Exploiting Hollywood 1980

Tom Mount, the president of Universal, met Ronald and accompanying Niceta in his office.

At the age of 33, Mount became the president in charge of production of one of the eight, no, seven major studios. Mount is now very proud. He took this position at the age of 27. In the past few years, he has personally initiated, produced, or provided financing, and has produced more than 100 films in total.

He has great confidence in various types of movies that are popular nowadays and predicts the profit level in advance.

Ronald, who was welcomed in by his secretary, noticed that on the wall of his office was a replica of an interview page from an issue of Time magazine, mounted in a wooden frame. In the exclusive interview, Mount is called a young tycoon (babyogul), and he is a hot and powerful person in Hollywood.

The young Mount has a very good demeanor. The handmade suit with metal buttons looks closer to the body than Ronald's. It should also be much more expensive. Maybe it is a tailor from Savile Row in London.

Mount, who had dealt with Niceta a lot, stood up and hugged him.

But Ronald still stretched out his hand to shake his hand. He had met David Lynch once before, but maybe the busy CEO had forgotten about him. Just use the etiquette of first meeting.

"You must be Ronald, please sit down. Please bring us two cups of coffee, can you add sugar?" Mount shook Ronald's hand warmly and asked his secretary to bring coffee to them.

The three of them sat down and Mount asked, "Ronald, tell me what this movie in your mind is like."

Ronald knew that the first critical question came today. For directors who have just debuted and have no experience in directing feature films for theaters, the most important thing for producers to interview them is to examine, discover, and evaluate the other party's directing level through questions.

Simply put, tell me what kind of scenes you can produce by directing the on-set technical team and actors.

"I wanted to make 'Fast Time' into a movie about growing up as a teenager, reflecting the living conditions of high school students in California. When the audience sees it, they will feel that these high school students are so real, as if they are in the high school next door go to school.

Therefore, the background of the movie is realistic, the tone is a slightly exaggerated light comedy, and the five main student characters represent the six typical types of students today. "

Ronald spoke the words he had been practicing for a long time, and he took out a cardboard board from his briefcase with six categories written on it on colored paper cards.

"They are

The eldest brother Brad, who always looks for life experience from books,

Stacy, the little sister who is full of imagination about the opposite sex,

Linda, the social queen who pretended to be mature and invented a perfect boyfriend,

Mark, the nerdy 'mouse' who is too shy to date girls,

Mike, who comes from a poor family and does whatever it takes to make money by talking,

And Spicoli, who is ignorant but good at surfing and maintains his childlike innocence. "

Ronald pointed to the portraits of the six characters on the cardboard and the character traits written in words next to them, and explained to Mount.

"Oh, you draw very well. Do you have any considerations for classifying characters like this?" Mount picked up the cardboard and looked at it carefully.

"Yes, I have considered it," Ronald replied.

“American high school students have different physical, intellectual, and character development speeds. Students in the same year can have very different abilities in these three areas, giving the impression that students are not in the same grade.

You must know that the author of the novel, Cameron Crowe, once went undercover a few years after graduation, and no one discovered his true identity for a year. "

"Their development levels are also distributed differently in these three items, so they will present several typical characters. For example, a nerd with a poor body but a good brain; another example is an athlete whose body is relatively developed compared to his brain...

Various differences can show different levels of popularity in high school social circles. For example, a beautiful social queen, or a transparent person with basically no social circle...

All these character archetypes are deeply engraved in the minds of young audiences. As long as you can see this type of character on the screen, you can think of your classmates and friends around you.

This can greatly enhance the audience's involvement and allow them to integrate into the atmosphere of the story as quickly as possible.

…

Of course, a large part of these ideas should be attributed to Cameron Crowe, the author of the original novel. The above are some of my views on the finished film. "

Ronald talked for more than 20 minutes, and Tom Mount listened carefully.

In particular, he was very interested in the six different types of high school students. He held the cardboard in his hand and kept watching.

"Very good, Ronald. I have a general understanding of your idea for the film. Niceta showed me a few commercials you directed, which were impressive, but you have no experience directing a 90-minute feature film. I Why do you believe in your ability?"

Ronald knew his weaknesses very well and had been prepared for it long ago. “Although I have never directed a 90-minute feature film, I have worked on Roger Corman’s crew and shot low-cost productions. The method has its own understanding.

Later, on the Famous crew, I handled a lot of relationships with actors as a crew assistant, and I knew how to stimulate actors' acting skills.

As for the camera scheduling and understanding of the overall atmosphere of the film, I think Mr. Mount, you have seen several of my series of advertisements, and the atmosphere is very unified. You can judge for yourself my ability to translate the script into the audition language. "

"Very good, what do you think about casting?"

"I used to work at the New York Academy of Acting Studios. My view on roles is: to ensure that adults can work 8 hours a day and have acting skills, as close to the real age of the characters as possible.

I think the closeness here mainly refers to selecting actors with temperaments similar to high school students. As for the real age of the actors, it is not very important."

Ronald knew that this question seemed to test the casting ability, but in fact it was a test of the cost control of low-cost youth exploitation films.

"Very good, Ronald."

Tom Mount asked some more questions to test Ronald's directorial scheduling and stimulate the actors' acting skills. Finally, he nodded with satisfaction and said to Ronald:

"I appreciate your directorial intentions and your use of language to express your thoughts on the language of the film audition. Especially the classification of this role, can you keep it for me to take a look?"

Ronald glanced at Niceta and saw that she nodded slightly, so he agreed happily.

"When can we complete the contract?" Niceta finally asked Mount the most important question.

"We still need to meet some potential candidates. If their performance is not as good as Ronald's, we may sign at any time in about two weeks." Mount touched his nose and said.

"Two weeks?" Ronald repeated.

"Any problem?"

"No, no problem at all." Ronald thought that he had to stay in Los Angeles for these two weeks, so he called back to ask for leave from school. Generally, New York University will support students to participate in the crew work and will also give corresponding credits. If you become a director, they will not stop you.

Nicita and Ronald said goodbye and left the office.

After confirming that the two had left, Tom Mount picked up the phone and dialed a number.

"Hello," a woman's voice came from the phone.

"Ronald is very strong... I have a role classification table here, which is his invention. You can come and take a look."

At the same time, Ronald got into Nicita's BMW in the parking lot.

"How was my performance?" Ronald asked as soon as he sat down.

"Oh, it's perfect. I can't help but be overwhelmed by your preparation, Ronald. I can't think of any reason not to choose you. There shouldn't be a better choice for this $3 million production."

"Why? Do you think Mount has other choices?" Ronald asked nervously.

"Of course, there are always choices in this industry. We often say that it's not what you know, but who you know. It's always true in the film industry.

But your performance is very good. Logically, you shouldn't consider other things. Besides, you are a newcomer and can only ask for a salary of $100,000. At this level, I can't think of a newcomer who is better than you."

Nicita still felt a little strange, so she pulled the car over, got out of the car and made two or three calls to the phone booth to confirm.

"Any news?" Ronald, sitting in the car, was actually waiting anxiously.

"No, we haven't heard of any strong candidates yet. But two weeks is really strange."

"Why?"

"If it's a veteran director who needs to wait for his time, Mount could tell us who it is. Newcomers are very weak in front of veterans. We can only pray that the competitor has other better options or asks for a salary that exceeds the budget."

Ronald nodded, "What if the opponent is a novice like me?"

"That's even more impossible. Since he is a novice, how can he be qualified to let someone of Tom Mount wait for him for two weeks?" Nicita felt that this was a questionable place, but he couldn't analyze and judge without further information.

However, he has found several insiders, and if there is clear news, he should know it first.

"In this case, why don't we think about him and find a place to eat something?" Ronald asked. After working hard to sell himself for an afternoon, Ronald felt a little hungry.

"No problem, I know a good steak house, I'll treat you today." Nicita started the accelerator and drove to a restaurant on the edge of Hollywood.

"I have a question. If you don't feel comfortable answering it, you don't have to answer it, Rick." Ronald sat in the passenger seat and opened the window a little, letting the wind blow in through the gap and onto his face.

Today's interview was over. It was a bit like a dream. He needed a little sense of reality to remind himself that he had realized his dream of being a director. He had done everything he could. The rest depended on God's arrangement.

"Go ahead, what's the question?" Niceta replied.

"Tom Mount is only 33 years old. Last time, Richard told me that Shirley Lansing, the president of 20th Century Fox, was not even 35 years old. How can such young people become the presidents of the seven major studios? Are they geniuses?"

"Genius?"

Nicita smiled, "I don't know what a producer genius is. In this industry, there are director geniuses, actor geniuses, and other technical geniuses such as photography, but what is the genius of a producer?"

"Then why can they become presidents? Can you tell me?"

"The virtue of an agent is not to speak ill of others behind their backs. But you see that the men are handsome and the women are retired actors. What do you think they rely on to become presidents?" Nicita asked back.

"I know, it must be their unparalleled sense of humor."

"Hahaha..." Niceta laughed, "Ronald, you are becoming more and more like a Hollywood director now."