(ayo it's been a while since I saw Ji Xiaokun play CXS and oh boy, he is so back ✨)
Recently Ji Xiaokun has been quite active on weibo and posting behind the scenes photos. He takes most of them himself and is clearly having fun with it, so check them out:
look, isn't it basically live action Cheng Xiaoshi running around, taking pictures of his friends and Lu Guang? im sobbing
240121 lineup was: Deng Xianling, Ji Xiaokun, Guo Hongxu
🥹😭💖
I honestly don't know who crushed my heart harder today
lc musical clip list pt.4! i'm calling this one, the birthday special!!
(pt.1, pt.2, pt.3, and pt.5 here)
Why is this the birthday special, well because of this:
51. 28/02/2024, Happy BDay Guo Hongxu! I don't usually upload promovid but uhh he's so cool in this one so, here. Sidenote, Shu Rongbo is very hyper and cute this performance. And Qian Anqi's cute english plss i love her.
52. 03/03/2024 night, Happy BDay Zuo Yiping! Watch also, Cao Muzhi penguin walk across the table, Wu Yihan please watch your steps and don't poke other people's cake!!
(funny coincidence, I happen to watch a Santa Lucia/Mio Fratello clip of Cao Muzhi-Wu Yihan just a couple days before this)
53. 10/03/2024 night, Happy Bday Shu Rongbo and Wu Yihan!! Hehe the way Qian Anqi knocks their heads together and insisted to sing them happy birthday is so cute. Wu Yihan said 'Happy Birthday' before their customary Guiding Light hug. And pls someone translate (or at least transcribed) the closing speech for me, there's a lot of laughing involved, I'm curious. Also, have this bonus stage door clip.
Some funfacts. Since last year they play in the same 4 musicals including Link Click and out of those 4 plays they shared 2 roles. Shu Rongbo played a total of 9 roles while Wu Yihan played 7. (Yes, I am at that level of hyperfixation)
54. 11/03/2024, HBD Teng Chunpeng! LMAO It's you, so of course your promo video would be great! His face during the sofa choreo though. And why are both him and Du Guangyi stomping and jumping on the table so hard. You menaces, please you're gonna break it. The couch trio is also looking cute behind them.
Moving on from the birthdays starting with this special one,
55. 11/03/2024 Valentine's day special, <- Official ver. Forgive my language TENG CHUNPENG DU GUANGYI YOU FCKING TEASE! YOU GEM OF A HUMAN BEING! Have this fancam with the superior angle.
(This makes Du Guangyi the first and only actor who have played all 3 roles in that scene. Congrats!)
56. Special Encore rehearsals/BTS! Special mentions to Teng Chunpeng's fashion sense, Wu Yihan's cute act, Ding Xingchen's falling wig, Zhang Jiahao's IDGAF mood, and Wang Minhui's violent tendencies.
57. 26/02/2024, when I say Cai Qi and Wang Minhui have the best dynamic, this is what I meant.
58. 29/02/2024, watch Ji Xiaokun and Guo Hongxu's "Oi!" "Oi."
59. 01/03/2024, Look at them stumbling through singing "Guiding Light" and it's a Wu Yihan-Shu Rongbo duo which means hug! Also Wu Yihan, why are you a menace at holding hands, this time with Zou Ziyue.
60. 03/03/2024 day, why is there a piglet??? Why are you seasoning the piglet??? Why are you stepping on the piglet?? Why is the piglet bowing?? piglet??
61. 04/03/2024, Bai Zhuoming being extra sassy and playful on the couch makes me so happy. Of course Cai Lu also becomes playful in response. Typical Guiding Light mistake also causes Wang Minhui to crack.
62. 07/03/2024, Guo Hongxu putting up the wrong foot and stumbling on the sofa choreo.
63. 07/03/2024, same performance as above, Ji Xiaokun being annoying <3. When other pairs hug, they wrestle.
64. 10/03/2024 day, Mooom! Cai Qi and Wang Minhui are fighting instead of doing rock-paper-scissors again.
65. 09/03/2024 day, uuuhh Wu Yihan sitting on the counter like that with those lights and shadows during Guiding Light is creepy.
66. 09/03/20204 night, love me some Du Guangyi shenanigans, the way he just gives up on the handshake and walk off the table plss and him teasing Deng Xianling during the closing speech. Speaking of, she brings out the bat and forces their arms to form the heart. Then there's Bai Zhuoming being cute and the little shimmy dance he does.
67. 09/03/2024 night, bonus to the one above. Du Guangyi last minute adlib was unexpected but very enjoyable. Also, I love the contrast between his and Bai Zhuoming's tutting.
That's all for now!
Bonus clip with Bai Zhuoming! The song "Number 7" from "Fan Letter" musical is really good, I'm obssesed. But special performance where they're joined by their alternate cast? And his alternate cast is, Shu Rongbo? Even better!! They're kinda in their own world too. Here's a close up. Their voices go so well together!
(I swear they're playing something on that paper, and that makes it 3 musicals I know where they share the same role. Is it time I made a venn diagram?)
so at which point do i admit this brainrot is slowly but surely turning from linkclick focused to actor focused?
Ji Xiaokun and Guo Hongxu. Sometimes we get a hug and sometimes we get a tsundere elbow nudge, and both are good.
That hug is from the 29th. Wu Yihan and Shu Rongbo. But this blurry video is the only image of the jump hug that got captured! Someone in the audience yelled for them to hug. Edit: better video acquired: http://xhslink.com/HgEpAE
Cai Lu gets bubble gun rights for blowing bubbles around Ji Xiaokun and Guo Hongxu’s bestie handshake.
I’m ecstatic we finally have a visual for the “difficult ribbon throwing” people keep talking about. Thank you Du Guangyi for demonstrating stellar skills.
(The 100th performance and 2 special encore videos, also I cried from joy and it's not an offtop)
@elaraqwq attended the 100th play, gave away the postcards we made to the audience and SOMEHOW delivered them to the trio actors 😭🧡💙💕 As an absolute legend she is, she sent me the pictures as a proof 🙇♂️ So I lost my mind about the loveliness of it all and took a while to chill o7 💝
But enough of that! Lemme tell you abt today's events ✨
Feb 25th, noon performance: Ji Xiaokun, Guo Hongxu, Cai Lu, Guo Zhenyan, Li Zexi
For special encore they did full version of 'You can forget about it' ('Rock, paper, scissors song') but sung is 3 different dialects: from Hebei, Shandong and Shanghai (lowkey foreshadowing).
TW:CXS's dramatic ass once again puts on the noose, so if it makes you uncomfortable, be warned~
If you've been listening to this song over and over again (like me), you should be able to hear the difference in pronounciation. It's as if they changed the lyrics completely ><
Feb 25th, night, the 100th performance: Cai Qi, Wang Minhui, Deng Xianling, Zhang Jiahao, Zhu Jiayan
It's full version of 'As the saying goes' (earthquake arc mom and son quarrel) with Cai Qi in place of Cheng Xiao and Wang Minhui as his mom. Joined by the rest of cast :>
I called the earlier encore foreshadowing bc (like in dongua) the earthquake arc characters speak in Sichuan dialect (the province where the plot takes place). And despite the role swap Wang Minhui used Sichuan as well.
⬆from Zhu Jiayan's weibo
⬆ @/渲染KL不加糖_瑾家 posted this picture on weibo with caption: 'Chicken run'. And I think it's the funniest joke ever ><
Check the replies for both videos 💙🧡 And I hope you'll have just as good time watching it as I did ^0^
March 23rd, night: Shu Rongbo, Wu Yihan, Qian Dongyue, Zou Ziyue, Xu Fangxing
The only photos from that day were posted by the actors themselves >< Seems like they were having fun taking photos of each other ^^'
⬆ those 2 photos are especially dear to me, bless you Zou Ziyue for the one with matching outfits 🙏 the other one was posted by wyh first and the actors were being cute asf in the comments <3 like:
srb: 'wuhu wúhú [tornado emoji]', wyh: 'brother bobi', Li Zexi: 'You two look so good ❤', zzy:'I think my photos are better'
plsss 😭💖
March 24th, noon: Ji Xiaokun, Guo Hongxu, Cai Lu
Guo Hongxu came back from a health break ^^ There are quite a few clips from that day, check them out if you wanna see ghx get stuck on 'Dive back in time' lyrics and jxk reaction ><'
⬆ these photos were taken by Ji Xiaokun with a camera from the audience ^^
Look at this dorky sd photo 🥺 💛
March 24th, night: Zhao Muzhi, Zhu Hanbin, Wu Hanglu
I strongly recommend you watch this encore! It has:
CXS looses rock, paper, scissors despite cheating and bluescreens >< LG uhh kinda...caresses his face to make him snap back to reality.
he's locked in
Oh yes, Zhu Hanbin did whole encore wearing his shirt inside out >< Wu Hanglu points it out after they're done with last song.
*btw I need to check, how do we write Muzhi's surname? Bc atp I've seen 3 versions: 'Cao', 'Zhao' and 'Tsao'. I use 'Zhao', Sael uses 'Cao' and on weibo I've seen a meme signed with 'Tsao'. WHICH ONE IS IT?
Anyway, he did a lot of cute and funny faces, but I couldn't fit them all in this post ;w; I'll post them later~
On his weibo, Shu Rongbo posted photos he gathered throuough 2023, performing in LC. Here they are :>
shiguang under the christmas tree 🥺
Some more photos, that were posted for Ji Xiaokun's birthday (by actors, fans or himself):
Not musical relatad. but he posted a really heartfelt message on his weibo acc on his birthday. Self-reflecting on personal growth and work experience... it really made me appreciate him from a different angle, so I recommend you check his weibo profile if you're interested ^^ he's a very sweet guy <3
As always, we had Deng Xianling being adorable 😊💗💖
And Teng Chunpeng being goofy ahh
🙏
To see bonus stage door photos of Teng Chunpeng carrying a comically large backpack , you can check my twitter @niebo_asdfghjkl (I couldn't fit them anywhere)
(backlog, the most 🫣😳💅✨photos with the actors you requested)
Disclaimer??: I'm asexual, and call people 'hot' mostly as a joke. Honestly, I don't have a good feel for what's attractive in people, so sorry if you expected more (I tried my best to feed you) ><
On the other hand, I promise this post has no intent to objectify the actors and is just to appreciate them 🌟 I'm sure it was a given for you, but since the musical involves real people I'd rather be extra careful to be respectful :>
⬆ Wang Minhui ✨People seem to like his dancing moves (and arms, especially the arms. fair)
⬆ Teng Chunpeng <3
⬆ Shu Rongbo (the first photo? he posted it on his weibo >>)
⬆ Ji Xiaokun (Quarri I'm sorry there's so little, I'll add more next time)
⬆ Wu Yihan (@saelterlude sent me a cute clip with him, so check the replies for a link to click)
And finally, an extra treat ^u^ My darlings, I present you Wu Yihan as Florence from 桑塔露琪亚/Mio Fratello musical 💅✨It took an immense brainrot and luck to learn about the existence of this character. And a lot of time to find at least one picture of her 😤 Huge thanks to @chocolatexiaoshi for help with researching 🙏
I went down this rabbit hole and thought it may be interesting for my fellow Wu Yihan enjoyers 💕 Sorry for the huge offtop ><'
About 'Mio Fratello', it's a long term musical with small cast (like LC play), in that case 3 actors. It's a story about Italian mafia combining the present with flashback elements?? Wu Yihan actually plays the mafia boss, Sonny Boy. That is his main character:
Florence is a different character from the past memories/flashback part. So Wu Yihan plays her bc they only have 3 actors. The reason it's so hard to find pictures of him in this costume, despite him still performing in Mio Fratello, is that Florence appears in the main plot. And as we've learned with LC musical, we only get to see the encore recordings😞
But I saw people praise his depiction of Florence, saying it was 'really visible (he) studied carefully what is a cute girl like' yet there were 'no common stereotypes for female characters' 🙏 imo? another reason to love this guy 💙
*Oh, trivia! Currently, Zhao Muzhi also plays in Mio Fratello. And Shu Rongbo used to as well (he doesn't anymore). They did different characters.
I've used up most of his photos in the last post abt him ><' But you can check Encore Musical's weibo for a celebratory video with him (it's v sweet).
About the first photo, he took it himself with a camera from the audience :'> 2nd is from musical's weibo (pls look at his cake, it has a camera 🥺). 3rd is from Cai Lu's weibo 🙏
Lineup today was: Cai Lu, Guo Hongxu, Ji Xiaokun, Liao Jingyuan, Song Yuanming
⬆Song Yuanming (he debuted some time ago but I had no time to actually show him, imsorry man)
(last 5 pics are from different stage, with Deng Xianling)
From recent official announcements: Encore Musicals posted a video where all CXS actors answer the question 'If there was a Time Photo Studio in real life, what task would you entrust them with?'.
Today I haphazardly made a machine translation thread of their answers. It's a great material to compare the actors personalities, so please check it out.
Links in replies: video of cxs actors answering the question + link to my twt thread with 'translations', cq&wyh encore
April 5th, noon: Ji Xiaokun, Guo Hongxu, Qiang Dongyue
Not much coverage bc there was another performance on a same day that drew more attention...
April 5th, night: Cai Qi, Wu Yihan, Qian Anqi
It was their 2nd performance together and it felt more relaxed this time🙏It was fun and playful encore ^^
They shoved each other during 'Pursuers of light'. For 'You can forget about it' XiaoJuan piglet made a comeback 🐷 just to get slapped by both lg and cxs ><' Wu Yihan laughs a lot 💙first at Cai Qi hitting poor XiaoJuan, then at rock, paper, scissors match.
He does his trick of making the signs while keeping his hand low, so cxs doesn't notice. But he looses anyway and chokes on a laugh.
(part 1 of Wed-Sat performances overview but it's mostly Shu Rongbo bc he appeared thrice)
Translating the schedule has been lifechanging 🙇♂️ I feel so stupid for not using it earlier ><
Here's the main lineups from recent plays. Ik Guo Hongxu apeared 3 times too, but he was a focus of last posts, so let's move on to other actors~
Feb 28th Shu Rongbo, Guo Hongxu, Qian Anqi:
I'm not sure why but imo he looked particularly gorgeous that day, I think it's the slightly stronger eyeshadow? maybe?? (hard to tell bc there weren't many photos of him, since it was LG's actor birthday)
Feb 29th Ji Xiaokun, Guo Hongxu:
I'll link the adorable clip where they 'Oi!' at each other before 'Dive back in time'. You need to see his brilliant smile on a video 🧡
March 1st Shu Rongbo, Wu Yihan, Qian Anqi:
I dunno guys... I think Wu Yihan got a new wig 🤔 hmm
First of all, check Encore Musicals bilibili, they posted 4th ep of Link Click Musical behind the scenes🌟 It's collection of cute clips with all the actors ^^
The Spring Festival livestream is tommorow, but since timezones are confusing, I'll try to add some info for clearance 💖
When you enter the broadcast link, there is a countdown (see? it reads 19h left). You can copy and translate the whole text to make sure, how long till the start ^^
Another thing is, if you're worried you won't make it right on time, here's how the set list looks like (I translated most important parts, don't panic ok ;) Based on it, we can't guess when exactly LC cast appears, but I think we can trust it will be in the second half, probably after some sort of break.
I have a day off tomorow & I hope I'll be able to watch it without any technical difficulties, so I can report on it. But like I mentioned earlier, chinese musical and lc fans have our back, dw abot missing it 💪
That concludes the live info, I also have pictures from the actors and then some backlog stuff o7
From Wu Hanglu:
From Ji Xiaokun, with new year's greetings:
also this cute dog, named LiuLiu (?) it's exactly like dog-xiaoshi from shorts, so I had to add this ;w;🧡
⬆Zhu Hanbin 🤓💙 I lowkey got invested in his lore, bc I went on his weibo profile and there's a video of his performence from an academy exam (I'll link it). And it's this insanely well sung opera song. In italian. And according to chocho-xiaoshi, he's still in school, final year. Like?? Sir, you're amazing 🧎♂️
(a random bunch from Shanghai musicals multiverse)
⬆ from Ji Xiaokun's weibo, with Guo Hongxu >< text says 'Happy Chinese Valentine's Day ❤' (it's an old pic from 'Flames' musical set)
I've accumulated a bunch of vaguely LC musical related photos posted by the cast. The actors perform together in different musicals ('Shanghai musicals multiverse') that's why you may recognise them from lc stage but they'll be wearing different costumes. I find it fun to notice the connections so here they are~
⬆ Qian Anqi (she released these as photocards to celebrate reaching 4k weibo followers)
⬆ Wu Hanglu with 1)Teng Chunpeng 2) Wang Yifei 3) Zhou Bobo, Du Guangyi, Teng Chunpeng, Yu Mengying (+idk who's the lady in glasses)
⬆ all from Yu Mengying 🙏 1) Teng Chunpeng, Du Guangyi, Cao Muzhi, Wu Hanglu, Zhang Zhiwei, Wu Yihan, Shu Rongbo, Zhang Jiahao, Wang Minhui (+the technical crew in last pic) 2) Bai Zhuoming, Guo Zhenyan, Wu Hanglu, Zhu Hanbin (no idea who's the 3rd lady in last pic) 3) Wu Hanglu, Shu Rongbo 4) blurry Zhu Hanbin ><
⬆ from Zhu Jiayan with Wang Minhui, Zhang Jiahao, Deng Xianling and Cai Qi
⬆ very old photo of Zhu Jiayan and Ji Xiaokun (they play in long-going 'Flames' musical together)
⬆ stage door photo of Ding Xingchen and Guo Zhenyan (I found it by a total accident)
Oh! Since people were worried about him bc of his sudden health break, here are sd pics from LC noon performance on March 30th. He's back and he's stunning 😌🧡👌
Okay this one has nothing to do with Link Click except the actors >< but is super interesting (for me at least) and it makes sense to mention it I promise! So there's a musical version of 'The Brothers Karamazov'. And since it's like a restart/s2 of this play, they're doing quite a lot of promo.
3 actors from 'The Brothers Karamazov' were invited to a Shanghai Fashion Week for a brand collab, and look who's here!
indisputable fashion icon Teng Chunpeng (LC CXS & eldest Karamazov brother)🌟 but also...
Zheng Yibin 🤍 who acts as Lu Guang in the upcoming Link Click Dance Musical (yes, another one) and also as the youngest Karamazov brother ><
Second reason I bring up this musical is the other actor for the youngest Karamazov >>
it's Shu Rongbo 🥺
What I'm saying is Brothers Karamazov is the link between Link Click musicals, with two Cheng Xiaoshis and one Lu Guang >< And I think it's just neat that they know each other and have a history of working together ^^
*tcp is also starring in 'Love Begins', the same play as Zhao Jialin - QL's actress from dance musical
*Brothers Karamazov's plot is very accessible to grasp bc it's based on a famous russian novel by Dostoyevsky that's why I know about it. Also bc it's dramatic and sad af and the actors look gorgeous so I just had to learn more ><'
It was sth different this time, but I hope it was fun for you ^^ bye bye