Chapter 599

"The Jump Up Theater actually mainly does these three types of plays: youth growth, crime suspense, and life workplace."

After *Intern* aired, on Monday night, Chen Siqi and the director of *Intern* live-streamed with everyone, chatting for half an hour about the stories behind the scenes of *Intern*, and then talked about their positioning for the Jump Up Theater.

"Because the plays in the Jump Up Theater are all adapted from novels published in *Jump Up* magazine, the themes are also mainly focused on these types," Chen Siqi said. "Through the three plays *Girl's Adventure*, *The Vortex*, and *Intern*, we have basically shown everyone the positioning and style of the Jump Up Theater. Of course, in addition to these three main directions, we will also do some experimental works that may be rarely adapted into film and television."

When they were live-streaming, in the bullet screen room, many people sent bullet screens, expressing their hope to continue to see the story of *Intern*.

Jiao You, the director of *Intern*, saw this and said with a smile: "Currently, the story of *Intern* has been filmed. Its original work is a short story. Thank you all for liking it so much. As for the sequel that everyone has been asking about, after the live stream ends later, I will go and ask the original author if there is a plan to write a sequel."

The average viewership rating per episode of *Intern* refreshed the viewership rating record for Sunday night in the past three years with 1.32%.

The next day, this play also became popular on the Internet, and the discussion was very high.

The workplace relationship between the boss and the subordinate in it, as well as the contradictions, conflicts, and various stories that occurred between them, all triggered the resonance of many working people, and they shared their own workplace stories on the Internet.

There was a complaint post, and the comment section had tens of thousands of comments, all of which were working people complaining about stories between themselves and their bosses.

Yan Liang forwarded it to the small group of three, @Lu Yan He: Yan He, I think *Intern* can continue to be made.

Lu Yan He asked: Do you want to do it yourself?

Yan Liang: Hmm, I acted very happily, and everyone's feedback is also very good. I chatted with Jiao You, and he also very much wants to continue making *Intern*. Especially these jokes on the Internet, Jiao You and I both feel that many things in them can be made into content in the script.

Lu Yan He: If you want to do it, I will go and tell them.

Yan Liang: Good.

Lu Yan He was not surprised by Yan Liang's idea of wanting to continue making *Intern*.

*Intern* should be the most relaxed and happiest play Yan Liang has ever filmed. It is also the play with the highest discussion after airing. Moreover, workplace life naturally has room for continued adaptation.

Just as Lu Yan He and Chen Siqi and the others said when they first started the Jump Up Theater, the plays aired in the Jump Up Theater, although very short, if the response is very good and there is room for continued adaptation, they may also derive sequels, or even spin-off dramas.

In the film and television industry, sequels are a very important part. However, because domestic film and television dramas were aired on TV stations before, they were already 40 or 50 episodes long. Except for a very small number of explosive dramas that would make sequels, they generally did not develop sequels.

On the contrary, after entering the online broadcasting era, sequels have slowly risen.

First, compared to the traditional TV station era, which needed to rely on the number of episodes to pull viewership ratings, the online broadcasting era needs to rely more on different works to attract new audiences. Second, for popular dramas, every broadcast of a sequel can drive the playback data of the previous work, which is killing two birds with one stone. Third, it is to better control costs—

TV stations rely on overall viewership ratings for investment promotion, but video platforms are project-based. If this play is not aired well, it will be directly reflected in the fact that advertisers withdraw their capital. There may be a few pre-roll ads when it starts airing, but after a few episodes, they all run away.

Therefore, with the rise of sequels in the web drama era, the projects of Lu Yan He and the others are also increasingly serialized and sequelized.

Chen Siqi said: "Currently, there are two directions for the sequel development of *Intern*. One is to develop it independently and make it a long drama, or continue to develop it according to the model of the Jump Up Theater and develop another short drama with a duration of about two hours."

oco

Lu Yan He said: "If it is adapted into a long drama, it is not suitable to be aired in the Jump Up Theater. If it is developed as a short drama, if the response to the second part is still very good, then the third part, the fourth part... will this actually occupy the airing opportunities of other plays in the Jump Up Theater?"

The Jump Up Theater airs one play a week. If *Intern* airs one more, the airing opportunities left for other plays will be one less.

Then if *Intern* does this, what about others who want to do sequel adaptations later?

Will the Jump Up Theater be able to give up original works and change its name to the Sequel Channel over time?

"For sequel development, let's not continue to air it in the Jump Up Theater," Lu Yan He suggested.

Chen Siqi nodded.

"That's what I think too."

"*Intern* wants to develop a sequel and make it a long drama. The Jump Up Theater has a good start," Lu Qingzhen said to Chen Ziyan with a smile. "Of course, your speed is fast enough. Yan Yuling was signed by you, and now she is immediately popular because of this play."

Chen Ziyan: "I think I'm old."

"What the hell?" Lu Qingzhen looked at Chen Ziyan in disbelief, not understanding why she suddenly made such a sigh for no reason.

"The waves behind the Yangtze River push the waves in front. The Jump Up Theater was actually made by them," Chen Ziyan shook her head, very emotional. "I'm telling you privately, you are not allowed to tell anyone."

"When has the conversation between the two of us ever been revealed?" Lu Qingzhen rolled her eyes at Chen Ziyan.

"I really didn't think the Jump Up Theater could be successful at first," Chen Ziyan said. "It's just that they wanted to do it and wanted to try, so let's try. Who could have imagined that it really stabilized the viewership ratings and became a new way for long drama adaptation. Do you know how much production budget Yuehu TV opened for the sequel of *Intern*? 60 million, used to produce a 16-episode drama."

Lu Qingzhen heard this and said: "For a sequel to a drama that has already achieved success, 60 million is not much."

"I know, I'm just sighing that I'm old. I didn't even dare to think about this kind of way of playing before," Chen Ziyan shook her head. "The first part of *Intern* only had three episodes, and the total production cost was only over 3 million. Qingzhen, I suddenly feel that the Jump Up Theater will change the sky of the entire film and television circle."

Lu Qingzhen smiled.

"But don't you think this is actually not a new thing?" she said. "In a sense, this is like those pilot episodes abroad. The feedback from the pilot episodes is good, so it is officially approved and given the green light. It's just because of the particularity of the Jump Up Theater, the plays in the Jump Up Theater are aimed at all audiences from the beginning."

"Yes, so I am thinking, if there are more examples like *Intern* in the Jump Up Theater deciding to produce long dramas because of the good airing effect, many platforms will require production companies to shoot a short drama first and throw it into the market to see the feedback before officially producing long dramas," Chen Ziyan said. "For current dramas, less than 30% really make money for the platform, and the rest are all losses and losing money. On the one hand, I am really proud that Lu Yan He and Chen Siqi can make such innovations. On the other hand, I am worried that they are really too prominent. This is moving the cheese of too many people."

There are so many production companies in the country. Except for those big companies, many small and medium-sized companies may only open one project a year.

Everyone in the whole company relies on this one project to support them.

They are the backbone of the entertainment industry.

If their production environment faces such huge changes, many unqualified producers will definitely be eliminated in the middle. For this industry and for the audience, this is of course a good thing. But what about Lu Yan He?

Chen Ziyan could not help but be worried.

Lu Qingzhen patted her hand soothingly and said: "To get things done, don't be afraid of offending people. To tell the truth, have we offended fewer people?"

Chen Ziyan: "In the past, we offended individuals or a small part of people, but this time we may be challenging the entire industry. Even if a thing is correct, if it touches the interests of most people, it is very difficult to continue."

Lu Qingzhen was suddenly enlightened.

"Although there is only such a budding sign now, I hope I am just worrying about nothing," Chen Ziyan said.

Lu Qingzhen: "I think what you said makes sense. It can't be said to be worrying about nothing. However, if you look at this matter from two sides, pilot episodes are a good thing for both platforms and production companies, which can reduce project risks. If the Jump Up Theater can really launch three to four long-dramatized plays a year, letting everyone see the replicability of this model, even if some production companies accustomed to the past production model are unwilling, the purchasers of the dramas will definitely make them change their models."

"At that time, maybe some companies will unite to resist this requirement of the platform," Chen Ziyan said. "After all, if pilot episodes are promoted on a large scale, the production company has worked hard to organize a team and shoot two or three episodes. Once it is not aired well and the platform doesn't want it, then for them, it is equivalent to the hard work in the early stage being in vain. This risk is borne by the production company. After all, TV series are basically mainly long-form. The short dramas of the Jump Up Theater are the ones that are not mainstream. Short dramas themselves are also difficult to make money. Even if the viewership ratings of the three plays currently aired in the Jump Up Theater are not bad, in fact, they have not achieved any profitability. The early investment and promotion costs are too high, and the advertising revenue in the first month is very small."

Lu Qingzhen said: "But the member viewing data of these few plays on Beijiguang is still quite bright. *Girl's Adventure* and *The Vortex* have more than 2 million and more than 3 million members who have finished watching the whole play respectively, and *Intern* has just been launched, and the number of member viewers has already exceeded 4 million."

Chen Ziyan: "If you don't say it, forget it. Look at this playback data. If it weren't for the unified use of the Jump Up Theater to do their early preparation and promotion, it would actually be basically difficult to make money. We can only hope that this theater will really become popular and drive the playback data of each play to obtain a relatively good long-tail effect."

Indeed, among the three plays currently launched, only *Intern* has truly reached the standard of a popular drama.

Although *The Vortex* starring Huai Qian has aroused a lot of discussion and attention on the Internet, judging from the playback data, it is actually still a niche drama and has not broken the circle.

The income of a drama mainly comes from the number of effective member viewers, duration, new user acquisition, and advertising revenue.

The actual number of viewers is only two or three million, and the number of episodes is only two or three. No matter how high the unit price per episode of advertising fees is, it is only that high—not to mention that because of the skeptical attitude towards this theater model before, advertisers were not willing to pay a high price. Now the advertising revenue of Beijiguang Video in this theater is not even as good as the advertising revenue of Yuehu TV, which is evident.

"According to what you said, in fact, the Jump Up Theater is not particularly successful now, so why are you worried that it will be resisted by the industry?" Lu Qingzhen was a little puzzled.

"I just said that it is not profitable for the time being, but anyone can see the potential of this theater. Moreover, the point is not the profitability of the theater itself, but look, although this small theater is not profitable for the time being, *Intern* directly received an investment of 60 million to develop a long drama," Chen Ziyan said. "This is equivalent to the budget that Yuehu TV originally used to produce other projects being used to make *Intern*. How much is Yuehu TV's budget for content production a year? If there are a few more projects like *Intern*, Yuehu TV will not need to cooperate with other production teams. Not to mention Yuehu TV buying foreign plays, how much money do their internal production teams want to get to make projects? Will they also require them to do the same thing as the Jump Up Theater, first verify the market potential of this project?"

Lu Qingzhen was suddenly enlightened at this moment.

"Just like when Beijiguang Video internally actually had several production centers dissatisfied with Yan He, because Beijiguang Video moved a large amount of production budget to produce Lu Yan He's *My Own Swordsman* and *Squid Game*."

"Yes," Chen Ziyan nodded.

For the Jump Up Theater, calculated according to the average production cost of 5 million per play, at most less than 50 plays are filmed a year, that is, the total investment will not exceed 250 million.

250 million is very high, but for an S+ level drama, it may only be filmed as one.

This piece of cake can be said to be big, but divided into so many projects, it is not eye-catching.

But one-fiftieth can be exchanged for an investment of 60 million, so how many more one-fiftieths are there?

Lu Qingzhen only thought of part of it before and did not think of the whole picture. Until this moment, she truly understood what Chen Ziyan was worried about.

However, Chen Ziyan forgot one thing, and that is how many people are staring at Lu Yan He's actions now.

When Lu Yan He has a new action, everyone's first reaction is not how much threat Lu Yan He's new action will pose to them, but imitation.

If you can't succeed easily, imitate those who often succeed.

After the show *Director Please Advise* recruited many actors in the industry, Bingyuan Video suddenly announced two actions:

Bingyuan Video will produce a show similar to actor competition, uniting the four major film and television companies, taking projects as the theme, auditioning actors, and competing. With the variety show as the stage, actors can truly get film and television projects, and the audience can also see the real casting backstage.

At the same time, Bingyuan Video will launch the "Original Short Drama Theater", uniting four senior directors in the industry, with the old leading the new, jointly directing, and launching 12 boutique short drama projects.

People with discerning eyes naturally know that these two projects of Bingyuan Video are following Lu Yan He's *The Birth of an Actor* and the Jump Up Theater.

Although different innovations have been made, in essence, it is the same thing.

When many marketing accounts were discussing, Bingyuan Video did not deny that their two actions were inspired.

"Lu Yan He's *The Birth of an Actor* and the Jump Up Theater have had a very positive impact on our industry and achieved a win-win for the project itself and the industry. As a leading video platform, why shouldn't we learn from it?"

Bingyuan Video admitted it generously, and everyone's attitude towards these two projects was actually a bit better.

On the contrary, *Director Please Advise*, which Dengta Video refused to admit was imitating *The Birth of an Actor* even though it was swollen, is still criticized by many people to this day.

Not long after, Beijiguang Video announced another thing internally.

Beijiguang Video will adjust the cooperation model of its production centers and producer studios and will further optimize the project investment and sharing model.

In short, Beijiguang Video will change the original "one-price purchase" to a "base purchase price + sharing based on playback performance" model.

This action directly triggered the resistance of a large group of production companies in the circle. However, Beijiguang Video's attitude was very tough. For non-key projects, they were obviously unwilling to bear the risks for those production companies anymore, like the traditional purchase model, a one-shot deal.

Lu Yan He even received several phone calls asking about the specific cooperation details between him and Beijiguang Video.

But in fact, this change by Beijiguang did not have much impact on the projects of Lu Yan He and Linghe.

Because his cooperation with Beijiguang was not the traditional two-element model of producer and purchaser. From the beginning, Beijiguang itself was the investor and producer of these projects of Lu Yan He. Lu Yan He actually only participated in the production of the drama through screenwriting and scripts and retained the copyright of the IP itself. Strictly speaking, Lu Yan He's Linghe Company does not belong to the producer. The producer is Beijiguang itself.

On the contrary, *Co-renting Men and Women*, which Linghe is now going to cooperate with Beijiguang Video, is a typical two-element cooperation model of production-purchase.

Hu Siwei frowned. He had basically been in this state for the past few days.

Bai Jingnian knocked on the door and entered his office.

"What's wrong with you? Your secretary said you've been frowning for the past few days."

Hu Siwei: "What else could it be for? Of course, it's about *Co-renting Men and Women*. Now that Beijiguang has done this, I don't even know if we should cooperate with Beijiguang for *Co-renting Men and Women*."

"What is the base price offered by Beijiguang?" Bai Jingnian asked.

Hu Siwei: "300,000 per episode."

Bai Jingnian showed a slightly surprised expression. At this moment, he knew why Hu Siwei was so worried.

The production cost of *Co-renting Men and Women* was controlled very strictly at the time, with a cost of about 1 million per episode, just to reduce risks.

Now that Beijiguang has carried out such a reform, *Co-renting Men and Women* still needs to face great risks.

Bai Jingnian asked: "What are the sharing terms given to you by Beijiguang?"

"The sharing terms are okay, they are very generous. They have a very complex calculation system," Hu Siwei said. "However, if we want to break even, the number of effective viewers of *Co-renting Men and Women* on Beijiguang Video must reach at least 1.5 million."

Bai Jingnian thought for a while and said: "This requirement doesn't seem to be very high, right?"

"It's not high, but our play has no stars acting in it, so there is still risk," Hu Siwei said. "I am hesitating whether to cooperate with Beijiguang and air *Co-renting Men and Women* according to their new model, or to contact Dengta Video and Bingyuan Video to see if we should sell *Co-renting Men and Women* to them."

Bai Jingnian: "You still want to be a bit safer?"

"This is my first project in Linghe, and it is a project controlled by me. If it really loses money, I really can't hold my head up."

Hu Siwei not only wants to express gratitude for Linghe's kindness of knowing him, but also to prove to the industry that he can make good projects after leaving Jingtai, and even make better projects than before.

The pressure is here.

Bai Jingnian understood Hu Siwei's thoughts.

However, in this matter, Bai Jingnian could not help Hu Siwei with anything.

Bai Jingnian asked: "Have you talked to Chen Ziyan and Lu Yan He about this?"

Hu Siwei shook his head.

"Not yet, also because they have a long-term cooperative relationship with Beijiguang. If I really don't want to sell *Co-renting Men and Women* to Beijiguang in the end, I will have to communicate with them again."

Bai Jingnian: "I think you might as well listen to their opinions now."

"Now?"

"Hmm," Bai Jingnian nodded. "For risk issues, don't make a decision by yourself and then bear it by yourself. When this play was filmed, Beijiguang Video was not playing this way. Now that the way has changed, the prospects of the project also have more risks. They must know about this. In case—in case the results of *Co-renting Men and Women* are really not good in the end, then it is understandable."

Hu Siwei was silent.

Seeing him like this, Bai Jingnian knew what he was thinking.

For his cautious and steady old friend, Bai Jingnian knew Hu Siwei's temperament and thoughts very well.

Cautious, heavy sense of responsibility. However, on the other hand, it is also reflected in his stubbornness, heavy self-esteem, and other aspects.

This is both Hu Siwei's advantage and Hu Siwei's disadvantage.

Because *Co-renting Men and Women* is a project he made by himself, he hopes to hand in a satisfactory answer sheet. Before this answer sheet is handed in, he does not want any problems that need to be solved by finding Chen Ziyan and Lu Yan He—Hu Siwei will think that the answer sheet handed in this way is not a perfect score.

Bai Jingnian: "Don't take your thoughts too heavily, Siwei. As an old friend, let me tell you seriously, if your thoughts are always so heavy, and you can't even handle small projects like *Co-renting Men and Women* with ease, how will you keep up with the pace of the two of them later? Don't be a lone ranger. The style you developed at Jingtai of handling everything yourself and only showing the results to the leaders may not be suitable for Linghe, and Chen Ziyan and Lu Yan He may not like it either."

Bai Jingnian's words were like a blow to the head.

Hu Siwei woke up.

When did he develop this habit?

When did he start to find that when encountering problems and troubles, finding leaders is useless, no one helps you solve them, you can only weigh the pros and cons yourself, make a choice, and then produce a result and hand it to the leader's desk?