China News Service, Beijing, November 6 (Reporter Lang Lang) Did not talk about the ratings data, nor the gains and losses of awards. At the main forum of the 2026 China Radio and Television Quality Creation Conference, actor Hu Ge took the stage with "The Tree of Life" and talked about three small things.
A traffic jam, a line, a wish. Three little things connect the inside and outside of the story of "The Tree of Life". His path from "acting as a guardian" to "becoming a guardian" also puts an industry proposition to the ground: How deep can the "rooting" of high-quality creations take root?
The picture shows Hu Ge. Photo courtesy
"The Tree of Life" is based on the ecological protection of the Sanjiangyuan in Qinghai. The mountain patrol captain Dorje played by Hu Ge combines the real deeds of the Hoh Xil environmental protection pioneers Jason Suonandajie and Chika Zhaba Dorje. As a Han actor portraying a Tibetan guardian, the challenge is self-evident. Hu Ge said that what supported him to dare to take this role was his personal experience of traveling to and from the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau for more than ten years.
In 2015, on the way from Yushu Batang Airport to Nangqian, he encountered a traffic jam. The local driver told him that Tibetan herdsmen were cleaning the road in front of them, fearing that the passing vehicles would crush the small bugs on the road. More than a dozen cars were waiting quietly, with "calm and bright smiles" on the herders' faces.
"That traffic jam gave me the most concrete and vivid understanding of ecological protection. It was not only my original intention to adhere to public welfare, but many years later, it also became my most solid psychological basis for shaping Dorje."
On the day "The Tree of Life" was wrapped, Hu Ge's last line only had three words: "Check it out." In the play, that was Dorje's unfinished responsibility; outside the play, this sentence was like the character's entrustment to Hu Ge. The day he took off his costume, he immediately started working on ecological protection in the third season of the environmental documentary program "Along the Road".
"The goodwill and perseverance conveyed by the work should not be frozen in the camera as soon as it is completed." Hu Ge said on the stage, "The most important thing for an actor is the unity of knowledge and action."
This is not a pretty statement. During the filming of "The Tree of Life", the crew filmed for 188 days on the Qinghai Plateau with an average altitude of more than 4,000 meters. Riding on snowy mountains, even experienced riders would be frightened by the extremely steep slopes. Actor Yang Zi rushed down on a motorcycle; filming the car chase and shootout scene, Hu Ge was already filming at the end She didn’t have the strength to stand up, so she could only half-squat to complete the shot; filming the scene of rescuing a child on horseback at an altitude of 4,200 meters in Golmud, Mei Ting filmed for several hours in strong wind and sand... In life, the members of the mountain patrol "burned" their lives to protect Hoh Xil; in creation, they also devoted all their efforts.
The third thing comes from the young Tibetan actor Tsaidin Tashi who plays Dong Zhiba in "The Tree of Life". He is from Nangqian, Yushu. He has seen that life in his hometown is getting better and better, and he has also seen that the lifestyle of respecting nature is slowly disappearing. He has always wanted to do something for his hometown.
Invited by Cai Ding Zhaxi, the "Looking for Blue" ecological and cultural development center launched by Hu Ge and artist Han Lili will begin research and site selection in Nangqian in 2025. In March 2026, Miran signed an ecological protection cooperation framework agreement with the Nangqian County Government; on October 15, the Nangqian Nature Service Center was officially opened. This center is designed as a platform for scientific research collaboration, a link for community co-construction, and a window for popular science education to the public.
Hu Ge talked about a detail on the stage. Tsai Ding Tashi’s aunt was involved in the yak hair weaving work at the service center during her lifetime. The day before her death, she sent a message to Tsai Ding saying: She never expected that the skills she had learned since childhood could be exchanged for income. “Her skills were seen and she was needed.” Hu Ge said that this passage convinced him: "Protecting mountains and rivers and all things is also protecting human dignity."
Not long ago, Tsaidin Tashi and his partners took Nangqian’s ecological practices to Yerevan, Armenia, to participate in the COP17 Convention on Biological Diversity conference, showing the world the conservation stories from the plateau.
From "Tree of Life" to "Along the Way" to Nangqian Nature Service Center, Hu Ge combined his three identities as actor, environmental volunteer and public welfare practitioner into one sentence: "It is not a separate identity label, but a fellow traveler on the same road - the ideal in the play falls on the land outside the play."
The theme of this conference is "Creating Classics of the Times and Climbing the Peak of Literature and Art". In Hu Ge's narration, "peak" is not only in the data list, but also in where an actor goes after the series is completed. "On the screen, the characters carry our refined artistic beliefs; outside the screen, the perseverance of stepping on the ground is the truest echo of that belief." (End)
