Chapter 374 The Circus King

Zhou Yan originally thought that after Kareem Abdul-Jabbar was taken away by Kanter and others, he would not come again.

But after their rehearsal that day, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar appeared again.

"Mr. Y, can we talk again?"

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar directly stopped Zhou Yan at the entrance of the hall. It seemed that he should have been waiting for a long time.

Seeing Kareem Abdul-Jabbar's sincere face, Zhou Yan sighed, "You probably haven't eaten yet."

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar shook his head, "Not yet."

"Let's go, if you don't mind, come with us to the hotel to eat."

"Of course I don't mind." Kareem Abdul-Jabbar's eyes lit up, he knew what Zhou Yan meant by this.

After arriving at the hotel restaurant, Zhou Yan asked Kareem Abdul-Jabbar while eating not-so-authentic Chinese food, "Have you ever directed a musical before?"

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar nodded, "Of course, I have been the screenwriter and director of seven plays in total."

Seven?

Zhou Yan looked at Kareem Abdul-Jabbar in surprise.

This number is not ordinary, because musicals are very time-consuming, and many directors spend many years on just one musical.

The creation process of a musical is different from that of a movie. It is continuous. Even if the preliminary work goes smoothly, when the musical is actually on stage, the creation is still going on, and the director will constantly adjust according to the situation on the spot.

The same play may be completely different after the first performance and the hundredth performance.

"These seven musicals do not include your homework in school, right?" Zhou Yan asked half-jokingly.

"Of course not, these seven musicals have all been performed publicly. Of course, five of them have no more than 50 performances, and only one has more than 100 performances."

This result is not particularly good, but it is also good.

Zhou Yan wondered, "Then why are you still a resident director?"

Since Kareem Abdul-Jabbar already has a play that has been performed for more than 100 times, it proves that there is still some market. He doesn't need to be a resident director for others, just rely on his own play.

Being a resident director for others is very time-consuming and energy-consuming. As a director with creative ability and experience, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar has no reason to do this again.

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar smiled and explained, "The Sound of Music is the first real commercial drama I participated in. I have feelings for it. Moreover, my resident performance is limited to Houston. The performance tasks are not heavy on weekdays, so I have a lot of time to do my own things."

"Is your own drama still being performed now?"

"There are no performance plans this month, and there are six performances next month, all in Houston."

Zhou Yan nodded. He roughly understood Kareem Abdul-Jabbar's situation. He underestimated Kareem Abdul-Jabbar before. He thought Kareem Abdul-Jabbar was just a tool man.

"It's a pity. If I could stay longer, I would definitely go to see your play. What is the theme of your play? Is it an adaptation or an original work?"

"It's an original work. It's called "A Night at the Circus". It mainly tells the story of..."

Jabbar spent more than ten minutes introducing his "A Night at the Circus" to Zhou Yan. This is a very conventional stage musical. It is different from classic musicals and opera musicals in form. The plot is relatively complex and interesting, and it basically uses popular music.

Of course, although the form is new, the core of the story is still the same old story. It tells the story of a rich boy who falls in love with the daughter of the circus director.

In order to see his beloved girl, the rich boy went to the circus in the dark and happened to encounter the circus rehearsal. He had to dress up as a clown and join the circus rehearsal.

Naturally, there were many situations in the middle, as if the rich boy would be discovered at any time.

The ending was that the rich boy successfully spent the night and saw his beloved girl, but all this was under the watchful eyes of the circus director.

It turned out that the circus leader had long known that the clown was played by a rich kid.

The plot was pretty good, at least after Zhou Yan heard it, he became interested in the play.

However, whether the play was good or not still depended on the live performance. What was on the stage was always different from what was in the script.

Especially for musicals, many scripts seemed to have ordinary stories, but when they were presented on the stage, they were very contagious.

Those classic plays have not changed their scripts for many years, and many troupes have imitated them, but the effects presented by different troupes are very different.

This not only tests the director's choreography ability, but also the actor's performance ability.

After Kareem Abdul-Jabbar finished talking about his musical, he kept looking at Zhou Yan, trying to judge Zhou Yan's attitude towards the musical through his expression.

However, Zhou Yan did not make any extra expressions or speak, as if he was thinking about something.

Seeing Zhou Yan thinking, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar didn't want to interrupt him.

After about a minute, Zhou Yan finally spoke, "Do you know Barnum?"

Jabbar was slightly stunned. He thought Zhou Yan would comment on his musical "A Night at the Circus" after being silent. Unexpectedly, Zhou Yan asked him if he knew Barnum.

But this question did not seem to be off topic, because Barnum was a very important figure in the history of the circus.

Jabbar did not know Barnum before, but because he wanted to write "A Night at the Circus", he studied the history of the circus and learned about Barnum.

"I know Barnum, and he had a profound influence on the development of the circus today."

Zhou Yan nodded. Some people say that Barnum is the King of the Circus. At first glance, this title sounds like Barnum invented the circus.

Of course this is not the case. There was a circus long before Barnum, but the circus at that time was very different from the circus today.

It was Barnum's appearance that innovated the form of the circus and made the circus popular among the masses.

"Have you ever thought about arranging a Barnum story?" Zhou Yan asked.

"This... I haven't thought about it."

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar knew Barnum's influence on the development of the circus, but he didn't think Barnum's story was easy to tell.

Barnum was actually a businessman through and through. He would do anything to succeed and sell tickets. For example, he once bought a paralyzed black slave girl and released news that the black slave girl was 161 years old and was Washington's mother. , and in order to extract the value of the female slave, he had to put the female slave on display for more than ten hours every day.

The most outrageous thing is that he even held a ticketed anatomy show after the death of the slave girl.

He also trained a four-year-old child and packaged the child into a thumb general.

In addition, there are a bunch of strange characters such as a bearded woman, a dog man, a four-legged girl, etc.

From the perspective of entertaining the public, Barnum is undoubtedly a genius. He is always able to take advantage of the audience's curiosity and contribute unique performances.

So much so that today, more than a hundred years later, the circus is still following the same path that Barnum followed.

In Kareem Abdul-Jabbar's view, Barnum is a profiteer who has no bottom line and only knows how to entertain the public. If he is to be arranged in a musical, he should be a villain in it.

After thinking about it, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar added, "Y, you may not know Barnum very well. Maybe you have read some of the stories that were circulated in the early days, but in fact, these stories were made up by Barnum to create a good reputation for himself. ”

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar is telling the truth. Barnum did do anything in his early days, but as he became more and more famous and gradually entered the upper class, he began to pay attention to his image.

In order to change the public's impression of himself, he even bribed many newspapers and asked them to write some articles that were favorable to him.

In such an era, these articles obviously played a role.

So Kareem Abdul-Jabbar thought that Zhou Yan might have said this because he accidentally saw those old stories.

But he had to let Zhou Yan know that the real Barnum was not as good as those stories said.

Zhou Yan shook his head, "I know Barnum fairly well, and I also know that he is a pure entertainer."

As a pure entertainer, I can't hear the praise or criticism, but Kareem Abdul-Jabbar thinks it's quite appropriate.

"I don't think Barnum has anything worthy of praise." Kareem Abdul-Jabbar said his thoughts directly.

Zhou Yan put down the chopsticks in his hand with a smile, "A musical is not a historical drama. Historical figures can be just a symbol, a symbol, like a ball of thread. We just need to find a thread. Barnum's experience can be considered a legend. Serve as this thread.”

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar also responded quickly. He frowned and said, "You mean, just take a little bit from his story?"

"As long as we find what we want, no matter what methods Barnum uses, his entrepreneurial history is still quite inspiring."

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar nodded in approval, "Indeed, aside from some of his unscrupulous operations, just looking at his rising resume is indeed very inspiring. In any case, he did bring a lot of innovation to the circus, and his influence is real. "

"So, if we follow this clue, we can definitely arrange an inspirational musical."

"Indeed, and so can those bizarre circus performers..."

Halfway through, Jabbar suddenly stopped.

He didn't understand what he was doing, why did he suddenly discuss the new drama with Zhou Yan? He came to Zhou Yan to ask Zhou Yan to cooperate with him to make "Spring of the Cowherd Class" into a musical.

But now the content of the discussion between the two completely deviated from the topic he wanted to discuss, and became related to the circus.

"Mr. Y, I actually don't want to schedule another musical related to the circus." Kareem Abdul-Jabbar tried to change the topic to "Spring of the Cowherd Class".

However, Zhou Yan smiled and said, "But after listening to your "Wonderful Night at the Circus", I have some ideas."

"But……"

As soon as Jabbar opened his mouth, Zhou Yan interrupted him, "If you are willing, we can try to cooperate on this new drama. As for "Spring of the Cowherd Class", I am not ready to do it for the time being."

Zhou Yan's words made Kareem Abdul-Jabbar not sure how to respond.

Of course he still wanted "Spring of the Cowherd Class", but Zhou Yandu had already said so firmly that it seemed pointless for him to persist.

As for the new drama, although he only has one idea now, and he doesn't even know what Zhou Yan wants to do, he doesn't want to miss it. After all, Zhou Yan is sitting in front of him.

Since Zhou Yan was able to make "Spring of the Cowherd Class", can he make another equally excellent work?

Leaving aside the script, if you work with Zhou Yan, at least you don’t have to worry about the music anymore.

After pondering for a long time, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar said, "As long as I can cooperate with you, I will be extremely honored."

“But I can’t write the script until the end of the year.” Zhou Yan said.

“Of course, no problem.”

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar even felt that it was beyond his expectations to see the script by the end of the year. It only took a few months to write a musical script from scratch, which was very efficient.

Zhou Yan wanted to work with Kareem Abdul-Jabbar on The Greatest Showman.

The Greatest Showman is a musical with a very good market response, with a global box office of over 400 million US dollars.

Zhou Yan thought of this movie after Kareem Abdul-Jabbar talked about his own musical. Zhou Yan thought about taking this movie and turning it into a stage musical.

It can be regarded as a test. If the effect is good, it can be made into a movie in the future, whether he does it himself or gives it to other directors.

Of course, Zhou Yan is not sure to work with Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. For the time being, he knows about Kareem Abdul-Jabbar from Kareem Abdul-Jabbar himself.

He must find an opportunity to watch Kareem Abdul-Jabbar’s musical before making a final decision.

…

After dinner, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar did not stay any longer. After the two exchanged contact information, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar said goodbye.

After returning to the room, Zhou Yan wrote "The Greatest Showman" on his schedule.

During this period, his schedule was basically full. He would have time to work on "The Greatest Showman" only after "The Time Traveler" was finished.

It is more difficult to make a musical of "The Greatest Showman" than "The Chorus" because he has only seen the movie version of "The Greatest Showman" and cannot copy it, so he can only adapt it according to the movie.

In this regard, he may need to communicate more with Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.

Or, he can also ask his good friend Alan Rickman for advice. Alan Rickman is very experienced in musicals, especially in writing musical scripts.

After adding the schedule, Zhou Yan began to work on the storyboards of "The Time Traveler".

Probably influenced by James Cameron, Zhou Yan's painting skills have improved recently, and the storyboards are much more delicate than before.

But there is another problem, that is, the more detailed the drawing, the slower the speed. He is now slower in producing storyboards than when he was filming "The Chorus".

But time is tight, so he now spends a lot of time drawing storyboards every day.

Basically, he spends all his free time on drawing.

Of course, detailed drawing is more convenient for later filming, which can save a lot of explanation.

Others basically know what Zhou Yan wants as soon as they see the manuscript, which can be regarded as sharpening the knife before chopping wood.

That night, Zhou Yan went to bed at around eleven o'clock, but got up from bed at seven o'clock the next morning.

After getting up, he had a simple breakfast and started working again.

It was not until he went to the theater with the orchestra in the afternoon that Zhou Yan stopped the work at hand.

Zhou Yan had just arrived backstage and was fiddling with his bamboo flute and violin when the team leader Zhang Lin came over and said, "Teacher Zhou, someone is looking for you."

"Looking for me? Who?"

"Beyoncé and her agent."

Zhou Yan was a little surprised, wondering why the father and daughter came without saying hello in advance.

"Let them in."

"Okay."

Not long after Zhang Lin left, he led a tall black man and a tall little girl over. The girl was Beyoncé.

Matthew Knowles looked like a typical black man, but although he was dark, you could see that his facial features were quite regular.

Although Beyoncé was only fifteen years old, she was already quite tall, probably close to 1.7 meters.

Beyoncé now looks darker than later. Later, her skin color tended to be bronze, while now her skin color is similar to Will Smith's.

As soon as he saw Zhou Yan, Matthew Knowles came up to him enthusiastically, "Mr. Y, I'm so happy to meet you. Welcome to Houston. I hope you can have good memories here."

Zhou Yan probably understood that Matthew Knowles' family was in Houston, no wonder he came here.

However, Zhou Yan still saw Matthew Knowles's little thoughts. He only brought Beyonce, and none of the other members of Destiny's Child.

"Come on, Beyonce, say hello to Mr. Y."

"Hello, Mr. Y."

Zhou Yan looked at Beyonce. He didn't expect the little girl to be a little shy. This was different from the Beyonce he imagined.

"Hello." Zhou Yan nodded and praised, "Your expression in We Are Young is very good."

"Thank you."

At this time, Matthew Knowles tugged at his daughter's clothes, and Beyonce immediately reacted and quickly said in broken Chinese, "Thank you."

Zhou Yan shook his head secretly. This Matthew Knowles is quite good at scheming. Before coming, he specially asked his daughter to learn a sentence in Chinese.

But this trick is really useful. Zhou Yan heard Beyonce say thank you in Chinese and smiled and said, "The pronunciation is not bad. Can you say anything else?"

Beyonce glanced at her father and then said, "Hello, have you eaten? Sorry."

It can be seen that she has tried her best to say the Chinese words she remembered, and the pronunciation of "hello" is still okay.

But Zhou Yan still encouraged her, "Not bad, keep up the good work, maybe next time we meet, we can communicate in Chinese."

Matthew Knowles was very happy to see that the few Chinese sentences he had asked his daughter to learn were useful. He added, "In fact, Beyonce has loved Chinese culture since she was a child. It's a pity that there are few Chinese people around us, so it's difficult for her to learn more about Chinese culture."

Obviously, this was a lie made up by Matthew Knowles. Beyonce didn't seem to be interested in Chinese culture.

However, Zhou Yan did not reject others to cater to his preferences. Regardless of whether Beyonce liked Chinese culture before, if Beyonce learned about Chinese culture because of him, the result would be good.

"Chinese culture is profound and cannot be understood in a day or two. If she is really interested, we can communicate more in the future."

"That's an honor."

Matthew Knowles achieved his goal and was naturally in a good mood.

He knew clearly that if Beyonce could hold on to Zhou Yan, her future would be limitless.

If he had only used Zhou Yan as one of his preparations before, now he was determined to hold on to Zhou Yan's thigh, and his change of mentality came from "We Are Young".

As soon as this song was released, it immediately became the weekly champion of Billboard and has been on the top for two weeks.

Judging from the current situation, it should continue to be on the top for a few weeks.

The Backstreet Boys, who were already on the rise, also took their career to a new level because of this song.

Now they have firmly sat on the throne of the number one youth group in North America, and the two songs "Yellow" and "We Are Young" lifted them up.

Although Zhou Yan has not written many English songs, they have been on the top for a long time. The previous song "Young and Beautiful" has been on the top for many weeks. (End of this chapter)