Chapter 942 Waiting

Time entered December, and the entire northern hemisphere began to enter the rhythm of ice and snow.

But John Dyce felt more and more hot every day.

Christmas is coming, and in North America, merchants have started to take various actions. Unknowingly, the pre-holiday atmosphere has begun, and even the entire North American region has begun to enter the rhythm of Christmas.

At the same time, after the signing of the distribution agreement, Columbia quickly entered the rhythm of work. It has just entered December, and related publicity related to "Calabash Baby" has already begun to appear.

Because of the strict requirements of Minghu culture, this film is defined as "a family carnival animation work from China". A story of brothers united against evil."

Li Qian did not interfere in the slightest with these publicity plans, but John Days was always pursuing this matter, and it is said that this set of publicity plans was finally finalized by him and Columbia.

He has shown great care in the promotion and release of "Calabash Baby".

In the original negotiation of the distribution agreement, it was his repeated requests that made Dongfangmeng Film Company finally obtain the right to enter the show. The total publicity and distribution funds have been increased from only 10 million US dollars to 15 million US dollars - but among the distribution share, Dongfangmeng Film Company will only get 20% of the share!

And this is not the most critical.

More importantly, "Calabash Baby", which invested 15 million US dollars in publicity and distribution, may not be able to sell much box office after it goes public. For Dongfangmeng Film Company, investing 5 million US dollars in the During this announcement, it will be very difficult to earn the five million back!

Therefore, Columbia probably looked at John Days as if he was looking at a fool, and there was some discussion about this in the Oriental Dream Film Company.

However, Oriental Dream is controlled by Li Qian himself, and John Dyce owns 8% of the shares as a manager, and Li Qian has authorized him to manage the company with full authority, so no one can object to him doing this.

It was such a stupid business, such a business that would probably lose five million dollars, that John Dice, an old Hollywood businessman, did it without hesitation.

Li Qian just smiled when he learned about it, but Qi Jie said at the time: "If Columbia is taken down in the future, this person will definitely not be able to be the president!"

Li Qian nodded in agreement.

Still, it's nice to have a guy who's willing to flatter himself—even if it's really for his own money.

And the problem is, he knows exactly where to flatter!

The promotion of "Calabash Baby" is a business that even if it loses, the boss will be happy--in the future, anyone who says that people from European and American countries will not flatter, Li Qian will never believe it.

December 9th, Manhattan, New York.

In one morning, accompanied by Qi Jie, John Deiss, and several American lawyers, Li Qian signed several contracts.

These contracts involved a total amount of more than three billion U.S. dollars. Once the contract was finally completed, the amount of commission paid to the entrusted party alone would be as high as tens of millions of U.S. dollars.

A large part of it is that Minghu Culture and Li Qian personally entrusted a company named PricewaterhouseCoopers to complete two things. First, PricewaterhouseCoopers was responsible for registering and establishing an offshore company as the basis for the acquisition. The initiator, the second thing is that PricewaterhouseCoopers will calculate the total assets and net assets of Columbia Pictures and all its subsidiaries, tangible and intangible assets, and give a quotation valuation.

The second largest piece, the most important one, is an authorized acquisition agreement, that is, Minghu Culture and Li Qian personally entrust Morgan Stanley Group to initiate the formal acquisition of Columbia Pictures and all its affiliated assets, and be responsible for the post-acquisition Financial takeover and audit in the short term.

Of course, this entrustment will of course also include Morgan Stanley's valuation of various assets under Columbia.

The third block is to entrust PricewaterhouseCoopers and another law firm to conduct the whole process of financial, accounting and legal supervision of the entire acquisition.

After the agreement was signed, the matter was officially handed over to the companies that accepted the entrustment.

And until this time, including China and the United States, there are still very few people who know that Minghu Culture is about to initiate an acquisition of a movie giant like Columbia Pictures.

This matter is still top secret until now.

After the agreement was signed, Qi Jie stayed in the United States to handle the subsequent acquisition with full authority, and planned to submit an acquisition request to Coca-Cola, the owner of Columbia, by December 20 at the latest.

At this time, Li Qian took a plane directly from New York and flew back to China.

There was a shocking deal going on in secret, but he kept reminding himself to calm down—after returning to China, he rested for two days, and then he appeared in the art director's office of Minghu Culture Company normally, And started working in the morning, handling the daily affairs of the company on behalf of Qi Jie, going to the ninth floor to edit in the afternoon, and urging the special effects department to start the follow-up production schedule of "The Matrix" as soon as possible.

Because at this time, he knew very well in his heart that no matter how big the matter was, he, a layman, didn't need to intervene.

The agreement was signed, the money was ready, and there was only one thing left for him to do, and that was: wait!

Waiting for the global simultaneous release of "Calabash Baby", waiting for this acquisition to stir up thousands of waves.

…………

Shuntianfu, Daxing, Minghu No. 1 Film and Television City.

"Legend of the Condor Heroes" crew.

After a day of filming, the crew called it a day.

The actors went back to the dressing room to remove their make-up. The staff was busy tidying up the equipment. Several photographers and stage managers sorted out all the good materials and unused films, cameras, etc., and some of them had to hurry up to send They will be put into the warehouse at the company on the same day, and will be edited and produced later after the whole film is finished.

As it is now, it is much, much more convenient.

Because the film and television city is owned by Minghu Culture, and everything is its own, so after the security personnel are equipped, there are a lot of equipment and props that are not so precious. , Tomorrow, you only need to come to the studio half an hour in advance for a certain reset, or arrange it according to the director's advance arrangement, and everything will be in order.

If you are going out on location, or filming in other film and television cities, at night, no matter how fragmentary these things are, they must be packed up, loaded into the car and taken away, and then get up early the next morning and take them over again. It would take at least two hours, or even more than three hours, to come and go every day, which would be a waste of time on these things.

Han Shunzhang slumped on the director's chair for a while before standing up.

The assistant director Liu Xueyi took the people with him, took the important things - the films and materials that had been shot, and left first. He just walked around, looked around, watched with his own eyes the staff of the crew sorting out the machines, equipment, props, etc., and then, when the actors began to take off their makeup, someone came out to greet him and bid farewell. Nodding with a smile, saying goodbye to people.

Then, the staff basically left, and the actors were basically gone. In the huge indoor classical studio, there were only five or six staff members who were still doing the final work, but he still did not leave. In the past, I carefully checked the things that the staff had arranged just now.

Like him, there is another assistant director, Feng Bicheng, who is doing the last check everywhere.

"The Legend of the Condor Heroes" has three assistant directors.

One is Liu Xueyi who is in charge of all the hardware of the crew, props, scenery, lighting, film, cameras, and even shooting vehicles, etc. Everything that can't breathe by itself is under his control, which is called small logistics in the industry.

The second is to be responsible for all the external activities of the crew, what to eat, where to live, to go out to a certain location, to rent the venue and negotiate the price in advance, etc., to break down part of the producer function of Han Shunzhang, the director and producer In the past, such a role was called "big logistics" in the industry.

The person who took on this role in the crew was Li Qian's classmate, Lu Bin.

And the third assistant director is Feng Bicheng, who is in charge of casting during the preparatory period, and is in charge of communicating with all actors and behind-the-scenes staff after the crew is established, and is responsible for personnel reception, etc.

To be honest, Feng Bicheng, the deputy director, has the least responsibility and power.

During the casting period, the major roles must be selected by Li Qian, and the next-level important roles must be decided by the director and producer Han Shunzhang. and the level of extras. To put it bluntly, he had to go to Lu Bin to explain and communicate with Lu Bin after recruiting a few extra extras for a few lunch boxes.

But since the preparatory period began, he has been very happy in the crew of "The Legend of the Condor Heroes".

Here, you can hardly see the splendor and splendor that the 500 million director should have. What is just a big handyman who is busy all day long and pays attention to everything.

Lu Bin, the big supporter, is Li Qian's best friend and direct descendant. He looks down on Feng Bicheng very much, but Feng Bicheng treats each other with a smile. He does everything accurately, such as the number of extra performers, lunch boxes, etc. every day, making Lu Bin almost Don't worry too much. Liu Xueyi, Li Qian's best friend, has a more peaceful personality, but he has a heavy burden. Every day, he is responsible for sending the films shot today back to the company's film library for storage, so he is left behind to check various equipment and other things. , Feng Bicheng consciously stared at him for him. After a long time, Liu Xueyi still had a good impression of him, and he would usually sit together and smoke a cigarette to chat.

As for Han Shunzhang, the head butler of the Minghu Culture Film and Television Department, ever since he proposed to ask Feng Bicheng to join the crew to help him, he never regarded him as an outsider at all, regardless of the shooting, the training of the actors, or even the placement of the camera, etc. , All kinds of problems, once you can't make up your mind, you will discuss it with him.

After all, Feng Bicheng also came from a film background, and has already made three films. His experience, ability, and knowledge are definitely top-notch among the younger generation of directors in China.

Moreover, the two had worked together on the crew of "Big Wrist", and Han Shunzhang knew his abilities well.

It can even be said that in Minghu Culture, the person who knows Feng Bicheng the best, and knows how he has been reborn and reborn from the ashes, is Han Shunzhang.

The two cooperated very well.

This time, like almost every time in the past, it was the two of them who fell last.

When the two people finally walked out of the studio amidst the farewell voices of the studio management staff, it was already half past seven, and the sky outside was completely dark.

After leaving the studio, both of them lit cigarettes one after another, smoked, chatted, and walked slowly to the parking lot.

The film and television city has already built two staff dormitories. One has arranged for the staff and set workers inside the film and television city to live in. It is a pure staff dormitory. Quite, the interior decoration is also more practical. And this staff dormitory is aimed at the staff filming here, including actors.

As long as the crew is stationed in the filming, the members of the crew can apply for a house for free during the filming period. This room fee will eventually be settled by the financial department of Minghu Culture with the management of the film and television city, and then in turn with the financial settlement of the crew— ——In the later period, it will even be open to outside crews to move in.

Of course, the current free rooms are also double rooms. If you want to live in a more comfortable single room, you need to pay part of the money, and Minghu Culture and the crew will not pay for this money.

At present, the crew of "The Legend of the Condor Heroes" is the second crew to enter this film and television city after the crew of "The Matrix", and the crew of "Daming Palace Ci" that came in not long ago is the third. Many staff members of the two crews chose to live in the staff dormitory, because it is indeed comfortable and convenient, and they don't have to run back and forth.

But for Han Shunzhang, he felt that it would not be too far to go home, so Han Shunzhang still prefers to go home every day. The child of him and Zhu Yu is more than two years old this year, and the little one is very cute. I really want to see him every day, even if when I get home, all I can see is him in his sleep.

But Feng Bicheng is different, he lives in the staff dormitory.

Going along the road, there is a parking lot over there, and not far away is the big restaurant inside.

Halfway through a cigarette, Feng Bicheng was about to say goodbye to Han Shunzhang when he had already arrived at the parking lot. He went to eat by himself, and when he turned around the intersection, he suddenly found a person standing under the street lamp.

He has good eyes, and he can tell at a glance that it is Zheng Xiaoyue who plays Mu Nianci in the play.

A young girl who just graduated from the Acting Department of Songjiang Drama Academy last year, Zhou Zhiyu's younger junior sister, Han Shunzhang immediately fell in love with her during the audition, and felt that she had a heroic and righteous temperament, which was very suitable for Mu Nianci , and strongly recommended to Li Qian, and finally Li Qian agreed to his suggestion.

And this thing has spread out before I know it!

At this moment, Feng Bicheng turned to look at Han Shunzhang, and sure enough, he frowned.

This is nothing new. Although the little girl is secretive, the group of people who have been in the crew all year round are all sharp-eyed and pleasant-hearted. If there is any trouble, you can immediately smell it. What's more, Zheng Xiaoyue just filmed There are several crews mixed up in several plays, and they are still very young.

However, Han Shunzhang never accepted her fault.

From Zheng Xiaoyue's point of view, this matter is actually quite normal.

She doesn't even need to know anything else, she just needs to know that Han Shunzhang is the manager of the film and television department of Minghu Culture, that's enough! As for Han Shunzhang, who is also one of the shareholders of Minghu Culture, he can be regarded as a hidden little rich man, so there is no need to mention those things.

Because if she understood a little bit more deeply, she would know that Han Shunzhang is currently the third person in the character sequence of the Minghu Culture Film and Television Department, and Cao Zhan who joined the animation department is also the fourth person. Moreover, Cao Zhan is actually in charge of the animation department, while Jin Han basically doesn't care about things, and Li Qian, the art director, has always been in charge of the general manager and all the details, so Han Shunzhang, the big housekeeper, can actually be regarded as the number one person in the film and television department .

Zhao He, himself, is a great director, but he is not enough to see in front of him.

Just like Xie Mingyuan is in charge of the music department, in terms of film and television, this is the person who really helps Li Qian take the helm.

And the problem is that Han Shunzhang is only in his early thirties, not only has a high status now, but also has an unlimited future - he is not handsome, but he can be considered a little handsomer than ordinary men. He is not short, he is thin, and looks very energetic. In addition, he is calm and old-fashioned in his work, and he has the charm of some men.

Such a character, with the previous "Grace of Jane Ba" and "Grace of Support", even if he has never deliberately teased, for a girl like Zheng Xiaoyue who has just come out of the rivers and lakes, it is really normal for a girl like Zheng Xiaoyue to know her heart and have admiration But that's all--this is still a good thing, a good feeling.

If you want to talk about it, let's speculate maliciously: Who is it not to fall in love with? Sleep with whom is not sleep? There are many young actresses in China, and it is too difficult to get ahead. The best way is to find a "noble person" to help! Then instead of finding an old man who looks awkward, he is inferior to a young man like Han Shunzhang in terms of strength, status, and power. Why not seize the opportunity and take Han Shunzhang down!

If this Zheng Xiaoyue thought the same way, Feng Bicheng would not be surprised at all!

In this day and age, money is king.

No one is worse than anyone else, why does she get up in just one movie, and she has a film contract and an advertisement endorsement, and if she makes money and earns soft hands, I have to be willing to stay poor and stick to art? Where am I worse than her? Isn't it because she is "in love" with an important person?

And... the so-called art, what is it?

Therefore, even though she knew that Han Shunzhang already had a wife and children, and his wife Zhu Yu was still a typical Li Qian's party - she was also from the Shuntian Film Academy, and she came here with Han Shunzhang very early to help Li Qian create Minghu culture. From the very beginning to the present, except for the one-year period of pregnancy and childbirth, the film and television department has always been the art director and costume designer of Li Qian's every play, and also created a costume together with Zhou Mo The brand, the relationship is too good-then she is still not afraid.

In fact, Feng Bicheng felt that, let alone a high position, she might not even be a concubine at the beginning, but the experience of struggling in the circle for many years in the past let him know: girls these days are very courageous!

Lowering his head and coughing, Feng Bicheng said, "Then what, Old Han, I'm going to eat first!"

After a pause, he whispered again before leaving: "Take it easy."

Han Shunzhang nodded.

After Feng Bicheng passed by first, he nodded and greeted Zheng Xiaoyue who was standing alone under the street lamp, and then he walked over slowly, and when he was not far in front of her, he deliberately kept walking, seemingly just saying hello casually, Said: "Wait for someone!"

But Zheng Xiaoyue looked at him and said directly: "Wait for you."