Unconsciously, it was already dusk all around, and the lights on both sides of the street were on.
Simon looked at the two women in front of him who were dumbfounded and the other hesitant, and could only remind them in a relaxed tone that it was indeed time to go back. Malibu, which is far away in the western suburbs of Los Angeles, is still far away from Burbank. Finally, it was suggested that Catherine should drive. It was too dangerous for Janet Johnston to drive in high heels.
Seeing that Simon was normal and showed no signs of illness, Catherine felt relieved, but she felt inexplicably unwilling to explore Simon's past.
Glancing at her friend beside her who was still rolling her eyes but finally stopped, Catherine felt a little funny again.
I've kept you up all day and finally been cured.
A female hooligan pretending to be crazy meets a real lunatic from a mental hospital, tsk tsk.
After stuffing her friend into the passenger seat, Catherine also got into the car. After hesitating for a moment, the woman told Simon, who was standing outside the car window, to contact her if he had any difficulties before starting the car.
Turning the car around at an intersection not far away, Catherine finally nodded to the big boy on the side of the road, slowly stepped on the accelerator, and the burgundy Ford sedan gradually merged into the city traffic at dusk.
Watching the two women's cars drive away, Simon picked up the backpack on his shoulders and turned to leave.
Simon bought a map of Los Angeles city from a nearby store, sat down at an outdoor seat at a street fast food restaurant, ordered the cheapest dinner, and started to look at the map.
Because he inherited the memories of twelve other people, Simon discovered that not only those professional skills, but also about Hollywood, or the entire Los Angeles, from human geography to entertainment gossip, all kinds of information for decades, Simon was simply All understood.
It seems that I still have the potential to be a paparazzi.
Thinking so amusingly, Simon easily found the location of the WMA headquarters on the map.
Camino Street is located not far from the intersection of Wilshire Boulevard and Santa Monica Boulevard, the busiest streets in Beverly Hills. Nearby is Century City Park, where media companies gather, and the 20th Century Fox studio is located there. , the WMA’s arch-rival CAA headquarters is also not far away.
After marking the location of the WMA headquarters, Simon found the address of the Writers Guild of America's headquarters and also circled it casually.
The waiter brought the dinner, Simon filled his stomach, paid the bill and walked out of the restaurant.
Then I started to worry about how to leave Burbank.
In the 1980s, there were no buses or subways in Los Angeles. Taxis were also very few and needed to be booked by phone.
After wandering the streets for more than half an hour with a sense of luck, Simon finally failed to find a taxi willing to take him. Simon realized that he had underestimated the lack of public transportation in Los Angeles, and regretted not having the nerve to ask Catherine to give him a ride. .
There was no choice but to stay in a hotel in Burbank.
Early the next morning, with the help of the hotel owner, Simon booked a taxi over the phone. After some bargaining with the driver who arrived, he finally paid $15 with a tip before the driver sent him to West Hollywood on the other side of the Santa Monica Mountains.
Standing on the side of Melrose Avenue, although there was still a long way to go before the destination, in order to save money, I had no choice but to leave. Fortunately, Simon had a whole day. Following the map, we walked south along the nearby north-south Fairfax Avenue that intersects with Melrose Avenue for more than 20 minutes, and arrived outside the Writers Guild of America (WGA) building.
Naturally, Simon didn't come here to join the Writers Guild. He didn't have such qualifications yet. He mainly came here to register the copyright of the script in his backpack.
Under federal copyright law, in theory, a creator automatically acquires copyright upon completion of a work. But in reality, once a legal dispute occurs, whether copyright registration has been carried out becomes a very critical piece of evidence.
In the United States, there are many ways to register copyright, and there are even some private registration agencies.
The most authoritative of these is naturally the Copyright Office. However, due to the notoriously low work efficiency of U.S. government departments, when submitting registrations to the Copyright Office, creators may have to wait four to six months to obtain a copyright certificate, and the review process is as slow as Outrageous.
Therefore, in Hollywood, registering copyright through the WGA has become the first choice for most screenwriters.
Prepare the materials and registration fee, and you can basically get the registration certificate on the same day.
Of course, there are also disadvantages to registering with the WGA, that is, it will only save registered materials for creators for five to ten years, and renewal will be required upon expiration. However, registration with the Copyright Office is permanent, and you can get more complete protection even if there is a legal dispute.
After some consideration, Simon chose to submit all two completed scripts for registration.
The registration fee for a single script is $20, and the cost of two scripts plus printing materials once again drained Simon's wallet a lot. After leaving the WGA building and thinking about the afternoon meeting, Simon made another copy of the script for "The Butterfly Effect" and then picked up an electronic watch that cost less than $2 at a roadside stall.
After doing all this, it was already past noon.
After simply buying a piece of food to fill his stomach, Simon rechecked his wallet. Yesterday's $198 had quickly dropped to less than $97.
A little helpless, but not too panicked.
The worst case scenario would be to live on the street, and the possibility of starving to death is still very low. At worst, he could find a church to get some free food stamps.
The agreed time was four o'clock in the afternoon. To ensure nothing went wrong, Simon arrived near the WMA headquarters half an hour in advance.
The WMA headquarters building on Camino Street is a very modern-looking glass-and-steel structure building. Although the floors are not high, it looks quite impressive compared to other mediocre commercial buildings around it. There is also a small small building in front of the building. Plaza, these undoubtedly show WMA's outstanding status in Hollywood at this time.
Just before four o'clock, Simon entered the WMA headquarters five minutes early.
I explained my purpose of visit to the company receptionist, and they called me. After a moment, a white young man who looked less than thirty years old came out. The young man was wearing a professional white shirt and black trousers. He was tall and thin, with gold-rimmed glasses and dark brown hair parted meticulously. He looked polite and polite.
The two briefly introduced each other, and Simon knew that the other person's name was Owen Wright and that he was Jonathan Friedman's assistant, and then he followed the other person toward the inside of the building.
Walking through the spacious corridor next to the glass curtain wall, Simon found that the WMA employees around him were either walking in a hurry or frowning, and some people had a slightly wary look in their eyes after noticing his unfamiliar face.
Simon was not too surprised by this situation.
According to the information he knew, the WMA was going through a very serious turmoil in recent months.
In the first half of this year, WMA chairman and CEO Maurice Stoller and president Stan Kamen passed away.
The job vacancies caused by the death of two core executives not only caused a power struggle within the company, but also brokerage companies such as CAA and ICM took advantage of the turmoil in the WMA to unceremoniously start poaching employees.
Especially after the death of Stan Kamen, the top Hollywood agent's top stars such as Al Pacino, Warren Beatty, Barbra Streisand, Goldie Hawn, etc. all jumped to CAA. This incident directly damaged the vitality of WMA.
Simon followed Owen Wright to the outside of an office and waited for a moment in the lounge. A middle-aged white man with slightly gray hair opened the door and walked in from outside.
The middle-aged man looks to be in his forties or fifties, wearing a gray suit. He is not too tall, just over 1.7 meters tall, has a thin build, deep eye sockets, a broad nose, black hair, and a typical Jewish appearance.
In fact, Friedman is clearly a Jewish surname.
"Sorry, I just finished a meeting." Seeing Simon get up, Jonathan Friedman walked straight towards him, looked at Simon lightly with a gentle smile on his face, and stretched out his hand to him politely, saying: "So, Simon Westeros?"
Simon nodded, shook hands with the other person, and said: "Hello, Mr. Friedman, nice to meet you."
Jonathan Friedman nodded in response and then made a gesture of invitation.
The two walked into the office next to each other, and the middle-aged man said while still getting acquainted: "This is the first time I heard the surname 'Westeros', so I remembered it immediately. Simon, this is your advantage. In Hollywood, it’s not easy to be remembered.”
Simon just smiled and said nothing.
Jonathan Friedman motioned for Simon to sit down across from the desk. After he sat down, he relaxed his arms on the table, crossed his fingers casually and looked at the young man opposite.
Height is about 180CM, very standard.
He has an angular face and brown hair. He doesn't have the childishness of a teenage actor and is very photogenic.
Wearing a black T-shirt and jeans, he is dressed simply and plainly, but he has a calm confidence that surpasses his peers, which is very attractive to the opposite sex.
The potential embryo of a popular niche.
There is the potential to develop into a Tom Cruise type, and the recent box office hit "Top Gun" has really attracted too much attention.
However, this boy is a screenwriter.
Jonathan Friedman suddenly didn’t have much expectations anymore.
A good screenwriter requires experience. Jonathan Friedman does not believe that a young man in his twenties can write any outstanding scripts. He even doubted whether this young man understood how to write a formal Hollywood script.
In fact, Jonathan Friedman was not familiar with Catherine.
Aside from occasional encounters at Hollywood parties, the two men's most recent encounter was when one of Friedman's clients was vying for the leading role in a film Catherine was about to direct.
It is for this reason that Jonathan Friedman only agreed to today's meeting after receiving a recommendation call from Catherine, which was a favor to the beautiful woman who had a certain say in the film's casting.
Jonathan Friedman’s original plan was that if the person introduced by Catherine was good, he would casually recommend the person to WMA’s literary agency department. After all, even a first-tier screenwriter in Hollywood often does not bring as much income to his agent as a second-tier actor. He has no plans to personally represent a screenwriter. If it doesn't work, the favor is sufficient anyway, so there's nothing wrong with rejecting it directly.
But at this time, seeing Simon himself, Jonathan Friedman already had some thoughts on sending Simon away as soon as possible. He was just promoted to the vice president of WMA this month, and the company has been in a mess recently. At this time, he is not in the mood to deal with a young man who is so ambitious.
Of course, Jonathan Friedman didn’t express this sentiment. He has always believed that to be an excellent agent, it is necessary to maintain a humble attitude at all times.
After a brief inner evaluation, Jonathan Friedman's tone remained gentle, with some encouragement and expectation, and said: "So, Simon, tell me about your script first?"