However, Jiang Xiaoman also had a backup plan—
If you don't want to stay in the warehouse, there are seven guest rooms available, which can sleep about eighteen people.
In addition, Lang Ying's side could free up two guest rooms, and the village chief's family also offered two rooms, which was enough to accommodate so many people from the film crew.
However, in order to leave a good impression on the film crew (and more importantly, to take advantage of their publicity channels), the village chief and Jiang Xiaoman did not take the opportunity to raise prices. They gave the two warehouses to the film crew for free for a month, with the crew paying for their own water and electricity, and the guest rooms were priced at the usual rate.
The event coordinator came to Jiang Xiaoman this time mainly to ask to borrow a venue from him.
There was a scene in the drama where the main character was struggling to start a business in a cramped but fully equipped small studio. Originally, the production team was supposed to pay for the materials to build this scene. Lang Ying knew that the production team was in a hurry to finish filming the outdoor scenes and go on holiday for the New Year, so she suggested that the production assistant go and see if Jiang Xiaoman's place was suitable.
Instead of spending money to buy materials and set up a temporary structure, it's better to just rent a venue.
Lang Yingzhen never forgets to generate revenue for her boss.
"What money do you need?" Jiang Xiaoman waved her hand generously, making only one small request—
"Could you also take a picture of our Langshan local specialty product display stand when you're there?"
As he spoke, Jiang Xiaoman stood up and pointed to the row of display shelves he had the renovation workers build against the wall after the renovation. The shelves were filled with all kinds of local specialties from Langshan, such as wild honey, deep mountain rock honey, wild mountain tea cakes, and various wild vegetables.
The production assistants wanted nothing more than to hug and kiss Xiaoman!
"That's great! I was thinking of asking you to help me buy some local specialties to decorate the village, but now I can save money on that too."
"Don't worry, Xiaoman. You don't need to ask the director for permission. I'll definitely get it done for you."
That's why you say they're professionals.
Jiang Xiaoman quickly packed up her personal belongings and cleared out her studio at the courier station. Since the villagers usually came to pick up their packages in the afternoon or evening, and the film crew was shooting here in the morning, it wouldn't interfere with anything.
When the film crew moved to another location to film, Jiang Xiaoman made a special trip to check on them. After seeing it, he finally understood why the production assistant had said there was no need to ask the director.
The staff had people move many of the obstructive items from the courier station to the side, leaving only a desk and a row of local specialty product display shelves in the room, which were particularly eye-catching!
Goodness! The camera can't escape it at all! Everywhere it pans, it captures the local specialties of Langshan on the display shelves.
In this drama, Lang Ying plays the role of a capable assistant to the protagonist, a rural woman who is bullied by her in-laws and disliked by her husband. It can be said that this is another role that is close to her own personality. Since she has already had the experience of filming before, coupled with the fact that the male lead she is working with this time is not particularly outstanding in terms of acting skills, and the director also seems to be giving up. In short, she is having a great time slacking off on this set.
Although the pay wasn't as high as when she worked with Director Liang, she still received 100,000 yuan after filming the outdoor scenes. For a left-behind mother who might not even earn 10,000 yuan a year before, this pay was a "huge sum".
Regarding Lang Ying's return to filming, which is expected to make her the village's second star (the first being Jiang Cancan), the villagers have gone from initial envy and excitement to now being quite used to it.
Only her former in-laws were extremely jealous. They had secretly watched Lang Ying filming in the crowd, and after watching, they couldn't help but feel envious. They went around telling everyone in the village that a rural woman like Lang Ying was not cut out to be a female star.
She was just lucky; the director took pity on her and let her serve tea and water to the male lead.
She's just playing a nanny, look how proud she is!
That's what they say, but they heard that the production team paid Lang Ying a whopping 100,000 yuan, which made Lang Liugu and her husband Lang Hongyi quite envious.
Especially a few days later, when their son Jiang Erming couldn't make it outside and returned home dejectedly, Aunt Lang and her husband were initially very happy. They thought their son was so capable that he must have made money outside, and their family could have a good New Year this year, no worse off than that little hussy Lang Ying...
Who would have thought that Jiang Erming, who was used to enjoying a life of luxury and had been secretly flattered by the Hou family for a period of time, had developed a prince's mentality despite not having the life of a prince, and looked down on the work in the factory.
He didn't have a high level of education and couldn't find other jobs, so he could only take orders and run errands for others. At night, he would simply stay up all night and sleep in internet cafes.
After spending more than half a year out there, I not only failed to save any money, but also incurred a lot of online loan debt.
The naive Jiang Erming thought that as long as he changed his phone number and went back to his hometown, he wouldn't have to repay these online loans.
When Lang Liugu and her husband saw that their son had returned home for the New Year without bringing any money, they were a little disappointed. The main reason was that without money, they couldn't show off in the village.
Comparing their former daughter-in-law's current success to their current life, the elderly couple were so heartbroken that they didn't want to leave the house!
However, as the saying goes, it is only right to pay back debts. Jiang Erming thought that if he lost his SIM card and went back to his hometown, the debt collectors would not be able to find him.
Soon, debt collection calls started coming to Jiang Hongyi and his wife's phones. Even the village committee received calls. They said they weren't calling for any other reason than to ask the village to persuade Jiang Erming to pay back the money he owed the platform as soon as possible. Otherwise, the interest would snowball, and the longer he delayed, the more he would be unable to pay. In that case, they would apply for court enforcement to seize Jiang Erming's house...
During the Lunar New Year, the village was hit with debt collection calls. The village committee felt extremely embarrassed and was almost furious!
Jiang Youtian didn't care about saving face for Jiang Hongyi and his wife. He went straight to their house and loudly relayed the debt collection company's phone number verbatim.
That's truly utterly shameful.
Jiang Hongyi's face at that moment was so red it could be renamed "Jiang Red Face".
When Aunt Lang heard the amount of principal and interest demanded by the debt collection company, she clenched her teeth, and after a long while, her eyes rolled back and she fainted!
"Mother!" Jiang Erming was shocked and quickly ran over to support his mother.
The Jiang family was thrown into chaos.
The villagers who were watching were afraid of getting bad luck from this poor family during the New Year, and they were also worried that the family would ask to borrow money, so they quietly dispersed.
They're all just there for the spectacle; they might as well go watch the film crew's performance.
After all, although the director of this film crew was very stingy with the filming budget, he was very good at dealing with people. Sometimes he would ask some villagers to be the background, and he would also go to the convenience store to buy a lot of food and drinks to give to everyone. He was very generous!
In the Jiang family, Lang Liugu slowly woke up and saw her husband and son squatting face to face by the bed, each with a cigarette in their hand. The room was filled with the pungent smell of smoke. Whether it was from the smoke or from anger, she couldn't help but sob.
After crying for a long time, seeing that her husband and son were unmoved and no one offered her tea or water, Lang Liugu lay on her back on the dirty, long-unwashed quilt, and suddenly felt an overwhelming sense of regret!
Why was she so blinded by greed that she watched her son divorce Lang Ying?
If Lang Ying were still her daughter-in-law, this family would still be doing well. There would be someone to cultivate the land, someone to feed the pigs, and someone to wash the clothes and bedding for all four seasons...
Most importantly, with the 100,000 yuan that Lang Ying earned while filming on set, wouldn't her son be able to pay off the high-interest loans he owed right away?
Thinking of this, Aunt Lang struggled to sit up and urgently called her son to her side—
“Erming, go find Yingzi right now! Kneel down and apologize to her! Yingzi is the softest-hearted one. You still have two daughters. Even if it's just because you're the father of her children, she won't abandon you to your death.”
"I heard Yingzi is filming on another set, and the production team promised her 100,000 yuan in wages! Go ask Yingzi for the money! If she refuses, kneel down in front of her and don't get up!"
Jiang Erming's face instantly turned bright red.
Make him kneel before Lang Ying, that woman, to borrow money?
"I'm not going!!!"
"You're not going? If you don't go, where will you get the money to pay off the loan sharks? They said that if you don't pay back the money you owe outside this month, you'll be charged over a hundred yuan in interest every day! Next month, it'll be over two hundred yuan every day!"
"Do the math yourself. Can you even earn a little over two hundred a day at the factory? That's just interest! How are you going to pay back the principal?"
These words left Jiang Erming dejected.
While the Jiang family was shrouded in gloom, Lang Ying's side was filled with laughter and joy. She finished work early today, and coincidentally, the pigs she had raised this year had all grown up. She planned to sell two of them, and for the remaining one, she entrusted the pig dealer who came to buy pigs to help her slaughter it and make it into cured meat to eat next year.
Upon hearing that her family was going to slaughter pigs for the New Year, the stingy director, who was known for saving money, immediately decided that the production crew would fund the purchase of the two large, fat pigs that Lang Ying's family was going to sell.
We also filmed the Lunar New Year scene from the script ahead of schedule. After filming, we can use the remaining props (the slaughtered pig) to reward the crew members. Perfect!
"Director Hu, aren't you being incredibly stingy? Our crew has so many people participating in a team-building activity, and you're just going to kill two pigs to make up for it?"
"Exactly! We absolutely must arrange a grand feast in the countryside!"
"Yes! We want to eat a grand rural feast!"
The crew members rose up in rebellion; if there was no rural feast, they would go on strike!
It's important to know that the equipment used by the production crew was all rented, and the salaries of the main actors were calculated on a daily basis. If filming were to be delayed until after the Lunar New Year, the production crew would have to spend a lot of extra money over the holiday!
The stingy director felt as if his heart was being torn apart upon hearing this.
Fortunately, there was the beautiful and kind-hearted Ms. Lang Ying.
"Director Hu, if you're comfortable with this, why don't you leave it to me? Actually, large banquets in rural areas aren't that expensive."
"Think about it, you've already bought the two pigs that cost the most. As for the vegetables like radishes and greens, I have them in my garden. Since you're treating everyone to meat, I'll cover the vegetables."
"Give me another thousand yuan, and I'll go to town to buy some chickens and ducks, some fish, and two blocks of tofu. I'll ask the women from our cooperative to come and help out, and we'll have a meal."
Wow! Thinking about it this way, hosting a big feast in the countryside really doesn't cost that much money!
The crew members were secretly annoyed, but Director Hu stood up with a big smile, urging the production assistant to quickly transfer the money to Lang Ying.
"A thousand yuan is too little. I'll transfer five thousand yuan to your sister Yingzi. Buy more chicken, duck, fish, and meat, and good quality drinks too. It's just a rural feast, right? Arrange it! Our crew isn't short of money!"
Everyone couldn't help but roll their eyes.
Five thousand yuan was all it took to reunite the entire cast and crew?
It's no wonder that Director Liang can become an internationally renowned director, while Director Hu can only be a well-known director within the province...
Chapter 203
In rural areas, families who slaughter a pig for the New Year always invite relatives and friends to a feast.
Lang Ying specially asked the crew for two days off. She planned to slaughter a pig on the first day, treat her relatives and friends to a meal, and then slaughter the remaining two pigs on the second day so that the crew could taste the pig-slaughtering feast of Langshan.
Lang Ying had already severed ties with her family, and her husband's family was even further removed; the two sides had long since become estranged.
However, don't assume that Lang Ying is helpless and easy to bully.
She is now considered Jiang Xiaoman's "second-in-command," managing the daily affairs of the tea cooperative for Jiang Xiaoman. Not only that, she is also warm and kind, and often helps to connect people with the village's aunts, sisters-in-law, grandmothers and grandmas to find short-term jobs at the cooperative.
To put it simply, the most popular woman in Langshan Village right now is definitely Lang Ying.
Moreover, for some unspeakable reasons, Lang Ying also had a lot of influence in the beekeeping cooperative.
This time, her family held a pig-slaughtering feast. In addition to the Jiang Xiaoman and Shan Yan families, they also invited two colleagues from the cooperative, several sisters-in-law and sisters from the village who got along well, and even the village officials.
The small courtyard was packed with people; there were six tables set up for the banquet alone!
"Sister Yingzi, with so many of us here, your pig is going to be eaten so badly today that not even the tail will be left!" a colleague teased.
"If there's nothing left, we'll eat it all! Anyway, your family is going to slaughter a pig for the New Year in a couple of days. I'll buy one for each family and make it into cured meat. That'll be enough for my family to eat next year."
Everyone burst into laughter, saying that after eating Lang Ying's New Year's pig, how could they dare let her spend money to buy meat? When they slaughtered their own New Year's pigs, they would definitely save her the best piece of pork belly!
Large chunks of pork are boiled, then taken out, sliced, and stir-fried with tender garlic sprouts to make twice-cooked pork, a dish that men love to enjoy with drinks.
The whole pig's head is boiled, the meat is removed, and then braised with potato chunks and vermicelli. A large pot of it is served on the table, suitable for all ages.
Fresh pig's blood, stir-fried with chili peppers and fermented bean paste, then topped with pickled cabbage, makes a fragrant, spicy, tender stir-fried pig's blood with pickled cabbage that leaves everyone sweating profusely.
There were also braised pork belly, braised pork with preserved mustard greens, stir-fried pork liver with chili peppers, braised pig's trotters, braised large intestines... The table was piled high with food, and the courtyard was bustling with people.
At this moment, Lang Ying was no longer the divorced woman abandoned by her husband's family and unable to rely on her own. She had her own career, her own friends, and, moreover, earned the respect and love of the villagers through her inherent kindness and perseverance.
They are not related to Lang Ying by blood, and they weren't even friends before, but now they are more reliable than her real family!
The evidence is that when Jiang Erming was forcibly brought to apologize (and borrow money) by Lang Liugu and his wife, Lang Ying didn't even need to intervene. The men in the courtyard, drunk, rushed over and gave Jiang Erming a severe beating.