Hollywood (我就是好莱坞) Part I

Chapter 169 - A roundabout talk

Aniston, who had been sitting quickly beside Eric, was a little confused. Before she came, Eric did not hide the purpose of this invitation to Robert Shea. But now that dinner was past over half, neither of them had mentioned the acquisition of the film company at all. Instead, they were talking irrelevantly about kinds of industry insiders, such as the huge loss of MGM's Heaven's Door, the box office miracle of "Gone with the Wind" in 1939 when Robert Shea was born, why Disney rose so fast, or the truth of RKO's bankruptcy. Anyway, there was nothing about the aquisition, at least the not-so intelligent young lady didn't find anything related.

At first, Aniston listened with relish, then gradually interest, but she didn't want to be rude so that her boyfriend would lose face, the lady can only sit up and listen carefully, although her mind had flown to the horizon.

Until the waiter removed the dishes and severed coffee for them, Eric's chat with Robert Shea was not over.

"... The lates issue of "Variety published a data article. Statistics show that, from next year, the revenue from video tape and television rights of movies will surpass the box office. Moreover, the development of various copyright of merchandising products from movies is more diversified. So the role of distribution channels will become increasingly important in the film industry chain. Pure content providers will find it difficult to survive."

"That's one-sided. If there are in excellent films, then the expansion of distribution channel will be impossible to talk about. Hollywood is developing it's territory in the overseas market just by virtue of high-quality films one after another. If our films are as unproductive as European movies and few good ones were made, they will surely be like European movies, can only be competitive in a small circle. Building Highway is important, but without automobiles, highway has no value for existence. More ever, the salary of Hollywood movie stars has increased more than ten times compared with ten years ago, and they have even begun to take cuts from the profits of movies, which is the most intuitive manifestation of the importance of content in the film market." Eric finished, took a slow sip of coffee and glanced at Robert Shea. Shortly after dinner began, they exchanged a few words of greetings and flattery, and insensibly started a secret confrontation. Although no one mentioned any issues about company acquisition, they had been arguing about which part was of greater consequence, the content of the film or the distributor.

The topic was initiated by Robert Shea, who had lost the upper hand since that moment. Now that Robert Shea started the topic Eric knew that he was very exited about the Firefly's proposal to buy Newline. If he was unwilling to sell, he would not mention the topic at all.

Robert Shea, was also slightly distressed. He found himself far underestimating the vision and insight of the young lad sitting opposite.

As an experience man who has been making a living in Hollywood for more than twenty years, how could he not understand that once the topic was started, he was likely to uncover his intention?

But Robert Shea though Eric was only nineteen years old. Even he had some talent in film making, he certainly knew ver little about other aspects. And he was thirty years older than him, accumulating much more experience. Moreover, Robert thought his eloquence was not bad, so at first he was confident that he could hold Eric down. Once a seed was planted in Eric's heart the distribution channel is the key, Robert would be able to take the initiative in future negotiations.

Eric's successive film had worked wonders at the box office. So when Eric's had someone invite him and leaked some info, Robert Shea felt tempted. Fireflies buying Newline was for sure, Robert Shea didn't consider the possibility of the reverse at all. Robert Shea was already fifty years old, but still very ambitious. He didn't value the huge amount of money from fireflies purchasing. Instead, he hoped to achieve the merger of the two companies and get as much equity as possible.