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Chapter 252: Paramount Calls? (Seeking monthly tickets)

The two people looked at each other, neither of them moved, as if they were waiting for the other to take the initiative.

Five or six seconds passed, and Cao Sheng spoke: "Monster! I need you to help me practice!"

Wang Zuxian was startled, thinking that this sentence seemed a little familiar, and then she remembered that it seemed to be a line from the movie "Green Snake".

In the movie "Green Snake", Zhang Manyu is the heroine, and she is the second female lead, playing the White Snake.

This line was said by Fahai to the Green Snake played by Zhang Manyu.

Plus, this movie was released in 1993, and it’s been a while, so she wasn’t able to react immediately.

"I am the White Snake! You are not Fahai!"

She said with amusement.

Cao Sheng: "White Snake! I need you to help me practice!"

Wang Zuxian: “???”

There seemed to be a string of question marks in her eyes.

Does this mean that she must help him practice?

She tilted her head slightly to look at him, and asked with a half-smile, "What if I can break your concentration?"

Cao Sheng: “Try it!”

Wang Zuxian: "Then come and see me next month?"

Cao Sheng nodded slightly.

So, next it was her time to unleash her charm, just like the legendary witch of the devil using her enchantment, constantly testing his will.

Sometimes she danced in front of him; sometimes she stood behind him, face to face, whispering to him; sometimes she appeared beside him again, and slowly put a delicate hand into the collar of his clothes...

Can he withstand such a test?
Of course he couldn't bear it.

I didn't plan to hold on.

……

Same night.

Just when Cao Sheng asked the "White Snake" to help him practice, Cheng Long received a call from Paramount. After he communicated with the other party in English for a few sentences, his expression became quite surprised.

Because the other party said that he liked the script of "Pacific Rim" very much, Paramount decided to buy the filming rights of the script and wanted him to give the screenwriter's contact information so as to discuss the script contract.

When the call ended, Cheng Long still looked a little surprised.

He had previously promised Cao Sheng to help submit the script to several major Hollywood companies. It was purely a favor and he did not think that the script would be favored by Hollywood.

The main reason is that he felt that the special effects required for the mecha in the "Pacific Rim" script were too expensive, and that the current Hollywood special effects technology might not be able to film such a script well.

Moreover, Hollywood rarely uses scripts written by Chinese.

Just like Chinese-language films rarely use scripts written by European and American screenwriters.

Scripts written by screenwriters from different cultural backgrounds are unlikely to be liked by audiences from another cultural background.

I didn't expect that Paramount would call me shortly after I submitted the script to them, saying they wanted to discuss the contract for the script.

At this moment, Cao Sheng's status in his heart directly rose a lot.

It's already a rare achievement to be able to write a script that can conquer Hong Kong directors and investors, but how can you write a script that can conquer Paramount?
At the same time, he couldn't help but doubt his own vision of the script.

Because he previously thought that this script could not be filmed in Hong Kong at the moment, and probably couldn't be filmed in Hollywood either, so it was a very fantastic script.

Too ahead of its time!

In this day and age, it is extremely difficult to make a movie about war weapons such as mechas.

But the call from Paramount just now made him realize that he had underestimated Hollywood and Cao Sheng.

After a moment's silence, he came to his senses and sent Cao Sheng's contact information to Paramount.

Then, he called Cao Sheng again.

But Cao Sheng did not answer the two consecutive calls.

This surprised Cheng Long.

Decided to call back later.

He decided to call back later, but the people from Paramount didn't wait and called Cao Sheng's phone one after another.

Wang Zuxian's residence.

Cao Sheng and she are studying N ways of writing the character "Kun".

Very busy!

They both heard his cell phone ringing, but they both chose to ignore it. You know, they haven't seen each other for a few days, and a short separation is better than a new marriage, so how could they have the energy to answer the phone?

For Cao Sheng, she has the aura of Nie Xiaoqian, which is very exciting.

To her, he was young, full of energy, and he was so good! His various tricks were truly groundbreaking.

She had seen movies that were twenty years ahead of their time, but she had never expected that his approach to this sort of thing would also be twenty years ahead of his time.

He found it exciting to do this with her.

She also found it exciting.

"You've had a lot of girlfriends, right? That's it?"

Exhausted, she curled up in his arms and asked weakly.

The faces of his girlfriends before his rebirth flashed through Cao Sheng’s mind. He could no longer remember some of their names. Finally, he thought of Huang Qingya, whom he dated after his rebirth.

So he said, "No! Just one."

She looked up at him suspiciously, "Really?"

He hummed.

She asked again: "Then she wasn't ruined by you?"

He almost laughed at her.

Just then, his cell phone rang again.

"Answer it! He's calling you so many times in a row, maybe he has something urgent to tell you." She said lazily.

Cao Sheng hummed, reached for his pants, and took out his cell phone. The caller ID showed a very strange number, neither from the mainland nor from Hong Kong.

"Where's this number from?"

He showed Wang Zuxian the screen of his mobile phone.

She took a look and said, "Huh? This is a US number. Do you know anyone there?"

Cao Sheng shook his head.

"Please answer it! Maybe it's a director or actor from Hong Kong who has gone to the United States and is calling you from the number there."

she says.

Cao Sheng thought it made sense and answered the call.

When I put the phone to my ear, I could hear a string of bird chirping.

English?

And judging from the accent, it doesn't sound like the English accent spoken by Chinese people. The person on the other end of the phone seems to be a pure foreigner.

He immediately frowned and didn't have the confidence to communicate with the other party.

Because his English grades have never been very good, and his spoken English is even worse.

Then he looked at Wang Zuxian in his arms. He handed the phone to her and asked, "How is your English? Answer the phone for me?"

She looked at him in surprise, smiled secretly, took his phone, sat up and started communicating with him in English.

As a big star, she may also be preparing for a breakout in Hollywood, as she speaks fluent English.

After communicating with the other party skillfully for a few sentences, she looked at Cao Sheng in surprise.

Cao Sheng was completely confused by her look.

He looked at her with questioning eyes.

She spoke a few more words to the person on the other end of the phone, and suddenly covered the phone receiver with one hand and said to Cao Sheng, "The other party claims to be from Paramount, saying that Cheng Long helped you submit a script to them before, and they liked it and want to discuss the script contract with you. What are your conditions? For example, how much do you want for the script fee? Or if you have any other conditions, tell me quickly and I'll translate it for you."

Paramount's?

The script that Cheng Long helped to invest in?

"Pacific Rim"?
Cao Sheng was slightly surprised, then quickly said, "Ask them how much they can give me for the script?"

Wang Zuxian nodded, put down the phone and continued communicating with the other party in English.

At the same time, Cao Sheng narrowed his eyes and began to calculate how much he should ask for the script and what other conditions he could put forward.
He knew that Hollywood investments in movies were all calculated in US dollars.

Around 2000, the investment amounts for special effects blockbusters invested by Hollywood were often hundreds of millions of dollars, and investments of tens of millions of dollars were not considered A-level projects at all.

Therefore, the script fee for my script should also be negotiated in US dollars.

Like a million or two dollars for the script?
It may not sound like much, but if converted into RMB, it would be around tens of millions.

Before his rebirth, he also read a lot of online articles about movies.

Many of them are about Hollywood movies.

He remembered that it was normal for a Hollywood blockbuster script to sell for one or two million dollars.

So, when Wang Zuxian covered the microphone of the phone again and said to him: "The other party said they can give you 50 US dollars, do you agree?"

He immediately shook his head, "No! Tell him it's at least 200 million US dollars!"

Wang Zuxian looked surprised, but still nodded, let go of the phone microphone and continued to communicate with the other party.

After a moment, she covered the microphone again and said to him, "No! The other party said that they can only give you a maximum of 80 US dollars, no more!"

Cao Sheng narrowed his eyes and said, "Tell him 200 million US dollars. In addition, the development rights of the sequel belong to me."

Wang Zuxian: “???”

Does Cao Sheng care about the development rights for the sequel?
Actually he doesn't care.

Because he felt that the plot of the original "Pacific Rim" was pretty bad, especially the plot of the second part, which simply left him speechless.

But the visual effects of this mecha blockbuster are really awesome.

The creativity and setting are also good.

It is suitable to be written in the book "The Linglong Tower of Heaven and Earth", allowing the protagonist to use a flying sword to cut the mecha, giving readers a different sense of pleasure.

So, he used a little memory and his own creativity to come up with a script for Pacific Rim.

But he had little interest in writing the second script.

The plot of the second part is not used in his novel.

The reason why he asked the other party for the sequel development rights at this time was for one reason: the offer they gave him for the script was too low.

From $50 to $80?
Are you bullying him because he is a Chinese screenwriter and doesn't understand the market situation of Hollywood special effects blockbusters?
A script like "Pacific Rim" would not have produced a decent result without a total investment of hundreds of millions of dollars.

With an investment of hundreds of millions of US dollars, he, as the screenwriter, wants 200 million US dollars for the script. Is that a lot?
Since the other party was unwilling to pay 200 million US dollars for the script, he used the sequel development rights to force the other party to raise the price.

He believed that for a special effects blockbuster with this amount of investment, the other party would definitely want to obtain the rights to develop a sequel.

Otherwise, if the first film becomes a hit, but the development rights for the second film are in the hands of the screenwriter, to what extent will the script fee for the second film increase?
If the screenwriter asks for 10 million US dollars for the script, will Paramount give it to him or not?

If you don’t give it, you won’t be able to make money by shooting the second film.

If you give, it means heavy bleeding.

Sure enough, a moment later, Wang Zuxian covered the microphone of her phone again, turned to him and said, "No! He said that the development rights of the sequel must belong to Paramount, and he can raise the script fee to 100 million US dollars, no more."

Cao Sheng smiled and said, "Tell him, 250 million US dollars! We can give them the rights to develop the sequel."

Wang Zuxian looked at him thoughtfully and nodded, as if she understood what he meant.

Next, she communicated with Paramount again.

Cao Sheng put his hands behind his head and watched her communicating with the other party in English with a smile.

Suddenly I felt that I didn’t lose out by being tricked into coming to Hong Kong this time.

Not only did she have a great time, but she also got to use her spoken English and negotiation skills for free.

If he had not come to Hong Kong today and was still in Huizhou, he would definitely not understand the call from Paramount, and his assistant Wang Jing might not understand it either. Even if he asked an English teacher to answer the call, he might not be able to understand some of the film industry terms mentioned by the other party.

"120 million US dollars! The rights to develop the sequel belong to them!"

After a moment, Wang Zuxian covered the microphone of the phone again and told him the results of the discussion.

Cao Sheng shook his head. "My bottom line is 200 million US dollars. As long as the other party doesn't offer this price, don't give in!"

He didn't believe that the other party would really give up on a special effects blockbuster with this amount of investment just because of a script fee of several hundred thousand dollars.

Unless the other party doesn't really want the script in the first place.

But he didn't believe in this kind of script that required a lot of investment. If the other party really didn't want it, they would never ask him to buy the script.

"He said if you insist on $250 million, he doesn't have the authority and needs to apply to higher authorities."

A few minutes later, Wang Zuxian reported the negotiation results to him again.

Cao Sheng nodded, "Then let him apply, and I'll wait for the result of his application."

"it is good!"

Wang Zuxian agreed and spoke to the other party again.

This time she ended the call quickly and handed the phone back to Cao Sheng.

When Cao Sheng took the phone, she asked curiously, "What kind of script did you submit to Paramount? They actually offered 120 million US dollars for the script? Did you know that most of our Hong Kong actors can't get that much even if they can act in Hollywood movies?"

Cao Sheng smiled and said, "It's a script for a mecha movie."

"Mecha movie? Is that the script you talked about with Brother Cheng Long on the fishing boat last time?"

The last time Cheng Long invited him to eat seafood at the sea, she was there.

So, she also heard what he said to Cheng Long about the mecha movie script on the fishing boat.

Cao Sheng nodded.

Wang Zuxian was surprised. As she lay back in his arms, she sighed, "You showed this script to Brother Cheng Long? And then asked him to help you submit it to Paramount? And then Paramount liked it? This, this is simply too exaggerated! Why do I feel that no matter who you submit your script to, everyone will like it? You submitted it to Huang Baiming before, right? Huang Baiming liked it, and then you submitted it to Brother Cheng Long for "The Hunger Games", and Brother Cheng Long also liked it. Now you submit a script to Paramount, and Paramount also likes it. Have you ever failed? In the script?"

Cao Sheng laughed.

I thought to myself: All the movie scripts I copied were those that had been tested by the market in the original time and space. They either had good reputation, good box office, or both good reputation and good box office.

If someone doesn't like this kind of script, it's not my fault! It's because the other party is not professional enough!

Of course, he wouldn't say that.

He only said: "I have not failed in my scripts yet. As for why? I don't know. Maybe this is the legendary gift from the ancestors!"

She stared at him blankly.

As she watched, she whispered, "I'm fine again. Can you help me practice this time?"

(End of this chapter)