Last night I was disturbed very late by some tiny noises, and in the end I even wondered if it was my hallucination. When I was brushing my teeth, I looked in the mirror. Fortunately, there were no dark circles under my eyes, otherwise I would have been really embarrassed.
The time is seven o'clock in the morning.
Saturday.
The weather in Park City is still cold in January, but the house is warm as spring.
Leaving the bedroom, he guiltily slowed down and glanced at another door not far away. He must not have gotten up yet this time.
When I came downstairs to the living room, I was shocked.
Simon was already sitting on the armchair by the fireplace, talking on the phone. Janet curled up in his arms like a kitten, squinting her eyes. She was only wearing a long pale pink woolen sweater, and her two dazzling white long legs poked out from the hem of the dress unscrupulously, looking extremely springlike.
She stood blankly at the stairs for a few seconds. It wasn't until the man nodded to her that she realized what she was doing. She walked over and sat down on the sofa next to her as if nothing had happened.
But my heart was sour.
After he kissed her neck in the car that day, although there was no other close contact after that, she naturally thought that the two of them were somehow involved.
Now.
Janet could curl up in his arms without any worries.
But Jennifer could only sit next to him, still feeling a faint sense of guilt as if she had stolen something from someone else.
Simon chatted with the other person for a while, then put down the phone and asked Jennifer: "How was your rest last night?"
Some blushing sounds appeared in Jennifer's mind again, her eyes moved to the side, and she nodded calmly: "Very good, you, um, who were you calling just now?"
"Ed McCracken, CEO of Silicon Graphics," Simon said, and then explained: "I suddenly realized something last night. There is no need for me to rely on others to produce 3D animation and CG special effects. On the acquisition of the company. If I want to do this, I can recruit people and form a team myself, which is cheaper and can control the development direction of technology more flexibly. Silicon Graphics Company supplies professional graphics to many universities, enterprises and R&D teams Workstation, I happen to have connections in this area, and I just asked McCracken to help me introduce some people.”
Jennifer listened to the man absentmindedly, but suddenly realized something. She raised her eyes and looked at Simon and said, "Did you think of this last night?"
Simon nodded: "Yeah, what's wrong?"
Before Jennifer could answer, Janet, who was shrinking in Simon's arms, couldn't help laughing.
Simon also figured it out in the blink of an eye. Looking at Jennifer who was blushing, he had to add: "Actually, I had already had this idea when I left Pixar headquarters the day before yesterday."
Jennifer felt even more embarrassed. She stood up and said, "I'm going to prepare breakfast" and fled to the kitchen.
Simon watched the female assistant disappear in a hurry. He patted Janet, who was still squinting in his arms, and said, "Baby, would you like to go to the bedroom to sleep? Be careful of catching a cold."
Janet put her hands around Simon and said coquettishly: "You carry me over."
Simon carried Janet to the bedroom on the second floor, put her on the big bed, covered her with a quilt, and said, "Go to sleep. I'll call you when breakfast is ready."
Janet huddled in the bed, but after hearing this, she blinked at Simon: "You can finish breakfast with her and then call me."
Simon smiled and pinched the woman's cheek, helped her gather the quilt, and then went downstairs again.
While still on the stairs, Simon heard the phone ringing and came to the living room. He happened to see Jennifer coming out of the kitchen, probably to answer the phone. Seeing Simon, the female assistant immediately shrank back, like a frightened deer.
Simon smiled helplessly and walked over to pick up the phone. The call came from New York, and it was already working hours on the East Coast.
After Westeros Company began to reduce its holdings of New World Entertainment shares yesterday, the company's stock price fell directly from $16.75 at Thursday's closing price to $13.25 at yesterday's closing price.
New World Entertainment's shareholders and executives, who were still secretly waiting for Simon's initiative to contact them, couldn't sit still. Early this morning, New World Entertainment's major shareholder Larry Copping rushed to visit James Raybould in person. At this time, he was talking to Simon in Raybould's office.
After buying New World Pictures from the king of B-movies Roger Corman in 1983, after several years of mergers, expansions, and reorganizations, Larry Copping and his other partner Harry Sloan still maintained the Has more than 40% stake in New World Entertainment.
During the phone call, Larry Copping said that they were well aware of Simon's intentions and expressed that they were happy to see the deal come to fruition and hoped that the two parties could formally start acquisition negotiations.
Even based on yesterday's closing price of US$13.25, New World Entertainment's market value still exceeds US$330 million, which is still not something Westeros can afford.
What's more, once the two parties officially start negotiations, New World Entertainment's stock price will definitely rebound again.
The main difficulty facing New World Entertainment is lack of funds. If Simon agrees to start acquisition negotiations for New World Entertainment, those Wall Street capital who want to kill Westeros will definitely not allow the company's operations to have problems.
At that time, it will definitely be too easy for New World Entertainment to obtain working capital to get out of trouble.
Therefore, it is also very obvious what Larry Coupin is thinking.
As long as it can maintain contact with Simon, a major financial backer, New World Entertainment has a good chance of overcoming the current difficulties regardless of whether the final deal is reached or not. Of course, Simon couldn't get married, so he simply dealt with the other party on the phone and left the matter to James to handle.
After breakfast, Simon rushed to the city with Janet and Jennifer at nine o'clock to attend the premiere of a movie called "The State of Dreams", which Robert Redford also studied at Sundance. Served as executive producer on films funded by the company.
Simon also had a few words with "Place of Dreams" director Michael Hoffman at a party at the Redfords last year. Since this is the first feature film directed by himself, Michael Hoffman's narrative techniques are not yet mature enough. However, Simon really liked the film's cold lens that explores disillusionment and confusing reality.
The premiere of "The State of Dreams" ended. Simon, Robert Redford and others left the Egyptian Theater and were planning to go to a nearby restaurant for dinner.
As soon as everyone went out, they were surrounded by a group of reporters.
Simon didn't pay too much attention at first. After hearing the reporters' questions, he realized that these people were targeting him.
It turns out that this morning, the WGA announced the nominations for the new Writers Guild of America Awards. Simon's three films from last year, "La Lola Run," "The Butterfly Effect" and "The Last Day Out," were all ignored and didn't receive a single nomination.
Among the three movies, although the plot concept of "The Butterfly Effect" is very novel, the film received a very low reputation from film critics last year, so it is natural that it was ignored by the awards. As for "The Deathly Hallows", this plasma thriller will not win the award. Nominated.
Therefore, "Run Lola Run" can be said to be Simon's main contender for awards during this year's awards season.
Prior to this, due to his age, the media generally predicted that Simon would be more likely to win the most important award at the most important Oscars during the awards season, which is Best Screenplay. The three films Simon wrote last year all made the top ten at the box office of the year, and he deserves this award.
The main voting members for the Oscar screenwriting awards are concentrated in the Writers Guild of America.
Now, the WGA has completely ignored "Run Lola Run", and it is impossible for Simon to win any more screenwriting awards at the next Oscars.
Returning to the resort apartment in the afternoon, Simon also received more detailed information from Los Angeles.
At the nomination press conference, when asked by the media, George Cogo, chairman of the WGA Western Chapter, explained that "Lola Run" focused too much on form and lacked content, so it failed to meet the award nomination standards.
Simon just laughed it off. He didn't expect that because he refused to join the WGA, the other party's "killing stick" would be so obvious.
However, after a brief discussion, Simon just asked Pat Kingsley to make some cliche remarks about respecting the WGA's choice.
Simon himself doesn’t care about awards, but there’s no way he wouldn’t consider a film produced by Daenerys Films.
Ultimately, the entire awards season is a game, everyone is in the game, and if you want to be rewarded, you must abide by the rules.
Therefore, although some media with a keen sense of smell noticed the fact that Simon was not a WGA member and used it to consider the fairness of the WGA nomination, Simon did not make any response to this.
End of a bustling day.
In the evening, Simon, Janet and Jennifer sat on the sofa together by the fireplace in the resort apartment, each holding a script in their hands.
Robert Redford sent two large boxes of scripts today. Simon plans to return to Los Angeles tomorrow afternoon and will attend the premiere of another movie tomorrow morning, so he can only use his spare time in the evening to read through these scripts. .
After the premiere of "The State of Dreams," Simon has agreed to finance another film by Michael Hoffman called "Sisters," about a college student who travels to Canada to visit his girlfriend in a bizarre family. Interesting things.
Janet was holding the script at this time, leaning on Simon and reading with gusto.
Jennifer was a little absent-minded. There was nothing wrong with her last night. Everyone rested quickly after returning from the party. But tonight, we are in this strange town among the mountains, surrounded by ice, snow and cold, in a quiet resort cabin, with a man and two women.
This atmosphere is so weird.
The weirdest thing is that the other two guys looked completely unaware.
I don’t know how long it took, but the phone rang suddenly, finally breaking the atmosphere that made Jennifer feel uncomfortable. She raised her head and saw that Simon had already picked up the phone, said a few words to the other party, and then hung up again. Telephone.
Janet was a little dissatisfied with the atmosphere just being broken. She squeezed Simon and asked, "What's going on?"
Simon picked up the script again and said with a smile: "The Lord of the Rings is ours."
Janet curled her lips: "It's 10 million US dollars. It would be abnormal for Zaenz to refuse."
Jennifer was still unaware of the communication between Simon and Saul Zaenz last night. She was a little disbelieving when she heard the words: "$10 million to buy the rights to the "Lord of the Rings" trilogy?"
"Yes, but as long as you know, don't tell anyone."
Jennifer still had surprise on her expression and just nodded.
Janet smiled and stretched out her little hand to scratch Simon and said, "This sheep is very fat, Janet, do you want to touch it too?"
Jennifer blushed slightly and pretended not to hear Janet's words.
Janet rolled her eyes, stood up and walked over. She pulled Jennifer, who had not yet reacted, to stand up and return, pressing her down where she was. The woman ran to the other side of the sofa and squeezed Simon towards the middle. , sat down again.
This is a couch facing the fireplace. It's not very big, so with three people sitting down it suddenly seems a bit crowded.
I don't know if it was because of the fire in the fireplace, but Jennifer felt the breath of the man next to her, and her face suddenly felt a little warm. She didn't know what she was feeling in her heart. After hesitating for a while, she still didn't run away. She cautiously stood next to the man and pretended to be calm and focused on the script again.
Simon was still thinking about the next thing to win the copyright of "The Silmarillion" in one go. He didn't expect Janet to do this suddenly, but he just smiled and said: "It's only two, which is a bit less."
"Little bastard, how many more do you want?"
"Of course, the more, the better... Ah, don't pinch."
“Jenny, pinch him too.”
Jennifer raised her arm eagerly, and when Simon happened to look over, she shyly shrank back. After the two of them had fun for a while, she randomly found a topic and asked Simon: "Have you chosen any script? "
Simon shook the script in his hand and said, "This is good."
Jennifer looked sideways curiously and found a string of numbers, 3000, written on the cover of the script.
Well, "3000", what does this mean
Simon sensed her curiosity and took the initiative to explain: "This is a black drama, telling the story of Vivian, a street girl in Los Angeles, who agreed to accompany a rich man for a week for $3,000. However, I plan to change her into a A romance film.”
Jennifer frowned slightly when she heard the term 'street girl', and quickly said: "A romantic movie, like, um, "La Traviata"?"
Simon nodded and said: "That's right."
Janet also said at this time: "In this case, it must be a tragedy. If it were a work by Xiao Dumas, maybe someone would be interested. In modern times, who would be interested in a love tragedy about a street girl?"
"I didn't say I wanted to change it into a tragedy. Of course, the ending is that the prince and the princess live together happily." Simon shook his head, glanced at the script in his hand, and said with a smile: "I also thought of another name for this story. , ‘Pretty Woman.’”
The "Pretty Woman" that I remember happened to be adapted from a dark drama called "3000".
Simon did not expect to see this story in the script recommended by Redford. Whether it was the name of the screenwriter J.F. Lawton or the content of the story, it fit very well with "Pretty Woman". But if you think about it carefully, the Sundance Institute happens to provide a training and development platform for new directors and screenwriters. The black drama "3000" script also echoes the style of the Sundance Film Festival. I straightened it out and got this script at this time. , it’s not too much of a coincidence.
After "Run Lola Run", if "Pretty Woman" comes out of Sundance again, Park City will definitely be more lively in the future.
On the sofa in front of the fireplace, Simon felt the two women beside him, thinking about the good things that would come in pairs tonight when he got "The Lord of the Rings" and "Pretty Woman" in succession.
perhaps.
Park City is truly its own blessed place.