PUBLISHED ONFebruary 19, 2025 10:12 AMByYeo Shu HuiChinese actress Zhang Ziyi and Hong Kong actor Francis Ng have been in showbiz for decades and have seen many types of acting, but they were certainly not prepared to see how some participants performed in this Chinese acting reality show.
The third season of Everybody Stand By released its first episode on Feb 14, gathering veteran actors, producers and directors mainly from the Chinese entertainment industry to mentor artistes competing to emerge as "The Best Actor".
Some of the familiar faces in this season include Taiwanese actress Esther Liu, Taiwanese singer-actor Danson Tang, Hong Kong actor Alex Fong and ex-Mediacorp actor Dai Xiangyu, who was formerly known as Dai Yangtian.
In the first impression round of the competition, the 45 contestants were brought to a Chinese Republican Era drama set where they could design their own characters and choose the location they want to perform for the judges, which consisted of Ziyi, Francis, Chinese director Chen Kaige and French actress Isabelle Huppert.
While their intention was to capture the judges' attention with their emotional performance, there were some contestants who managed that for the wrong reasons.
Here is a recap of some of the performances.
Chinese singer-actor Zhang Jiayuan, who is a member of Chinese boyband Into 1 and has one year of acting experience, chose to play a student who has lost his dog.
When Kaige and Isabelle came to his spot to look at his performance, the 22-year-old began by shouting at Kaige: "What gives you the right to throw my dog away? Tell me!"
The 72-year-old director looked at him and began scribbling on his clipboard, ignoring Jiayuan's attempt to engage him in his performance.
Observing that Kaige wasn't responding to him, Jiayuan continued: "I won't be coming back to this home anymore."
He ran away from them to the next drama set, which has a mock-up vegetable stall and — strangely — plunged his head into a basket of greens.
Commenting on his performance later, Kaige said: "In real life, if something like this happened, how would you react? While you would be mad at the situation, the way you portrayed it is over-exaggerated."
Jiayuan's attitude also did not impress Ziyi and Francis in a later segment where he performed before the two as well as Kaige, Isabelle, Hong Kong actress Kara Wai and Chinese television producer Yang Xiaopei.
At first, the judges were happy to see his bubbly and confident personality, but also advised him on his wittiness, telling him to read the situation before responding.
Ziyi, 46, also wanted him to do impromptu acting with a bottle of water and he responded immediately: "Can I drink this? I'm so thirsty." Francis, who wasn't pleased with his attitude, rolled his eyes.
Jiayuan's performance was later critiqued by Ziyi as being lacking in details, "insincere" and "unserious".
He was given a second chance to perform as an idol calling for a press conference to announce his relationship, but he also did not meet their expectations. Kaige said he was acting like a "hooligan", instead of behaving as an idol with reputation.
As he tried to argue his reason, Francis, 63, stopped him and said angrily: "Do you know as actors, our responsibility is to fulfil what is expected of us [by the highest authority]? If you can't complete a task that is assigned to you, why are you giving excuses?"
Jiayuan was told that he could return to his seat but he insisted on explaining himself as an idol, which left an angry Ziyi telling him: "Stop explaining yourself, leave. Don't try to create a personality here, get down. With your attitude like this as an idol, who will look up to you?"
Chinese singer-actress Xu Jiaqi, who has nine years of acting experience, turned into a cat and began her performance by hissing at Francis when he and Ziyi came to her spot, earning a doubtful look from him.
The 29-year-old said in a separate interview: "I'm not able to plan for an impromptu script, but I think I am more expressive with my body language, so I decided to perform as a stray cat."
Jiaqi also approached Ziyi during her performance, with the latter reaching out to stroke her. She recoiled as a tear rolled down her cheeks.
As Ziyi commented she had "tried too hard", both she and Francis turned away to observe the next performance.
Yang Zi made Isabelle uncomfortable with his performance as womaniser Ximen Qing, a fictional character from the Chinese novel Water Margin.
The 49-year-old, who has two decades of acting experience, approached Isabelle, 71, and flirted with her in Mandarin while looking at her intensely. Towards the end of his performance, Isabelle pulled her coat tighter around her.
In a separate interview, Yang Zi said: "Perhaps the French people are not familiar with Water Margin or Ximen Qing, so Isabelle doesn't know why I am acting like this. She might have thought, 'What is this man doing, is he crazy?' Why would he speak to a woman like this?' I think she was shocked. I understand. I felt I acted how I wanted the character to be."
He also performed using the same tactics on Ziyi later. As he tried to walk closer to her, Ziyi could be seen sidestepping to put some space between them. Francis, observing them from the side, could be seen with an uneasy expression.
As Ziyi tried to walk away from him, he followed her closely and Francis had to get between them to pause his performance.
In Chinese romance-fantasy drama Lost You Forever (2023), one of the climatic and most anticipated scenes involves the violent and tragic death of snake demon warrior Xiang Liu, one of the love interests of the protagonist Xiao Yao.
The character was played by Chinese actor-singer Tan Jianci, who shot to fame for his memorable portrayal of the heroic character.
Chinese influencer Liu Zichen, who has one year of acting experience and is known for having undergone cosmetic surgery, had both Ziyi and Francis in stitches with his exaggerated reenactment of Xiang Liu's death scene at the Chinese Republican Era drama set.
Holding an arrow under his armpit, Zichen recited Xiang Liu's lines from his final scene, before pulling the arrow out and falling — dramatically — on a few sacks on the ground.
Francis, who was actually looking at another performance beside Zichen, turned to look at him before stepping back a little, seemingly to leave him to his private moment.
As Zichen 'dies' on the sacks of sand, Francis was seen with a bewildered expression and the former quickly stood up.
Ziyi approached them shortly after and Zichen performed for them again and both judges couldn't hold back their laughter.
Ziyi was asked about the influencer's performance in a separate interview, to which she responded: "The one who stabbed himself with an arrow? You call that a performance?"
The next episode of Everybody Stand By airs this Friday (Feb 21) on the China platform Tencent Video.
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