Exploiting Hollywood 1980

The joint strike of the two major screenwriters' unions has lasted for several weeks. The most uncomfortable ones now are not directors like Ronald, nor small production companies like Daydream. But the seven major studios.

The reason for this is also very simple. The larger the company, the more it cares about the schedule of film and television production. For a small company like Daydream, if the strike affects the script, it is also very simple, just postpone the filming. Anyway, when it is released, it is mostly released during the off-season or when the box office of big movies is not good.

However, the big productions of the seven major studios are often scheduled one to one and a half years in advance. The impact of the strike is great. And the most uncomfortable thing about this strike is that we don’t know when it will end. It makes it impossible to arrange the production of new films.

The ones who are more uncomfortable than the seven major studios may be the medium-sized studios in Hollywood. If the big studios only suffer from the filming progress and arrangement, then the losses of the medium-sized studios are very real. Their projects often have to raise funds through various financing methods. If they are delayed, they have to pay expensive interest every day.

Moreover, Wall Street is now in a cycle of interest rate hikes and tightening of money supply. After the stock market crash, many Wall Street investment banks have also suffered serious losses. They have begun to withdraw a lot of the delayed film shooting funds. The delays and loan withdrawals have caused many mid-sized company presidents to wail louder than the seven CEOs.

Even worse than the mid-sized studios are the three major wireless TV stations. Movies have a cycle of release, and now the audience can still see movies shot last year. The shooting cycle of TV stations is very short, and one episode per week is broadcast on weekends.

The audience has been watching reruns for more than a month and can't bear it anymore. The monthly advertising revenue loss is already millions of dollars. Moreover, TV drama viewers have no new movies to watch, and they are lost to cable TV networks, which is really digging the foundation of the three major wireless TV stations.

Ten years ago, the three major wireless TV networks, ABC and CBS, accounted for 92% of TV viewers. Cable TV and independent TV stations only had 8% of the market share. Today, the share of wireless TV viewers has dropped to 70%, while the share of cable TV and independent TV stations has risen to 30%.

If this strike continues until June when the new season of TV series starts, the number of audience loss will make all TV station CEOs look very ugly. Audiences who have watched pay cable TV are all high-quality audiences. If they leave, they may not come back.

Cameron Crowe's script was written and improved during the strike, so he could not be signed openly. Fortunately, the two had a close relationship and made a verbal gentleman's agreement. As soon as the strike ended, Ronald's Daydream would immediately sign a contract with Crowe and let him be the director.

There are still various minor problems in the script of "Deep Love", especially at the end, the climax is slightly insufficient. The audience may not be satisfied when they see this. This will hinder the reputation of the movie.

Ronald agreed to continue to discuss with Crowe how to improve the script. The two tentatively decided to talk about the script once a week, and Crowe would go back and revise it according to Ronald's opinions until it was polished.

Another script was sent to him by Nora Ephron, a female screenwriter who met him on the plane. She called Ronald's agent as soon as she got off the plane, and handed a copy of the script to Richard in private.

Now the Writers Guild is catching private transactions like catching thieves, so all secret communications must be done like spies. Otherwise, if you send a script by express or mail it, and other screenwriters find out and report it to the Writers Guild, you will be suspended or even canceled from the union membership.

This tragedy happened to several TV screenwriters two weeks ago. They made private deals with TV stations and wrote scripts for the TV station's evening talk show. As a result, they were reported by their companions and the words "labor scab" were posted on their doors.

The screenwriters who thought they could get away with using a pseudonym not only did not get paid, but also lost the qualification to receive union relief funds. In the end, they could only start to pawn their belongings. One of the unlucky screenwriters even appeared on NBC's TV interview program. Although his face was mosaiced, people who knew him knew who he was. It was reported that he would face disciplinary punishment from the union.

After reading the entire script, Ronald was very interested in this unnamed project, especially if the ending could be changed to a marriage between the two.

In order to further discuss the script, Ronald called Nora Ephron and asked to meet to discuss in detail.

"My friend Rob is having a party, why don't you come? It's all friends, so it's easier for us to talk." Nora Ephron understood what Ronald meant, so she thought of a way to chat privately at the party. In this way, even if colleagues saw it, they couldn't report that two friends who were having a good chat at the party were not.

"Oh, it's you..." Ronald arrived at the party venue, Nora Ephron's friend Rob's house, and found out that this Rob was Rob Reiner, whom he had met several times at the Directors Guild.

After filming "The Princess Bride", Rob Reiner did not direct any new movies, but participated as an actor in his friend Danny DeVito's directorial debut "Throw Mom from the Train".

The leading actor of that movie was Billy Crystal, and his jokes were still worth listening to at the Oscars. Ronald was familiar with both of them, and a group of old friends chatted while drinking light beer at Laina's home.

"So, you two are Jewish?" Ronald looked at the two. They happened to be talking about the "First Great Intifada" that had recently taken place in Palestine.

At the end of last year, a Jewish truck broke into the "Gaberia Refugee Camp" in northern Gaza Province and crushed four Palestinians to death. After that, the PLO exile government Fatah in Tunisia did not make a timely statement.

Some more radical organizations that broke away from Fatah quickly organized large-scale protests in Gaza, the West Bank and East Jerusalem. This time their strategy was very different. They asked many teenagers with stones to provoke the fully armed Israeli soldiers, so that once the other party could not help but fight back, they would be photographed by the camera crew waiting nearby and provided to major Western and Eastern media.

This incident did not cause much waves in the American news. Ronald just saw on the news that the United Nations passed two resolutions, 607 and 608, condemning Israel's violence.

"I don't believe in Judaism. I'm a fucking atheist." Rob Reiner didn't like people saying he was Jewish. He didn't understand how it was already the 1980s, how could anyone still believe that everything in an ancient book thousands of years old was true.

"My dad (Carl Reiner) said that he stopped believing in God after the Holocaust. Where was God at that time? Was he busy playing with zebras and rhinos?"

Rob Reiner did not believe in Judaism, and he also mocked those Jews who adhered to traditions, and their children could not enjoy the fun of opening Santa Claus's gifts.

"I did hold a Jewish bar mitzvah, but it was for the happiness of my relatives on my mother's side. I don't believe in any organized religion, and I only agree with the ideas of Buddhism a little bit."

"He has become cynical since he divorced Penny." His close friend Billy Crystal started to joke next to him to calm down the somewhat outrageous Reiner.

Seeing Ronald looking at him, Kristo smiled and said, "I don't like the customs of the synagogue either. We are all believers in America. No matter who you are, the most important thing in America is success. If you succeed, you are right. Even if you go to church every week and confess to the rabbi that you bullied your classmates when you were a child, this is also the secret of success."

"You are different from other Jews in Hollywood that I have met." Ronald felt that the two very secular Jews were to his taste.

"Ha, of course we Jews from New York are different. I grew up in the Bronx, Billy is a rich man in the Upper East Side of Manhattan, and his father's record company basically invented jazz. Nora's parents are also in the theater, and her father named her after the heroine in Ibsen's A Doll's House. What about you, Ronald?"

It turns out that these are the second generation of New York's literary and artistic circles. No wonder they tend to have left-wing liberal values. The Upper East Side of Manhattan and Long Island in New York are full of such wealthy families.

"You are all rich Jews. I grew up on Staten Island. My parents were pure patriots who fought for Uncle Sam." Ronald laughed.

"I've been to Staten Island. The scenery there is great. Many people have only one lover in their lives, grow old together, and have a lot of children." Rob Reiner suddenly became sad, "Just like my father and mother."

"Why can't we find a lover who will never change his heart?" Over there, Nora Ephron also began to sigh.

"That's why you can write such a script. Many of them are taken from my life with Penny. And you and Bernstein. For example, I met my ex-wife in the store."

No wonder Ronald understood why this script ended with such a sad ending. The two protagonists, Harry and Sally, still didn't get together.

Nora Ephron and Rob Reiner are both frustrated divorcees. And they are the kind of people who want to grow old together but can't.

Rob Reiner's ex-wife is the female director of "Grown Up" played by Diane, Penny Marshall. Both of them are children of New York's performing arts family, and their acquaintances are basically the same, which made the divorce extremely painful.

And Nora Ephron's ex-husband is even more famous, the famous journalist Bernstein who exposed the Watergate scandal. The previous movie "All the President's Men" that reflected this incident, in which Dustin Hoffman played the role of Bernstein.

The scene of Nora Ephron's divorce was even more tragic. When she was pregnant for the second time, her husband Bernstein cheated on the daughter of the former British Prime Minister, the wife of the British ambassador at the time, Baroness Margaret Jayne. It almost caused a political scandal.

Nora Ephron was not easy to mess with. She wrote the script "Heartfire" about her husband's scandal, and finally Jack Nicholson and Meryl Streep put it on the screen. Although the box office was not good, during the marketing, the ex-husband was pulled out and whipped in the media.

Seeing Nora Ephron in painful memories, Ronald thought for a moment, "I have always had a question, you might be able to tell me."

"What's the question?" Now Nora, Rob, and Billy were all interested.

"You said your ex-husband was Bernstein who exposed the Watergate scandal, then do you know who Deep Throat is?"

"Ahaha... Come on, come on, tell Ronald the urban legend you like to tell people the most." Rob Reiner laughed, and it was obvious that Nora had revealed the secret to her friends more than once.

"Hey, this is my own reasoning. I think Deep Throat is the deputy director of the FBI, Mark Felt. I read Bernstein's notebook, which abbreviated Deep Throat to F. I checked all possible candidates. However, only the deputy director of the FBI has the initials F."

"Hahaha, I don't believe it. Is the FBI so amateur? He must have used a pseudonym." Ronald didn't believe it.

"Hahaha, I said the same, Norah, you must have seen too much of Agatha's detective."

Several New Yorkers hit it off immediately, and they chatted about everything. But that's how New Yorkers are. In this kind of chat where everyone expresses their own opinions and even tit-for-tat, you can immediately feel that the other person is also a New Yorker.

The rest of the things will be much easier to handle. This is how we New Yorkers do things. Those rednecks from Los Angeles don’t understand.

"To be honest, I haven't made up my mind to make this movie yet." Rob Reiner said of Nora's script.

Liner opened Castle Rock Prod last year with friends, named after the fictional town in Stephen King's novel.

His dream is not to be taught how to make movies by the executives of big studios, but to make movies according to the ideas of creators and artists.

Liner's first film at Castle Rock, "The Princess Bride," was an unexpected box office success, and they wanted to pursue their idea further.

But unfortunately, there was a stock market crash, and Colombia, which originally invested in it, has now suspended all financing projects. If you rely on your own funds, the risk of investment is relatively high. So Laina was a bit hesitant.

"I can actually invest, but there's only one condition."

"We can talk about anything." Rob Lenner, one of the founders of Castle Rock, became interested. "We can talk about any conditions, but we have signed a distribution agreement with Columbia. We will make 15 movies in three years. The movie is distributed by Columbia. If your company wants to get involved in the distribution business, it must get the nod from Columbia.”

"Hey, my company can't afford this kind of theatrical film distribution. We can only distribute small productions like 'Hairspray', or do video distribution." Ronald shook his head, saying that he didn't want to get involved in the distribution business. All three looked at Ronald, wondering what his terms were. "

"My conditions are very practical. You may think I'm vulgar, but I want the two protagonists to be together at the end of the movie. This is the only way to make a profitable investment."

"Oh? Do you think so? In fact, we don't accept the traditional ending at all. Nora said that you suggested that we watch 'Sullivan's Travels'. We did watch it in college before, and it does make sense."

Rob Reiner was not a layman who only wanted to satisfy artists. He looked at Nora Ephron. In fact, the prototype and many details of this script are based on my own life and Nora's. Both of them are divorced. If it is written as a happy reunion, will Nora have that meaning?

But the two of them were too familiar, and they didn't feel like a couple.

"Do you think we need to invite celebrities? How much is the investment?" Laina is still interested, and it is very beneficial to cooperate with Ronald.

"I think ultimately it will take a popular young female star to play Sally, and then a convincing Harry, like Billy."

"Ha...ha...that's funny. My salary is not as good as that of stars." Billy Crystal laughed. As a comedy star, he has not had any popular works yet. Compared with those popular male stars, his salary may be higher. Only less than half of others.

"I don't dare to ask Billy to act. If the box office is not good and he fails to become a first-class male star as he hopes, I will feel sorry for him." "My mother was thrown from the train" had neither box office nor awards, and it really deceived my friends.

"If there are stars, I think the price of about 15 million can cover it." Ronald reported a figure. Now that star salary inflation is serious, the average production cost of medium-sized productions is higher than before. It has increased in two years.

"You know, I think it's better for our company to sign a strategic cooperation agreement, so that Nora's script is confirmed and we can start evaluating the project. In this way, when the writers' strike is over, both of our companies will have new films that can be quickly put into production. , just in time to be released before the script shortage ends next year.”

Laina thought this was feasible, so he asked Ronald to agree on cooperation first.

"Of course, we let the lawyers sort out the paperwork."

"It's very interesting that you are directing a film about women. I will go to the studio to have a look." Laina was very happy and brought a box of biscuits from the supermarket and opened it for Ronald to eat.

"Aren't you the director?" Ronald picked up a piece and only took half a bite before putting it down. The taste of the candy corn was much worse than that of his aunt's handiwork.

"Shall I do it? I'm actually afraid that directing a work like this will always remind me of the time when I divorced my ex-wife."

"Isn't that very real? Who else knows better than you how it should be acted? If I direct, I will only shoot the ending where the two of them are together." When Ronald heard that he wanted to direct it, he agreed. , it must have a happy ending.

"It depends on Nora's wishes." Laina respects the screenwriter's autonomy, and this kind of thing still has to be left to the screenwriter to decide.

…

Soon, the lawyers of both sides prepared the cooperation framework. Both sides have priority over each other's films. Under the same conditions as competitors, both sides will let the other side invest in their own projects first.

"Your Australian cowboy friend has made Paramount miserable." The lawyer who came to sign the contract was Mickey Kantor, a famous Hollywood lawyer with gray eyes.

"Isn't that still your power?" Ronald laughed.

Paul Hogan, the star of "Crocodile Dundee", was approached by Kantor to confront the domestic distributor Paramount. Paramount Home Entertainment, which had tampered with the sales of videotapes, had to admit under the evidence that it was its own accounting statistics that lagged behind the sales.

Paul Hogan received the generous commission that should have belonged to him and his wife. By the way, he also checked the accounts of the overseas distribution company 20th Century Fox and dug out some box office shares that were behind schedule.

Finally, Kantor helped Hogan solve a small trap in the distribution contract of "Crocodile Dundee 2".

It was written that the sequel must still be distributed by Paramount in America. Kanter changed it to the priority right under the same conditions. If the clause is a dead-end clause, the other party may not release it for any reason, and the third part may not be filmed.

】

Hogan was very happy and called Ronald to thank him. He also said that Ronald could go to Australia to shoot in the future. He is very popular there, and has many connections in the music and film and television circles. As long as Ronald asks for it, he can guarantee resources and give the lowest price.

So, in fact, it is still relying on Mickey Kanter's professional ability and reputation to get a good result. Ronald just recommended a suitable candidate.

"By the way, I still have some business that I need your help with." After Ronald signed the contract, he pulled Kanter to continue talking about business.

"It's the copyright issue of videotapes. I have some movies and friends' movies. I want to buy out the copyright of the videotapes, and then release a better version of the videotapes. By the way, take back the copyright of the videotapes."

"Now the seven major studios have all understood the potential of videotapes. It's not cheap if you want to buy them." Kanter said with a smile.

"It doesn't matter. Money is not a problem. The original box office of the movie wasn't very good, but my colleague analyzed it and thought it might be suitable for videotape."