Chapter 36

Burbank is known as the media capital of the world. The Warner Group's conjoined building is an important part of it. Warner Bros. Pictures, one of Hollywood's traditional giants, is located in it.

Like other companies in Hollywood, Warner Bros. produces a large number of movies every year and has the same stringent censorship system. For every project to be produced, a professional team will analyze and review the script, determine potential risks and market commercial value. These considerations include factual elements such as the category of the movie, the target audience, the performance of previous similar movies, the actors that may appear in the movie, and the director who may direct the movie.

These factors may affect the final performance of the film in commercial revenue.

Perhaps this cannot guarantee the success of the movie, but it can minimize the risk of investment.

After this series of procedures, Duke's "Break into Death Island" was finally placed at the high-level meeting of Warner Bros.

The conference room was quiet. Jeff Robinoff was asking his secretary to distribute documents to many executives including CEO Kevin Trasuha. This was carefully prepared by the pre-research team. data.

Even now, as long as I remembered that he had rubbed with a North American movie project with a box office of over 100 million yuan~9, passing by, he would feel a little regret in his heart. If he could give the young man ten more minutes, say It is forbidden that the "Speed ​​of Life" project belongs to Warner.

Therefore, when Nancy Josephson delivered "Cruise to Death Island" to Warner Bros., Jeff Robinoff was also promoting the review process and asked his subordinates to investigate Duke Rosenberg's best Detailed information.

The information was quickly posted, and someone has opened it. The first page is the director's evaluation.

In Hollywood, there is a procedural or even rigid assessment system for directors and actors.

The criteria for evaluating directors are the three data of the works in the past five years-total box office and single screen, one-week box office-film companies generally use colors to distinguish director grades, blue indicates first-line directors, and red indicates directors who are not good at it. .

Therefore, it doesn't matter how many box offices a director has in the past 10 years. Just look at the most recent 3 movies. As long as a single screen exceeds 10,000 in a single week, then he is a first-line director.

Obviously, Duke, who has only one work, is not in this category. Warner Bros. marked his name in green that represents great potential.

Generally speaking, Hollywood is no different from other commercial companies in North America. Everything is said by data and commercial results.

"There is another piece of information that is not on the data." Jeff Robinoff said slowly, "My people found out that Nancy Josephson delivered "Break into Death Island" to major production companies. Shortly afterwards, Duke Rosenberg filed a sci-fi film code-named "day" and a war film code-named "D-Day" two brief scripts in the Screenwriters Association. Although these don't explain much, I think we should probably Put him in the ranks of Quentin Tastino or Stephen Soderbergh, the most promising director."

"Let me remind you." Executive Vice President Robert Solomon said suddenly, "Twentieth Century Fox has opened negotiations with Duke Rosenberg."

"I have the exact news." Jeff Robinoff did not go to see Robert Solomon at all, and said calmly, "Duke Rosenberg's negotiations with Twentieth Century Fox have reached a deadlock. This is our intervention. good chance."

"Don't forget, he only has one work!" said the man next to Robert Solomon.

"This only work has a North American box office of 130 million U.S. dollars!" another person suddenly said, "The global box office exceeded 200 million U.S. dollars! How many such directors can you find in Hollywood today?"

There is no data on anything and the business results just created are more convincing.

"Our "Batman Returns" has just been released, and it takes time to return the funds." Robert Solomon will not talk about the director himself. The results of "Life and Death" and the script of "Courage to Death Island" are indeed good. These cannot be objections. The reason for this is that "the huge investment in "Death of the Dead" and "Out of the Sky" has not been completed yet, and we lack sufficient cash flow."

"I heard about a situation." Jeff Romanov slightly raised his mouth, "Duke Rosenberg wants to bring money to participate in his film, which can solve some of our funding problems. In addition, Malibu The Aug Film Fund is said to be interested in this project, and we can raise funds from them."

"And I have another idea." He added, "Warner Bros. lacks a close co-director. If this movie "Life and Death" is as successful, then Duke Rosenberg's commercial potential is immeasurable. , His next two works will inevitably become hot sellers, we can sign a 1+2 contract with him, "Courage to Death Island" is successful, we have the priority investment rights for his second two works, if the market is not ideal , Then we abandon him."

At the same time that Warner Bros. was holding a meeting, Nancy Josephson walked into Duke's apartment, and the news that the negotiations with Twentieth Century Fox had fallen into a deadlock was actually released on purpose. Duke is not an unqualified director , Can also attract the eyes of some investors.

"I have freshly brewed coffee here."

Handing Nancy to the sofa in the living room, Duke stepped aside and took the coffee pot. "Would you like to try it?"

"Thank you." Nancy nodded.

Filling the guests with coffee, Duke turned to look at Sophia Coppola, who was flipping through the documents, "How about you?"

"No milk, no sugar." Sophia was also polite, "Thank you."

After the three of them finished half a cup of coffee, Duke sat opposite Nancy and asked directly, "Tell me about the negotiation."

"Twentieth Century Fox values ​​this project more than we expected." Nancy put down the coffee cup and took out an attitude of talking about work. "They agreed that you will be one of the producers, and they will be your director, screenwriter and producer. The three positions of the filmmaker paid a total of 5 million U.S. dollars in remuneration, and agreed that you participate in the investment."

"Isn't this a good thing?" Duke asked strangely.

"But they have additional conditions." Nancy's face is not very good. Obviously Fox's conditions are a bit annoying to her. "Fox intends to use their tax rebate quota on this project. The tax rebate is not included in the movie revenue, which is ours. Unable to share these millions of dollars."

Frowning slightly, Duke made a gesture to continue. This condition is not uncommon in Hollywood, and certainly not the reason for Nancy's irritation.

"Fox will convert the publicity and distribution costs into the cost of the film..."

Announcement expenses are generally not included in the cost of the film. If Fox counts the fees paid by the distributors into the cost, it will definitely increase their investment ratio, thereby diluting Duke's income.

But this is not over yet, "Fox does not agree that our accountant team will participate in the future overseas distribution of the film..."

"What do they want to do?"

Hearing this, Duke asked subconsciously, "Kick us out?"

The cost of overseas publicity is very difficult to grasp the specific figures of funds. If there is no dedicated accountant team to participate in the whole process, the 20th Century Fox will have more than double the report. Duke is very clear that there is a big explosion of information in the past life. Announcement of discounted costs is a special method used by Hollywood companies to deal with foreign investors.

Even in the future Internet information age, Hollywood is notoriously opaque in auditing, defrauding the interests of foreign investors by concealing income, delaying payments, exaggerating costs, and obstructing audits.

Yes, Twentieth Century Fox might not do this on this project. Maybe they think too much, but no one can pin this kind of thing on the conscience of capital.

You know, Hollywood dare to lie to Wall Street funds!

Nancy's words also reminded Duke of another Hollywood-related news he had seen. The most famous is Paramount's "Melrose Platter Plan", which includes Merrill Lynch, Allianz, and JP Morgan Chase. The investment of Wall Street giants was fooled by Paramount through many methods. The two parties also went to court for this. However, because of the complex income of the film industry and the inability to accurately calculate the income from overseas announcements, the lawsuit lasted for six full years. At that time, Wall Street was unable to obtain the desired result.

This group of people who even dare to lie to vampires can count on them to have a conscience?

If his own accountant team does not supervise the whole process, Duke absolutely believes that after the end of this project, the accounts of 20th Century Fox will inevitably lose money!

But Duke also feels strange that Hollywood often uses this trick to deal with foreign investors, but it rarely targets the industry. In particular, Fox's negotiation object is still a senior industry insider like Nancy.

"Fox didn't want to kick you out. Don't forget, you didn't sign any agreement with them." Nancy quickly solved his doubts. "Fox is optimistic about the profit prospects of this project. They don't want you to join the cake. In the ranks."

"So, they increased my personal compensation." Duke understood immediately, "and then use this method to make me quit?"

"It should be like this."

Seeing Nancy nodding, Duke thought for a while and asked, "What about Townsend Rothman? What did he say?"

"This is the condition that Townsend Rothman told me personally."

Nancy's words also shattered Duke's only remaining illusion about Fox in the twentieth century. After thinking from a different perspective, he immediately figured it out. Before, Townsend Rothman admired him and supported "Speed ​​of Life and Death" because it was in line with him and Fox's interests demand, and when he wanted to touch their interests, Townsend Rothman immediately stood on the opposite side.

"They are not worried that I will give up cooperation?" Duke asked again.

"Why should you worry? No other company has reported that they want to establish a project. They have no competitors for the time being." Nancy looked at Duke and said lightly, "Don't forget, you are not a first-line director, but they are twenty. Century Fox!"