Chapter 53: The Premiere of Princess Dong Hua

An Mu smiled at Li Momo as she looked around the atmosphere of the class curiously. “What is the hustle about?”

Li Momo instantly stared at An Mu like she was some alien and said, “An Mu, I doubt you’ve disconnected this much from society. Didn’t you watch the Lemon Channel yesterday?”

An Mu was puzzled. “Huh? Lemon Channel?”

Lemon Channel had the highest ratings among local television companies, and were part of the Jiangnan television company.

The ratings from the drama series broadcasted from that channel were normally high.

“That’s right, the premiere of Princess Dong Hua! We’ve been expecting it the entire summer! Finally, one episode was broadcasted yesterday.”

Em…

An Mu was shocked.

‘Didn’t filming for Princess Dong Hua only started last week?!’

She was always concerned about the plot of Princess Dong Hua but she did not take note of when it would premiere.

An Mu asked, “But, isn’t Princess Dong Hua still under filming?”

Li Momo stared at her with a you-are-an-idiot gaze as she patiently explained, “Princess Dong Hua is broadcasted weekly. They imitated the style of broadcasting overseas. One episode would be aired each week, and they would still broadcast even if filming for the entire series had not been completed yet.”

When An Mu heard about the news, she…

Her puzzled expression made Li Momo explain further. “This style was applied because Director Huang was forced to an end.”

After Li Momo’s patiently explained, An Mu finally understood.

There were a lot of critics about Princess Dong Hua being shot as a TV drama series. A lot of people reckoned that the TV series would not be a hit.

Yet, Director Huang was determined to select first-class actors from the film industry or great actors or actresses who had won awards. Excluding the pay for the female lead, the male lead character—Xie Yi’s—pay was already at least tens of millions per episode!

The cost to broadcast a TV series normally required at least a tens of millions Yuan.

However, if the episodes exceeded their budget, it would be very risky because to pay Xie Yi alone would already cost at least ten million.

If the strategy of broadcasting weekly was applied, the number of episodes to be shot later would highly depend on viewer ratings.

If the outcome was bad, the plot could be shortened and end up with only 20 episodes.

The risk of incurring a loss could be lowered.

Of course, if the ratings were high, the amount of capital needed for future filming would be significantly increased as well.

An Mu sighed. The entertainment industry was complicated indeed.

Yet, at the same time, she felt very delighted.

Certainly, there were countless TV series filmings each year but there were a lot less that were scheduled for release.

In fact, the TV series which was shot last week could be released that day…

Suddenly, An Mu felt uneasy.

She wondered how her portrayal of Qiong Hua looked in the end.

She could not even wait until the end of class to go back home. An Mu quickly used her phone to access the video app and watched the show.

The first episode was brief and was only 35 minutes long.

It had the scenes on Qiong Hua and the Evil Emperor. Ten thousand years later, the Evil Emperor was finally awakened but his memories were gone. He was taken away and renamed Mingyuan.

The last scene stopped in the palace where Dong Hua was born.

An Mu was left dazed after finishing the video.

She felt that it was amazing.

Th-This was the TV series she acted in and now it had been released?

She shook her head and heard Li Momo’s excited voice. “Have you watched it? Have you watched it? Qiong Hua is so pretty! All these years in showbiz, there hasn’t been an actress this pretty!”

A few girls from the front row turned their heads back after they heard how Li Momo spoke about Qiong Hua.

“Yes, her eyes were so beautiful!”

“Didn’t you notice? Her acting skills were great too! The Qiong Hua character she portrayed made me weep in the end!”