The time has entered December, and the third week of "Scream" was released. Although Thanksgiving has passed, thanks to its popularity among teenagers, the film still earned a box office of 13.56 million U.S. dollars, and the cumulative box office in three weeks reached 52.11 million. Ten thousand U.S. dollars.
Relatively speaking, "Jedi Boys" released by Firefly Headquarters, although it received a box office of 42.57 million US dollars in the first week, made people overjoyed, but because it maintained a box office decline of more than 40% for two consecutive weeks, the box office of the film fell to 15.6 million in the third week. The U.S. dollar, compared with "Scream", does not have much advantage. With the weak weekly decline curve of "Scream" of about 20%, this low-cost thriller may even have a big impact on "Jedi Wars" in the fourth week. "Police" achieved a box office lead.
However, although the box office curves are very different, there is no suspense for the two films to break through 100 million at the North American box office in the next few weeks. As the two films, the production cost does not exceed 20 million, and the total cost of production and distribution is about 30 million. The North American box office exceeded 100 million. These two films were undoubtedly the dark horses at the box office at the end of 1995, while the box office of the other films released in the same period was only within 30 million US dollars in three weeks. Even if the corresponding film companies did not lose money, The profits obtained are far from being comparable to "Scream" and "Bad Boys".
The unexpected success of "Scream" played a very obvious role in promoting MGM's December stock issuance plan.
At present, several major film companies in North America have basically completed their transformation and integration into media groups. Even Columbia and Universal are backed by large multinational groups, and their business scope also involves all aspects other than films. However, MGM, which has been struggling with operating difficulties and debt quagmire for more than ten years, is still limited to pure film production and distribution. After the copyright, its strength has greatly increased. MGM wants to issue additional shares, and it is estimated that it cannot even find an investment bank to undertake the business.
Still, with Charlie's Angels, 007, Mission: Impossible, Night at the Museum, Resident Evil and the recent box office success of the Scream series, MGM's December stock The additional issuance was extremely smooth, and the additional issuance plan of a total of 70 million shares was fully subscribed within a week of the official issuance.
Normally, when a company implements additional stock issuance, the stock price tends to show a downward trend. However, due to the positive stimulus from the box office success of "Scream", MGM's stock price not only did not fall, but reversed within a week. After the completion of the additional issuance, MGM’s total share capital reached 435 million shares, and its market value reached a new high of 6.873 billion U.S. dollars. With the huge amount of US$1 billion raised in this additional issuance, MGM has completely got rid of the current situation of shortage of funds, and the huge debt of US$1.7 billion can no longer pose too much threat to it, and the company has officially entered a healthy development track.
Burbank, Firefly Group headquarters.
Kelly Hines knocked on Eric's office door and walked in.
"Eric, this is the casting information for "Sex and the City" that has just been sent from New York. They have reduced the number of candidates to eight."
Eric motioned for Kelly to sit down, and lowered his head to open a few actor profiles in his hand.
After Candice Bushnell disagreed with Elizabeth Hurley as the leading actress, Eric delegated the casting to AE Network's programming department.
However, during the casting process, Eric casually added several heroines from the original version to the audition list. At this time, when he opened the audition results from New York, Eric was surprised to find that the heroine given by the crew Among Carly Bradshaw's two candidates, Sarah Jessica Parker was still elected, and the other candidate surprised Eric even more, Mary Louise Parker, the single poisonous mother in the original time and space .
Just looking at the names, people who don't know may even think they are sisters, but Eric knows that the two have no relationship at all.
In the character evaluation column of the role form, Mary Louise Parker's comment reads: With many years of Broadway stage performance experience, she is skilled in acting, has shrewd and cunning eyes, but is not lacking in style, which is very suitable for the heroine Carly Brad Xiao's identity as an urban female writer.
Because of the type of drama and the relationship between the era, Eric's impression of "Single Weeds" is much stronger than that of "Sex and the City". Mary Louise Parker's role in "Single Weeds" is like a wolf Surrounded by worms, tigers and leopards, the unscrupulous little sheep struggled to survive. What Eric remembered more was the series of cute and innocent little eyes in the other party's black, bright and pure eyes.
Kelly, who was sitting opposite Eric, noticed a strange smile on the corner of his mouth for no reason, and asked curiously, "Eric, what's wrong?"
"Ah, no," Eric shook his head, crossing Mary Louise Parker's profile.
Although between Sarah Jessica Parker and Mary Louise Parker, the latter makes Eric look more sensible. But because of the deep memory of "Single Poison Mom", Eric was unable to bring Mary Louise Parker into the heroine of "Sex and the City", not to mention that the original heroine has already appeared in the final candidate list , Eric no longer does superfluous things.
After confirming this matter, Eric looked through several other candidates, but this time he did not find any acquaintances.
After sending the information to Kelly, Eric said: "The heroine is Sarah Jessica Parker. I don't care about the other three heroines. Let Annie and the others decide for themselves."
Kelly asked suspiciously: "Eric, don't you need to watch the audition tape, maybe it will be delivered tomorrow?"
Eric shook his head: "No, since they've narrowed down the candidates to eight, these people must be very suitable."
"Okay, then I want to go out."
Kelly packed up the materials and was about to leave when Eric stopped her: "By the way, Drew is holding a party at Pointe Manor tonight to celebrate the successful issuance of shares and the box office success of "Scream". Do you want to come over?"
Kelly stopped in her tracks, turned around, shook her head, and said with a smile, "I'm afraid not tonight. I promised Nina that I would take her to the movies."
"Oh, forget it, I won't delay you from being a good mother."
"Hehe, if it's okay, I'm going back to the office."
Kelly smiled and left Eric's office, but within five minutes, she turned back.
"Erik, Xinxian called and said that the English version of "Red Fan District" co-operated with Golden Harvest has been completed. You mentioned it earlier, do you want to watch it now?"
Eric nodded, looked at his watch, and said to Kelly: "Let them get ready, I'll be there at three o'clock."
"Okay." Kelly nodded and exited the office.
After finishing some of the work in hand, Eric got up and went to the filing cabinet in the office to find a script before three o'clock, and then left the office and walked towards the projection room of the office building.
After several years of development, the original New Line Film Company has been fully integrated into the Firefly system. However, under Eric's arrangement, the New Line team still adhered to the original production strategy, and at the same time did not cut off some cooperation with Golden Harvest Film Company on the other side of the ocean.
"Red Fan District" is another film that Golden Harvest is trying to break into the North American market. Golden Harvest is the main investment in the production. New Line only participated in a small part of the investment and provided relevant assistance during the filming process, so it obtained the North American distribution rights of the film. . The film was completed last year and has been widely released in Asia. However, the North American release is scheduled for Easter next year.
Although the North American box office of "Red Fan District" of more than 30 million U.S. dollars in the previous life was converted into more than 200 million Hong Kong dollars, which made Golden Harvest overjoyed, but Eric didn't care too much. Popular warm-up effect.
At this time, another script in Eric's hand was the focus of his plan.
This is a script written by a screenwriter named Ross Lamanna. Although Ross Lamanna seems to be unknown, this script is well-known in the original time and space because it is called "Rush Hour".
At this time, the "Rush Hour" script is just an old-fashioned and simple dual-protagonist criminal action genre film, which is different from the current "Bad Boys" and previous "Beverly Hills Cop" and "Lethal Weapon" etc. The series are very similar, and even the protagonist is not 100% sure to use Asians, and the plot is also far from the original.
However, Eric is only interested in the rough outline of the script. As for the detailed plot, he can modify it according to his own ideas in the future.
There is also a small episode worth mentioning. Ross Lamanna, the screenwriter of "Rush Hour", also wrote another script called "Titanic", which also revolves around the story of that big ship. Of course, this script has nothing to do with the project that Cameron is filming. Originally, some film companies were interested in this script. However, after Firefly released Cameron's version of "Titanic" This script was completely ignored.
When he came to the screening room of the headquarters building, besides the person in charge of New Line, Eric also saw several Asian faces, but he didn't see the leading actor.
"Mr. Williams, let me introduce you. This is Jonny Lee, the producer of "Red Zone", and Chen, the manager of the actor Jack." Seeing Eric approaching, the new line The person in charge introduced several people to Eric.
"Mr. Li, Mr. Chen, hello, welcome to Los Angeles," Eric shook hands with the other party, and then said: "Then, let's watch a movie first."
The producer surnamed Li said enthusiastically: "Of course, Mr. Williams, I believe you won't be disappointed."
Everyone didn't talk too much, and walked into the screening room together.
Eric had already seen this movie in his previous life, of course it was the Mandarin version. Now, watching the specially translated English version, there is of course no problem in understanding the lines. Compared with the original in memory, he finds it very interesting .
After the movie was played, Eric patiently listened to the introduction of the release plan by the person in charge of New Line, and just nodded, not intending to intervene. Instead, he handed the script of "Rush Hour" to the person in charge of New Line and the actor's agent separately.
"This is a script I saw by chance. I think this story is slightly modified, which is very suitable for Jack. I have written the detailed revision opinions on the script. However, I think that if it is filmed, Jack Cheng must have a lot of personal ideas. , So, Mr. Chen, you can take it back and discuss it with him, and if you are interested, we can sign the contract immediately."
Although they also got a few pages of the script, Golden Harvest's producer found that Eric didn't mention what they meant. He looked at Jack Cheng's agent and thought about it, but he still didn't speak immediately.
However, Jack Cheng's agent was overjoyed when he heard Eric's words, and said, "Mr. Williams, you mean that if Jack is willing, we can sign the contract immediately?"
"Of course," Eric nodded with a smile: "If everything goes well, I hope the film will be released by the end of next year."
Mr. Chen asked again: "Then, Mr. Williams, I wonder if this film is produced by New Line, or by Firefly Headquarters?"
Eric said: "New Line, but, Mr. Chen, several labels under Firefly, whether it is New Line, Firefly or Disney, the difference is only the type of film production, so you don't have to worry about the film being produced by New Line. , will be treated differently.”
Although he really wanted to cooperate, Mr. Chen continued to ask: "Mr. Williams, what about Jack's salary?"
"Hehe, let's discuss it with New Line," Eric said with a smile. Although Ai Rui also thought about letting the other party sign three low-priced film contracts in one go, but after thinking about it carefully, there is no need to do such a loss. After all, a win-win situation is the best way to cooperate.
After watching the movie, it was almost five o'clock. After talking about "Rush Hour", Eric handed over the follow-up work to the New Line team, and hurried back to Angle Manor by car.
"Scream" has entered its fourth week, and once again earned a box office of 10.65 million US dollars. The total box office has reached more than 62 million. With the arrival of the next Christmas schedule, it is believed that the box office of the film will rebound to a certain extent. Breaking 100 million is only a matter of time.
Coupled with the smooth implementation of MGM's stock issuance plan, the girl pestered Eric for a while, and was allowed to hold a celebration party for MGM's recent good situation at the Angle Manor.
Eric returned to the Angle Manor. It was already past six o'clock, and guests had already begun to arrive in the manor.
(To be continued.)