Here Brooke Shields' commercial time has not yet been decided, the start time of "Endless Love" has not yet been decided, and many booking plans have been interrupted by the strike. Ronald decided to go to San Francisco to learn editing from Walter Mersey.
The trip to San Francisco has been decided with Mercy, but before going there, he has to go to the CAA headquarters to formally meet with Niceta and other agents. Richard has already spoken to him several times. It just so happens that this time he takes advantage of the opportunity to discuss changes.
We finished the script together.
Michelle Pfeiffer is busy attending acting training classes in Los Angeles. Sometimes she can't find anyone on the phone and has to convey her thoughts through her agent.
After bidding farewell to his family, Ronald took a Pan American Airways flight to Los Angeles. This company, which originally specialized in overseas aviation, merged with National Airlines and began operating domestic routes after President Xi Jinping relaxed air traffic control laws.
"Ronald, I'm so glad you're finally here." The manager, Richard Lovett, made a special trip to the hotel where Ronald was staying in the evening and hugged Ronald as he opened the door.
Ronald took two bottles of drinks from the refrigerator, and the two young men started talking in the room.
"Richard, how is Hollywood? Is it greatly affected by the strike?"
"Hey, everyone is going crazy. I just came from the office, and half of the people are still working overtime at eight o'clock in the evening. The shutdown has hit the actors hard. CAA has just made a big move into the film industry, and now everything is in chaos."
"My new script has been brought." Ronald took out a script from his luggage and handed it to Richard.
The revised draft is a quarter thicker than the first draft, with a total of 119 pages. Ronald added an emotional line, the widow of a Vietnam War veteran, who works in the Department of Veterans Services and usually takes care of the idiots who died in Vietnam after being forcibly drafted.
One family.
Because the fool's body was not found, and no comrades could confirm that he had indeed died during the mission, he could not be counted as killed in action, but could only be classified as missing. In this way, the fool's pension and military treatment were significantly lower than those of the fallen soldiers.
cut.
The retired platoon leader took the initiative to come over and live in a trailer next to the fool's house to take care of the fool's family. The neighbors around him didn't understand him and were also discriminatory about his status as a Vietnam War veteran. The fool's family also didn't understand him and were very wary of him.
Only the soldier's widow from the Veterans Service Department understood the platoon leader's behavior and defended him to everyone.
The platoon leader was bullied, spat on, and thrown stones by neighbor children, but he never fought back. However, when a soldier's widow came to visit him at night and was robbed by a stranger, he decisively took action and beat the robber away. Only after showing the widow did she find out who he was.
He is a master of fighting, and the two of them had further communication.
After understanding everything the platoon leader had experienced, the soldier's widow fell in love with the platoon leader, and the two had dessert on page 73. Finally, the idiot's brother saw the platoon leader's diary and learned the truth. The family accepted the platoon leader,
The platoon leader also settled in the fool's hometown town and lived with the soldier's widow.
Richard finished reading the script quietly, then closed the cover and remained silent for a long time. Suddenly, he put the script on the table with a loud bang, which startled Ronald.
"What? Is there something wrong?"
"No, this script is very good. It just so happens that Mr. Ovitz and Mr. Meyer are looking for scripts related to the Vietnam War for their clients. I will go back to the office immediately and let them see if they can recommend it to Sean Connery and Sean Connery.
Sylvester Stallone.”
Ronald was also very happy when he heard these names. One is the original 007, and the other is the popular Italian boxing champion. "Is there hope? But Sean is old, can he play the role of the platoon leader?"
"It doesn't matter, the script will be adjusted according to the star. Let's replace the platoon leader with a senior sergeant major and have a look." Richard Lovett was very excited. Under the background of the general strike, all shooting plans had to be adjusted. It happened to be selling the script.
It's a good opportunity to give it to big studios and then take advantage of it and insert stars into it.
Maybe it can also solve the current crisis of CAA. The strike has caused Sean Connery's film career to suffer another crisis. He has already confided in Ovitz the idea of hopping to William Morris. This is the first head signed by CAA.
If all the male stars leave, it will be very detrimental to the company and even the newly signed Stallone will be shaken.
And one of his clients has a Vietnam War-themed script that is currently popular. Who doesn’t want to get an Oscar nomination or even win an Oscar like “The Deer Hunter” with a good script?
This is very valuable to Ronald, himself, or Ovitz and other company executives. Ronald is a screenwriter who respects the opinions of the studio and is a quick shooter, which is rare.
.
There are thousands of screenwriters who can write characters, and there are thousands of screenwriters who can write stories, but there are not many screenwriters who can quickly revise their scripts according to the wishes of all parties and come up with satisfactory revised drafts.
Many screenwriters feel that their scripts are perfect. If they change a sentence or a word, it will make them feel as uncomfortable as picking their eyes out.
Let's add an emotional scene, and immediately add an emotional line, and still keep the original plot of religion, war, anti-war, etc. It seems that Ronald is a gold medal screenwriter, able to cooperate with stars and deal with stars and producers
Fang, requests for all kinds of weird ideas.
Richard Lovett hurried back to the CAA offices, leaving Ronald alone in the hotel room.
Bored, Ronald called Michelle Pfeiffer again, but still no one answered. He had contacted her and her agent Limato before coming here. In addition to being busy attending acting training classes, Pfeiffer is also fighting for
He won the commercial shoot for Lux soap. He wanted to understand that he was not the only agent who relied on advertisements to gain exposure during the strike.
Due to the time difference, although it was only less than nine o'clock in the evening in Los Angeles, Ronald was already very tired, so he did not go to find old friends such as Cameron, but took a hot bath and went to bed, waiting to see him tomorrow.
All the big guys at CAA.
This chapter is not finished yet, please click on the next page to continue reading the exciting content! The next morning, Ronald woke up early, opened the door and saw his agent Richard Lovett, waiting at the door of his room.
"You're here so early?" Ronald looked at his watch and it was only six o'clock. He got up early because there was a three-hour time difference and he was still in New York time. Richard seemed to have been there for a while, maybe he could still get up early.
Stand and wait at the door.
"I arrive at the office at seven o'clock every day and leave at eight o'clock in the evening." Richard smiled.
"If you work so hard, it's hard not to succeed." Ronald smiled, "Should I be glad that I found an agent who works so hard?"
"I should be lucky, Ronald. Mr. Rick Niceta called me in the middle of the night last night and said that he was very optimistic about your script and would recommend it to Mr. Ovitz this morning." Richard smiled.
He was very happy, which is why he came to the hotel so early today.
Ronald asked him, "Are we going to CAA now?"
"It doesn't have to be so early. We can just get to the office at 9 o'clock." Richard now puts Ronald at the center of everything.
"Then you're here?"
"I'm here to accompany you. You have just arrived in Los Angeles and you need people to handle many things. I drove the car and can take you to CAA."
"Then let's go have breakfast together." Ronald pulled Richard over and had breakfast in the restaurant of the Holiday Inn. They talked a lot about CAA and some of Ronald's ideas for rewriting the script, and then the two sat down
Richard's little old car arrived at CAA together.
Rick Niceta took Paula Wagner and stood at the door of the office to greet Ronald, "Welcome, Ronald, the youngest gold medal screenwriter in Hollywood."
Ronald did not make a mistake this time, using the Hollywood-style etiquette of hugging and hugging each other. In the entertainment industry, any greeting less than a warm hug will be regarded as being very inconsistent with the other person.
"Paula, how is Tom?" Ronald and Paula hugged and said hello.
"He is very good. We will arrange an interview between him and Paul Newman next week. We arranged for Scorsese to talk to him last time. Thank you."
As the highest-ranking of Ronald's three agents, Niceta took Ronald around the company and greeted all the agents in the office.
Ronald noticed that although it was not the 9 a.m. start time, there were already more than 10 brokers busy in the office, and some were still interviewing clients or chatting on the phone. This is really a very dynamic company, and everyone is working hard.
Progress.
"Mr. Ovitz is busy. His schedule secretary said that he will be free at 10:30. At that time, we will have a meeting with him and Mr. Meyer to discuss your script." Niceta and everyone returned to her office,
Ask Ronald to sit down, "You can look around, or I can introduce you to some of our customers."
"You should be busy with your own business first. If possible, I would like to take a look at Hollywood's scripts in recent years. You should have quite a few here. I plan to collect scripts when I come to Los Angeles this time."
"Richard!" Niceta snapped her fingers and asked Richard to take him to the lounge next door, and then moved a lot of scripts from her office to him.
“A big part of my job is reading these scripts,” Richard told Ronald. “I help Mr. Niceta read the scripts and write summaries and comments, and he helps me graduate from the mailroom to getting
I became an apprentice agent ahead of schedule."
Ronald was quietly looking at the more than 20 scripts in the box. He first turned to page 73 to verify. Sure enough, there were more than 15 of them, and they all had passionate scenes within one or two pages before and after 73.
Sure enough, today's Hollywood must create some violent and passionate stunts to attract viewers to go out of their homes and go to the cinema to watch something different from TV. Since public television stations directly target children under the age of 18, America's three major public television stations
The TV series are relatively conservative, only equivalent to the G-rated movies.
Ronald has read a lot of scripts, mainly musicals, biopics, and police action films. They are all types that have been hit movies in the past two years. Needless to say, the quality of the scripts is better than Roger Corman's new movies.
The quality of world scripts is much higher.
However, none of them are about the Vietnam War. It seems that my "My Brother's Keeper" was appreciated, mainly because Rong Gui and The Deer Hunter detonated the theme of the Vietnam War and fit the current hot spots. Maybe there are quality Vietnam War scripts.
, all attracted attention and were not wasted on low-level agents like Richard.
"Ronald, let's go see Mr. Ovitz together." Ronald, who was flipping through the script, heard Richard's call and quickly stood up and walked to the conference room with him.
In the largest office of CAA, President Michael Ovitz is sitting inside. He is a middle-aged man with gray hair, wearing a pair of round glasses, energetic, and has heavy nasolabial folds on his face.
His chin shows that he is a very independent person. And his well-placed smile effectively dilutes others' stereotype of his stubborn character.
Next to him were two secretaries, both well-dressed young women. One arranged his schedule, and the other kept track of the phone calls he was about to make.
"Mary, how does my tie go with this suit? I'm going to meet a big client later." Ovitz looked at his tie repeatedly in the full-length mirror in the closet and asked Mary, the travel secretary, what she thought.
Mary had just been hired as Ovitz's secretary not long ago. She was a little scared. After thinking for nearly ten seconds, she bravely expressed her thoughts, "It looks ugly. A purple tie and a light blue shirt are not suitable."
"Thank God, I finally have a secretary who dares to tell me the truth. I felt something was wrong, but they all said it looked good." Ovitz's exaggerated expression made his secretary Mary laugh.
"Mr. Ovitz, Mr. Niceta and his new client, screenwriter Ronald Lee, are here." The secretary in charge of Ovitz's schedule reminded him.
This chapter is not over yet, please click on the next page to continue reading! "Invite them to the executive conference room." Ovitz quickly put on a navy blue tie and said to them.
"Ah, welcome, Mr. Li." Ovitz sat on the table in the conference room and greeted Ronald without standing up to welcome him. The two secretaries next to him were still following his instructions.
Come and send away documents that require his signature and other small notes that need to be addressed.
"Hello, Mr. Ovitz." Ronald sat on the other side of the conference table with Rick Niceta, Paula Wagner, and Richard Lovett.
"I heard you have a script about the Vietnam War?"
"Yes, the Vietnam War, brotherhood, anti-war, fools, religion, love between men and women..." Ronald briefly summarized the selling points of his script.
Richard took out two copies and brought them to the conference table. Opposite Ovitz was another CAA partner, Ron Meyer.
Next came the usual introduction. Ronald talked about some of his experiences starting from the New World, and Meyer also introduced the history of CAA and some of the major stars it represented.
Meyer picked up the script and read it, "My Brother's Keeper, well, this is a good title."
Ovitz did not participate in the discussion, but immersed himself in reading the script.
"He is very busy and arranges his time according to 10-minute intervals." Richard whispered in Ronald's ear.
Then the interview with me will only last for 10 minutes? Ronald thought to himself, apparently still echoing Meyer's comments on his script.
Five minutes had not passed when Michael Ovitz suddenly stood up from his chair without saying a word and walked out of the conference room.
"What a rude person!" Ronald commented secretly as Ovitz walked out of the conference room without saying hello.