I’m in Hollywood

Chapter 121: CAA Apocalypse

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Because of Michael Ovitz's insistence on caa's private partnership strategy, although caa has now developed into a giant in the industry, it has not been listed. Apart from the impact on the business for a period of time, it will not cause too much substantial damage to CAA, and even a wave of second- and third-tier artists poached by other brokerage companies will not have any impact on CAA. Although the current number of artists in CAA has not reached More than 20 years later, there are more than 6,000 people on the scale, but there are also thousands of people. It is a trivial matter for CAA to go to dozens of places.

But under this kind of turmoil, it is different when big-name stars suddenly leave, especially Tom Cruise's level. Tom Cruise has a great influence among Hollywood actors. His departure is definitely It will give a wrong signal to other superstars.

Michael Ovitz's reaction was swift. On the day Cruise left, all CAA's co-managers and signed artists received a letter written by Michael Ovitz, clarifying that Cruise had left CAA. After the reason, I sincerely counted the brilliant achievements of "caa" and the great changes brought to the actors in these years. I hope that everyone will not be influenced by public opinion, and the future of caa will be even more brilliant.

But this letter can't prevent the situation from getting worse. Within three days after Tom Cruise left, several A-level superstars quit CAA for various reasons.

The reason why these stars joined CAA at the beginning was because of Michael Ovitz's series of bundling measures, which greatly increased their income, but with the general increase in the income of Hollywood stars, even in other brokerage companies, what they can get The salary is also very high, coupled with the panic caused by Cruise's sudden departure from CAA, and someone offered a lower commission plan, the departure of these people has become a matter of course. At the same time, more stars also began to waver.

Michael Ovitz was in a state of desperation for a while. While scolding Cruise, he had to put down his figure and personally persuade those big-name actors who wanted to leave. He hadn't done this kind of thing for a long time.

In another corner of the city, Eric, the earliest instigator of this turmoil, will of course not stay out of it. This is a good opportunity, an opportunity to prevent CAA from dominating Hollywood in the next ten years.

"Eric, what's the matter with me all of a sudden, I can declare in advance that I already have four of Al and the others under my command. This is already the limit of my ability. Don't try to force me any more."

Kapoor appeared in Eric's office in Firefly in a hurry and with a red face. Because of the unlucky things that caa encountered these days, it would be hypocritical for Kapoor to say that he was unhappy, and his bald head seemed to shine a little point.

Eric leaned on the back of the executive chair and said with a smile, "What if it's Tom Hanks?"

"Who?" Kapoor pricked up his ears and leaned forward slightly.

"Tom Hanks." Eric repeated.

Kapoor showed a meaningful smirk: "Eric, are you sure, if it's him, then I will definitely make it difficult and add another burden to myself."

"It's still difficult, you're almost laughing, aren't you?" Eric teased.

Kapoor didn't care about Eric's teasing, and asked: "Eric, are you really sure you can get Tom Hanks over?"

Eric shook his head: "No, but I'm going to try. I've asked Hanks to have dinner tonight, and he agreed."

Kapoor is full of confidence in Eric, and this young man has brought him too many surprises: "Eric, why don't you try to bring Cruise closer to uta, he has no agent now company."

"Don't think about it. Mr. Cruise is very ambitious now and wants to be a producer. It is estimated that he will set up his own film production company soon."

Eric also didn't expect that because of his appearance, Cruise would go on the path of his previous life seven years in advance, probably because he was stimulated by the huge sales of his several movies in a row and the huge profits.

After leaving CAA, Cruise immediately asked his agent Paula Wagner to contact Firefly and started a new salary negotiation.

The conditions offered were not as outrageous as CAA's original offer, a salary of 5 million US dollars plus 10% profit share, this price was for Eric who was used to 20 million US dollar film salary and 10% to 20% profit share in his previous life very reasonable. However, the profit sharing model has only just appeared after all. The conditions offered by caa before are completely nonsense in this era. This is the condition when Cruise opened his mouth, which shows that there is still a lot of room for negotiation. Eric made up his mind and wanted to Cruise's share should be increased to 5%.

And he feels that the success rate of this matter is very high, because he got the latest news that Tom Hanks promised to give up the profit sharing model and only get a simple salary.

Although Cruise is a little more famous than Hanks now, the difference is not too much. Once Hanks' salary conditions are exposed, Cruise probably doesn't have much confidence in his heart to ask for a high profit share. It is a question of limitations of the times. Although Cruise tasted the sweetness of profit sharing in "Rain Man", in this era when actors generally do not have profit sharing, his last attempt was more like a special case, as I mentioned before The reason why Cruise was able to get the profit share of "Rain Man" was because the production cost of "Rain Man" was insufficient, and Cruise had to lower his salary. The share is more like compensation for Cruise. The loss in remuneration is just that the box office of "Rain Man" is too good, so the compensation is a bit too much.

And it was only after Eric heard that Hanks gave up the profit sharing plan that he wanted to poach Hanks. He felt that digging Hanks should be the easiest at this time. CAA just vowed to fight for the profit share for him, but suddenly disappeared. It is impossible for Hanks to have no idea. Others may not know it, but Eric knows Hanks' potential. Moreover, the next ten years will be the period when Hanks' acting career will explode. After more than half a century, he became the second person to win the Oscar winner.

Although he said that he was not sure about poaching Hanks, Eric felt that he had more than 90% chance of winning Hanks. Compared with CAA, the chips in his hand were more attractive.

"Okay, don't mention Cruise, Kapoor, actually I called you because of another thing." Eric said, took out a manuscript that he had spent several nights writing, and handed it To Kapoor: "Help me see, how do I sum it up?"

Kapoor took a glance at the title, "CAA Apocalypse: How the Brokerage Giant Was Formed".

Opening the manuscript, Kapoor slowly read it, and his expression became more serious as it went on. After finishing the manuscript, Kapoor slowly raised his head and stared at Eric with the eyes of looking at the monster.

This manuscript is very long, with more than ten pages in total. It describes in detail that after the five-member team of CAA jumped from WMA, they started through TV dramas, used curves to attract stars, and gradually developed a bundled sales system. The process of forming a brand-new and unique business philosophy in just a few years.

The reason why Kapoor was shocked was because of the things mentioned in Eric's manuscript, as the gold medal agent of CAA back then, he could understand it at a glance, and he had experienced most of the operation methods. However, he is not capable of systematically planning these things to form a relatively complete management theory of a brokerage company.

Moreover, he was also curious about how Eric knew this.

The reason why caa insists on not going public is that besides Michael Ovitz's personal business philosophy, there is another important reason, which is to prevent the leakage of caa's business strategy. Once the company goes public, it will have to disclose a large amount of caa to investors Information, then, CAA's advanced business philosophy ahead of other established companies will be easily learned by opponents.

The way a company operates is not something that can be patented. If other brokerage companies follow suit, the advantage of caa will no longer exist.

Swallowing his throat uncontrollably, Kapoor carefully raised the manuscript in his hand and asked, "Eric, are you writing these?"

"Well, I just want to help me see if there are any mistakes in it. By the way, Kapoor, you will not object to me sending this article?"

Kapoor shook his head quickly, and said with a wry smile: "If I had the ability to sum up these things, I would have sent them out a long time ago. Why wait until now. Eric, I can't understand you more and more. What you said above I can understand all the theories, but if I were to end it, I would be completely clueless."

Eric just smiled and didn't explain. Although in this era, CAA's business strategy is full of mystery in the eyes of other companies. An incomplete data can be obtained.

But for Eric, who came from the era of information explosion in later generations, the business strategy of caa is not such a mysterious thing. I remember that in the previous life, around 1996, caa, which had grown into an unshakable behemoth, caused a lot of trouble. Attention of a reporter who spent more than a year and collected a lot of information to completely reveal the mystery of CAA, and the public suddenly realized why Michael Ovitz, the helm of CAA, was named as the The most powerful man in Hollywood.

But at that time, caa had fully grown into a huge monster. Even if Michael Ovitz, who built it himself, wanted to challenge this giant monster, he only ended up failing.

And CAA's agent is completely a part of the huge machine of CAA. They can assist CAA to continue to run forward, but if you want a part to tell the operating principle of this huge machine, you can only get a result of a blind man feeling an elephant. The only person who can fully explain this set of business theories is probably Michael Ovitz himself. Of course, there is one more Eric now.