The TV series All Quiet in Peking, which premiered in 2014, was adapted from Liu Heping's novel of the same name. It is set against the backdrop of the decisive battle between the Kuomintang and the Communist Party in 1948 and tells the story of Fang Mengao, an underground member of the Communist Party of China, who lurks in the Kuomintang Air Force and helps the peaceful liberation of Peking. The series received a warm response after its broadcast, achieving a "double harvest" of word-of-mouth and awards, and won many honors including the 30th China TV Drama "Flying Apsaras Award" for Outstanding TV Drama, Outstanding Screenwriter, Outstanding Director, and Outstanding Actor. The broadcast of the series on the "Revisiting Classics" channel once again aroused the audience's thinking about this classic work and the history behind it.
Liu Heping served as the screenwriter and chief producer of the TV series All Quiet in Peking. Over the years, he has been deeply involved in the creation of historical dramas and has unique insights into character creation and plot arrangement. His works such as Yongzheng Dynasty and Ming Dynasty 1566, which he wrote, have both historical heritage and delicate emotions, and have enduring artistic charm. In All Quiet in Peking, Liu Heping extends his creative vision to the stormy historical transition moment, allowing the audience to see the historical inevitability of the people's choice of the Communist Party of China.
Recently, the China Television Art Committee specially invited Mr. Liu Heping to be interviewed and recall the creation process of "All Quiet in Peking".
This article is the result of an interview for the "Classic TV Drama Memories" oral history collection project
Project leader: Lin Hui (oral history expert at Communication University of China)
Executives of this issue: Lin Hui, Zhang Longzhu, Liu Xuefeng, Liu Da, Yu Yin, Cao Qingjiang (Communication University of China team)
Interview support: Sheng Linjie
Planning: Zhao Cong and Li Xuan
Recent photo of teacher Liu Heping
Liu Heping: Our ancestors have long concluded that the Six Classics are all history, and history is the mainstream culture of our nation. People generally say that he writes historical dramas, modern dramas, and period dramas. In fact, they are all sorting out the historical bloodline and cultural trends of our nation. The Six Classics are all history, which does not necessarily mean facts, events, situations, and events that have already happened, because the life forms in different periods have changed. So when I was writing, I paid more attention to the cultural trends of this historical period, paying attention to what everyone was thinking, what everyone was saying, and what opinions everyone held. This is very important, and it is especially difficult to apply it to literary and artistic works. Another feature of my creation is that I pay special attention to the influence of people in this historical stage on their predecessors. In fact, we are all influenced by our predecessors.
It has been a tradition in China for thousands of years to write history in prosperous times. It is also our responsibility to write about what happened during the Republic of China with the vision and height of writing history. Someone asked what the difference between Mao Zedong and Chiang Kai-shek was. I said that Chiang Kai-shek represented the interests of the Jiangsu and Zhejiang consortium, and he made his fortune by relying on the Jiangsu and Zhejiang consortium. When he was in power, he must have represented the interests of the emerging bourgeoisie. Mao Zedong was completely different. He represented the interests of the grassroots people, mainly farmers. Chiang Ching-kuo was a very special person. He was influenced by communism in the Soviet Union in his early years. There was one thing that was really unlike his father, that is, he went against the consortium. When I was writing "All Quiet in Peking", the hidden line was that Chiang Ching-kuo and Zhou Enlai competed for the hearts and minds of the people and fought against corruption. Fighting corruption must be supported by the majority of the people. Despite this, he (referring to Chiang Ching-kuo) could no longer save the building from collapse.
Liu Heping: Artistic truth is to see the world from a beautiful perspective, not just from a scientific perspective, so you will imagine some artistic elements that make the audience feel suddenly enlightened and aesthetically pleasing and present them, which is our pursuit and responsibility. Sometimes we are engaged in artistic creation and innovation like this, "Everyone says that the author is crazy, who can understand the meaning of it", this is Cao Xueqin's feeling, and it is also our feeling.
The same is true for All Quiet in Peking. I quoted the song Full Moon and Beautiful Flowers from beginning to end. This was the mainstream popular culture at the time. This interlude came from the movie Romance of the West Chamber at the time, but it was widely circulated and was completely different from all the music forms and musical tastes before the Qing Dynasty. Last year, I talked to Wong Kar-wai on WeChat, saying that his film Blossoms was amazing. This is what audio-visual narrative and image narrative are. He quoted a lot of popular songs from different eras and periods. Those songs can represent the cultural trends of that period. These are all the thoughts of people who engage in artistic creation when their hearts are at their quietest.
It is easy to watch a play, but it is difficult to write and act in a play.
Liu Heping: All Quiet in Peking presents the audience with the political struggle between the two parties, which is a political struggle that determines the fate of China, but what is really related to the fate of each person and each family is the individual. I always advocate writing about big things in a small way and writing about national affairs in a family way. In addition to fighting, you have to live your life, and there are always seven emotions and six desires, joys and sorrows, separations and reunions. These are what everyone has to experience, and the attitudes are different when making choices. So the background I gave to the Fang family is that some people at that time did not want to be involved in politics, and they yearned for the full moon and beautiful flowers, but they could not get it. If the country is not stable, the country will not be a country, so how can there be a family? But everyone hopes to have a happy family and a good life, which is the same.
Liu Heping: Yes, just like the family tradition of the Fang family is "If you don't learn poetry, you can't speak." Fang Buting taught his two sons to read poetry since they were young. If we push it back, his father may have taught him the same way. Because poetry is the best language, it often expresses spiritual things. When you can write poetry, your language must be better than that of ordinary people. In addition, there are many things that cannot be expressed clearly, and poetry can convey them. Fang Mengao finally wanted to praise his father and said, "I will give you the two poems you taught me, 'If Lao Ruan is not crazy, who will understand? When he goes out, he smiles and crosses the river'." This lifted his father's evaluation to the sky. This involves the specific techniques of writing. When you can't express it with direct words, you quote the classic sentences of the predecessors, including poetry, and the information and image of the characters will be much richer and more vivid.
Liu Heping: The Crescent Moon School, that was the trend of thought at the time. At that time, people who wrote modern poetry admired Tagore, and some poets were short-lived, but (modern poetry appears in the play) shows that a new era has come, a new cultural trend has come. I want to express another meaning, that popular culture must also have a certain amount of literary quality. When you quote those famous classics, the literary quality comes out. I have quoted them in every work. I admire their good writing from the bottom of my heart, and I think from the bottom of my heart why it is not written by me. When it is appropriate, I will quote it. These represent the high level of Chinese literature. Because mainstream literature is popular literature, but popular literature must also have considerable literary quality.
Stills from the TV series All Quiet in Peking
Liu Heping: It's just putting yourself in his shoes. If I were him and I were in the moment, what would happen? When you put yourself in his shoes and understand the background at that time, your description will be accurate, and your expression will be accurate. (At that time) everyone was starving, and everyone knew it was difficult. There were also people who resolutely carried out (orders), such as those inhumane orders issued by the Kuomintang's secret service agencies, and some people opened fire, but most people did not.
When an actor gets my script, he basically knows how to act at a glance. I basically tell him what his reaction, expression, attitude, and mentality should be at that time. He can tell me where to start, how to go, and what state he should be in when he sits down. They can't be wrong. Because they are professional actors, they make a living by acting. I am afraid that if I don't know what kind of person this person is, I won't be able to act. So what I write is worth watching when it is made into a film or TV work, and it is readable when it is published as a book. Of course, there is another point, that is, we must pay attention to the text, and our real effort should be put into the language.
Liu Heping: To show the new trend of thought replacing the old trend of thought, we can actually use only four words: reject reality. These four words are also the easiest for the audience to accept. Don’t think that we live the same life every day, but many complaints and dissatisfactions are actually manifestations of rejecting reality. Fang Mengao was the first one to reject reality. The Kuomintang was too corrupt. The eight-year war of resistance was not easy. He was a member of the Flying Tigers. His father was a doctor of economics and the manager of the Beijing branch of the Central Bank. He didn’t know about the gap between the rich and the poor in China? He was a person who rejected reality. Liang Jinglun also rejected reality, and Zeng Keda also rejected reality. That’s why the audience took a kind of understanding and sympathy for the underground party and the Iron Blood National Salvation Association in the play, because their attitude towards life was the same as the audience, and they all rejected the reality at that time.
So-called innovation is based on rejecting reality. When we write, we need to innovate. You have to reject the past to write something new. This is what progress means. After setting this tone, we know that Jiang Jingguo ("Comrade Jianfeng") is a typical person who rejects reality. This person has never appeared, but he runs through the entire play and exists all the time. Of course, there is a convenient condition given to me by the times. (Now) everyone has a mobile phone, so everyone can accept the scene of making a phone call. The problem is that it is more difficult to write the lines for the phone. I put a lot of effort into expressing a dark character who has never appeared only through sound.
Stills from the TV series All Quiet in Peking
Liu Heping: Because you can't see the other person on the phone, the context is definitely different. When you can see the other person, face-to-face conversation is one state, and on the phone it's another state. It must be like this. When you can't see the other person, your control of your voice, rhythm, emphasis, and the emotions you express must be in another context.
Because today is an era where everyone uses telephones, I wrote a lot of telephone lines. The most impressive thing is that when Xu Tieying wanted to execute Xie Mulan and others, Wang Puchen was anxious and called his top boss, the Director of the Bureau of Secret Affairs, Mao Renfeng, and told him, "There is a conflict between the Central Party Committee and Director Jiang Jingguo. What should we do?" What did Mao Renfeng say, "What's wrong with this phone call today? I can't hear a word." Then he hung up the phone and passed the buck. Using the excuse of a telephone malfunction to avoid being involved in the conflict between the Kuomintang Central Party Committee and the Ministry of National Defense's Preparatory Cadre Bureau, Mao Renfeng's move can be said to have risen to the level of "telephone art."
Liu Heping: Yes. Because the social structure of China for thousands of years is the same as that of the country. From the country to the family, it is basically the same structure. And this structure of China is the most stable and long-lasting structure in the world. So you can see that the biggest law in every dynasty is the court law, and at the grassroots level it becomes the family rules and clan laws.
Now that China has entered modern society, it has transformed from family culture to community culture. "All Quiet in Peking" depicts the Republic of China period, when family culture was still the mainstream culture. So you can see that in the background and scenes we set, the most important one is Fang Buting's home, and all the office (play) is done in his home. This is also an artistic conception, just like "Comrade Jianfeng" did not appear in the whole play. This play does not show the city of old Beijing, it talks about currency reform, and the story should take place in Shanghai, but I moved the location to Peking. So if you go and see, what I present most is Fang Buting's home, Yanda is all Western-style buildings, and then there is the police station and Xishan Prison. The only courtyard house that appears is Cui Zhongshi's home. This side is a wall, this side is a house, and there is a tree. I don't like courtyard houses, it's not easy to express people in the gray and hazy frame. The core of "All Quiet in Peking" expresses family culture, and the scenes try to use elements of community culture, which involves taking into account the aesthetic needs of today's audience. This kind of artistic conception is very complicated. The so-called ingenuity includes these aspects.
Liu Heping: The so-called change or development of characters can be explained by Su Dongpo's "giving shape to things". Su Dongpo compared people's thoughts to water. On flat ground, it can flow thousands of miles without any obstruction. When placed on rocks, the shape of water changes. The same is true for character creation. Just pay attention to giving shape to things, and change according to the situation. Generally speaking, as long as they are human beings, they have the same heart and the same reason, but typical characters in typical environments are different, and some of them are beyond my control.
For example, let's write about Cui Zhongshi's death. Originally, my personal wish was that Cui Zhongshi would live to the end, but at that point he had to die, and his death would bring about a new change in the entire plot and conflict. Fang Mengao was like a kite with a broken string, and at this time the people behind the scenes were forced to come out one by one. Later, I received some feedback, and they scolded me when they saw Cui Zhongshi's death. Some even gave up the show, because many viewers liked Cui Zhongshi so much, and asked me why I wrote him to death. The plot made it so, and he had to die. In fact, it was more difficult to write the play after Cui Zhongshi's death, and this difficulty made the plot more complicated and pushed it to a new climax.
Liu Heping: I like grand narratives, with many clues, complicated relationships between characters, and groups of characters that intersect with each other. This is a problem for myself. My work is difficult to structure. To put it bluntly, the art of screenwriting is the art of structure. Whoever structures better may get more attention for his script. When this person dies, how will that group of people react, and how will this group of people deal with it. When the characters in the play are in trouble, I am the first one to be in trouble. It is quite painful.
From the perspective of the history of art development, TV dramas are still a new art form. How can we let future generations say that the TV dramas of the past were really good? We deserve to be able to live in this era and do this job today. We have opportunities that our predecessors did not have, so we cannot miss them or let them down. In addition, we feel that we have the ability to do it, so we work hard. You can't give up after doing only 50% of your effort. We try to pursue perfection in artistic works until we no longer have the ability. It is not good to know that I have the ability, but I do it for the sake of ease and difficulty.
Liu Heping: It is difficult to define what a classic work is. It must have a certain level of ideological expression and a high level of artistic expression. Both are indispensable. I am particularly grateful to our competent department for being able to evaluate and launch a batch of works that are recognized by everyone in the vast number of TV dramas with objective standards, setting a benchmark. I hope that future works will reach or even exceed the level of these benchmarks, which is very meaningful. I heard that this batch of works was selected based on the evaluation of the general audience, which shows that the vitality of good works has a broad mass base. I hope that the classic repertoires of our channel will accumulate more and more. With more classics, the cultural soft power of our country will increase, and literature and art will prosper.
Work photos of the TV series "All Quiet in Peking"
【postscript】
In his early years, Liu Heping was engaged in drama research and creation in Hunan. In 1993, he won the "Wenhua Award" and the first "Cao Yu Drama Literature Award" from the Ministry of Culture for his stage play "Jiashen Sacrifice", which attracted attention in the industry.
In the 1990s, Liu Heping became the screenwriter of the TV series "Yongzheng Dynasty" by chance, successfully adapted Er Yuehe's novel of the same name, and won the 19th National TV Drama "Flying Apsaras Award" Outstanding Screenwriter Award and the 17th China TV "Golden Eagle Award" Best Screenwriter Award. After that, he created a series of widely circulated works such as "Li Wei as an Official" and "The Ming Dynasty 1566", and served as a producer. Over the years, his works are not many, but each one is a masterpiece.
Although All Quiet in Peking is based on the Kuomintang's anti-corruption campaign, it shows the inevitability of the direction of historical progress through the artistic presentation of the complex struggles on the economic front. The superb performances of actors such as Chen Baoguo, Ni Dahong, Wang Qingxiang, Zu Feng, Cheng Yu, and Dong Yong have added to the artistic charm of the work. Today, more than ten years after the premiere of All Quiet in Peking, the audience can still be seen on social platforms discussing the characters and plots of the play enthusiastically, which shows the audience's love for the play.
In recent years, Mr. Liu Heping has once again devoted his creative energy to the exploration of new themes. As he himself said, "It is our responsibility to uphold the truth and innovate."
Proofread by Xie Shuanghong
Producer: Li Minghao, Zhang Jingxue
