Yu Zheng Acknowledges Wu Jinyan’s Bottleneck
Soaring to massive popularity on the tidal success of palace drama Story of Yanxi Palace <延禧攻略> back in 2018, actress Wu Jinyan (吳謹言) has failed to impress in her follow-up works The Legend of Haolan <皓镧传> and 2022’s Royal Feast <尚食>, despite the productions attracting a fair amount of hype and discussions.
Left without any drama projects for one year and a half, word on the grapevine was that the 32-year-old has fallen out of favor and even “abandoned” by her agency — ongoing speculation which her manager, producer Yu Zheng (于正) once again took to social media to address.
Typecasting Concerns…?
Previously in denial that he favors newer artistes like Bai Lu (白鹿), Yu Zheng recently called the actress’ phase an “unprecedented crisis”. In a February 10 post, Yu Zheng candidly admits that Wu Jinyan’s career has hit a bottleneck, as “scripts are aplenty, but next to none offer the actress a potentially breakthrough role. “Many of the dramas we want to reject have producers who…feel she is suited only for a particular type of role,” he said.
Taking a Hiatus to Recalibrate
With immense pressure from negative public speculation, Yu Zheng admitted that he has considered taking on similar roles for income’s sake while holding out for good scripts, or specially customize a role for the actress, but the pandemic’s onset threw a spanner in the works. Knowing that compromising was not a solution, Yu Zheng therefore decided to let her take a short break from dramas, while encouraging the actress to appear on variety shows and reconnect with others so she could reignite her passion, and benefit from “learning about performance, gaining observances about life”.
Bringing up how he too had a “window period” in 2016, from which he nevertheless continued learning and eventually produced the successful Story of Yanxi Palace, he wrote, “Life is not a battleground, no flower can stay in blossom, only acting skills are dependable”. Revealing that Wu Jinyan has received a new script, he added that he is hopeful both himself and Wu Jinyan can continue attaining progress.
Source: ChinaPress
It is a matter of typecast or bottleneck or the fact that she is hardly a good actress and is of limited range and is bombed by many negative news about her behaviour? There’s a huge difference between those 2.
I seem to remember reading about her attitude on set may not be positive too but it was never confirmed. BUt she is a actress who really can carry limited roles… not surprised by her current status.
Yanxi Palace, she really did have this very unique and refreshing look despite the limited/obvious acting. It’s unfortunate that her follow up projects were a big disappointed (some are high budgeted and others are not quite). She is not the only actresses/actors w/ limited acting skills but somehow I feel it’s going to be hard for her to recovery. I really do hope she hits it w/ another project again.
She got famous within 1 shot, compared with Sun Li and Liu Tao. It’s worthy of others to be jealous and hate her to death. I watched BTS of Yanxi Palace, everyone has nothing but good things to say about her cheerful personality. She’s also likeable and playful during live shows. It’s not only WJY that’s being targeted. Qin Lan who is rising in fame also gets attacked daily. It’s all jealousy.