The Best Director

Chapter 114 Vigorous

"Stop talking, I'm going to class." Natalie over there was about to hang up, Wang Yang hummed, looked at the several-storey buildings on the street outside the car window, and said, "I'm going to class soon too ; but now, I got the company to work, bye. (read novel)"

Natalie hadn't picked up the line yet, and said lightly: "As for "Sweetheart", forget it, you didn't direct it anyway." Then, she suddenly said in surprise: "Oh man, it's later than I thought, we talked One hour? Damn, how can there be so many words?" Wang Yang smiled, and while turning into the parking lot, he said, "I don't know, you tell me." Several times he was about to end the call, but she said, "About I still have a question about your script." After talking for a long time, he smiled and said, "Thank you for your ideas, I think they will be useful."

The headquarters of Flame Films is no longer the original place. At the end of last year, it moved once and came to the seaside town of Santa Monica.

In this building, there are more than 200 employees of Flame Films and its subsidiary Flames-Man. Of course, there are many positions that are not in the office, especially the distribution department, overseas distribution department, and public relations department. Among the people who travel all the year round, there were only more than 50 people at the time, and now there are nearly 300 people. If you add more than 200 people to the independent subsidiary Blue Sky Studio, the number of employees of the Flame Group has exceeded 500.

"Good morning, Mr. Wang." The people waiting for the elevator at the elevator entrance greeted Wang Yang warmly when they saw Wang Yang in a windbreaker and jeans. Members, who doesn't know that their boss is the "youngest billionaire" Magic Yang? Even the cleaners in the company can casually tell the history of his fortune, how he went from $10,000 to hundreds of millions now.

"Hi, everyone." Wang Yang nodded to them with a smile, and walked into the opened elevator together. He didn't recognize the names and positions of these people, but it didn't matter that they started talking, a black-haired white girl in a women's suit holding a briefcase asked with a smile: "Mr. Wang, I'm Ada, when can I see you?" Is it time for your next film?" Wang Yang looked at her and replied with a smile: "Maybe it will be a while, Ada, but I have a film supervisor plan, you can read the Los Angeles Times."

Another black man said earnestly and jokingly: "Mr. Wang, I love this job, but you know that the current world is not good, my child is about to be born, when will I get a raise?" They laughed. They all knew that the young boss was a very easy-going and friendly person, so several people also booed and said, "I'm getting married soon", "My mortgage is too stressful..."

Wang Yang hugged his head with a smile, spread his hands to them and said: "Oh, maybe you should ask Mark about this question? I don't care about the company." He suddenly remembered something, and asked in doubt: "Guys, why should I Remember last Christmas, the company raised the salary?"

laughing with the staff,

Soon the elevator opened and closed, and Wang Yang came to the high-level office floor of the company. As soon as he stepped out of the elevator, he saw Mark Slanter in the distance telling a female copywriting secretary something. He waved and shouted: "Hey, Mark!"

"Prepare these documents and send them to the conference room..." Mark Slant heard this voice, turned his head and glanced, and said with a smile: "Hey, my boss, you came so early, which surprised me, You came 'on time' for every meeting." Wang Yang walked over to Jiang Ye with a smile and said, "If it wasn't for the traffic jam, I would have come earlier, I like Santa Monica."

After staying on this floor for a while, Wang Yang wandered around the company again, including the film storage room, equipment warehouse and other places. When the time came to ten o'clock in the morning, the meeting officially started.

In the bright conference room, people sat on both sides of the long conference table. Wang Yang sat as the chairman as the chief executive, and Mark Slanter and other company executives sat on both sides.

In fact, there are not many people on the company's current board of directors. Flame Films is still a very independent private film company. It has no debts, no Wall Street venture capital and other financing, and it has not yet listed on NASDAQ. Both Mark Slant, who is proficient in business, and Wang Yang, who is not half full, believe that the time for the company to go public has not yet come.

The purpose of going public is to raise funds and get more cash to develop the company; but Flame Movie is not short of money, enough to cope with the step-by-step development, and everything is proceeding in an orderly and rapid manner. No matter how fast it is, it will not be fast. If you blindly spend money on expansion, it will easily get out of control one day.

But now Wang Yang is not the only owner of Flame Films. He owns 95% of the company's shares; the other 5% is distributed among the company's top executives like Mark Slanter.

The core reason why Huoyan Movie can achieve its current scale is because of the release of several super hit movies such as "High School Musical" and "When Happiness Knocks on the Door", although he can attribute most of the credit to him; but the operation work behind the company , the actual release promotion, and the later peripheral sales, and channel expansion, etc., are not his achievements, and he doesn't even know the specific situation.

Just like when "High School Musical" was released in 1999, apart from the sales and rental of original soundtrack CDs, DVDs, and video tapes, not many other peripherals were developed. In the market, a few peripheral copyrights such as toys and clothes are not very profitable in order to build a relationship network; and in "High School Musical 2", there are already more small aspects such as novels and comics. Places and other aspects have made achievements.

The company has been improving all the time, and it is precisely because of the efforts of these high-level talents. Otherwise, with his average visit to the company once or twice a month, no matter how many blockbuster movies there are, it is impossible for him to be in the company in two years. Between them, it has developed into an independent film company with excellent distribution capabilities and rich distribution channels.

Although Wang Yang doesn’t know much about business, he had to reluctantly read some business and marketing books under the pressure of the blond girl in the past, and “worked hard” to go to Stanford. UC, Stanford did not apply from the beginning to the end. But even if he didn’t go to business school, he knew that in order to retain talents and encourage and stimulate their enthusiasm for work, in addition to shouting "work hard for the future of the company", there must be practical benefits.

Partnership is a good system that can bind these talents to the company and make them feel like "home". This is also their company. The better the company, the better they are.

5% may not seem like a lot, but it is actually very rich, because it is not 5% of any subsidiary company, but the parent company Flame Films, which means that FM, Blue Sky Studio and all the subsidiaries of Flame Films in the future Companies have their share. As for the long-term contracts newly signed by the top executives, as the company's annual performance improves in the future, they can gradually obtain more shares under the reward system; before listing in the future, they can still be lower than half of the issue price. Yang bought a certain amount of shares, and the terms of the contract definitely made people full of energy.

Facts have proved that many times a person does not even know whether he has the ability or how much ability he has. Many people just lack an opportunity, and once the opportunity comes, coupled with hard work, his ability will burst out. I can't believe it myself.

Just like Mark Slanter, if he hadn't become a flame movie, maybe he is still an agent now, and he might find some big star and become a gold medal agent, or he might continue to be a lousy agent. But since he got that contract, his life has gone on a different path. Now he is one of the "giants" of the flame movie and has become a new star in the business world.

However, Simon Willis, Sandy Parkes and others, who were originally depressed and mediocre in the era of A-x, came to the era of flame movies. Under the correct development strategy, they have also accomplished their own very well He has contributed a lot to the company due to his position and tasks.

Of course, the company is getting bigger and bigger and needs more talents to help, so Wang Yang put his idea on Lionsgate, because Lionsgate is the most successful independent film company in the future, and its operation and development methods are worth learning , and its operational executors are more worthy of vigorous invitation.

When the FM company was established last year, Wang Yang called Jon Filtimer and sincerely invited Jon to join Flame Films. In that case, he could get 2% of the company's shares and take over the FM company's affairs. .

FM Company is more of a new brand, and it shares distribution, production and other resources with FF Company. After it was created, Flame Films transferred all the business of outsourced films to it. Later, FM will be responsible for implementing the "video library" plan like Lionsgate, distributing outsourced films, and those who participated in the production as investors. Independent films, commercial films, but the production cost of a single film is limited to a budget of 2-20 million, and the distribution fee for large-scale releases does not exceed 10 million; while the FF brand only releases self-produced films, and no longer cares about outsourced films .

However, Jon, who is also a partner of Lions Gate and has a long-term contract for several years, declined Wang Yang's invitation without any consideration. But Flame Films is not without new talents, Michael Burns, the current president of FM Company; Peter Wilkes, the investment director of FM Company...

Wang Yang looked at the financial statement on the conference table, which clearly stated the company's revenue and expenditure in 2000, and listened to Mark Srant over there laughing and said: "In 2000, our company had a total of Four films have been released on a large scale, and all of them have made a fortune. The performance is amazing. Let us give the chairman some applause first." Simon Willis, Michael Burns and others laughed and applauded, and the meeting room suddenly burst into applause .

"Thank you all." Wang Yang clapped his hands with a smile, and said, "This is everyone's joint efforts. Please continue this enthusiasm this year and in the future. Thank you."

The encounters in life are really amazing. Three years ago, he would never have imagined the current situation. He was sitting in a conference room and saying such things to a group of men and women in their thirties and forties; but now he is familiar with it, without any nervousness. Bewildered, or excited. He feels a little old, unlike a 21-year-old. You must know that he has obtained a "drinking license" this month. He has imagined many times before that what he will do after obtaining the license is to go to the bar to meet hot girls Get drunk? But not now.

He smiled and looked down at the documents. In 2000, Flame Films released "When Happiness Knocks", "High School Musical 2", "Memory Fragments" and "Juno", but in this report, it was released on Christmas The "Juno" is not counted.

The first is the income situation. In terms of screening box office, "When Happiness Knocks on the Door" is 203 million in North America and 385 million in the world, and the after-tax income is more than 140 million; "Memento" has a box office of 55.31 million in North America and 84.11 million worldwide, with an after-tax income of 31 million. This adds up to a net profit of 254.5 million US dollars.

In 2000, the total box office in North America was 7.6 billion. The box office of Flame's four films was 450 million, accounting for nearly 6% of the market share, the most among independent film companies; while Lionsgate Films only had 1%.

On the soundtrack CD and DVD, "When Happiness Knocks on the Door" has sold 800,000 sets of soundtrack CDs and 4 million sets of DVD sets worldwide, with an after-tax income of 50 million; the soundtrack CD of "High School Musical 2" continues to sell well, and now It has reached 4 million sets, and the DVD that has just hit the shelves has also sold 5 million sets, bringing in an after-tax income of 80 million; the original soundtrack CD of "Memory Fragments" has sold 120,000 copies, and the DVD has not yet hit the shelves, so its The income is close to 1 million.

These two major peripherals have increased the company’s after-tax income by 131 million; at the same time, the three films also have rental and other peripheral revenues of 60 million, and the follow-up of “High School Musical” and the company’s film and television library of 10 million. The copyright fee obtained by the re-release of the movies is 10 million, and here is another 201 million, plus the box office profit, it is about 465.5 million.

465.5 million. That's how the company made after taxes, excluding Juno, after it nearly ran out of cash in the mid-2000s.

But this is not the number on the company's account, because there are still expenses, the promotional screening cost of "Juno" is 35 million, the production cost of "Mr. Hughes", which is about to start filming, is 65 million, and the production cost of "High School Musical 3" is 35 million , as well as shareholder dividends, company employee salaries and bonuses, and core business development, etc., spent about 70 million US dollars; and allocated 50 million to FM company.

Due to the nature of a private company, he withdrew his own 20 million in cash as a major shareholder, and donated another 20 million a few days ago, so a total of 295 million was spent, and now Flame Movie has 170.5 million in cash.

If you add the 50 million FM company, the 100 million blue sky studio, and two films in production, the market capital of the Flame Group is 400 million; if you add "Juno" at least 100 million in global box office tax After the income, and its considerable peripherals, the market capital of the Flame Group has reached more than 500 million, and the number of available cash will soon be 300 million US dollars.

"Very good." Wang Yang put down the financial statement, looked around at all the smiling executives at the conference table, applauded and said with a smile: "It really surprised me, very good." He looked at Mark Slanter, nodded and said: "Mark, let's start discussing the company's plans."

This year, Flame Films (FF) has no film plans except for "High School Musical 3", which is confirmed to be released on a large scale in August during the summer vacation. The collision of "High School Musical 3" is harmless, and the cruel Christmas schedule is not suitable for youth musicals, so if all goes well, "Sweetheart" is likely to be released in March or April of 2002.

In 2002, FF also had "Ice Age" in the summer vacation, and "Mr. Hughes" with an undetermined schedule, but it will definitely be released, but this is all in 2002. Only one movie will be released on a large scale this year, and the new work of "Chairman Stealing Money" seems to be in the foreseeable future. Therefore, this year, the focus of the work of the Flame Group will be shifted to the FM company. Naturally, there will be sufficient funds. The goal is to let FM as soon as possible. Form a good and stable screening mode, and continue to develop its film and television library.

"This year we will release a film on a large scale, test 20 films, and expand the film and television library to 2,000 films." Michael Burns stood in front of the projector, pointed to the image behind him, and introduced: "Our goal By 2002, the large-scale distribution increased to 2, and then increased at a rate of 2 per year..."

"It's time for us to start a TV business. I've contacted them. Many TV stations are interested in booking our TV series. Let's start with small-budget sitcoms..."

"We haven't developed enough overseas markets. Many countries and regions have not released it. This has caused us to lose too much overseas box office..."

Wang Yang sat quietly at the chief, turning his pen in his hand, and occasionally expressed a few opinions, but he would not have too many affirmations or vetoes. He is not a professional talent. Makes decisions; of course, if he is sure he knows what to do better, he will speak up and make up his mind. There are also some major investment matters that need to be consulted with him.

"Boss, I suggest that the company build a studio." Mark Slanter asked his secretary to pass a document to Wang Yang. He adjusted his black-rimmed glasses and said, "This is my proposal. There are several reasons, first, the company has sufficient cash and the financial situation permits; second, whether it is "Mr. Hughes" or the films produced by the company in the future, it will need to use a studio, which will save a lot of costs..."

Wang Yang looked at the proposal in his hand and nodded slightly. Although all the movies he has made so far are all shot on location, one day he will use the studio, not to mention that FM company plans to release it every year by 2005. 6+ homemade movies. After owning the studio, the crew of the Flame Group would not need to rent the studios of other film companies when filming, which would save a lot in the long run.

After looking at it for a while, he nodded affirmatively and said with a smile, "I agree with this plan. It's time for us to have a studio."

"Wow!" There was thunderous applause in the meeting room, and everyone immediately cheered and applauded happily. This meant that the scale of the company had reached a new level. In addition to the market share at the box office, it gradually became a large independent film company in terms of equipment.

When the applause stopped, Mark Slanter continued with a smile on his face: "Boss, look at the back, I suggest choosing the address of the studio in Vancouver, where there are many, many tax-free policies, which can not only save photography The cost of the studio is also very beneficial to its operation. You know, more and more film crews are going to Vancouver to film in order to save money." He laughed: "Damn America!" There was a burst of sound in the conference room laughter.

Wang Yang flipped through a few pages of the plan, looked at the contents behind with a smile, and nodded quickly: "OK, since there are so many discounts, let's build it there."

In the plan, the total cost of the studio is 100 million US dollars, but it will be divided into several phases to complete the project. The initial investment will be 50 million, including the construction of some conventional indoor scenes, such as offices, hospitals, homes, etc.; When the Flame Group's films need to be set up, they will do their best there as much as possible. After the filming is completed, those that can continue to be used are kept to achieve the goal of resource reuse.

Soon it was noon. After Wang Yang had lunch at a restaurant next to the company, he enjoyed a gust of sea breeze by the beach in Santa Monica. In the afternoon, the meeting continued again and discussed several decisions. Although the He's exhausted, but he's in a great mood because he sees a company that's in good shape and thriving

In the garage, Wang Yang looked at Jessica's car parked next to him. He tossed the keys in his hand and walked out of the garage, shouting, "Jessica, I'm back. Are you home?" Jessica's crisp voice came: "Well, I'm blowing Danny's hair, it's almost ready, he just took a bath"

Wang Yang listened intently, and sure enough there was the buzzing sound of a water blower. Thinking of Danny who was alive and kicking while blowing hair, even though the process was short, he decided not to participate. He walked towards the back garden with a smile and shouted : "I'm going to the garden" He came to the garden not to be lazy, but to continue an unfinished job before, which is to tie a swing to the plane tree. This is not Jessica's idea, but his. I have dreamed of having such a wooden swing.

Standing in front of the huge and dense sycamore tree, he looked up at the tall branches above, and murmured: "A man's job." After that, he stepped back a few steps, ran up and jumped onto a Standing on his feet, he climbed up the plane tree nimbly.

"Chirp, chirp..." Hearing these voices, Wang Yang standing on the main branch frowned suspiciously, bird? When is there a nest of birds in a tree? He followed the sound and climbed a little higher, and looked at a branch in the distance, and saw a bird's nest firmly built there, with a few small yellow-brown birds poking out their heads, chirping and chirping. squeaked.

"Oh, MAN is a nest of sparrows." Wang Yang looked at those ordinary and spiritual sparrows, took a few deep breaths, and suddenly called out loudly: "Hey, Jessica, Jessica is coming out." Jessica also yelled: "Wait a minute, what's the matter?" Wang Yang responded loudly: "A surprise." He looked at the new little lives with a smile, fell silent for a moment, and asked softly : "Hey, is your mother an underage girl?"

As he spoke, he shook his head and laughed, his heart was suddenly filled with relief, as if he had let go of a big rock, he knew that he had completely let go of the pregnancy incident in "Juno", don't worry so much, life will naturally find a way out .

"What's the matter?" Jessica's voice was getting closer and closer, Wang Yang smiled and climbed down the tree slowly, turned around and said: "We have some more guests in our house, and there is a nest of sparrows on the tree." He was about to step on He stepped on the next foothold, but suddenly stepped into the air, and suddenly fell backwards from a height of two meters, exclaiming: "Oh my God..."

Jessica, who came to the garden over there, happened to see this scene, her heart tightened, and she hurriedly ran over to Jiang Ye like a conditioned reflex, screaming and blurting out: "Yan!"

With a thud, Wang Yang fell heavily on the lawn. He felt pain all over his body. He didn't want to move. He gasped and grinned, "Crazy... oh, shit hurts like hell" Jessica He came to him with a panicked face, squatted down hastily, looked at him, and asked in a trembling voice: "God, Yang, are you okay? Calm down, calm down, I'm going to call 911, yes..."

"No, no, no." Wang Yang reluctantly smiled at her, took a few deep breaths, the pain had almost subsided, he shook his head and smiled, "No need, I'm fine, there's no abnormality in my muscles and joints, it's nothing but my butt It hurts..." He laughed a few times, stretched his hands and feet and lay on the lawn, and said with a smile: "It's nothing, I tried to jump off a three-meter-high roof when I was young, do you know what happened in the end? Wow, nothing happened at all."

Jessica frowned tightly, stroked his arm, and said, "Is it really okay? No, we still have to go to the hospital for an examination." Wang Yang still shook his head: "Believe me, if something happens, I won't I'll hold on, I'm not an idiot." Seeing that he seemed to be intact, Jessica stood up angrily and kicked him lightly, saying: "You scared me to death, this is your surprise? I said to use a ladder, why don't you listen to me, you are not Tarzan"

Wang Yang couldn't help but thumped the lawn with a smile: "I don't want to quarrel, but you are right, scold me...haha" Jessica rolled her eyes with a helpless smile, and glanced at the sycamore tree. where? She looked at him again and said, "Do you want me to help you up?"

"Wait a minute." Through the lush leaves of the sycamore tree, Wang Yang looked at the sky covered with sunset glow and the clouds fluttering in the wind, and sighed softly: "It's so beautiful now. Taobao Women's Clothing Tmall Taobao Mall Taobao Women's winter coat m..."

The artistic cell of the director came again. Jessica sat down on the lawn beside him with a smile, huddled her knees and looked up at the sky, but she was really beautiful.

※※

Claire opened the mailbox with her mouth curled up. These days, she was very tired. She originally thought that a group pregnancy would be a cool and interesting thing, but now it seems that it is not so fun. She took out the letters in the mailbox and looked at one of them suspiciously. It said that the receiving address was her school, and then it was forwarded here again.

Who sent it, Los Angeles, Wang Yang? Claire blinked and waited for a few seconds to react, and said to herself: "Wang Yang? How is it possible that Magical Yang is possible?" She hurriedly opened the letter, took out the letter paper inside and glanced at it. Written by herself, she first looked at the signature at the end of the letter, and it turned out to be the same as the handwriting of Miraculous Yang's signature on the Internet, she couldn't help being surprised: "Oh, my God, this is true..."

Because of the group pregnancy? She frowned and looked at it, what did he write? Want to teach me?

I saw the letter read: "Hi, I'm Wang Yang, maybe you like me, maybe you don't like me, but I have to say, your actions like that are very heartbreaking...Girl, I'm not saying that you are right Or wrong, you will make this judgment yourself in the future. You will encounter many, many difficulties in the future, even more difficult than Juno, and maybe one day, you will call 'Damn Fantastic Jan, damn Juno, let them go to hell'……"

Claire looked at the words on the letter paper silently, without preaching or teaching, but very sincerely. For some reason, she felt very warm in her heart.

She smiled and continued to read: "I hope that during this pregnancy process, you can clearly understand yourself and understand yourself like Juno... so that whether you are raising the baby by yourself, or looking for adoption like Juno, Y'all will take care of it... Anyway, good luck to you guys, good luck to the little ones I'm not cool at all? Yes, but do you know what is cool? Actually I don't know, I'm waiting for the day , you can tell me, Wang Yang."

What is cool? Claire was at a loss, thinking about the shocked and disappointed faces of her parents. Looking at the letter, she suddenly choked up, murmuring like Juno: "I don't know what kind of girl I am..." She was silent After a while, he suddenly took the letter and ran to the other side of the town.

"Jenny, I received a letter from Miracle Yang..." Claire came to the lawn in front of her good sister Janet's house panting, and saw Janet sitting on the lawn with a letter in her hand. Claire asked panting: "You got it too?"

Janet over there nodded, wiped the tears from the corners of her eyes, looked at her and said, "Claire, we are a little too willful." Claire exhaled expressionlessly, and said, "I know, but what can we do now? Do you want to do it?" Janet waved the letter paper in her hand and said with a smile: "I already have an idea, I will be like Juno, this baby, I will find a good adoptive family for him, and he will be happy."

"Hmm..." Claire responded silently, and she suddenly smiled: "I, you, Hetty...everyone will."