Chapter 291 Traditional Crosstalk: Selling Tickets
"What are you going to do?" Qi Long looked at Zhu Hecong in surprise.
Zhu Hecong shook his head and shouted, "I want to clear the door. From now on, you are not one of us. I will throw you out and close the door and not let you in."
Qi Long waved his hand: "It's okay, I have the key, let's continue."
"You have a key but it doesn't work. I'll change the lock cylinder and get a new key!"
"It's fine if I don't even bother with you, but you're still excited, aren't you? You, you want to clear my house? Who do you think you are? You want to make a copy of your keys? When you go to a key stand, the owner will ask you, do you make copies? How many keys do you want? Ugh!"
This is a typical example of indirect criticism in crosstalk. It seems that the actor is talking about the supporting actor, but in fact he is talking about other people.
Here, it is obvious that the person who threatened to clear the door is worthy of it.
Everyone in the audience who understood what was going on immediately cheered loudly, followed by applause and laughter.
Zhu Hecong wiped his face with the towel on the table: "Why am I not worthy?"
"In the Qing Sect, the senior brother of their own sect has the final say. Let's not talk about whether you are the senior brother of my sect. I want to ask if your Gang Sect has a senior brother? Why? Are you planning to parachute in a senior brother and then take charge of the affairs of other sects? That's really a grandson!"
There were cheers again. Qi Long was absolutely right to curse!
"Oh, this behavior is so like that of a grandson? Then I won't be a grandson anymore. I'd rather be a master's wife." Zhu Hecong saw that she couldn't respond to the scolding from her uncle-master, so she quickly found a way to catch her breath and grabbed Qi Long.
If you keep on cursing, who knows what he’ll say.
Even though the uncle seemed cheerful when he called his fellow brothers last night, he couldn't be without anger in his heart. It's just like if someone grabbed you on the street and told you that he was going to expel someone in your family from your household registration book. Isn't that crazy?
Seeing that Zhu Hecong was trying to change the subject, Qi Long also realized that he had had enough of making indirect accusations and almost continued to scold him, but he collected his thoughts and repeated that his acting skills were quite impressive.
"In the past, there was a professional school in the imperial capital called Fu Liancheng!" Qi Long continued.
Zhu Hecong: "Yes, this Fu Liancheng is a professional!"
Qi Long didn't understand why he was talking nonsense, and continued: "At that time, they opened seven courses to teach opera singing!"
"They teach seven subjects in opera singing, everyone!" Zhu Hecong continued to talk nonsense about literature.
Everyone was inexplicably amused by Zhu Hecong's explanation of how a formal sentence turned into an inverted sentence.
Qi Long turned around, looking puzzled: "Is it me who is talking that they don't understand? You translate it."
"Say it more, emphasize it, emphasize that Fu Liancheng is very powerful, he opened seven courses!"
"There are many famous actors and actresses in the Seventh Department!"
Zhu Hecong came again, and this time Qi Long joined him, introducing them to everyone in a slow, lifeless, and weak tone: "Many famous actors come from these seven departments!"
Qi Long pushed him: "I know what you are going to say. Which seven subjects?"
Zhu Hecong was slightly stunned. Why did he ask about the supporting actor?
But he also reacted quickly, and immediately spread out his fingers and said, "Chinese, mathematics, English, moral education, history, biology, geography, seven subjects!"
"Why is there no physics and chemistry?" Qi Long asked him with his hands behind his back.
"Physics classes are only offered in the second year of junior high school, and chemistry classes are only offered in the third year of junior high school. The level of crosstalk performers is generally at the level of the second year of junior high school."
"Go away, I'm talking to you about Fu Liancheng. You're talking to me about junior high school. If you don't know, just say less. Don't talk to that translator. A straight man has more words than me, the funny man. Seven subjects, listen carefully: Xi Lianfu Shengshi Yuanyun Qingshengping"
Zhu Hecong was obedient and listened to the instruction at first, but as soon as Qi Long finished speaking, he couldn't help but said, "Wow, listen, these seven subjects are for uncle, you seem to have missed three more."
Qi Long counted them again himself and said that he had counted too many, as the last three had not been done yet.
Then he said that this school did not stop offering courses, but went underground, and then it offered seven more courses.
These seven subjects are: I wish everyone a happy day!
Qi Long claimed that he was the number one student in the Tianzi class and that his teacher specifically gave him the name Dasheng.
"What's your full name?"
"Qitian Dasheng!"
If it were another supporting actor, he would be shocked, right? Zhu Hecong calmly pointed at Qi Long and said, "Oh, my uncle is singing a monkey show?"
"What a monkey show, a serious show, my junior brother, the second disciple of our Tianzi Department has the same surname as you, Zhu, and his name is Zhu Tianpeng!"
Zhu Hecong was normal this time: "What's your third junior brother's name, Sha Tian?"
"Look, there are still people who know us brothers, my third junior brother, General Sha Tian, fourth junior brother, Bai Tianma, and fifth junior brother."
"And the fifth junior brother?"
“Enoki mushroom”
"Isn't this heavenly?"
"See you tomorrow. The stage name he uses is just like your sesame seed cake!"
After making everyone laugh with the small gags in the narrative crosstalk, Qi Long said that the five of them were very famous back then, especially him, Qi Tian Dasheng. He was so popular that he was invited to perform everywhere.
One by one, they came to their doorsteps to beg him to perform, and finally he chose to open his own solo opera show at the National Grand Theater.
After confirming it, I went to write the poster myself.
"Uncle Master, wait a minute, you are such a big star, but you still write your own posters?"
"This is what sincerity looks like, you know? As an artist in any industry, no matter how great your achievements or accomplishments are, you must always be sincere when facing the audience, because the audience is the breadwinner of us artists!" Qi Long's tone became higher and higher as he spoke.
There was a feeling of forcing the value, which earned the audience applause.
"You said this on the crosstalk stage a long time ago, you will definitely not be among the ones to be cleared!" Zhu Hecong delivered the punchline and the whole audience burst into laughter.
Qi Long said that he has always been like this, and began to write on the poster: Dear friends, pay attention, pay attention, the famous Peking Opera performing artist Qi Tian Dasheng is going to hold a special opera performance here
"Uncle Master, if you don't understand, just ask, how do you write the word her?"
"If you don't know how to write, use pinyin. You don't even understand this, and you still have to ask. If you want to sing an opera here, when it comes to Qi Tian Da Sheng's opera, it's really good, especially good, very good, quite good, just good."
"Your word is too watery!"
"You are cordially invited to buy tickets for the special performance of "Better Than Beasts"."
"What the hell? Your special show is called Worse than Beasts!"
"Look, you don't understand again, right? Scientific research shows that the sounds of nature are the most beautiful sounds. The sounds made by animals are not as good as mine, which means that I am more natural than nature."
Once he got into Qi Long's rhythm, Zhu Hecong didn't know how to tell the joke and could only use the traditional method of supporting the main character: "What a mess!"
"Hey, I sang three plays in total. The first one is Wu Jia Pi."
"Slope, Wujia Slope!"
"The second act, the pervert shoots the mother."
"The poster will call the police, Silang visits his mother"
"Three one out, empty city plan, write down the last days, emphasize that Mr. Qi is worse than a beast!"
Why do we emphasize this sentence? Everyone who sees this will remember the eye-catching last word. By word of mouth, everyone knows that Mr. Qi is worse than a beast!
"As soon as the poster was posted, it immediately caused a sensation. People from all over the country spread the word that Mr. Qi Tian was going to hold a special opera performance that would last for several days. We want to go and see Mr. Qi's performance. Mr. Qi is worse than a beast!!!"
"I always feel like I'm scolding myself! Uncle, your poster is wrong, there's no price!" Qi Long waved his hand: "You don't need to write the price. For a star like me, the price is the same for the front row and the back row, one thousand yuan!"
"Only a fool would buy that!"
"Don't scold my audience. They come to watch my show and it doesn't matter whether they are in the front row or the back row!"
Qi Long began to describe how popular his opera would be across the country.
First, let’s talk about some places closer to the capital. People are riding bicycles, driving cars, and running. The highways are blocked. When you ask, they all come to watch the Qilong Opera.
It is also passed on by word of mouth: Mr. Qi is worse than a beast!
When he said it for the third time, Zhu Hecong followed Qi Long in shouting it.
Then came the people from Meng Province. They also heard about it and came on horses. Their horses were equipped with the ETC automatic bar lifting function. They would jump over the railing when they saw it, and rush to the imperial capital to listen to Qi Long's play.
It is also passed on by word of mouth: Mr. Qi is worse than a beast!
This time, it wasn't just Qi Long and Zhu Hecong, but the audience in the audience also joined in the shouting.
This is the power of repetition.
Maybe in the future they will have forgotten the specific details of this traditional crosstalk, but they will always remember the repeated emphasis on Mr. Qi being worse than a beast. This is the unique style of his crosstalk.
If you go to a farther place, you can take a train. One train can hold six cars' worth of people, so one train is better than six.
There were so many people that even the stationmaster was scared. Why are there so many people?
Those people shouted, "We want to go see Mr. Qi's play. Don't you know Mr. Qi is about to start the play?" Word of mouth spread across the country: Mr. Qi is worse than an animal.
Finally the train station had no choice but to add more train cars. The train with so many people on it couldn't move, so they got another train to push it from the back.
Zhu Hecong asked in a soul-searching way: "Why not send two?"
"Don't ask about the higher-ups!"
Continuing, for places farther away, the trains were no longer running, what should we do? We took planes, but there were so many people coming that the planes were so crowded that many people sat on the wings of the planes, and some even drilled into the fuel tanks and hung on the wheels.
The airport manager was scared to death.
"The airport manager is called the director?" Zhu Hecong interrupted and asked.
Qi Long said: "Then what do you call it?"
"Madam!"
"It's not the chicken, it's the plane. Don't worry about it. Anyway, the leader was terrified, so he arranged for one plane to hang on top of another and fly over together."
"So which one will fly first, the one at the bottom or the one at the top?"
"Fly together!"
"Oh, double..." Before Zhu Hecong could finish his words, Qi Long covered his mouth, and the audience burst into laughter again.
Not to mention the audience, just Qi Long's narration was interesting enough, and Zhu Hecong's inspirational on-stage creations and various little jokes made the actors on the sidelines all laugh and join in shouting that the actors were worse than beasts.
Once the noise was so loud, Qi Long had to go back and ask them to pay for the tickets!
After describing the scene where everyone rushed to the capital after hearing Mr. Qi was going to perform a play, the story moves to the day of the performance, when groups of people rushed in, insisting on listening to the play.
There is no seated ticket, so give me a standing ticket so I can stand in any corner of the venue and listen.
If there is no standing ticket, please give me a squatting ticket. There is enough space between two seats for one person to squat!
These tickets are all worth one thousand.
As the standing and squatting tickets were sold out, more than a hundred people came.
This time, the manager said there was nothing he could do. Look, the seats are all standing and there is no room left.
Those people refused to leave and insisted on watching. We want to watch Mr. Qi’s show. Mr. Qi is worse than a beast!
Finally, I came up with an idea: to vote!
"Pan ticket?"
"Isn't there a chair there? There is a space under the chair. You can lie down under the chair and the person on top can put their feet on the head of the person lying down!" Qi Long explained.
Zhu Hecong: "Hey, this is really a pain? How much is it!"
"The front and back rows are all 1,000 yuan, and standing tickets are 1,000 yuan. Of course, you can't get a special ticket if you lie down, so it's also 1,000 yuan. That's it. They sold out quickly. One by one, everyone lay down under other people's seats. Some people even lay down and patted the legs of the people above them: Please lift your legs for a moment, I want to say hello!"
"You're still saying good things after all this?"
At the last moment when the show was about to start, another twenty-four people came and still wanted to watch. The manager looked around the venue but could not see any place where they could stand. At this time, he noticed a solution.
"You can watch it if you want, but I'm afraid you will have to endure some suffering!"
"It's already hard enough to be caught lying on the ticket, what's the crime this time?"
"Those people said that as long as they can watch Mr. Qi's play, they are willing to do anything. The manager said, then, how about this, you buy one ticket for 24 people!"
"Ticket? Uncle Master, what kind of ticket is this?"
Qi Long said that there was no space on the ground in this venue, but there was still space in the sky. On the ceiling, there were four large electric fans, each with three blades.
Hang them on the fan blades, two people on each blade, a total of twenty-four people, just right.
One version of the hanging ticket was a nail, and Qi Long mentioned an electric fan, which made everyone laugh.
"Oh, how much is this ticket?" Zhu Hecong continued to ask.
"One thousand and fifty!"
"Why is the ticket still fifty yuan more expensive?"
"The rope is free, right? The wear and tear of the fan blades is free, right?"
"Oh, fair and reasonable!"
Finally, there was no more room for people to stand on the stage, and the show was about to begin.
"I just strode onto the stage and was about to open my mouth when an audience member stopped us and we couldn't see anything!"
"what happened?"
"The electric fan has one blade facing forward and two blades facing backward. The ones facing backward are invisible!"
"Oh, what should I do then?"
Qi Long laughed and said, "I gave the manager an idea. Turn on the fan and let it rotate. Turn it on a lower gear and rotate it slowly. If it's too loud, we will be thrown off!"
The audience imagined the scene and started to laugh.
This time there was finally no interference. Qi Long laid the groundwork for a whole scene of how good he was at singing, and how he was worse than beasts, and then he started to sing.
The result was that he just sang in a hoarse and rhythmless voice, without any performance from a famous opera artist.
"As soon as I opened my mouth, everyone who was standing ran away. Those who were sitting or squatting stood up and ran away. Those who were lying on their stomachs crawled out and ran away. Hey, the audience loves to listen!"
"Who is it?"
"The twenty-four on the fan."
"Can't come down?" Zhu Hecong said with a smile.
The father and son took a step back and bowed. The sister piece of the classic crosstalk "Selling Hanging Tickets" - "Selling Hanging Tickets" - ended!
(End of this chapter)
