I'm Really a Superstar

Saturday.

Early morning.

The bedroom door opened.

“Zhang Ye, wake up,” said Dong Shanshan who was in her work clothes.

Zhang Ye, who was hugging his blanket, turned his head drowsily, “Shanshan, why?”

Dong Shanshan said with a pretty smile, “What do you think? It’s already 8 A.M. Wake up quickly. I’m going to work first. Breakfast has been prepared for you.”

Zhang Ye shut his eyes again, “Okay.”

Dong Shanshan slapped his thighs, “Wake up quickly.”

“I’m not going to work in the morning. I know, I will get up soon,” Zhang Ye vaguely said.

Dong Shanshan glanced at him, “You were watching the news last night to find inspiration? You really asked for it when you promised to do the live broadcast. You could have just kept doing what you did and it would have been good and would get better. But yet, you had to go along with the crazy idea of the Leaders. If a live broadcast was so good to handle, wouldn’t the other online television stations already have done it? I don’t care anymore; I’m off.”

“Byebye.” Zhang Ye closed his eyes and waved.

Five minutes after the school belle left, Zhang Ye finally got up unwillingly. Because of tonight’s live broadcast, the Leader gave him the morning off to prepare for the program. After having breakfast, Zhang Ye continued watching the news as he sorted out the lines for tonight’s show in his head. But what gave Zhang Ye a headache was that there was not much that was interesting in the news recently. Many of the current affairs and happenings had already been used for the last show and couldn’t be used again. This was also the reason why he stayed up so late last night; it was because he could not find a suitable topic and points to talk about!

Give me a topic!

Can’t there be something happening today?

Otherwise, how would this bro do his talk show!

……

Weiwo had already released the news and this news had already been spread all over the internet.

“What?”

“Zhang Ye is going to do a live broadcast?”

“Is that fake news? Or has Teacher Zhang gone crazy?”

“A program that depends on the host’s oratorical skills and topic for 30 minutes… Can you even do a live broadcast for that? And it’s even a live broadcast over the internet? How much guts did you get from your mother!”

“Haha. It’s gonna be a good night tonight!”

“Looking forward to it. Zhang Ye is still the gutsy one! He even dares to do a live broadcast!”

“I am very interested and looking forward to it, but are you all sure that there won’t be any problems doing a live broadcast? This isn’t a news report or a sports live broadcast. Isn’t it going to be too difficult?”

“Yeah, I heard that Zhang Ye also doesn’t use a script!”

“Right, Teacher Zhang Ye seems to go off-script for the entire show!”

“What a professional! He even dares to go off-script for the whole episode and dares to do a live broadcast. This is what I call a real host!”

“Weiwo WebTV is really brave. There’s no other online television station that dares to do a live broadcast. I definitely must watch tonight!”

As Feng Guiqin predicted, this first-ever live broadcast for an online television station had attracted a lot of eyeballs. It had further propelled “Zhang Ye’s Talk Show” to a new height. Although it was not as shocking as the first episode of the talk show, the discussions around it were not small either.

An industry insider commented, “Zhang Ye is playing with fire. If the live broadcast fails or anything goes wrong, his popularity would definitely be affected. There’s already no lack of people who curse at him online. This would cause a massive increase in those kinds of people. He could have just continued what he was doing, but yet he chose to take this risk. Why?”

Another online television station’s CEO posted a laughing emoticon on Weibo, “Whether it’s Weiwo Company or Zhang Ye, all of this is too radical.”

Following that, another company’s long famous WebTV host analyzed, “Unless Zhang Ye prepares a script or uses a teleprompter this time, I do not think this live broadcast would work. A program like his depends too much on oratorical skills. No script? Fully going off-script? It’s not practical at all! For any hosts, they might not be able to do it well for a genre like a talk show even if they were reading it off a script, as the speed used in speaking can be too fast and too overloaded with information, so let’s not even talk about going off-script! If anything goes wrong during the recording, it can be re-recorded or edited out. But you can’t do that for a live broadcast!”

Everyone was discussing the matter intensely. They were guessing if Zhang Ye would be using a script this time. Because during the first episode of “Zhang Ye’s Talk Show”, the scene of Zhang Ye hosting off-script left a deep impression on everyone. The audience might not pay much attention nor care about this detail, but how could industry insiders and other hosts ignore this? To a truly knowledgeable person, Zhang Ye’s strongest ability was not in his writing of scripts or joke segments, but his ability to go off-script! Many people could write joke segments, but to be able to go off-script for 30 minutes and ensure the smooth delivery of all the complicated joke segments, the ability needed was very demanding. In the hosting world, only a handful of people could do that!

Arguments, discussions.

Everyone was mainly exchanging views.

But suddenly, an unfriendly voice appeared!

A Weibo profile with a picture of a pretty boy with small eyes commented. Those who saw it were immediately stunned. Everyone knew him. This person was called Lee Parkwoo. He had over 4 million followers on Weibo and was from South Korea. He had filmed many dramas in Korea this year which had average ratings. But in China, many people had watched it online. He was even a singer before, an ex-member of a Korean group. Lee Parkwoo was very popular in China right now, with many teenage girls forming his fan base. Lee Parkwoo was not extremely popular in Korea, but he could still do well in China. So for the past year, he had been focusing and based his promotions in China, ready to take root over here. It was not known whether he knew Chinese or if he had a translation assistant, but anyway, his post on Weibo was in Chinese!

Lee Parkwoo: “I’ve been on quite a number of programs, but I’ve never seen anyone go off-script for a performance like this before. If their company said that he was hosting off-script, would you necessarily need to believe it? There has to be a teleprompter or he refers to the script with every segment before keeping it away. But through editing, it was shown like he did not refer to a script throughout. Realistically, this is falsifying the truth; they just made it seem like it was real!”

“Wow!”

“It’s Lee Parkwoo!”

“Lee Parkwoo, I love you!”

“What program are you commenting about?”

“’Zhang Ye’s Talk Show’? What rubbish program is that? I’ve never watched it!”

“Support Lee Parkwoo. These domestic programs only know how to misrepresent and falsify! Our Lee Parkwoo is still the most charming! Never engaging in unscrupulous acts!”

When Lee Parkwoo spoke, the replies were countless!

But Zhang Ye’s peers were not impressed! Of these peers, some of them were Zhang Ye’s colleagues with a competing relationship. Some of them did not like Zhang Ye much either. But they were all countrymen, while he was a Korean! You are leading a bunch of our crazy Chinese fans to insult our profession?

A female WebTV host, who was ranked 4th in the industry, replied to Lee Parkwoo: “You speak like you understand our work. You might have been on many programs before, but it’s only as a guest. Have you even done hosting before? You don’t even know the basic editing process, so why are you commenting? The industry has already reached a consensus that the first episode of ‘Zhang Ye’s Talk Show’ was definitely done off-script. As for you saying that he refers to the script mid-way through and it was post-edited out? To say that means you are an amatuer! Do you think the live audience members are fools? If this was really the case, then the truth would never have been kept secret! And from the program’s effects, the cut scenes were definitely all continuous!”

At the same time, other industry insiders also rebutted!

Lee Parkwoo only responded with a word, “Childish.”

Even more unaccepting of the post were the domestic netizens. This included Zhang Ye’s fans, but even more of them were nationalistic youths! Many of these youths did not even know who Zhang Ye was, but seeing a Korean celebrity who wasn’t even from the hosting industry criticizing their country’s program and host, they began scolding!

“Why are you acting all high and mighty!?”

“You don’t know a fart! Don’t show off to us!”

“Go back to Korea!”

“You’re even accusing our Teacher Zhang Ye of faking it? I think you the one who’s faking it instead! You are f**king fake from your face to your legs!”

“Are you sure you were scolding Teacher Zhang Ye just now? I have a strong premonition that you guys are gonna be in for a bad time. Hahaha! Teacher Zhang is no pushover! You guys can offend anyone but him!”

But the opposing camp also fought back. It wasn’t Lee Parkwoo; he did not even say a word. It was his brainless Chinese fans who came rushing forward for him!

“Who are you scolding!”

“Damn! You dare to scold our Lee Parkwoo? Are you looking for death!”

“What Zhang Ye! What talk show! It’s all rubbish!”

“If Lee Parkwoo says that Zhang Ye was faking it, then he must be faking it!”

“Ask that whoever Zhang Ye to scram! Don’t deceive the audience anymore!”

……

Coincidentally, Zhang Ye, who was just watching the news, had received a call from a leader who was informing him about some matters. After hanging up, he conveniently browsed through Weibo and saw this mess of infighting.

Me?

Faking it?

Deceiving the audience?

Zhang Ye laughed. But he did not reply to anything. He only noted Lee Parkwoo’s name, which he went online to research on his news in Korea.

“A person from Korea claims: Chinese characters and the printing press were invented by them!”

“The Greats from the past have Korean origins? Korea comes up with audacious claims again! ”

“The officials of Korea have released a press statement. They will be applying for the World Cultural Heritage on traditional Chinese medicine. This author would like to ask… What does traditional Chinese medicine have anything to do with you all?”

News articles were found, which could have been published from long ago or from recent times.

Zhang Ye realised that this world and his previous world were alike. The Koreans would make claims to certain achievements? It was exactly the same as his previous world? There was even a news article which made Zhang Ye very angry. It had existed in this world, too — the Jiangling Dragon Boat Festival was declared by UNESCO as an “Intangible Cultural Heritage Property of Mankind” — a simmering World Heritage nomination of the Sino-Korean Dragon Boat Festival ended in victory for Korea!

Looking at these pieces of news…..

Looking at the Weibo’s mentions regarding him, Lee Parkwoo’s brainless fans and some Korean undergraduates in China scolding him……

Zhang Ye focused his mind. He still had not thought of what to talk about for this episode, but now he had found his topic. He speedily thought and planned his joke segments in his head and sorted out the order of presentation before committing it to memory. He double-checked everything, so that the episode’s presentation would not go wrong!

Let’s talk about Korea this episode!

It was impossible for such a wonderful country to not appear on a domestic talk show!

Translator’s Notes: Regarding the anti-Korean sentiment regarding the UNESCO cultural heritage in China, please refer to the Wikipedia page. About the Greats mentioned, it is due to reports that claim that Confucius, Cao Cao, etc were Korean by certain academics or through incorrectly communicated news. This naturally provoked a sense of national pride amongst the Chinese which they have always claimed to be theirs. To put it into context, Korean netizens can be as equally hateful as Chinese netizens when matters of national pride are at conflict such as the Paektu/Changbai mountains, with celebrities even embroiled in it, so neither side is really innocent in the cultural conflict. It is a matter that should be resolved through their own respective governments through diplomacy, so we, as outsiders will not comment on who is in the right or wrong. You can get some understanding of this very complicated conflict through this Quora post (South Korean point of view), and this one (Chinese point of view).