Made in Hollywood

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In the days that followed, Duke had more conversations with Zach Snyder, who took advantage of his off-duty time to pull out some of his commercials and scenery clips, as well as some of his work on several advertising teams. In the work diary he made, Duke also recognized him to a certain extent.

After accompanying his mother to a dinner hosted by the Lauder Group, Duke returned to Los Angeles. He first went to the Writers Guild to register as a member, and at the same time filed the script in his hand, and then negotiated with Nancy Josephson. After careful consideration, it was not until the time entered June that he signed the name of the brokerage contract of ICM.

At the same time, the second script he completed was also handed over to Nancy, and that was what the agent did.

Speed ​​of Life also came to its eighth week of release in North America. During the intense summer season, the film's potential was almost exhausted. The single-day box office had already dropped below $300,000, and the number of theaters it showed had also been reduced to There are less than 400 theaters, and most of them are remote theaters. Mainstream commercial theaters have more choices in summer.

However, the film's North American box office cumulative has reached 124.78 million US dollars!

This is the second North American film to break 100 million at the box office this year except for Instinct. More importantly, after half of 1992 has passed, Speed ​​of Life has temporarily become the highest-grossing film in North America this year!

In the past time!

As the controller of CAA, Michael Ovitz glanced coldly at the people sitting on both sides of the conference table, We made a major mistake in our work. The movie of the case slipped out of hand, and it failed on Alien 3!

His raging anger burned directly at Lovett, who was sitting at the end of the conference table, Why did Duke Rosenberg sign Nancy Josephson instead of you? You know a million-dollar box office club director who What does CAA mean?

Also, don't give him a big role anymore, that stupid Rick Solomon of yours! Michael Ovitz seemed even more angry, Look at his hilarious performance in Alien 3, it's almost like Circus clowns make no difference!

Lovett shrank his head, not daring to say a word.

During this time, Lovett has felt that his position in the company has quietly changed. In the past, he was the most dazzling newcomer in the company, and was even known for his precise vision. Now... He feels that he may be sent back to send and receive at any time. room.

Thinking of this, Lovett regretted a little, regretting that he did not use the resources in his hands and the resources that CAA could use to snipe Speed ​​of Life and Death.

However, this is also to think about, Lovett is very clear that the company will not risk a face-to-face with Fox to touch the works produced by Lucasfilm, which side of CAA and George Lucas and the Star Wars series More important to Fox, this is a question that simply does not need to be answered.

Originally, Lovett also wanted to become one of Mel Gibson's co-agents, but now it seems that there is no hope.

Martin... Michael Ovitz over there spoke again, Is the cinema still unwilling to extend the screening period of Alien 3?

Yes.

As the project director of Alien 3, Martin Bob's tone was filled with uncontrollable loss, Four weeks after the film was released, the North American box office was less than 35 million US dollars, and the Emperor Cinemas and AMG Cinemas have already sent Fox. An ultimatum, the film can stay in their theaters for up to two weeks.

CAA's packaging strategy is not without failures, but in the series Alien, which has a very high reputation and audience base, it has encountered such a failure, which will inevitably affect their further promotion of the packaging business.

It was also during this time that Twentieth Century Fox ushered in a new round of personnel changes. With the super sale of Speed ​​of Life and persuading George Lucas to restart the Star Wars series, Townsend Rothman was in a fierce battle. After the internal competition, he got his wish and sat in the position of CEO of Twentieth Century Fox.

In Townsend Rothman's newly renovated office, Duke's new agent, Nancy Rosenberg, is making a statement.

Townsend, do you think the script isn't good enough? Or is Duke's performance on Speed ​​of Life unconvincing?

Sitting on the chair in front of the desk, Nancy leaned forward, showing a slight sense of oppression, The final North American box office of Life and Death is likely to reach 130 million US dollars, which can definitely be ranked in this year's The top ten or even the top five! And Duke's new script completely continues the thrilling, hot, exciting, and even more profound ideas of Speed ​​of Life and Death, which is the genre Duke is best at, and Speed ​​of Life and Death also proves this. One point, there's no reason why it won't work!

Looking at the script on the desk, Townsend Rothman admitted that it is indeed better than the script of Speed ​​of Life, but an excellent script may not turn into a big-selling movie, not to mention the estimates after Duke's script, The cost of this film is much higher than Speed ​​of Life.

Faced with tens of millions or even millions of dollars in investment, any company would be cautious.

Nancy...

After thinking for a while, Townsend Rothman said, I am also very optimistic about this script, but you know, 20th Century Fox has strict project approval review, I will push the script to enter the review stage as soon as possible, and the final result is that you and Duke has to wait.

Hearing this sentence, Nancy leaned forward against the back of the chair, which was actually the result she wanted.

As a senior agent, she certainly knows that it is not a simple matter for any movie to be approved by a film company. The bigger the company, the stricter the review will be. The script written by a well-known Hollywood screenwriter is sent to the six major or second-tier production companies. , it is normal that the review results cannot be obtained for several months.

The reason why she said so much to Tom Rothman was that she wanted the other party to speed up the process and enter the actual project negotiation stage.

Of course, Duke and Nancy wouldn't hang from a tree in Fox.

After leaving the Fox Building, in just one week, Nancy used herself and ICM to make appointments with directors of Paramount, Touchstone, Universal Pictures, Warner Bros. and other companies, and sent the script to these companies. In the hands of the giants, and with Speed ​​of Life and Death as the base, Duke's new works will not be piled up on the desk waiting to be moldy even if they do not attract attention.

Although there are many people who are interested, no company has made a promise easily. No company will make a decision without taking measures such as risk assessment and preliminary market research. It's not much use to make promises.

Because of the complex composition of shares in Hollywood companies, whether it is the six major companies or a few second-tier companies, the CEO may not have to work too hard to veto a script, but he does not have the power to independently decide on a movie project.

The most typical is Warner Bros. They have an eight-member project approval review committee. Scripts or projects that can enter the review stage must be cross-reviewed by seven of them. After obtaining a majority vote, the eighth person will review it. , if it can still be passed at this time, it will be submitted to the company's top management, and a decision will be made after discussion.

If there is a CEO or other high-level executive who jumps out of the review committee to make a decision independently, the board of directors of the group company or film company can immediately initiate an accountability system and ask him to leave.

Even if it is an independent film, if you want a single independent item, the degree of cumbersomeness will not be much better than that of commercial films.

Of course, if an investor is willing to take the bait and take on two-thirds or more of the investment in a project that is already favored by some people in the film company, this process will inevitably be greatly reduced, such as Duke's mother Lia Luo Senberg on Speed ​​of Life.

Even so, Mrs. Leah first signed a $2 million guaranteed share with Lucasfilm. Regardless of whether Speed ​​of Life succeeds or not, Lucasfilm will not lose money, so that Speed ​​of Life will not lose money. Project approved.

People who knew Mrs. Leah's investment, such as Anne Spielberg, laughed at her for being dizzy, but no one said that anymore, especially when Duke heard rumors that after his mother returned to Los Angeles from New York, she had I met Annie Spielberg at a party, and the other party not only took a detour, but also all exited early.

Fortunately, the only people who knew about this little dispute were Duke and the others, and neither he nor his mother liked to talk much, otherwise Annie Spielberg would definitely lose face in the circle.

Time slowly turned to the end of June, and the box office of Alien 3 did not show any improvement. After only six weeks of its release, it was forced to go down by the North American Cinema Alliance. In the end, it only received more than 45 million US dollars at the North American box office. The cost was not recovered, and the impact of the film not only cost 20th Century Fox, but also caused them to temporarily shelve another CAA package project, Interview with the Vampire.

Speed ​​of Life, which was released four weeks earlier than Alien 3, stayed in theaters for an extra week. The film's North American box office will exceed the $130 million mark, and finally stop at $130.02 million, although Nuns Are Crazy, which was released last month, is catching up fast, but the film still temporarily maintains the honor of No. 1 at the North American box office in 1992.

With the release of the film, under the strong request of Lucasfilm, the production, investment, distribution and other aspects of Speed ​​of Life are all ready to divide up their own piece of cake.

According to the relevant regulations in North America, if a film is shown for a long time, after 28 days of release, the cinema will pay the first share to the distributor, and the subsequent share will change with the agreement and the release time. Within a week, the publisher gets all the box office share.

However, when the money is in the hands of the distributor, it is unknown when he will pay it to the producer and other investors.

Especially for those individual producers, it is not a procrastination for the distributor to delay for half a year and a year. Even the six major companies with the best reputation, there are endless cases of default and delay in payment, and the case of the Delaware Commercial Equity Court is even more serious. are countless.

In other words, never overestimate the ethics of Hollywood companies.

This is why Duke is looking for production companies or well-known producers, just like when 20th Century Fox faced Lucasfilm, they would never lose tens of millions of dollars for small.