Once a security guard, an electric welding worker, a waiter, and a street vendor, 20-year-old A Sheng has now carved his own role in the film industry given his ability to call in 100 to 200 temporary actors at any given notice. Each actor he draws into a project means three to five yuan to him, but despite his commission, he still frequently has problems paying for expensive phone bills.

A Sheng says his dream is to be a vice director who manages actors. "There are vice directors who have never been educated in this field!" he says.

Compared with Li Xinjun and A Sheng, Li Chenchen seems to be closer to his dream. Like Wang Baoqiang, who was picked for a leading role in Blind Shaft, Li Chenchen was chosen by director Jia Zhangke to act as worker "Er Guniang" in his film The World in 2003. But fate seems to favor him less than it does Wang Baoqiang, who later became well-known by A World without Thieves and won even wider praise through Soldier Sortie. The World didn't lead Li Chenchen to fame. Since then, he has only acted as "insignificant characters that did not impress the audience".

"Many at the studio's gate are just like the farmer who waits by a tree for a rabbit to pop up so they can hit it on the head and get a free meal. I thought to myself that I could only bring myself good luck by going out, hunting on my own," says Li Chenchen.

In the summer of 2005, his "hunting trip" began.

Li Chenchen says he was working for a TV series when he was admitted to the Shanghai Theater Academy. "I could feel that subtle change in the way the director and other actors treated me. It was totally different from when I was a walk-on. Wang Baoqiang must have had this same feeling several years ago."

Now studying directing at the Shanghai Theater Academy, Li Chenchen eloquently speaks of the basic elements in directing. Apparently, he doesn't need to wait for work any more. "I've already declined six or seven invitations to act this year," he says, adding that he's been busy shooting videos for a film festival and a drama for the International Drama Festival's opening ceremony.