Chapter 1132 1132 The Smoke of Gunpowder Rises Again

This lunch was originally intended for the audition for "Mission Impossible", but it ended in stiffness. Steven didn't respond to Hugo's advice, and neither of them said anything more. After a hasty lunch, the two ended their meeting and parted ways.

Hugo sighed lightly. He was indeed a bit of a nosy today. He had crossed the bottom line. After all, he and Steven were not friends of the same generation. Originally, he simply thought that he didn't want a unique and charming label like DreamWorks to disappear into the long river of history in such a bleak way. Steven and the others established DreamWorks with the concept of "independent studio". For this Hollywood has a huge contribution, he hopes that DreamWorks can wake up the importance of the distribution department at the beginning of its establishment, so as to avoid the ultimate destruction.

But Hugo had forgotten that, in Steven's eyes, he was just a young man under 30 who knew nothing about running a production company. On the contrary, his own talk is more like overreaching. If he thought about it from another perspective, Hugo would also feel that what he said just now was too self-righteous.

The recent smooth life has made Hugo lose his vigilance. From the Michael Jackson incident, Hugo should understand: he is not the savior, he cannot change everyone's future, in fact, even his own future is full of Not sure, what qualifications does he have to "save" other people?

Hugo patted his head and warned himself to be clear about his position in the future: he became a senior partner of Endeavour Elite Agency, but it did not mean that he was already a member of Hollywood management players. For now, he is still just a singer and an actor.

The reason why Hugo mentioned MGM just now is because MGM is the closest to the future model of DreamWorks, and the predicament that MGM is facing is also the closest to the future of DreamWorks.

There is no need to say much about the glorious history of MGM. This is the most successful film company in the history of Hollywood, no one. But after entering the 1960s, MGM went from bad to worse. It changed hands several times between various consortiums and suffered many hardships. Although the 1980s had a short resurgence, it was still unable to withstand the historical trend. Finally, it was acquired by Sony in 2005. , completely disappeared in the long river of history and became a subsidiary of Sony.

MGM has its own distribution channels, but with the rise of TV, they have not kept up with the pace of history. In the face of the strong rise of the TV industry, the plan chosen by MGM is not to follow the pace of the times and enter the TV industry. Instead, all bets are placed on the wide screen and big productions. Therefore, after the 1990s, when the cable TV channel and video tape market boomed, MGM's distribution channels lacked the final profit link. The distribution business they have to hand over to Warner Bros.

Real people in the industry know that compared to the box office, the video tape market, cable movie channels, movie peripherals, including the online market that has risen strongly after the 21st century, are the real money-making parts of a movie. Because the movie box office needs to be shared by theaters, production companies and distribution companies, but all these subsequent benefits belong to the movie companies. To be precise, it belongs to the film distribution department.

The lack of a distribution department almost means giving up all the major interests.

So, MGM is ultimately unsustainable, even if they still put out a lot of good works, but because of a "Windtalkers (Windtalkers)" will cause financial difficulties, and eventually have to enter the auction ranks.

MGM had distribution channels in US theaters, but because of the lack of international distribution channels and other related distribution channels, it eventually became a thing of the past. And how can DreamWorks, which has no distribution channels at all, create miracles?

Although the current situation of MGM is not as bad as after the 21st century, the industry has actually noticed the decline of MGM, because in the 1980s, MGM launched "West Side Story", "Flying Over the Cuckoo's Nest", "Graduate" ", "Rocky" and "007" series of movies and many other excellent works, but the market share is still only a pitiful 6%, and after entering the 1990s, it is even more exhausted.

Otherwise they wouldn't have rebooted the James Bond franchise some time ago, and they'd go to great lengths to hype it up.

When Hugo mentioned MGM, he was undoubtedly a wake-up call to Steven.

But Hugo forgot his measure, he was facing Steven, not Leonardo. Hugo could only put the matter behind him and warned himself not to get carried away.

The day after Hugo and Steven met, the Orange County Chronicle broke the news that Hugo was about to join Steven as a producer in his next work. Since Steven has no new directing plans recently, more energy is concentrated on DreamWorks, but his name as a producer can be seen in many works, such as the TV series "Emergency Room" which was broadcast in September last year. Story", another example is "Casper", which has been scheduled to be released in May.

Therefore, the news of the "Orange County Chronicle" immediately attracted a lot of attention. With the personal friendship between Hugo and Steven, coupled with the excellent cooperation between the two, people couldn't help but start looking forward to the new work.

But less than three days later, the "Daily News", a local newspaper also from California, broke the news again that Steven met Hugo this time as a lobbyist with two works, one from Columbia Pictures. "Men in Black", one is "Mission Impossible" from Paramount Pictures, these two projects are obviously big, and both hope that Hugo can play the leading role, relying on Hugo's current strong box office appeal Fight for next year's summer season.

Hugo is not surprised by the news of the "Orange County Chronicle". It is the busiest season in Hollywood recently. His every move is almost under the surveillance of the paparazzi, and he did not deliberately hide his whereabouts when meeting with Steven. . So it is quite normal to be found out. But the "Daily News" broke the news a bit strange.

The content of Hugo and Steven's chat that day only mentioned "Mission Impossible" and "Men in Black" once or twice. Even if the paparazzi can bribe the waiter in the restaurant to eavesdrop, it is difficult to know about these two works. So, where is the news source for the "Daily News"? Why do they know so well.

The next news trend confirmed Hugo's speculation.

Immediately, "Entertainment Weekly" broke the news again, "Paramount and Columbia Pictures are actively contacting Hugo, hoping that Hugo will appear in their works, 'Men in Black' invested 100 million US dollars, 'Mission Impossible' is The 80 million-level works are obviously heavyweight blockbusters, and Hugo is likely to star in the first work in his career that costs more than 60 million US dollars! Currently Hugo is considering and thinking, where will it be? It is really exciting for a work to win in the end.”

Although "Entertainment Weekly" has factual deviations about the cost of the two works, the details have gradually emerged. More importantly, their report also specifically mentioned, "At present, Tom Cruise is also a candidate for these two works, and 'Men in Black' has a relatively slim chance, and Tom is not too active; but Tom is very proactive about the 'Mission Impossible' project, and has discussed with the screenwriter and producer many times before and after, showing his determination to win."

When Tom Cruise's name came up, the revelations went in another direction. Without any accident, "Entertainment Weekly" almost spent its best efforts to put the two people on opposite sides.

"One is an absolute idol who swept Hollywood in the late 1980s, and the other is a top actor who has risen strongly in the past three years. The names Tom and Hugo mean the highest peak in Hollywood today, and these two actors also have Indissoluble bond.

In the competition for 'The Sea of ​​Righteousness', Hugo won the first round; but in the match of 'Sugar Coated Trap', Tom regained a victory. Later, "Interview with the Vampire" Tom continued to be strong again, but when this work was released, it launched a head-to-head confrontation with "Pulp Fiction", but failed miserably.

There is no doubt that the two most popular actors in the film industry are now fiercely competing for the top spot in Hollywood. Although Hugo has a record of five consecutive films breaking 100 million at the box office, Tom has also The box office of three consecutive works has exceeded 100 million, and it will definitely not fall behind.

This time, two of today's top male actors compete head-to-head once again. Who will have the last laugh? "

"Entertainment Weekly" spent two full pages to describe this matchup. Although there are not many details, it is very accurate, and it almost completely describes the current situation. In an instant, all the media reporters became excited, and "Mission Impossible" became the core focus; and readers also began to pay close attention to this competition that had just kicked off.

As "Entertainment Weekly" said, Hugo and Tom are currently the most popular top stars in Hollywood. Their every move can affect the attention of countless audiences, not to mention their duel, which almost detonated the cold winter in March. All the topics, even the upcoming Oscars at the end of the month were left out.

This kind of situation reminded Hugo of the hype when MGM was casting for James Bond last year. Obviously, this time it was Paramount's own internal planning, if it wasn't for Paramount's disclosure, " Entertainment Weekly" won't know that many details. This is the media hype that Paramount has voluntarily instigated for publicity.

Last time, in order to enter the elite agency, although Hugo had no interest in James Bond, he still attended the dinner; now he has come again, which makes Hugo feel a little helpless, but Hugo also knows that this is the In Hollywood, this kind of hype is also one of the ways that film companies, brokerage companies, actors, artists and news media use each other. In other words, this is the industry rule. Although Hugo didn't like it, even hated it, he couldn't avoid it because he was part of the circle.

But Hugo forgot one thing, that the media likes to make a big fuss, and he and Tom were far more topical than expected, so things quickly got out of control.