Chapter 98

Especially his clear, deep eyes and his face with its oriental charm—staring for too long really has a kind of magic.

Scarlett Johansson quickly takes a sip of champagne to calm her nerves; unexpectedly, the more she drinks, the thirstier she seems to get.

"Xu, there's a script, could you help play the male lead?"

"Ah?"

At the gala, Xu Can had just traded blows with the Black Widow, and then wandered among the celebrities with Happy.

He has gotten to know the top brass of Disney, Paramount, and Fox.

Although they are all in competition with Xu Can, getting to know each other doesn't mean there's no possibility of cooperation.

After all, given Xu Can's box office drawing power, no one wants to offend him; they'd rather curry favor with him instead.

Sony has a better relationship with Xu Can, so they naturally have a slight advantage.

Sony Entertainment Chairman Stringer is chatting with a bearded director, and seeing Xu Can, he quickly calls him over.

"This is Edward Zwick; we're discussing a film project and happened to bring you up."

"Oh? I have too many projects lately, I might not have the schedule."

The bearded man is very excited to see Xu Can: "Xu, it's just a youth romance film, filming won't take long. The first actor I thought of was you."

Xu Can himself can't imagine it; other actors are dying to have their agents search everywhere for opportunities.

His film offers haven't stopped for the past two years; almost every day someone is bringing a script to find him.

Most films have been turned down by Xu Can's assistant Vanessa, yet someone is still proactively finding him.

"What film?"

"It's a workplace romance film called *Love & Other Drugs*."

"What?"

Xu Can is stunned; it's actually this film?

Anne Hathaway's frontal shots—he has a deep memory of it from his past life.

Xu Can still wants to refuse, but Sony Entertainment Chairman Stringer persuades him:

"We acquired this script and feel it's quite interesting; you would definitely have box office appeal. Plus, the film's copyright can go entirely to your online platform, and we'll send you some more from our film library to stock it up, how about that?"

He doesn't know what got into Sony, but since that's the case, Xu Can is somewhat moved.

"Then I'll consider it."

The main awkwardness is that when filming, it's inevitable that he'll have to be intimately close with Anne Hathaway.

His backyard is already a bit troublesome; it will be very hard to clean up when the time comes.

But thinking about it carefully... that is Anne Hathaway, after all.

According to Xu Can's plan, the two 2008 works, *La La Land* and *Spider-Man 2*, have already finished filming,

and post-production is progressing smoothly; basically, they can all be released on schedule.

For the next period, he isn't responsible for directing or acting in the Marvel parts.

The directors are the Russo brothers, the producer is Kevin Feige, and he is responsible for the final check,

avoiding any political correctness or absurd plotlines, guiding the general direction to the peak level of Marvel.

According to Xu Can's plan, the Marvel side is his box office warehouse, his cash cow.

With Marvel, tens of billions in box office are waiting to be harvested, which can continuously bring back cash flow.

This makes Xu Can's other plan more convenient: seizing the right to speak in Hollywood.

He actually wants to do cultural output, using this position of global influence to promote the unique culture of China.

Japan used games and anime to make the world recognize Japanese culture, and many Chinese things were mistaken for Japanese or Korean.

Later, this phenomenon became quite common, and Xu Can wants to take this opportunity to make some changes.

China's 5,000 years of brilliant history and countless treasures should be felt by more people for their profoundness.

It's a pity that domestic entertainment and domestic games have never been able to go overseas, basically just producing and selling for themselves.

Xu Can wants to carry out cultural output; first, he must seize the position and the right to speak.

Currently, the most successful in Hollywood are only Bruce Lee and Jackie Chan, who carried forward the kung fu genre and made foreigners associate Chinese people with kung fu.

Director Ang Lee's *Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon* can only be counted as one of the few attempts in recent years.

Later films like *Turning Red* and *Everything Everywhere All at Once* look like they have Chinese protagonists, but in reality, they still contain stereotypes about Chinese people.

There is still so much, so much to do!

Xu Can wants to stand on the shoulders of his predecessors and push Chinese culture to another peak!

The so-called "with great power comes great responsibility"—he is a Hollywood filmmaker, but first and foremost, he is a Chinese person; this is where Xu Can's mission lies.

To seize the right to speak in Hollywood, he must first produce heavyweight works, making his status comparable to Francis Ford Coppola, comparable to Hitchcock...

At the very least, he should be comparable to Spielberg.

This Jewish director's *Schindler's List* has already generated enough influence.

So Xu Can plans to use some serious works next to gradually increase his own weight.

What exactly to film next, Xu Can is still considering.

Filming isn't just copying; moving works from his past life over intact still requires considering the director, the actors' schedules, their performance states, and many other factors.

Before he could decide, unexpectedly, Sony took the initiative to find him.

The conditions Sony offered are really quite good; besides the copyright for this film, Sony will also provide more online copyrights.

This way, his Galaxy TV+ film library won't be pitifully small; of course, the more, the better.

And filming probably won't delay him for more than a few months, plus he can earn a salary—why not?

The next day, before Xu Can could contact the other party, director Edward Zwick contacted Xu Can first.

"Mr. Xu, if it's about the salary, we can relax it a bit more; how about 25 million? This is already the limit I can fight for."

Xu Can's salary for playing the Joker was 15 million USD, and suddenly it jumps to 25 million.

The "best villain of the 21st century" he created, as well as the Golden Globe and Oscar Best Supporting Actor awards,

are enough to let Xu Can enter the "20 million club."

Everyone in this club is a Hollywood heavyweight male star like Leonardo, Schwarzenegger, George Clooney, Brad Pitt, Tom Hanks, Tom Cruise, etc.

Given Xu Can's box office appeal and influence, he is indeed worth that much money.

"Alright, I don't have a schedule lately, I can star in it."

Earning 25 million in two months—it would be a waste not to.

"Great! Then please help offer some opinions on the script too; we'll have a good talk when the time comes."

Edward Zwick is quite excited.

It's like a golden team finally hugging the thigh of a grandmaster; he wishes he could hand over the directing to Xu Can.

"Fine, you send the script over first."

*Love & Other Drugs* is mainly a romance story wearing a professional skin.

The male lead who sells little blue pills is a playboy, flirting with everyone he meets, leaving without a trace.

After meeting the female lead, he falls, but the female lead suffers from Parkinson's and doesn't intend to date formally.

The two stage a romance that is both painful and happy.

The original plot seemed to want to explore the pharmaceutical system, but unfortunately, it only scratched the surface, focusing more on the romance.

But the romance scenes were shot quite sluggishly, leading to average box office and average word-of-mouth, turning it into a niche art film.

Xu Can feels that besides the main romance line, the subplot of the pharmaceutical system can be dug into a bit more.

At the very least, he can raise the film's 7.5-point level to around 8.5 points.

By the way, he can use this film to practice... and then!

In the process of thinking about the pharmaceutical system, Xu Can has a flash of inspiration and suddenly has an idea.

Another film about medicine and saving people suddenly appears in his mind,

and before *Dallas Buyers Club* comes out, if he can film that movie, it will definitely shock the world!

"I think we should both calm down."

Beverly Hills, Xu Can's mansion.

Taylor Swift and Emma Stone sit facing each other at the dining table.