Zhou Yutong: How She Attained Her Sense of Ease (2025)

Since Nothing But You aired, Zhou Yutong has rarely searched her nameon the internet.

It isonly when her friends send her screenshotsthat she realisesshe is on Weibo hot search.After Will Love in Spring started airing in 2024, she did not once search for comments aboutherself,because she feels it is more important to know what her work can bring to the audience than herself.

Every time people followed her at the airport, Zhou Yutong appeared visibly nervous, only able to walk hurriedly with small steps and give a deep bow before the lift doors closed.‘I’mworried that actorsend up only beingconcerned withthemselves,and nothing else in the world. I like to keep myself in check tomake surethat I am broadening my horizons and focusing on more people,’said Zhou Yutong.

The day we met Zhou Yutong, she was preparing for an evening gala. When she heard us arrive, she came out to greet us with a smile, wearing a loose T-shirt and jeans while holding a cup of Americano, like the beautiful girl next door one had not seen in a while.

There were no cameras or flashing lights.Sheleaned back inherchair and crossedherlegs naturally; there was noroutine ‘first question’,wejust started chatting unknowingly. We talked about her recent poor appetite that gave her abs; wechattedabout how she helped to style ZhuangJie’soutfits in Shanghai.

Before we met, I had wanted to talk to her about how Will Love in Spring had supported her career and helped her achieve a breakthrough, but as we chatted, I realised that none of those seemed to matter to her. Because in her, I saw a sense of ease, something rarely found in an actress on the rise.

01: Self-Cultivation of an I-Person

Zhou Yutong is a typical INFP (mediator) [TL Note: One of the MBTI personality types], quiet, emotional, and go-with-the-flow.That’swhy she never imagined that she could become the‘social bandit’Zhuang Jie in Will Love in Spring.

In the summer of 2022, during the filming of Nothing But You, Zhou Yutong received the script for Will Love in Spring.She read three episodes, surprised that this character found her, just as she was moved by ZhuangJie’sstory.

The first time she met producer Jian Yiwen and director Cheng Liang, Zhou Yutong had just dyed her hair pink, like a flamingo. When Cheng Liang first saw her, he said,‘Yo, this hair,it’sa little different from your photo.’Zhou Yutong hurriedly explained,‘I’mstill excited about my newly bleached hair, butI’llgodye it black immediately ifI’mcast.’However, Jian Yiwen, the producer and screenwriter, smiled as if shesaid‘That’show Zhuang Jie should look like’.

At the time, Cheng Liang had just finished filming Blossoms Shanghai and had high expectations for the camera work. Will Love in Spring thus became the show with the mostnumber oftakes for Zhou Yutong.Sometimes, Cheng Liang would repeatedly request to shoot from a differentangle,just because he felt that the shot was not beautiful enough,anditwould take dozens of takes.Sometimestheweariness wouldstart toshow on her face, but Cheng Liang would say:‘I just thought of another angle…’

When filming UncleHe’sfuneral scene, Zhou Yutong cried over 20 times. Coincidentally, on that day, Li Mo, the director of Remembrance of Things Past, came to visit her on set. When he sawthat shewas exhausted from all the crying, he felt so sorry and kept comforting her.

After each take, Cheng Liang would let the actors watch the playback,talking aboutwhy it was necessary to film so many times and how the emotions were different when the camera angle changed. As she watched, Zhou Yutong understood thedirector’sintention. Actors need to work together with the visuals.For the same scene, the frontal view and side viewcould feel completely different.

‘People think Zhou Yutong looks good in Will Love in Springbutthat’sbecause the director worked hard to make this face look good,’Zhou Yutong said with a smile.

One of ZhuangJie’sclips that went viral wasthe onewhere she, as a medical salesperson, socialised around the table and added everyone on WeChat until she naturally landed at the one she wanted to add the most—Chen Maidong, played by Li Xian. Because of this clip, netizens named Zhuang Jie‘The Most Extroverted Female Lead in the History of Modern Idol Drama’.

Yet, Zhou Yutong does not think that Zhuang Jie is an E-person [TL Note: Someone who is an Extrovert according to the MBTI]. Her liveliness is her dedication to her work, but not thecharacter’sundertones.

‘Not everyone who appears sociable is an E-person, not everyone who is reserved is an I-person [TL Note: Someone who is an Introvert according to the MBTI].I have twoE friends in my Great Song groupwhoare extremely good at being themselves.During gatherings, theydon’tlaugh if theydon’twant to laughandtheydon’tsocialise if theydon’twant to socialise. On the contrary, the couple of I friends would take the initiative to liven up the atmosphere and control the mood. They may feel exhaustedas soon asthey get home and need to lie down at home for three days.’

Like Zhuang Jie, Zhou Yutong is an I-person who can act like an E-person in real life. As the second child of her family, she subconsciously helps out with everything, acting as a mediator and observingeveryone’semotions.

During the first week of filming, Zhou Yutong was not sure how to portray Zhuang Jie pretending to be an E-person. She worried that her performance would be toocliched,but was also afraid that the audience would not be able to see that she was only pretending to be a social butterfly. So,sheworked out a way to divide Zhuang Jie into two parts, one‘cold’and one‘hot’.During the day, Zhuang Jie is more chatty and fearless, and atnightsheis quieter and lonelier.This was her way to‘ground’Zhuang Jie after all the‘flying’in the day.

So far, it seems that mostof theviewers did not find ZhuangJie’s ‘noisiness’ uncomfortable, which Zhou Yutong is moved by. She knows that the audience understands Zhuang Jie.

02:‘Phantom Limb Pain’

When she first joined the industry, Zhou Yutong was an actress who went along with her emotions, expressing what shefelt,and not being able to convey what she did not feel. But as she acted more, shestarted to believethat actors should hold back on their emotions instead. Just like playing cards, one hasto slowly play their cardsand not play theirstrongesthand right at the beginning.

When it came to ZhuangJie’sdisability, she had been thinking about the degree to which she shouldbe portrayingit. She was worried that if she did not actwellpeople would be offended, and if she exaggerated toomuchit would lose authenticity.

The crew found two girls with similar experiences to Zhuang Jie to help her establish ZhuangJie’sliving conditions. At first, Zhou Yutong wasespeciallynervous, always afraid of offending the girls.However, she was surprisedto findthat the twogirls’openness, honesty, and resilience werecompletelybeyond her imagination.They told their stories as naturally as they would during agirl’stalk.

BecauseZhuangJie’sknee was preservedin her amputation, she can walkfairlywell, but it is a bit of a struggle to go up the steps.When it came to squatting, sitting down, going up and down the steps, running and jumping, and every other movement, she learnt bit by bit from the two girls.It was how some viewers noticed that ZhuangJie’slegs were different in the first episode.

During her research, Zhou Yutong found that many girls who wear prostheses would put beautiful rhinestones on them. She then discussed with the director, scriptwriter, and art departmentaboutwhether she could put some rhinestones on her crutches. When Jian Yiwen heard about it, she thought it wasa wonderfulidea and wrote the scene where Chen Maidong gifts her crutches.

To make ZhuangJie’sresidual limb more realistic, the prop maker scanned ZhouYutong’sleg and spent a month 3D-printing a prop limb. Zhou Yutong remembers that when she saw the limb for the first time, her heart seemed to have shattered with a‘crash’.Subsequently, during filming, she tied the prop to her leg, put her own leg into it, and stroked itover and over again.

Two days before Will Love in Spring aired, Zhou Yutong woke up in the morning and suddenly found the joints of her foot hurting, and shecouldn’teven walk. After going to the hospital for a checkup, the doctor saidthere was nothingwrong. Jian Yiwen thought it might have been Zhuang Jie using her senses to tell Zhou Yutongthat shewas coming.

03:‘I-People Crew’

Like Zhou Yutong, Li Xian is also an I-person. Both of them were slow to warm up. After each call for a cut, they would silently study the next sceneon their own. When editing the bloopers, Jian Yiwen keptmaking fun ofthem,‘Are you two suffering from some kind of aloofness disease on set!’

Zhou Yutong had seen many of LiXian’sworks previously. At first, she thought such a handsome guy must be very aloof.But on the day of the table read, she realised that Li Xian wasactually very cheerful and had an adorable smile.

When Cheng Liang finds that the atmosphere between the actors is good, he would intentionally not call cut and let them continue acting.In the scene where Zhuang Jie and Chen Maidong are eating popcorn at the cinema, Cheng Liang set a camera high upand letthe two improvise on their own andjustlook up to the sky at the end.Zhou Yutong and Li Xian threw popcorn into the sky together, but Li Xian was like an acrobat, throwing it upextremelyhigh and then catching it effortlessly. At timeshecould even throw two together, amusing Zhou Yutong as she watched.

After the filming wrapped, Jian Yiwen created a group chat for the director, ZhouYutong,and Li Xian, to share someof therecent dramas and films they had seen.It wasonlyafter they got out of the work environmentthat the two I-people beganto chat about everyday matters outside of work.

Liu Lin, who played ZhuangJie’smother, isalsoZhouYutong’smentor and friend.

When filming a scene in the funeral parlour, Liu Lin cried especially hard. Zhou Yutong looked at her thin frame from behind and saw her mother for a moment, so she could not help but walk up and pat her on the shoulder. After the scene, Liu Lin said to her,‘Let’ssave all the warmth for after the filming.’

Subsequently, every time before the two of them filmed an argument scene, they would stay alone in a small room, not chatting, just running through the lines over and over again.It was not until the filming was over that they wouldgive each other a big hug.

Wu Junting, who played her younger brother, and Zhang Xiwei, who played her younger sister, are both from Northeast China, so they had a strong accent whenever they spoke.As the only Southern actor in the Zhuang family,ZhouYutong’saccentwas often influencedby them.In one scene, Zhuang Jie is applying a facial mask while talking to her younger siblings, and Zhou Yutong blurted out,‘What’swrong with it?’[TL Note: She used a Northeastern slang phrase], making everyone laugh.

On the day Will Love in Spring wrapped, all the actors returned. The crew rented a cruise ship in Shanghai, and everyone spent a good time togetherwhichthey had long missed. Looking at the boat travelling on its set course, Zhou Yutong suddenly felt a sense of melancholy. The sound of theship’shorns seemed to remind her that the dream wascoming to an end.

04: Home

The aftereffect of filming Will Love in Spring was especially strong on Zhou Yutong, andthere was one sentence thatkept popping into her head:‘I want to go back to Nanping.’

Although the filming location, Quanzhou, is a long way from ZhouYutong’shome,every time she goes there,it reminds her of her childhood.‘There are a lot of brick walls and roadside stalls there, and everyone lives in the small streets and alleys, so people are very close to each other. I tear upevery timeI see Nanping becausethis warm atmosphere can no longer be found.’

When Zhou Yutong was a child, her mother was very busy at work, so she could only go to hergrandma’shouse for meals during the day and go home with her sister after school.At night,she was scared of sleeping alone, so she would burrow under hersister’sblanket and tell her stories.Ifher sisterwasentertained, she would give her a thumbs up. Holding her thumb, Zhou Yutong would finally be able to sleep soundly. Now, she still sleeps with her sister.

Before the show aired, the staff had been refraining from showing Zhou Yutong full clips from the show, fearing that she would not feel the emotions any more if she watched it again after it aired. But because she wanted to see theaudience’slive reaction, she snuck into the press conference, held a day before the show aired, and found herself a seat.

By then, the trailer was already halfway through. Whenshewalked in, the girl next to her thought she looked a little familiar and took a secondglance,but quickly turned her eyes back to the big screen. Later, she saw the girl crying and laughingtogetherwith the plot, and her heart felt warm.

Onthe second day of itsrun, Zhou Yutong and Jian Yiwen, along with all the female staff members, held a‘Girls’Drama Night’.They first watched the show without bullet comments (TL Note: Comments that roll across the top of the screen at the timestamp at which theywere posted),andthen put the show on TV and watched it with the bullet comments. One of the comments said,‘Chen Maidong,can’tyou stop the electric scooter in front of her?’,and everyone suddenly looked at each other and laughed and said,‘Right! Whydidn’twe think of that when we were filming!’

As she watched, Zhou Yutong could not stop crying. When she saw Zhuang Jie telling her mother,‘I want to be the golden phoenix of Nanping and climb up the ladder,’her tears flowed down. As soon as the music for the flashback scene played, Zhou Yutong broke down in tears.‘Who can resist this kind of white moonlight redemption story [TL Note: A genre where the protagonist is saved or healed by their unforgettable first love]! Originally, they wanted me and Li Xian to act as the younger version of our characters, but we both thought wecouldn’thandle it.Now itseems to have been the right choice because the two young actors were so amazing.’

05: Inner Struggles Are Rare

When asked if Will Love in Spring has met her expectations, Zhou Yutong laughed and saidthat shenever thought about it.

As a spontaneous P-person [TL Note: Someonewho hasa Perceiving personality according to the MBTI], she is not result-oriented and is never concerned about whether each drama she filmed has gone viral, nor does she dwell on any gains or losses.‘Every drama has its own value and significance, and as long as I do my bestat the moment, I can accept all outcomes. For example, if Will Love in Spring has healed me, it can also heal the audience. Even if only10viewers are watching it, it hasstillhealed10people.’

At the same time, she hasvery littleinner struggles. When she looks back on her works, she rarely has regrets.‘Every show has something thatcould have been donebetter,that’snormal.There’sno turning back in life, alwaysfeeling regret can beveryexhausting internally. You can only do your best to present what you think is best at the time.’

Many actors resent the labels they carry when they are ready tomake thetransition to another stage of their career. However, Zhou Yutong accepts these labels and does not want to get rid of them.

‘The two labelsthat peoplegive me now are career woman and fashion blogger. SometimeswhenI go shopping, the salespersonwould tell me thatshe likes to post my photos on her WeChat Circle, andI’mhappy about that. You are obviously reaping the benefits of these labels, so youcan’tjust say you only want to be an actresstoday,because what about all those benefits you are getting? People can put a million labels on themselves, but labelsdon’trestrict a person, theonly thing that can restrict you is yourself.’

To be‘untroubled’like this is something she has slowly learnt after ten years of acting as intelligent andperceptivewomen.

Ten years ago, Zhou Yutong went through the hardship of shuttling between casting calls like all young actors. But she did not want to elaborate on that and instead shared with us her mindset.At that time, she would go to sleep every night with anticipation and excitement,alwaysfeeling that when she turned on her phone the nextdayshe would receive good news.‘One has to have something to look forward to,’she said.

For the first time, ZhouYutong’sWeChat was soactive,after Remembrance of Things Past aired. She would receive all kinds of messages every day from people inside and outside the industry.

This intensity, however, made Zhou Yutong start to retreat. She did not even seeany ofher friends in the industry for a week.‘Because I thinkit’stoo happening. Peopleshouldn’tmake decisions when there is too much buzz because it may not be rational. The more it feels like this, the less you should be fooled by this false success. What I did during that time was to calm myself down and isolate myself from all this information for a while, and wait until everyone had calmed down before talking about working on projects together and my next steps.’

That led to a period of almost a year where she was not filming.Thisis unimaginable for an actress who had just become popular.But Zhou Yutong knew very well that shewas not someone who couldjoin another cast without taking a break or casually take up arole,just because she was afraid of not beingpopular.

It wasbecause of her composurethat ZhouYutong managed to get her roles in Nothing But You and Will Love in Spring.

After ten years in the industry, if she were to draw a trend chart for her career, she feels that it must be a slowly rising line, with no sudden fluctuations ormajorups and downs. She has never set any points for a transition or to go on an upward trend. The line may move up in the future, or there may be new changes, but those are not what she is thinking aboutat the moment.

For her, the glamour and limelight she may attain in the future seem far less appealing than the cup of Americano she holds in her hand.

This sense of ease is hergreatestprotection in an industry not known for its security.

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