Exploiting Hollywood 1980

"Why did you let the director of photography Kimball tamper with the film? Although it protected Tom's interests, it was very disrespectful to Ronald." Nicita said to his wife Paula, who was sitting opposite, while smoking a cigar.

Ronald called her before and said something very serious, implying that he should control his wife. This trick went beyond the norm and greatly damaged the atmosphere of the crew. Next, Val Kilmer will not continue to abide by the unspoken rules, and the competition will expand to those areas that Ronald does not want to go to.

"I know, I know, I originally wanted to control the matter between me and Kimball, so that Ronald might not find out, so it would not affect our relationship. Who knew that he guessed it quickly, and he tricked me into telling the truth."

Paula smiled bitterly. Ronald actually didn't know who did it, so he tricked her to see the reaction. She was captured by his aura and accidentally let the response reveal that it was she who planned the overexposure incident.

"I will apologize to him in person, Paula. I don't understand. Ronald is one of us, and he will appropriately reduce Val Kilmer's role. We have this tacit understanding.

What is the reason for you to do this? I know you are a smart person. This is not good for Tom, because Kilmer will also use tricks next, which is not good for Ronald, and even more not good for us."

Paula sat in Niceta's arms, hugging her husband's neck. The two of them went through hardships and paid a great price to become a couple. They really love each other.

"Of course I won't be so stupid. You expect Ronald to favor Tom in editing. This is of course good, if Ronald can really get the right to edit."

"What do you mean?"

Paula felt her husband's body stiffen. Now Ronald is his most profitable director, driving the future of many actors. So does this mean that you are not optimistic about Ronald's ability to guide editing?

"I have my own news channel, Rick. Val Kilmer is loved by Paramount CEO Frank Mancuso. He personally praised Kilmer at a high-level meeting and suggested signing him with multiple film contracts."

Nicita remembered his wife's Jewish identity, and the reliability of this news should be very high.

"And he didn't mention Tom at the high-level meeting. The most important thing is that he praised Kilmer's height and praised his appearance in line with the traditional appearance of male stars since the golden age of Hollywood. He also said that he would praise him in the same way as he praised Cary Grant in the past."

Nicita put down the cigar and was silent for a long time. It seems that Mancuso really wants to interfere with the filming and editing of the crew.

Frank Mancuso is a fool. A fool becomes a CEO without knowing it. He is very confident in his judgment of Hollywood. If he wants to interfere in the production business, it will inevitably bring a series of disasters.

There are news from various channels that Mancuso wants to restore the old way of doing things at Paramount, signing male stars to take the lead in big productions, creating scripts around them, and then from directors to script supervisors, all are workers on the assembly line.

This approach that goes against the historical trend will certainly not succeed. This is not the era when studios shoot fifty films a year. Technicians can schedule production like an assembly line. If the director is not obedient, they can ask the editor to re-cut and then replace him.

Today's Hollywood studios are more like venture capital funds. They see that the projects led by producers, directors, or stars can bring box office, and then bet on them. What everyone competes for is vision and the ability to control key people, not to bypass them and end up on their own.

Paula's approach did protect Tom Cruise's interests to the greatest extent, but Ronald's interests were damaged. If Ronald and Tom were not friends from childhood, they might have fallen out at once.

But Paula is one with her husband after all. After thinking for a while, Nicita slowly raised her head and said to Paula in her arms:

"You should withdraw from the negotiation of the contract renewal with Ronald. For the next contract, you should not be his agent."

...

Ronald did not continue to work on Sunday as he did when he was a director before, but took a rare day off during the shooting period. He and Bruckheimer came to the addiction treatment center to meet Don Simpson.

"You are in good spirits," Ronald saw Don wearing sunglasses and lying comfortably by the swimming pool to bask in the sun.

"There are many actresses here, I know a lot of them, hahaha."

"Don, we didn't come to you to chat..." Bruckheimer told Simpson in detail what happened in the crew.

Don Simpson listened to them talking about Val Kilmer's stealing the show, "This is all caused by Frank Mancuso's old brain. You continue to shoot, I guess after you finish the scenes that don't involve fighter jets, it will be time for Kilmer to make trouble. By then, I can recover and go out to play the role of the bad police again."

"Why? The scenes at the base and the studio will take another month to finish."

Don Simpson shook his head. He had seen the scenes where the leading actors in the crew attacked each other by any means, which would be very ugly at that time.

"Val Kilmer has no solid evidence to prove that someone is behind this, and he himself is not clean. Besides, he doesn't have many scenes to play next. I think only after the scenes not involving fighter jets are over, he will compete for those particularly brilliant appearances in the fighter cockpit."

Ronald was relieved when he heard Don Simpson say that. With this "bad cop" coming forward, the relationships in the crew could be straightened out. It was the first time for him to find a star to act in a play, and it was really uncomfortable for them to interfere with the creation of the crew at any time.

"Your girl named Demi is good, she is courageous, she has seen the situation clearly, and dares to bet. To be honest, she is very suitable for Hollywood..."

"Oh, shxt", Ronald remembered that he had forgotten Demi Moore in the motel for several days. He quickly said goodbye to the two producers and went to let her out.

"Do you think Ronald can withstand Mancuso's pressure when the crew switches to shooting fighter flight shots? Will Mancuso forcefully intervene in the subsequent fighter shooting? He is not good at business, but he is good at power struggles. Even Eisner was squeezed out by him to Disney."

After Ronald left, Bruckheimer expressed his concern to his partner, "The main reason we invited Ronald to come is his aesthetic ability to shoot fighters. If Mancuso wants to use Val Kilmer's incident to make trouble and ask for a replacement, we have to protect Ronald."

"Don't worry, I don't need to come forward." Don Simpson looked very good. He seemed to have really gotten rid of his addiction after recuperating in the rehabilitation center until now.

"The Navy is so cooperative because of Ronald's very strong connections. Mancuso wants to intervene in the crew and fire Ronald to replace him, but he will hit a big nail. Do you think the Navy will still provide convenience to the crew at that time?"

"Demi, are you okay?" Ronald rushed to the hotel reserved by Little Bud, and Demi had been waiting for him here for three days.

Little Bud strictly followed Ronald's instructions, booked a cheap hotel for Demi, gave her two hundred dollars in cash, and watched her in the hotel.

Demi was very well behaved these days. She did not go home to reunite with Emilio, but waited for Ronald in the hotel.

"Don't worry, I won't touch that stuff anymore. I want to be a star. I saw the big star Farrah Fawcett in it. She has become... It's unlikely that she will act again." Demi took out the cash and wanted to return the remaining one hundred dollars to Ronald.

"Take it. I owe you a favor this time." Ronald pushed her hand back. "I think you are not short of money now. I will remember and recommend you when there is a suitable opportunity."

Demi Moore saw that she had achieved her goal and took the small luggage bag that had been prepared long ago from the bedside. "Thank you, Ronald, but you still have to lend me some money. I don't have any clothes this time. Emilio and I lied that I was traveling in Europe, so I have to buy some clothes to bring back."

Ronald took out his credit card and handed it to Little Bud. "Take Demi to a clothing store in West Hollywood. Five thousand, no, less than ten thousand dollars. Don't call me."

"Thank you," Demi rushed up and hugged Ronald happily and kissed him.

...

Sure enough, as Don Simpson and Niceta expected, Val Kilmer did not make a big fuss during the remaining filming time. In addition to the daily tricks of stealing the spotlight, and various ways to compete with Tom Cruise, and entertaining the actors one by one, he was quite cooperative.

Tom Cruise went to Ronald with Paula and apologized to him in person. Cruise repeatedly assured that he didn't know about Paula's tricks. He was confident that he could beat Val Kilmer without these tricks, after all, Ronald was his buddy.

Paula apologized generously and said that she would focus on being Tom's agent and would fade out of Ronald's agent business.

Ronald, who had met with Niceta in advance, also forgave Paula. He asked him not to use tricks before the filming of "Top Gun" was completed.

Tom Cruise's confidence was not without reason. His handsomeness and ability to mobilize the audience's emotions were slightly better than Val Kilmer. If Ronald had been in charge until the filming was completed and the final editing and music, Tom would definitely attract more fans than Kilmer.

The filming at Miramar Base soon came to an end. The crew was here, and there was only one shot of a fighter jet flying over the tower to be filmed.

This was the only fighter shot that the crew shot in advance before focusing on the air combat shots, because the tower of Miramar Airport was needed.

Ronald found consultant Pete Pettigrew to discuss it together. Before he entered the conference room, he was arguing with a few old colleagues from the real gun flight school outside the door.

"You don't know the style of these Hollywood people. If I hadn't stopped them, they would have made the movie into a musical or a fighting movie."

Pete said to his old colleague excitedly, his voice was so loud that it could be heard inside.

"Pitt is a bit bullied by both sides. Those instructors have a lot of opinions about him. They think that the shots we shot are too ridiculous. Real fighter pilots can't fly like this."

The one who spoke to Ronald was Lloyd Abel, an F-14A pilot with the call sign "Bozo". He will also serve as the crew's flight consultant in the subsequent air combat shooting and design the air combat scenes together.

"Why? Why?"

"This shot you made today let the F-14 Tomcat pass through the tower at high speed. If it was really shot at high speed, all the glass on the tower would be shattered. And any fighter pilot who dares to do this will be punished and ordered to retire dishonorably."

Bozo laughed.

"We're making a movie, so we need some gimmicks."

"Actually, I really want to do this. I will retire from active service in the second half of the year and fly a civil airliner." Bozo said his destination with a bit of melancholy.

"When you go to civil aviation, don't pull up high G, otherwise the passengers will be vomited by you." Ronald remembered his glorious deeds of making Tom Cruise vomit.

"Hahaha, I'm not really stupid."

"I never asked you, you seem to be fearless, as a naval pilot, is there nothing that scares you?" Ronald asked.

"There are still some", the fool said without hesitation, "What we are most afraid of is landing on an aircraft carrier at night. Every time my heart beats, it feels like it's going to explode."

"Oh?" Ronald was about to ask, but Pete Pettigrew persuaded his old colleague to leave and walked in through the door.

"You're here too, great. Let's talk about this maneuver. Low altitude, low speed, force the wings to fold, but don't really break the tower glass."

"That's what I thought," Idiot continued, "The low speed during the leap will also make it easier for you to shoot."

Ronald nodded. He had to listen to the consensus reached by the experts.

"Okay, I'll go find the pilots at the base and see who is willing to fly." Pete turned around to find the pilots.

"Uh..." Idiot raised his hand and put it down again, "Forget it, I won't argue with the young people. Anyway, I'm about to retire."