Hollywood Road

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There was hardly any sign. During the period before the Oscars, the larger Hollywood company reached a silent understanding and decided to drastically cut the pay of the stars. Stanton Studio was also one of them. Due to the studio’s participation After many projects, Murphy also temporarily gave up the screenwriting work at hand and frequently participated in conferences between producer alliances.

In this regard, Hollywood's capitalists undoubtedly have the same interest demands.

Just as the agent of CAA has changed from being tyrannical in the Michael Ovitz era to being relatively modest now, all major Hollywood film companies are no longer separate production or distribution companies, but are members of a media group responsible for it. Provide vital'content' for the entire group!

Any commercial company is happy to reduce the income of the carve-ups and thereby increase their profits.

Therefore, Tom Cruise, who was first used by Paramount Pictures, Viacom Group, and Summer Redstone, temporarily became the most unlucky one.

Although many media reported on last year’s economic crisis, Summer Redstone may be embarrassed not to be a billionaire anymore because of the plunge in stock prices, but he is after all the chairman of Viacom Group’s board of directors and the largest individual shareholder. , Mobilizing the media and uniting some people to deal with Tom Cruise is not a problem.

What's more, other companies have the same aspirations in this regard, and they will naturally support Paramount Pictures.

Murphy didn't know if Summer Redstone remembered himself, he couldn't reach for this kind of thing, and he was basically watching the changes with the crowd.

It’s undeniable that the superstar is still and has always been a member of the top of Hollywood, but it will be very difficult to get a 2+2 remuneration contract as easily as before, unless there is a fixed image of the sequel and a few super big ones. Prove your market appeal in selling your works.

In the process of publicly suppressing star pay by the producer alliance representing the interests of production companies, unlike the high pay for actors he once reported frantically on the other side of the Pacific, Murphy has never seen the government, even associations and guilds. I have never heard the voices of the labor union, and it is a business behavior that is a game of industry strength.

The ultimate decisive factor is the market and audience, because in a mature and sound industrial structure, the reason why a star becomes a star is entirely due to its own market appeal.

But the audience is forgetful, especially those who like summer commercials, they pay more attention to the visual effects and some elements that they are good about, and the stars should be ranked behind.

To some extent, apart from those iron fans, most of the audience is a clever and ruthless group who can vote with their feet.

Paramount Pictures and Summer Redstone dared to take the lead in choosing superstars like Tom Cruise instead of other stars. The audience is one of the important reasons.

When "Mission: Impossible 3" was released, Tom Cruise's anomie behavior led to the loss of many female audiences and transformed it into Hollywood language. This is money, and money is Hollywood’s principled position: no matter who you are , If you delay my earning money, you have to leave.

Regardless of the star's strength, the director's strength, or other strengths, the film industry is built in the commercial jungle after all. The value of the players in the game can only depend on their gaming strength at the commercial level. When a star overestimates its own strength or ignores it When the change of one's own strength no longer allows employers to "see money", when one's own celebrity machine, which was supposed to make money and reasonably exist, is no longer functioning reasonably, if not only does not think about corrections, but also asks wildly and does not allow the other party to pay back on the spot. For money, the result must be discarded.

On the other hand, Tom Cruise did leave enough and widely accepted reasons for Paramount Pictures.

Before the release of "Mission Impossible 3", in order to cater to Scientology and show love to Katie Helms, Tom Cruise did not hesitate to jump on the scene of Oprah Winfrey's talk show; in order to protect him Tom Cruise did not hesitate to attack Brooke Shields using drugs to treat postpartum depression, and verbally conflicted with Matt Lauer, which caused his popularity to drop sharply. It is precisely because of these that Pella Sumner Redstone, the boss of Viacom, the parent company of Mongolia, left an eloquent statement.

On the surface, Tom Cruise was abandoned because of what Summer Redstone said, because "his recent behavior is no longer acceptable to Paramount Pictures," but the crux of the problem is like Murphy. Everyone in the circle knows that, after all, it is still a struggle for interests.

In the past ten years or so, according to the cooperation agreement between Paramount Pictures and Tom Cruise, Paramount Pictures must pay 10 million US dollars to Cruise Wagla under the name of Tom Cruise every year. Annual fee to get the right of first choice for all film projects developed by it.

This tens of millions of dollars has nothing to do with film remuneration and investment, but a fixed fee that Paramount Pictures needs to pay every year.

In addition, the film starring Tom Cruise not only requires traditional remuneration, but also insists on participating in the theater box office and DVD sales dividends.

Although Tom Cruise's previous "Mission Impossible 3" box office was not a failure, it was a significant drop compared to the $545 million box office of the previous episode.

The film’s box office of 393 million US dollars sounds not a small number, but the film’s production and publicity costs are as high as 250 million US dollars. The box office has to be divided into theaters. As far as the theater box office is concerned, Paramount Pictures absolutely It's lost everything.

If it were not for the peripheral and downstream output value, Paramount Pictures could be said to be working purely for Tom Cruise.

Moreover, even the DVD sales revenue, Tom Cruise still takes 25%.

According to the exact news that Murphy got from Carla Fess, Paramount Pictures was very busy on this project. "Mission Impossible 3" brought them only 800,000 US dollars in profit, while Atang Ge did. Close to 100 million U.S. dollars.

If Murphy were to say it, this is simply "uncle tolerable but aunt unbearable". ,

So, in order to save costs, Paramount Pictures insisted on reducing the annual fee of Cruise Wagra from 10 million US dollars to 1 million US dollars. Of course, Tom Cruise did not do it, and finally the two sides broke down.

If this kind of thing happened ten years ago, any studio would inevitably have to go through a protracted lawsuit, because Summer Redstone not only smashed Tom’s job, but also publicly insulted his personality by the way.

Summer Redstone is a businessman, a very smart businessman. Everything he does is not accidental, but must be a prudent decision.

Generally speaking, news about the dismissal of celebrities like this will be the first choice for the American industry magazine Variety Weekly, and the wording will be very tactful or even regrettable. It only needs to be disclosed by the CEO of the studio.

Both sides expressed their sincerity: we could not reach a satisfactory agreement with Tom Cruise, but we wish Tom all the best, so much; and Tom Cruise will also respond that we have always cooperated very well, so much.

But this time it was Summer Redstone himself, and it was still on the front page of the top American financial newspaper "The Wall Street Journal" that pointed directly at Tom Cruise’s mental state and misbehavior, and it was precisely at this time. In an attempt to fly solo, Tom Cruise claims to be in the knot of money from Wall Street.

Although the methodology was extremely suspicious, it did cheer other studios that were plagued by the super-high pay of stars.

Tom Cruise’s bizarre behavior is undoubtedly a public relations disaster. Paramount Pictures has always believed that if it were not for Tom Cruise’s misconduct, the box office revenue of "Mission Impossible 3" would be at least $100 million more. To 150 million U.S. dollars.

This is definitely not a small amount of money for Summer Redstone, who is ‘embarrassing no longer a billionaire’.

Therefore, he must make this heavy punch to show the fans who were injured by Tom Cruise high-profile to draw the line, so as not to further hurt their own interests.

Later, at the Oscars ceremony that Murphy did not attend, Summer Redstone publicly threw out remarks against Tom Cruise.

"He didn't do anything on the set, so I got 10 million dollars, so I fired him, and all the studios understood me and supported me."

Indeed, as he said, Hollywood producers support Paramount Pictures almost uniformly.

Murphy watched the Oscars at home. "Inglourious Basterds" won eight nominations, but only Christopher Waltz got back the best supporting actor and a golden figure.

However, the actor highlighted Murphy in the interview.

"One day, my agent in Los Angeles informed me to go to an uncommon audition. What was unusual was that before the audition, I received the script of the whole play. I read the script and felt Hans -Randa’s character is lifelike. Then I went to meet the director named Murphy Stanton. For me, it was a historic meeting, and everything was different after that."

Faced with interviews from many media reporters, Christopher Waltz said, "I am obsessed with Murphy's movies, really. He is a genius, and I would like to devote my whole body and soul to his movies unconditionally."

Best, he said, "Murphy is a pure director. Every nerve fiber of him is serving his directorship. He never directs the actors indiscriminately, but tries to let the actors understand and perform as much as possible. . Perhaps it is this kind of indulgence that made my half-life accumulation of performance energy gush out..."

Of course, while praising Murphy, the smart Christopher Waltz will not forget to borrow Dongfeng and praise himself by the way.

In fact, when Christopher Waltz lifted up the Golden Man at the awards ceremony, he also gave special thanks to Murphy-he is a fearless pioneer who used a unique method to sail this huge ship and finally led us to Victory was achieved here. This is the meeting gift you gave me, and I can't express my gratitude!

More than just flattering, Christopher Waltz has accepted Murphy's invitation to appear in his next movie.