America 1982

Martin sat in his seat in the conference room, always feeling a little restless. He was even more uncomfortable than when he was dealing with black people in the neighborhoods of Compton. Those black people didn't know that he was a fake big shot.

But at this moment, everyone in the BT TV conference room knew that he was just Tommy's driver, but they still let him sit at the conference table to participate in the meeting. Even the old Page could only stand aside, but he could sit in the table openly. Being around Mi, this made him a little flattered.

"I conducted several surveys across California, focusing on the cities of Oakland, Los Angeles, San Francisco and Sacramento. The TV sets in most black families are usually turned on at six o'clock in the morning, and then turn on. It lasts all day, and will not be turned off until the end of late night. Women will turn on the TV and listen to the news talk show between six and seven o'clock while making breakfast. This is probably their only broadcast of the day. Important news sources are mainly concentrated in several news talk shows on local California TV stations, including "Good Morning Pasadena", "The Donna Show", and "Breakfast News", which are not very serious news talk shows..." Sean Ray, the vice president of the TV station in charge of public relations, walked slowly around the conference table indoors while staring at the documents in his hand and introduced the results of the investigation:

"The characteristics of these programs are that they are straightforward, bold and irresponsible. They can spread hearsay news. For example, last week "Breakfast News" reported that a famous fortune teller predicted that there would be a Category 10 earthquake in California last Saturday. Earthquake... Then it was said that on the day the news was broadcast, at least seven convenience stores in California were robbed of food by idiots who believed they were real, and the police arrested dozens of homeless people suspected of robbery."

"Then there is prime time, which is mainly the production of popular dramas from the three major TV networks. However, FOX TV network has suddenly emerged. Their ratings in prime time have reached fourth place, firmly holding on to the third place ABC TV network. Fuck, and most of FOX’s audience overlaps with ours, they are all middle and lower class people, and they even have similar ideas for producing programs, relying on low-cost but full of gimmicks to attract viewers.”

"The most popular FOX homemade program currently airs during prime time, called "America's Most Wanted." This program is a weekly program that reports on the ten most famous criminal cases in the United States within a week and interviews criminals and police. , and then invited police officers and sociologists as guests to comment and give weekly rankings. Many people at the bottom stayed in front of the computer on time to watch this program. Many gangs tried to get their members to appear on this program. They privately call this program the Oscars of the gang world. It has been broadcast for nine episodes so far and is FOX's most popular program. With this program, FOX TV Network has negotiated 57 local TV stations to join FOX, integrating FOX's programs and advertising Covering 70% of the United States, in this program, FOX will broadcast thirty-second advertisements four times, with a quote of US$185,000 per thirty seconds, which is the advertising revenue of a single episode of the program. Ten thousand, while their single-phase cost is only three hundred and fifty thousand."

"And I learned that they are producing a spin-off variety show "America's Most Powerful Cop", also known as "Finding You", a documentary program about police arrests, which will undoubtedly succeed "Wanted"."

Rick was a little surprised when he heard Sean talking about the other party's cost: "Why is their single-issue cost so low?"

"Because the Murdoch Group spent 575 million to buy the entire 20th Century Fox Film Company, including their television production department, ensuring that all links are in their own hands from the beginning, avoiding being controlled by others and reducing production costs." Xiao En said:

"Although we will not enter the daytime soap theater for the time being, we have also conducted a survey and there is no suspense. The daytime soap opera time period is still a staple of the three major TV networks. The soap operas with the highest ratings are "In Our Lives" Days of Our Lives, All My Children, Success, and Roseanne."

"Late-night programming is divided between the three major television networks' respective late-night show theaters. However, FOX has produced a late-night program like "The Late Show: Starring Rivers" and wants to compete with CBS's "The Late Show: Starring Carson." , but it seems that the effect is not very good so far. It has burned 23 million since its launch, but the ratings are not half of its competitors. FOX is internally considering axing it and designing a new late-night program, tentatively named " Married with Children,” a reality TV sitcom.”

"Okay, everyone, this is my market data. Next, Earl will explain the work of TV station cooperation." Sean closed the documents in his hand, walked back to his seat, looked at everyone, and said.

"Thank you, Sean." Earl Rush gently adjusted his tie with his hand and stood up: "I have recently been relying on personal connections and some alumni relationships to make preliminary contacts with some regional independent television stations in Illinois and California. These TV stations are all crap that the three major TV networks and FOX have not taken notice of, so my job right now is a gold-digging process to find those TV stations that seem to have the potential to rise with us."

“In general, stations that are going out of business at any time and have ratings worse than the crappiest student report card welcome us and wish we could save them with our shows because we won’t make them pay franchise fees, and It can also save a certain amount of program purchasing expenses, and the TV stations that still have some ratings want to wait and see. Most of them hope that we will allow them to play half of the advertisements they undertake when broadcasting the programs we produce. To make a profit, we rely on the ratings to get enough benefits."

Earl has been running around these days and may not have had much rest. Even with his dark skin, you can't see the dark circles under his eyes, but you can tell from the two bags under his eyes that it was not easy for him to travel between Chicago and Los Angeles during this period. , said in a calm tone at this time:

"Let's put it this way, if we want these guys to operate TV stations according to our ideas and build our BT network, we must first make them make money. This means that the programs we put out must at least make those TV stations popular. The local ratings ranking has climbed significantly, which makes it easier for them to sell their advertising."

"The response to "Searching for Dad" in the black community near Los Angeles was very good, but the response to "The Showdown" was much worse than it was. Black people who watched it thought that the design of the competition system was too complicated and confused them, and it was too confusing. En told me that FOX is producing a dance competition reality show similar to the format of "Battle of Blue Silk", so we have temporarily canceled the plan of "Battle of Blue Silk"." Rick Luther heard Earl talking about the show, Shi opened his mouth and responded:

"I had a meeting with the team and discussed it. Considering that a pure competition program requires people to understand the complicated competition procedures, and there are too many similar programs on the market, it is better to borrow some ready-made gimmicks, similar to what I tried to shoot in Live Color. The idea of ​​​​"Terminator" adult movie."

"My team and I looked up the best-selling books, the highest-grossing movies, and the highest-rated TV series in the past three years, and then I found a book that was published in the United States in 1949 and had seven million copies published by 1970. In 1984 At the beginning of the year, maybe because of the title of the book, maybe because of other reasons, in short, it appeared on the top of the best-seller list in history, and it continues until this year. For this reason, I specially asked Martin to visit the black community to find out whether black people have heard of this name. Unexpectedly Unexpectedly, many black people at the bottom have heard the name of this book, but they have not read it. Instead, they have heard this story from the radio. It is an imaginary historical novel called "1984". Everyone here should Everyone has read this best-selling book.”

Everyone, including Martin, nodded when they heard the name, indicating that they understood the story.

"1984" is a dystopian novel written by the British writer George Orwell. It was published in 1949. The story takes place in the fictional year of 1984. In the author's conception, in 1984, the world There are only three superpowers left, namely Eurasia, Eastasia and Oceania.

Eurasia, whose territory is the European continent and Russia's Siberia, is actually the author's belief that the Soviet Union will one day completely occupy Europe.

East Asia's territory covers most of Asia, that is, the Asian yellow race united to form a powerful country.

Oceania, where the story mainly takes place, covers the entire Western Hemisphere, the British Isles, Australia and Africa. It is the most powerful of the three superpowers.

Of course, Tommy has read this popular best-seller, but in his opinion, the reason why this book is so popular in the United States, and even the U.S. government has promoted it, and even radio broadcasts will play audio stories, is mainly because the ideas in the book are consistent with The government's malicious speculation about the Soviet Union is fueling the fire. It hopes that the citizens will read the stories in this book and regard it as an event that may actually happen, so that the citizens will believe that once the Soviet Union really rules the world, their lives will be different. It will be as miserable as described in the book.

Rick saw that everyone understood this story, so he continued to introduce: "In the book, the leader of Oceania is called Big Brother. Big Brother uses cameras to monitor every move of all citizens, and every word he says is the most famous one in the book. 's line: Big Brother is watching you! That line stuck with every one of us."

"So, I want to adapt this idea into a reality show, called "Big Brother is Watching You," but this time, all the viewers are Big Brother, and the program participants are citizens under surveillance. I The idea is to arrange a villa to serve as a detention dormitory for the Ministry of Charity in Oceania, and then select sixteen tenants who are strangers to each other to live in it, completely isolated from the outside world, and every move and every word they say will be exposed in front of the camera. Everyone will be recorded by a microphone, a separate informant room will be designed, and high bonuses will be designed. One person will be eliminated every week, and a season will last three months, and the final winner will take home one hundred thousand dollars."

"This also requires these contestants, if they want to win, take away the money and leave the villa, they must have superb acting skills, a strong heart and clever scheming methods like the protagonist in the novel."

“Each episode, the houseguests will anonymously vote to select a housemate to be eliminated, and the audience will also vote to decide which one shows the most disgusting, hypocritical behavior. If the audience and the houseguests choose not the same person, it will take two people to vote. In the final showdown, we will design various tasks to increase the communication conflicts between tenants and amplify the contradictions of human nature in this closed environment. The tenants can even go to bed. We will broadcast it without violating the rules of TV program broadcasting. In short , this is a reality show that satisfies voyeuristic desires and penetrates human nature. People will see that in order to win in the end, the contestants use all means to avoid elimination, even if it is body trading."

"Initial preparations are to edit the essence of the week's daily life material into a one-hour program, which will be broadcast during prime time on Sunday."

After talking about his team's ideas, Rick looked at Tommy and others excitedly, eager to get a reply. Tommy just nodded slightly, then looked at Earl and Sean: "What do you think?"

Sean held the coffee in both hands and thought seriously for dozens of seconds with a fat face before speaking:

"Basically, people who have read this novel or know this story may pay attention to this program. After all, many people in the United States have stereotypes about the Soviet Union, which are actually derived from this completely false historical hour. The gimmick is indeed good. After all, it is criticizing the Soviet Union. If it is not too vulgar, the feedback will be good. It is easy to use money to get space in some mainstream newspapers and increase the popularity and influence of some TV stations, but the premise is that the program must be well-produced and unconventional. .”

"I agree with Sean, at least those members of Congress will be happy to see us smearing the Soviet Union for free. I mean there should be no trouble with the Communications Committee or the Ethics Committee, because we can say that the people on the show are just Interpret the living conditions of Soviet citizens in the novel."

"Martin, after listening to this, are you interested in participating in this show?" Tommy turned his head and looked at Martin and asked.

Martin shook his head: "I won't sign up, but I am willing to sit in front of the TV and watch other people's performances. You know, boss, I am in front of the TV and see which guy has a chance to get the bonus. I I immediately picked up the phone and called the TV program team to vote him out. People like to see other people working hard but ultimately failing. I like to see this kind of ending. Many black people I know also like it. Think about it. Look, a woman slept with fifteen other men in order to earn a hundred thousand bonus, thinking that she would have the last laugh. Guess what, of course the audience voted this woman out and saw her crazy expression."

"Don't use actors from the Screen Actors Guild to help with the trial recording. Let Martin take you to Compton to select some black people. Choose the Beverly building where he will temporarily use the dormitory as the villa. Try to reduce costs as much as possible. Try to shoot a week's worth of material first. Edit it and see if the show has enough and attractive highlights as you imagined." Tommy finally looked at Rick and said.

If you want to make money as soon as possible and expand your influence, it is not enough to broadcast programs on your own channel. Therefore, BT TV station needs to ensure that the self-made programs have enough attractive highlights, at least before they are broadcast, Earl-Ra Shi used the pilot tape to attract the heads of other small TV stations, so that they could recognize BT's production capabilities and see the possibility of making money, so they agreed to cooperate with BT TV station and broadcast programs produced by BT TV station.

Only by helping other TV stations make money will they be willing to hand over the operation of the TV station to BT TV station, so that a new national TV network can be gradually formed around BT TV station.

"Okay." Rick agreed, and then handed out the few pages of episode introductions at hand to a few people: "Then, this is the list of episodes that I plan to purchase to fill the TV station's time."

Tommy sighed: "Martin took this list to the black communities he visited and asked black people if they liked watching it. He helped you get some feedback."

"So, Martin, what do they think of these episodes? I picked them carefully." Hearing Tommy's words, Rick looked at Martin.

Martin nodded: "Yes, black people are only impressed by two movies, because except for these two movies, no one has watched the other movies. The first one, "Little House on the Prairie", I have When my old black cousins ​​ask about this show, their reaction is, Mr. Martin Hart, you start a black TV station and you are going to show black people this kind of shit? Are you a lackey of the white people?"

"White stooge? This is a children's comedy. I hope it will be shown during the day for black children to watch...and although the protagonist is a white little girl, there is also a black man who plays an important role. He is a doctor with superb medical skills, and he saves lives." The protagonist's family, the scene..." After hearing Martin talk about the impressions of the black people in the community on the show, Rick's face was blank, and he even wondered if these black people had seen the show, and he opened his mouth to explain.

"Listen, I know there's a nigga dumb* doctor on the TV show, okay? I already know that, that's what white people see as a good image of black people, and look, how fucking considerate were we to arrange a perfect no-brainer A picky role was given to a black actor, and he was asked to save white people." Martin indicated that Rick did not need to explain, and continued:

"My countrymen tell me that only f**king white people like to watch black people like this, and if I'm going to put this show on, don't even think about them watching our channel."

"Okay, which one is the second one?" Rick asked with a sigh.

"'Miami Vice', everyone has seen it, it's the most famous one on your list."

After hearing this, Rick breathed a sigh of relief: "I knew it would interest black people! It's just that the purchase price of this large-scale series is a bit high, a single episode costs about 70,000, but if the audience is interested, it won't Problem, we can rely on advertising time..."

Martin interrupted Rick again: "No, you misunderstood, Rick, the reason they are interested is... Mr. Hart, as a black big shot from Miami, why haven't you arranged for your men to kill that idiot*" The director and all the actors on the set of Miami Vice?”

"So, they think it's ugly?" Rick was stunned again: "It's a very exciting action series, with speeding cars, explosions, gun battles..."

"They think it's ugly?" Martin repeated the sentence imitating Rick's puzzled tone, and then said: "Of course, of course they find it ugly. Do you think we should be happy when the white police protagonist has a black police partner? The black gang members in that show all look like idiots, and in every episode the black police partner is injured, waiting for the white protagonist to save him. If there were no other shows to watch, they wouldn't watch this kind of discrimination against black people. Trash."

Rick scratched his red hair in annoyance: "So what do they want? They want us to be like NBC and give them a black idol, Eddie Murphy?"

"I don't know who Eddie Murphy is. I'm just conveying the thoughts of those black people, that is, they don't like to see those black actors on TV who are always helping white people and being kind like Black Jesus. They want to hear the truth. "?" Martin looked at Rick.

"certainly."

"Those black people told me that they wanted to see black people take revenge on white people, burn to death the white people who had insulted them, and take away their property! Because white people have done this to us in history, and they are curious why everyone on TV Black actors are like idiots who have lost their memory. They have forgotten the painful years when white people bullied black people, and instead extended a helping hand to black people. For example, in the first movie, "Little House on the Prairie", there was actually that black person in it. A doctor helps a white family avoid being hunted by local Indians? Are you kidding? This country and white people owe us and the Indians, and this TV series is like a steaming plate of shit, forcing black people and Indians to open their mouths. , swallow it! Do you think they will like to watch it?" Martin said excitedly.

Rick sighed forcefully: "So, you are saying that the black people at the bottom actually want to see the plots you mentioned, retaliate against white people, vent their resentment towards white people through TV programs, and blame their own sufferings on white people. Gain inner satisfaction by taking down white people.”

"That's right." Martin nodded.

Noticing Tommy's thoughtful expression, Rick immediately spoke:

"Earl is helping the TV station contact some other local independent TV stations in California during this time, preparing for a joint premiere event when it is officially launched... If he knew that BT TV station was planning to produce such a blaxploitation-themed drama, it would definitely be detrimental to him Work is ongoing. Hollywood has had similar B-movies showing the killing of black people. It is a specific category, blaxploitation film. However, this niche genre has already been established in the early 1980s because of the Anti-Blaxploitation Film Alliance formed by three major black associations. The constant pressure to die out, the high caliber black people in the league don’t want to see their fellow black people represented in movies that are too violent, even in the lead roles.”

For the black people at the bottom, this plot may have a sense of revenge, but not all independent TV stations have black viewers, and no independent TV station is willing to offend the three major black associations.

The so-called three major black associations are the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, formerly known as the Negro Leadership Conference on Nonviolent Integration, and the National Negro Urban League.

"Why is it a B-level movie? Why can't it be a movie that can be watched by men, women, old and young?" Earl asked with some confusion after hearing Rick's words.

"Earl, no white people are willing to go into the theater to watch a movie with a black protagonist. This is a reality, and how many black people have enough time and can afford movie tickets to watch a black-only movie?" Rick Explaining why black movies can only be B-level cheap movies:

"So we can only reduce production costs, and then use pornography, violence, and gore as gimmicks to attract some viewers. If we make a drama series suitable for all ages, that's fine. NBC previously had a drama series called "Roots," which tells the story of an African American family's experiences. The five-generation family saga of being sold by slave traders, arriving as slaves in the United States, and being emancipated as free people. The ratings are astonishingly high, and the feedback is very positive. Both whites and blacks are full of praise for it. , but that requires high costs and the participation of well-known screenwriters. In other words, big companies can spend tens of millions on trial and error, but we can’t.”

"Have you seen what Rick said about Roots? Martin." Tommy asked Martin.

Martin nodded: "I've seen it. It's a very good shot. There's just one problem. Most of the white people in it are so damn kind. The kind white manor owners, the kind daughter-in-law, the kind white officers, the kind Lincoln... think about it. , if the white man is not kind, the black man can only be obedient and survive under the whip before he has a chance to be arranged by the white manor owner to marry a woman and reproduce his own offspring. But how can it be good to film a black man lingering, so white people need to be kind."

"Violence, money, black rights, white bullying, these are all built together. I didn't think of a B-movie. Instead, I thought of a black version of "The Godfather." If black people need it, we should give them what they want to see. , seeing Martin dressed like this, I even thought about the name of this black-only series." Tommy looked at everyone:

"Nigger Boss, I mean no harm, Earl, Martin, you two, I'm just saying the name of the show."

Seeing that Martin and Earl did not refute his wording, Tommy continued: "For example, design a crime city, such as Compton, where black people are miserable, keep the crime rate in this city high, and black people take desperate risks, etc. All problems are blamed on white mayors, white police chiefs, and even white firefighters. Our protagonist is the black godfather. When someone bullies his compatriots, he will help his compatriots solve the trouble. At the same time, bad white people will also collude with some bad black people. , if you want to get rid of this thorn in your side, this is probably the idea. In short, the black Boss is designed to be the perfect image of a black man. Although he fell into a gang because the government deprived black people of their right to education, he did not give up on himself. He is also a thief and sticks to the bottom line. On the contrary , those white people who have no bottom line, so he will go to war with white people on TV, conquer white women, get the wealth of corrupt white officials, distribute it to the black people in the community, and eventually become the King of Compton, do you think this Will the three major associations of gadgets cause trouble?"

"This is a good gimmick. Frankly speaking, since "The Godfather" was released, all the big gangsters in movies and TV in the past ten years have become Italians. I kind of want to see a black godfather appear, but frankly, there is no clue. They will definitely get into trouble. The black executives of the three major associations accept donations from other TV stations. When the time comes, they will jump out and accuse BT TV station... It is normal, because I have done this kind of thing all the time." After hearing this, Sean nodded. said.

Tommy looked at Sean: "So, you are saying that to make them unable to eat, you need to put on a righteous coat for this black drama."

"I have an idea. In 1984, the Miss America beauty pageant gave birth to the first black champion in history. However, her results were canceled immediately after she was elected, and then a white woman succeeded her and became the champion." Earl said at this time Looking at Tommy: "She's a good coat, Vanessa Williams."

"Yes, that's her. I've heard this woman's name." Sean also reacted: "Yes, this woman is good. She just happens to be in trouble now."

Tommy looked at Earl: "Do you know her?"

"She and her agent came to me before, hoping that my firm would help handle her lawsuit against "Penthouse", but I ultimately did not agree because there was no chance of winning, and the girl had no money to pay me. She only promised that if she won, , give me a share of the compensation." Earl introduced how to get to know the other party:

"So, for her to be boycotted by Hollywood and mainstream TV, she can gain sympathy from all black people by appearing in this series. To this day, black people still believe that her loss of the championship was a conspiracy of white people, so they asked her to participate in this series. , or simply use her real experience to process it. She was framed by white people and lost her championship crown. Then she found the black godfather and hoped that Nigger Boss would help her get justice. It can be regarded as the main story line of the first season."

"Sean, Earl will give you her contact information. You are responsible for finding her and her agent." After hearing what Earl said, Tommy said decisively:

"This is a good gimmick. Reality and fiction are intertwined. In the play, Nigger Boss saves her, but outside the play, BT TV station saves her."