provide a replay."
Wasn't Chu Xi's plan just to watch the replay to reconstruct the menu?
Impossible. The Director wouldn't let the production team help them so easily, not until he'd made every celebrity here cry for help.
Reality shows were all about letting the celebrities fend for themselves, haha!
"Pah, you Old Fox!" Li Xiling shouted. "That won't work, Chu Xi. The production team is too cruel. They won't help us."
Chu Xi's expression didn't change. She just smiled without saying a word.
She had known what kind of person the Director was all along. So, who said she was going to ask the production team for help?
Half an hour earlier-
Inside the Star Han Agency building, Hu Lan was supervising the artists under her, making them practice their vocals overtime.
As a veteran agent at Star Han with many years in the industry, she absolutely could not tolerate any artist she managed embarrassing her.
That's why she had kicked the useless Chu Xi to the curb.
Now, Chu Xi's only value was to serve as a cautionary tale in her lectures.
When she saw a female artist ask the vocal coach for "a short break," Hu Lan immediately put her hands on her hips and scolded her.
"You sing so terribly and you have the nerve to ask for a break? The coach hasn't even said anything, so what are you getting antsy about? Don't think you can get by in the entertainment industry just because you have a pretty face! There are tons of good-looking artists in this circle, so why should the resources go to you? All of you, keep practicing! Unless you want to be a good-for-nothing like Chu Xi. Let me tell you, it doesn't matter how beautiful she is! If I don't want her, she won't be able to make it anywhere else!"
The artists in the practice room could only be angry without daring to voice it. If it were just a normal practice session, they certainly wouldn't complain about being supervised.
But the workload Hu Lan gave them was far from a normal practice routine. Sixteen hours a day, they had to learn vocals, dance, and do other training for their expressions and posture. There were very few breaks in between. She was completely exploiting them as if they were robots!
Even if someone had a cold and a fever, Hu Lan would force them to practice!
If they didn't practice well, they couldn't go out and earn money for her. If they couldn't earn money and gain fame, they would come back only to be harshly berated by Hu Lan, who would even PUA them into thinking they were worthless!
Sigh... Unfortunately, there was nothing they could do. They had no background and no connections. If they wanted to make a name for themselves, they could only rely on the company and work themselves to death under Hu Lan, treated as less than human.
If they were disobedient, their fate would be the same as Chu Xi's...
They heard that Chu Xi's contract had been terminated, and that Hu Lan had even notified several other agencies, telling her peers not to take in that good-for-nothing, or else they would be disrespecting her, the great Agent Hu.
Sigh, they had no idea how Chu Xi had offended Hu Lan. Her future looked miserable. It probably wouldn't be long before she disappeared from the industry completely!
The background music in the practice room resumed. A staff member scurried over to Hu Lan's side and whispered fawningly, "Auntie Lan, Auntie Lan, look at this..."
"Hmm? What is it? Isn't this the show I found before... Something like this happened...?"
Hu Lan's expression shifted rapidly after seeing the staff member's phone. Then, with the lackey who had tipped her off in tow, she quickly left the practice room.
As she left, a clear look of displeasure was on her face.
The artists left in the practice room looked at each other, wondering what had happened.
Hu Lan walked all the way to her office, and the staff member trailing her was still cursing nonstop on her behalf-
"That Chu Xi is so reckless and shameless! She's clearly a good-for-nothing, yet she deliberately bought trending topics about being a top student! Does she think she can make a comeback on her own after leaving you? I wonder who she's buying these trending topics for..."
Hu Lan's face was dark as she sneered.
"She bought them for me to see, of course. She wants to tell me she's doing even better after going solo."
The moment her contract was terminated, she started building a persona and buying trending topics to get famous. Why didn't Hu Lan ever realize Chu Xi was so ambitious before?
As an agent, the last thing you want to see is an artist flying the coop and then doing even better, their career taking off.
Especially an artist like Chu Xi, who had once been disrespectful to her.
Hu Lan looked at the topics that had trended on Weibo a couple of days ago and surmised that Chu Xi must have found another agent, or had run to another agency the moment her contract was terminated...
In short, someone else was giving her ideas, telling Chu Xi to establish this fake, high-IQ, top-student persona to attract fans and get famous!
It must be!
What a pity...
Who was she, Hu Lan? She had created more personas in the entertainment industry than Chu Xi had eaten grains of salt! How could she not understand what marketing tricks she was pulling?
Wants to be famous, huh?
Wants to show me how famous she can get, huh?
I won't allow it!
If an artist who terminated their contract under her managed to make a comeback and soar, where would she, a distinguished gold-medal agent, put her face?
Hu Lan picked up her teacup, blew on the floating tea leaves, and suddenly had a flash of inspiration.
After finishing her sip of hot tea, she immediately went to the next room to find a male artist from the company who was scheduled for a live stream that evening.
Hu Lan pushed the door open and brazenly entered the live stream studio. The staff in the room didn't dare to stop her. The male artist, who was already live, was surprised but polite.
"Auntie Lan, what are you doing here?" The not-so-famous male artist even stood up and offered her a seat.
Hu Lan smiled as she sat down and gestured for the male artist to do the same. "Xiao Hu, sit down. The company arranged for me to join your live stream and add a little spice to our broadcast."
When it came to live streaming, Hu Lan knew a thing or two. She quickly faced the camera, became the center of attention, and naturally began interacting with the audience.
"This 'spice'... is the kind you find in bombshell revelations. Let me introduce myself. I'm Hu Lan, an agent who has been with Star Han Agency for thirty years, and I currently also serve as a trainer for the company's agents. If anyone has any curious questions about this industry, feel free to ask me."
The male artist, who was supposed to be the host, was instantly eclipsed by her presence. Unable to get a word in, he could only sit silently on the sidelines like a decorative vase with a forced smile.
Hu Lan chatted and laughed animatedly in the live stream. Hearing that she was about to drop some bombshells, the number of viewers in the stream surged in a short time.
More and more viewers were drawn in by the gimmick of a "veteran agent exposing industry secrets," eager to hear what gossip she was about to share.
Seeing that the number of viewers had already risen to 50,000, Hu Lan concealed a triumphant smile in her eyes and began to steer the conversation in her calculated direction.
"Yes... yes, that's right. Many artists aren't actually like what you see on the surface... because in front of the camera, they subconsciously hide their true selves..."
"As for creating a persona, I can only say that it definitely happens in the industry. But our company, and the artists under me, we don't do that! Absolutely not! Because I feel it's a burden for the artist, and it's not authentic for the fans. If fans are going to like a star, they should definitely like them for their most authentic personality..."
The male artist next to her was young, after all, and he could barely maintain his formulaic fake smile as he listened. His face was about to go stiff.
Is... is this true? Then why did the company give him a persona sheet the moment he joined? And he'd heard that Hu Lan was the best in the company at establishing personas... Why was what she was saying completely different from what he knew?
Hu Lan continued, "Hmm... let me talk about an artist I used to manage. Of course, she's no longer under my management now."
"She doesn't have a high level of education, and she was very authentic at work. For example, there were many characters in the script she didn't recognize... Even though she was only playing a supporting role with very low billing and just a few lines in total, she basically managed to mispronounce words every time, creating some jokes on set, haha..."
"And another time on some variety show, I think she was asked an elementary school math problem, something about triangles? If I remember correctly, that was it. In the end, she couldn't answer it, and the director didn't even let her re-record the take, hahaha..."
"You ask what I'm laughing at? I'm not gloating, really. Let me explain. When you encounter an artist like this, who doesn't like to study, I feel quite helpless too."
"You're asking for the first letter of her name? I can only tell you, it's two characters, an artist whose name starts with C... a female, a female..."
Hu Lan might as well have read out Chu Xi's ID number. At this point, all the gossip-hungry viewers in the live stream understood completely.
A two-character name, starts with C, female artist, couldn't answer an elementary school triangle problem-all the elements added up. It could only be Chu Xi!
The comments were already being spammed with the name "Chu Xi."
At this point, Hu Lan said, "Actually, this is also a kind of authenticity. Everyone, please stop typing her name. Let's not say her name, to protect the artist, protect her..."
"Sigh, she used to be under my management. Sometimes she would blame me for not creating a persona for her, as if it was because we agents weren't working hard enough that she was getting hate online."
Although at this point, Hu Lan was just making things up, the question was, which of them would the audience believe? Chu Xi, or her?
Whatever Chu Xi was like, wasn't it up to her former agent to say?
Besides, Chu Xi was already known as a brainless good-for-nothing. If she embellished the story a little, who on the outside could tell what was true and what was false?
Sure enough, people in the live stream couldn't help but start cursing Chu Xi.
Hu Lan watched the comments scroll by and picked a few to answer.
"What show are you talking about? Oh, I haven't watched it... Since our company doesn't currently have any artists on that show, I haven't been paying attention..."
"Does CX usually do practice problems? How is that possible... Oh, I shouldn't say that. I can only say that for a period of time, I was with her for over ten hours a day and never saw her do a single problem."
"A persona? I wouldn't dare to say for sure... CX is no longer with our company. I don't know what kind of packaging she might be getting from others..."
"Sigh, as for the artist CX, I originally thought she was quite good-looking and wanted to cultivate her properly. Her biggest flaw is probably that she's just too 'Buddha-like'... Her attitude toward acting? Uh... also very 'Buddha-like.' Yes, 'Buddha-like'... She wouldn't even bother to memorize a script with one or two pages of lines. In the end, she'd just tell the director she couldn't remember them..."
"What did she do on set... haha, she'd just make things up, or recite numbers..."
"You can't say she didn't try. I did see her trying to memorize the script, but she just couldn't retain it. Maybe she just doesn't have the talent for it... Yes, her memory is a bit poor. I remember one time she couldn't even remember song lyrics and had to rely on a teleprompter in the end..."
A few of the staff members in the room who had been with the company for a long time and knew a thing or two about Hu Lan's character were speechless.
On the surface, she claimed to be protecting the artist, but in reality, she had insulted Chu Xi in every way imaginable.
One moment she was implying Chu Xi was unprofessional and didn't memorize her lines, the next she was implying Chu Xi was stupid and had a bad memory. It was as if she couldn't wait to expose all of Chu Xi's supposed flaws to the public!
But this kind of overt and covert insinuation from Hu Lan was precisely what netizens ate up.
By now, the gossip-hungry crowd was thoroughly convinced that Chu Xi was just a useless pretty face with professional skills so poor that even her former agent had to complain about her!
Comments
Post a Comment