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Xuân, more commonly known as Red-haired Xuân, is the titular main protagonist of Vũ Trọng Phụng's satirical novel Dumb Luck and its 1990 film adaptation of the same name, as well as the deuteragonist of the 2013 TV series Game of Life, a composite adaptation of Vũ Trọng Phụng's stories. Despite being the main protagonist, Xuân is far from a heroic figure, as he is a pervert who starts off in the lower class but works his way up to the top through cunning.
In the 1990 film adaptation, he was portrayed by the film's assistant director Quốc Trọng. In Game of Life, he was portrayed by Việt Bắc.
Personality[]
At a young age, Xuân already showed himself to be a pervert, as seen when he peeped at his uncle's wife bathing, an act that had gotten him banished away from his home. Having been forced to survive on the streets, Xuân is uneducated and his perverted habit still doesn't change, which ultimately gets him fired from the tennis court. On the other hand, he is much smarter than he lets on, as he has learned the way of life.
Once beginning to work for Mrs. Phó Đoan, Xuân starts to grow more cunning over time. While at first he is shocked at his sudden luck and doesn't know how to utilize it, this soon changes when he realizes that the upper class, despite being different from the lower class he was from on the surface, is ultimately the same thing: it's all about perversion and depravity. As such, he goes from a pawn for the elitists to a manipulator himself, using his cunning to work his way up to the top to great success.
Despite his condescending attitude towards the elitists, Xuân cares for the poor even after becoming rich. He will always try to give his old poor friends money and even delicious food whenever he has the opportunity. He also has a friendship with Văn Minh, the one whose lies served as the foundation to his ascension to the top and one of the only people to know the truth about him.
Biography[]
As a child, Xuân was the orphaned nephew of a farmer. One day, he peeped at his uncle's wife bathing. The uncle caught him and banished him away for such action. With nowhere to go, Xuân became homeless, and had to work in a tennis court. Growing up, Xuân once again peeps at a woman changing clothes and gets caught, but Mrs. Phó Đoan bails him out since she herself is a perverted woman and sees an opportunity in him. Mrs. Phó Đoan then introduces Xuân to the Europeanization tailor shop, and he joins the social reform from then on. Thanks to the advertisements of the smuggled medicines, he earns from the Văn Minh couple the nicknames "Student at Medicine School" and "Doctor Xuân".
Xuân eventually joins the upper class and gets acquainted with wealthy and powerful people, including Văn Minh's younger sisters, Miss Tuyết and Miss Hoàng Hôn. He also manages to seduce Miss Tuyết and discovers Miss Hoàng Hôn's adultery. Additionally, he is also invited by Mrs. Phó Đoan to teach Phước, and by the monk Tăng Phú to be the consultant for the newspaper Striking the Wooden Bell. When Xuân tells the Great-Grandpa, Miss Hoàng Hôn's grandfather, about Miss Hoàng Hôn's adultery, the latter dies out of frustration. Since the Great-Grandpa's death has been long awaited by his family, Văn Minh becomes grateful of Xuân and erases his past records.
Văn Minh then has Xuân register in the tennis competition as the King of Siam comes to Tonkin. Through cunning, Xuân makes the two champion athletes arrested before the day of the competition, allowing Xuân himself to compete with the champion of Siam instead. At the end, for diplomatic reasons, he is ordered to lose. After the competition was over, the crowd protest, so Xuân makes a speech about his "sacrifice for the country". He is then invited to the AFIMA, gets a Legion of Honour, and becomes Grandpa Hồng's (the Great-Grandpa's son) son-in-law.
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Trivia[]
- The novel's original Vietnamese title, Số Đỏ, is actually a pun on his name. As Số Đỏ literally translates into Red Luck, it indicates both his luck and hair color.
- Quốc Trọng was initially tasked to find an actor for Xuân in the film, however he got no satisfying result. As an experienced actor, Quốc Trọng then volunteered himself for the role instead. In order to test his acting as the character, he played Xuân in 3 parts that he liked the most in the novel. After reviewing his acting, screenwriter Hứa Văn Định agreed for Quốc Trọng to play Xuân, which proved to be a success.
- Xuân is considered to be Quốc Trọng's most iconic role, to the point that people keep associating Quốc Trọng with the character. Because of this, Quốc Trọng eventually gave up acting and became a director.