One of China's most successful TV drama writers, Hai Yan says he wants audiences to identify with the protagonists of his latest work.

Hai Yan is best-known to TV viewers as the writer of popular TV dramas such as Never Close The Eyes (Yongbu Mingmu) and Jade Goddess of Mercy (Yu Guanyin), in which heart-breaking love is mixed up with detectives and crime.

However, for his latest TV series Dancer (Wu Zhe), Hai Yan, 55, creates a pure love story.

"I love good character dramas, but what I really wanted to give the audience was an out-of-control, pure love. I wanted to get back to the basic love between two young people. I love it when I can sense the audience bonding together, feeling a connection with the roles in the drama. It's a communal experience."

Dancer is a love story about two young people, Gao Chun and Jin Kui, who fall in love because of their mutual passion for dancing. They decide to go to Beijing to pursue their dreams and look for Gao's father, who he has never met. However, their love is tested when Gao breaks his leg in an accident. With the help of Zhou Xin, a girl from a wealthy family, they find Gao's father and inherit a huge amount of money.

"Here are a young man and woman who think they are constant in love, but the material world, greed and desire make them confused," Hai Yan explains. "That's what seems relevant - the greed. I tried to make people identify with the two characters because the moment they make their choice I want the audience to make that choice with them. They fail with them. They ponder with them."

Hai Yan, originally named Lu Haiyan, was born in Beijing in 1954. His parents divorced when he was 9, so he didn't complete his middle school education. After four years of military service, he joined the public security department as a police officer. These experiences gave him lots of inspiration for his future writing as they revealed complicated personal relationships and love affairs.

Plain-clothes Policeman (Bianyi Jingcha), his maiden full-length novel in 1986, features the twists and turns of an ordinary young policeman's career and life during the "cultural revolution" (1966-76). The novel sold 300,000 copies and was adapted for TV, becoming an instant hit.

He stopped writing for a while, however, when the public security department transferred him to work at a small hotel. While his career in hotel management developed, he stopped writing for nearly 10 years.

That break gave him time to observe different people at work. Then, in 1994, a TV station invited Hai Yan to write a detective story. He was reminded of the story of a musician who lost a valuable violin while traveling abroad and wrote it up. Then he penned another TV hit, A Story of Romance (Na Yichang Fenghua Xueyue De Shi), directed by Zhao Baogang. Since then, Hai Yan has published novels every year and all of them have been adapted into TV series.

The best-selling writer is not just an author. He used to be general manager of the Kunlun Hotel, one of the country's most prestigious five-star hotels. Now, he is vice-president of Jinjiang Group, to which Kunlin Hotel belongs.

"Literature allows readers to imagine and muse," he says. "In my works, I want to create a dream. Though it is not real, it can still touch your heart and make you feel connected to the story."

Viewing figures show that Hai Yan dramas still sell well. His works not only build a dreamland for audiences but also have helped many young actors fulfill their dreams. Young actors and actresses such as Xu Jinglei, Lu Yi, Sun Li and Tong Dawei have all become stars after appearing in Hai Yan's dramas.

Zhang Lingzhi plays the lead role in Dancer, which is about a couple who find their relationship tested by money. [File photos]

Dancer is getting a lot of attention because of the actors. Starring Lu Hao Jiji, Zhang Lingzhi, and Song Wenfei, the TV series topped the ratings when it was first broadcast last November on Hunan TV. "Most of them were new to acting but the result was good," Hai Yan says.

The actor who plays Gao Chun, Lu Hao Jiji, has got a lot of media attention because he is Hai Yan's son.

"It should have bothered me," Hai Yan says. "I was completely against his decision to be an actor at the beginning because showbiz is so commercial and the competition is cruel. But since he insisted, I agreed."

Speaking of the Hai Yan drama label, he says: "I try to be invisible when I write stories. ... I don't want the audience to categorize the stories. I want them to be pulled in. The background of the characters, such as their jobs and families are just what they do and where they live. What happens in their lives and their attitudes are the points I want to address."

(China Daily August 4, 2009)