Zhou Jie --- From [Er Kang] to [Bao Qing Tian]
written by: Jin Yu
By being the leading actor "Er Kang" in "Huan Zhu Ge Ge" TV series and later became famous, Zhou Jie may not be the brightest star in the whole performing circle. But he definitely is the one who's burning to the touch. Zhou Jie was born on August 5, 1970 in Xian, ShaanXi. He graduated from Shanghai Drama Institute. He is six feet tall with a handsome and brilliant face. The privileges from his outlook and his professional acting training are the elements for his success in this circle.
Together with the series "Huan Zhu Ge Ge", Zhou Jie is popular from mainland China to Hong Kong, Taiwan, even to Europe and the United States. He is no longer a person who was unknown to the public. "Huan Zhu Ge Ge" not only has a great response in the United States, but also in the whole wide world where Chinese are around. One time, there was a friend of Zhou Jie who just got back from Switzerland. The first thing he said to Zhou Jie was calling him "Er Kang". In the United States and Australia, there are some Zhou Jie's personal websites that were established by his fans voluntarily. It happened in Taiwan too. The fans in Taiwan even picked a sentimental name for the web, which was called "Xin You Qian Qian Jie"(which means that Zhou Jie is always in our hearts). Recently, Zhou Jie and Lin Xin Ru both attended a promotional activity for the "Huan Zhu Ge Ge", which was held by the Governor of California of the United States.
In Zhou Jie's mind, "Huan Zhu Ge Ge" is like an old friend. Although he is not working on this series anymore, he still feels a deep attachment to this play every time he thinks about it. "Huan Zhu Ge Ge" to Zhou Jie is not mainly a successful TV series, it also provides more opportunities for him to act, more power for him to choose the characters he likes. Afterward, there was a period of time that Zhou Jie can even stay in Beijing to pick up his next show. During that time, there were so many different roles offered to him to choose. There were five series all asking Zhou Jie to be the leading actor. Among them, three were from China and two were from Taiwan. Since then, he has been going crazy reading scripts, and totally preparing himself for his next job. Due to his righteous and brilliant performance in "Huan Zhu Ge Ge", there were a lot of producers who came to him for his big, strong, and positive image. Right at this moment, the producer of "Young Bao Qing Tian" named Chen Yong asked Zhou Jie to play the leading role. Of course Zhou Jie was very interested in this proposal. He wanted to play more of this kind of historical heroes, such as "Yue Fei" "Qu Yuan" "Bao Qing Tian" ...... etc. These are the characters that Zhou Jie has been dreaming to play. Plus, the script of the "Young Bao Qing Tian" is especially interesting so as to grab audience attention continuously. So Zhou Jie rejected the other offers and chose "Young Bao Qing Tian".
On the surface, comparing the outlook of Zhou Jie in this series to those in previous "Bao Qing Tian", there are a lot of differences. The Bao Qing Tian in the past has been darker and fatter. The skin color of Zhou Jie after the make up in this play is not as dark as the color of the bottom of the wok. It is more akin to the tan color of sunburn. Since this play emphasizes more on the youth of Bao Qing Tian, before age thirty, there is no need to worry about any boycott from the audiences. From Zhou Jie's experience, it was harder to play the role in "Young Bao Qing Tian" than Er Kang in "Huan Zhu Ge Ge". The main hardship of acting in "Huan Zhu Ge Ge" came from the cold weather, also from having more fighting scenes since Er Kang was a Kung Fu fighter. On the other hand, the hard work of the "Young Bao Qing Tian" was mainly the continuous filming. At the beginning, there were A, B, C, three shooting teams. Later, only A, B two teams alternating. In "Huan Zhu Ge Ge", Zhou Jie had around three hundred scenes in total. This time it had increased to over one thousand scenes in "Young Bao Qing Tian". Almost every scene required Zhou Jie's presence. He was needed for both A, B teams without a single day of absence. That's why he worked over twenty hours everyday. This is probably also why Zhou Jie is deeply attached to the role in "Young Bao Qing Tian". To Zhou Jie, in acting, "The most important thing for an actor is to act well for every play. So it is not necessary for actors to pay too much attention to what people say." "If the audience doesn't enjoy my acting, it only shows that my performance is not good enough."
