Hollywood Director 1992.

Chapter 230: Headhunting War
Link also received news that Keanu Reeves, Sandra Bullock and Julianne Moore were preparing to switch jobs.

He called Marty Bauer, president of UTA agency, and asked him to try his best to sign the three players, saying that they had great potential and he would continue to work with them in the future.

When "Speed" was originally being prepared, it was considered that the film would be a big hit and Keanu Reeves and Sandra Bullock would also become famous.

He had contacted UTA agency in advance and asked them to send someone to contact the two to see if there was any chance to persuade them to change jobs.

A few months passed and he almost forgot about it. He didn't expect to hear the news at this time.

Marty Bauer said that he had arranged for a poaching team to contact the three people and proposed many preferential terms, including helping them pay the termination fee, compensating them for the losses caused by the termination of the contract, and giving them preferential treatment in the agent's share.

UTA agency has shown great sincerity in this matter and the probability of success is very high.

However, after the news came out, the two brokerage companies WMA and ICM also contacted the three and were prepared to pay a large sum of money to poach them. At the same time, CAA also tried its best to retain the three.

Four brokerage companies have started a war to poach talent.

For a time, it attracted the attention of many people in the circle, not only the four brokerage companies, but also Link.

Although this matter has nothing to do with Link, the three people who were poached have worked with Link before and have a good relationship with him.

Now these three people are preparing to change jobs, which seems to be Link's work no matter how you look at it.

This is his way of taking revenge on Michael Ovitz for suppressing his film.

Some media speculated that the incident might be part of the summer box office war. Before the summer vacation, CAA teamed up with the Big Seven Pictures to suppress Guess What Pictures' "Speed" and "Se7en". Link was unable to compete with the Big Seven Pictures in film promotion, so he prepared to cause an explosion within CAA and embarrass Michael Ovitz.

Link did not provide any explanation for these speculations.

During this time, he also received calls from Keanu Reeves and Sandra Bullock.

Keanu Reeves said he didn't want to stay at CAA because the culture within CAA had changed.

The top management began to frequently interfere in the work of the artists, asking them to help promote movies they disliked, preventing them from working with peace of mind, and asking them to be negative about the promotion of "Speed".

If you don't cooperate, use resources to threaten you.

This is an extreme act and they do not treat artists as human beings at all.

Keanu Reeves really disliked the management style of CAA's top management and decided to change jobs.

Link supported him.

The main reason why Sandra Bullock is preparing to change jobs is that she is getting older. She is 30 years old this year. Since there are too many artists under CAA and the internal competition is very fierce, it is difficult for actors like her to grab resources.

In the past, many of the roles she received were obtained through personal channels or through hard work in auditions.

The help provided by CAA was very limited, but it also took 10% of her agent's share of her salary.

She didn't want to stay at CAA, but UTA offered good terms, so she decided to give it a try.

Sandra asked for his opinion, hoping to get his support.

Link also supported her and said that he would work with her again if there was a chance.

Sandra happily invited him to dinner.

Julianne Moore didn’t call him, but leaned over to talk about it during a date at Renée Zellweger’s house.

Julianne Moore is 34 years old this year. She entered the industry in 83 and later played small supporting roles in many film and television dramas. In 92, she played the second female lead in the thriller "The Hand that Rocks the Cradle". As the movie sold well, she also became famous.

After the success, CAA re-signed an agency contract with her, paid more attention to her, and provided her with a lot of film and television and advertising resources.

She currently has more than 4 years left on her agency contract with CAA.

If she changed jobs at this time, she would have to pay a penalty of 200 million US dollars, which would waste a lot of resources and result in a huge loss. In addition, after hearing that she was going to change jobs, CAA gave her some film and television advertising resources worth millions of dollars.

So she is quite conflicted now and hopes to hear his opinion.

Link could tell that she didn't want to change jobs, so he persuaded her to stay at CAA. He had some minor conflicts with CAA President Michael Ovitz, but not with CAA, and he also maintained a good personal relationship with Vice President Jay Maloney.

If nothing unexpected happens, Michael Ovitz will jump to Disney next year, and it is not certain who CAA will listen to at that time.

Julianne Moore got his support and happily crawled back into the blanket to please him.

Renée Zellweger laughed at her for being greedy.

After several days of bargaining, CAA agency paid a huge price to keep Julianne Moore, WMA successfully poached Keanu Reeves, and Sandra Bullock joined UTA agency.

In this match, WMA got the upper hand, UTA won a small victory, and CAA suffered a loss.

Thus ended the dispute among the four major brokerage companies.

According to news from within CAA, Michael Ovitz was furious afterwards and even smashed several cups and threatened to ban Keanu Reeves and Sandra Bullock.

The reason why Ovitz was so angry was not only because he lost to Link again, but also because he hated betrayal.

Initially, he betrayed WMA agency and founded CAA with a few friends, becoming a thorn in WMA's side.

To prevent this from happening at CAA, he implemented a cross-agent responsibility system at CAA.

That is, an artist has more than two agents, including general agents, executive agents, film agents, television agents, advertising agents, etc.

An artist's performing arts agency affairs are separated from advertising and other agency affairs.

This can prevent agents from changing jobs with artists, and also prevent artists from changing jobs with agents.

But this time, Keanu and Sandra forcefully terminated their partnership and took away several agents and assistants.

This also shows that the system he implemented in CAA artist management is not as practical as imagined. Once an artist is determined to change jobs, or a rival is willing to spend a lot of money to poach someone, a few agency contracts alone cannot stop them.

This incident made Ovitz even more angry, and he blamed it all on Link.

Michael Ovitz was not a man who would suffer a loss, so he immediately contacted several major media companies and asked them to refuse to promote Guess Pictures' films. As compensation, he could help them contact other publicity businesses.

Some agreed, some refused.

The main reason is that Guess What Pictures has announced that the minimum publicity funds prepared for "Seven" is 1500 million US dollars, with no upper limit.

This is a huge piece of fat.

Media companies are also profit-making organizations and they must be accountable to their boards of directors. They will not leave money unearned. Even Time Warner, as a rival, is no exception.

Time Warner Group's business portfolio spans media, publishing, film and television industries.

Its subsidiaries include Warner Bros. Pictures and WarnerMedia.

The two companies have equal status within the group.

The company president is appointed by the board of directors and is accountable to the board of directors.

In companies with good performance, management will be rewarded by the board of directors and their annual salary and bonuses will be increased.

Those with poor performance will be criticized or even replaced.

This also led to different attitudes of the two companies towards Guess What Pictures. Even though Warner Bros. Pictures and Guess What Pictures are hostile, it did not prevent Warner Media from cooperating with Guess What Pictures and helping to promote Guess What Pictures' movies.

There are also News Corporation's subsidiaries 20th Century Fox Film Corporation, FOX News Channel and Star Media.

The same is true for Paramount Pictures and MTV, both subsidiaries of Viacom.

Unless the group's top management asks them not to promote movies under Guess the Movies, the group will be responsible for the losses.

However, the current size of Guess the Movies is not enough to attract the attention of several major media groups.

This is why Link doesn’t worry about promoting his movies when competing with the Big Seven.

But there are negative effects as well.

Under pressure from many sides, the companies under the seven major media groups knew that Guess the Movie was at a disadvantage, so they offered a higher price than usual, ready to reap the benefits.

Doing so also forces Link to continue raising the bet.

If they don't increase their investment, the two films will only get very few promotional resources and will inevitably be at a disadvantage in the summer box office war and be completely crushed by the seven major film studios.

Once they increase their bets and invest more money in promoting the movie, it would be fine if the movie sells well, but if it fails at the box office, guess what, the film industry will suffer even greater losses.

This is also the result that the seven major film studios want to see.

"Will Link continue to raise the stakes?"

Suddenly, many people in Hollywood looked at Link.

After careful consideration, Link asked the company to increase publicity funds and promote "Speed" and "Seven Deadly Sins" at all costs.

The top executives of the seven major film companies couldn't help but laugh when they received the news. Link was a good director, but not a good entrepreneur. He was too green and didn't understand business warfare at all.

This is Hollywood, their territory, equivalent to the banker in a gambling game.

They are not worried about whether Link's movie will be a hit, they are only worried that Link will be scared and unwilling to continue gambling. As long as Link dares to sit at the poker table, they are sure that Link will lose everything.

Link's announcement of increasing the cost of film promotion was also leaked by the media.

The media believes that his approach is risky and may lead Guess What Pictures to its demise.

Many acquaintances, including Robert Shea, Vanity Fair editor-in-chief Graydon Carter, and Hollywood Reporter deputy editor-in-chief Aaron Couch, called to persuade him not to be too tough. The seven major film studios and the media groups behind them are very powerful, and guess what, it is not a good thing for the film studios to be hostile to them.

Several people persuaded him to accept the recruitment of entertainment capital and release more shares. With the support of entertainment capital behind him, the seven major film studios would also treat him as one of their own.

Link did not agree. The war with the Big Seven Studios had just begun and he had not yet failed. How could he surrender?

Even if you surrender, you should wait until you lose before considering it.

After hearing what he said, those who tried to persuade him stopped trying, but everyone believed that Link would definitely lose in this competition and would eventually join the Big Seven Film Studios.

"Link is confused. No matter how powerful he is, how can he defeat a group of people?"

Harvey Weinstein looked at the newspaper, smiled and shook his head.

"He was too arrogant. He thought that by winning the bet against Ovitz and others, he could withstand the suppression of the seven major film studios. He was also too greedy and was unwilling to share profits with entertainment capital. Naturally, capital would not let him continue to exist."

Robert Reiner, president of Castle Rock Pictures, sneered as he sipped his coffee.

Harvey Weinstein nodded approvingly.

In the 1980s, when Miramax Films was not yet profitable, the Big Seven Studios wouldn't mind Miramax making a little money.

After Miramax made a lot of money, the Big Seven Pictures began to pay attention to Miramax and sent out acquisition notices. If he did not agree, the Big Seven Pictures would force him to agree.

Harvey didn't want to go against the capital, so he wisely sold the company to Disney, one of the seven major film studios. Although he made less money than before, he felt very stable.

Unlike Link, who is now almost a public enemy of the film industry.

It is actually very unwise to do so. In the end, Guess Pictures will lose the competition and will still be acquired by the Big Seven Studios, and Link will suffer greater losses.

“I heard you didn’t accept Michael Ovitz’s invitation?”

Robert Reiner asked.

"I am still cooperating with Guess What Pictures, so it is not appropriate for me to participate in your operation. Besides, with so many of you taking action, it doesn't matter whether Miramax is involved or not."

Harvey tapped the ash off his cigarette and took a drag.

"That's right. Four of the seven major film studios have agreed to help. What can Link do to fight back? We'll first defeat him in the summer season, and then continue to suppress him in the winter season so that he can't hold his head up. If everything goes well, we should be able to drive Link out of Hollywood before Christmas next year. With this guy around, we can forget about having a good life."

When Robert Reiner talked about Link, his face was full of resentment and anger.

Before the emergence of Guess What, Castle Rock Pictures was one of the top three independent film companies, making tens of millions of dollars in profit each year, and hundreds of millions in good times.

After the rise of Guess What Pictures, Castle Rock's revenue situation became worse and worse, almost to the brink of bankruptcy.

He is now looking forward to the bankruptcy of Guess What Movies more than anyone else.

Harvey nodded and looked at a piece of information in the newspaper, which said that Guess Pictures' "Speed" would be released on Friday.

After so much criticism, how much box office can this movie get? Do you think the film industry will suffer a huge loss?
Harvey enjoyed watching this kind of excitement.

(End of this chapter)