Chapter 330: Celebrities Are Boring

The box office for Shark Beach didn't look promising, which worried Yu Xian—he'd just become a mortgage slave.

If the family didn't make money, his lavish lifestyle couldn't be sustained; besides his mortgage, his monthly expenses for keeping mistresses, special events, and entertainment were all huge.

By domestic standards, he was now a billionaire, so to maintain appearances, he called Fang Hong to discuss a few new film projects.

Fang Hong dictated all the film projects because he held all the copyrights; Yu Xian only had to execute them and coast to victory, no thinking required.

Now his identity shifted between producer and director, so he could make more films.

Most of the time he hired European and American directors, mostly playing the producer role—in Hollywood, producers were the big bosses.

"Aren't you always complaining that I treat you like a dog, and say you don't want to work so hard, you just want to enjoy life—so why do you want to make movies again?" Fang Hong said.

"Fuck, it's just that I saw you weren't making money, and I felt bad about it," Yu Xian lied.

"Hehehe!" Fang Hong laughed.

"Don't laugh—I've got more film projects coming, throw them at me right now." Yu Xian felt exposed the moment he heard Fang Hong laugh.

"Would you make a horror film?" Fang Hong asked tentatively.

"Sure, I'll make any movie, as long as it makes money—I'll do it," Yu Xian now understood just how good money was, how amazing wealth felt.

Before, life was simpler, with smaller expenses, so he never noticed—money never ran out. But since falling into luxury, all kinds of costs piled up.

In the United States, the life of the rich and the life of the poor were truly heaven and hell.

"Alright, the family's account doesn't have much cash left—we can only make low-budget films."

Fang Hong had drained the family too hard before, so they couldn't afford films like Fifty Shades of Grey anymore.

It meant starting over from scratch—building an industry was just too hard.

Making Fifty Shades of Grey had taken years of accumulation; money didn't just appear—it didn't mean you earned a lot, you'd have that much.

The family had costs too: salaries to pay, and some taxes to pay—even with tax avoidance, you still had to pay something, you couldn't dodge it all.

And for salaries, employees like Liu Tianxian still needed symbolic pay—at least the minimum wage of $7.25 per hour, eight hours a day, totaling $1,737 per month.

Round it up to $1,800 per month for her.

That meant paying Liu Tianxian this much every month; the other four employees got slightly more, since they actually worked—doing accounting, sweeping floors, etc. —while Liu Tianxian just sat around doing nothing.

"No problem, make them," Yu Xian said firmly.

Fang Hong opened his notebook, glanced at the screen, and pointed: "How about Get Out, Don't Breathe, and then a Nun from The Conjuring universe?"

He treated making films like ordering food—whatever he picked, he got.

The Nun belonged to The Conjuring universe; after this one, the entire Conjuring film series would be complete—later sequels or spin-offs could follow.

"Fine," Yu Xian had read all these screenplays—he'd read every script and treatment Fang Hong gave him.

They were just scary, except Get Out had some fresh ideas.

"Don't dump them all at once—space them out. If you dump them all, the family's funds won't keep up." Fang Hong warned.

If one film project ran out of funds, the whole pipeline would break—you'd have to transfer money from China.

Yu Xian asked: "Which one should we start with, then which one after?"

"Start with Get Out—it costs $5 million; Don't Breathe costs $9.9 million; The Nun costs $22 million. Start with the cheapest," Fang Hong said.

These film budgets were already finalized; Yu Xian just needed to assemble the production teams and find directors.

Make the low-cost ones first, then the expensive ones; once Shark Beach, The Purge 3, and The Fault in Our Stars are released, we'll have enough capital again to make big-budget films.

Moonlight is just a free award-bait film—we don't plan to make money from it.

Of course, making a big-budget film is hard unless Fang Hong stops siphoning funds.

"Ojkb!" Yu Xian agreed.

"Are you really that short on cash? I remember you've got appearance fees now!" Fang Hong checked his financial situation.

If things weren't too bad, he'd help him out.

Now that Yu Xian was a big director, he earned appearance fees for events and interviews—extra income.

Once a person becomes famous, they can always make money.

"Bullshit, my appearance fees are only one or two grand—I'm not a real celebrity, I don't sing or dance, so who's going to invite me? Plus, most invitations are charity events—just show up and smile."

Yu Xian explained further: "I'm not exactly broke—it's just that I recently got a supermodel girlfriend, and I've got to work hard now."

"Holy shit, you're not into celebrities anymore—you're into supermodels now?" Fang Hong was speechless. "Celebrities are boring—just a face, average bodies. Supermodels? Their bodies are truly top-tier."

Yu Xian got excited and shared with Fang Hong: "Let me tell you, her peach butt is super bouncy—it rebounds, it's awesome. When you get a girlfriend later, you'll see—you already have one, so you don't need another."

"."

They chatted a while longer, and that bastard got Fang Hong all worked up—but unfortunately, Liu Tianxian had joined a romantic drama set, so he couldn't touch her ass anymore.

Liu Tianxian's ass wasn't bad either—it was very bouncy!

After hanging up, Fang Hong arranged to import Shark Beach for domestic theatrical release.

No matter the box office, it'd earn something!

Private companies could import foreign films, but with limits—twenty per year—just take some time.

Now that Yutu had connections, they'd give a little face, so the film got imported.

Shark Beach had no ghosts or anything—just intense thrills; after cutting some bloody scenes, it could still be released domestically.

After theatrical release, it would air on Chang'e Video—no copyright fees needed; Chang'e Video got all the family's films without paying any copyright fees.

Just take it and upload—just delete a few scenes to avoid trouble.

At this stage, online streaming wasn't strictly regulated—ghosts and all sorts of things could be shown; internet oversight was lax, otherwise KuaiBo wouldn't have survived.

Plus, they could freely provide the films to Bilibili Up Masters for clip edits and commentary—no extra copyright fees.

In his past life, Up Masters had to bundle copyright licenses from copyright agencies to make commentary clips—that's why most commentary was on old films or foreign films.

Old film copyrights were cheap—you could bundle dozens for a few hundred yuan; foreign film copyrights were hard to maintain.

These two categories had few copyright disputes—that's why.

Of course, copyright management isn't mature yet—any film or TV show can be sliced up and re-explained.

If disputes arise later, we'll deal with them later!

The Chang'e Video software isn't ready yet. It's estimated that a simple interface will be put up for trial launch around May, and then gradually improved afterward.

The thing is, it's quite server-heavy. The Data Center's current thousand servers clearly aren't enough—more need to be built.

For now we can only rent. Once we have money we'll build them. In the early stage of development, everything costs money.

As time moved into late April, just as the Propaganda Department push for "The Partner" was in full swing, the United States' Twentieth Century Fox animated film "The Croods" premiered on April 20.

It took in 20 million at the domestic box office on its first day, and 125 million USD in other regions worldwide—hugely popular.

When will Jade Rabbit's animated film be able to premiere worldwide? It's been almost two years in the making.

No idea whether it will make any splash after release!

If it can't make money, then several years of time, hundreds of millions in capital, and the efforts of over a thousand people will all go down the drain—truly hard to bear.

Fang Hong didn't press them either. Pressing would only add pressure and lead to shoddy work.

But he couldn't stop investing. If he didn't invest, all the money spent before would be wasted, all the effort for nothing—so he could only tough it out.

No way around it—he was benchmarking against Hollywood. This was the time to train the team. Once one production was finished, a sizable group of experienced elite production people would emerge.

Besides the film, the TV drama "Legend of Lu Zhen" would also premiere exclusively on Mang Guo Jin Ying Ju Chang on May 5.

The licensing fee was 200 million, roughly 4.44 million per episode. Only Mango TV could air it; other TV stations couldn't, and if they did, it would only be in the second round.

Besides Mango Satellite TV, Jin Ying Net could also air it, no extra fee required.

This 200 million was a package deal—broadcast across the entire Mango platform system!

Mango TV was rolling in money. Five hundred million in this day and age was an astronomical price. No choice—after all, Chen Xiao Hong and Zhao Xiaodao weren't short on cash either.

But the online rights weren't exclusive. iQiyi wanted 288 million to buy the exclusive online rights.

Apart from the Mango system, no other platform could air it.

But Fang Hong didn't sell—he wanted to give it to Chang'e Video. This made Chen Zhixi unhappy. Why give it to Chang'e Video? They had no money.

Over 200 million for a single TV drama—truly unaffordable. Ten or a hundred dramas would be tens of billions. Who could burn that much cash? And it would only get more expensive.

Apart from BAT-level players, fewer and fewer could afford to play.

This is also why iQiyi, Youku, and Tencent lose money year after year!

But this was tied to Fang Hong's self-circulation strategy—self-producing and self-distributing. He couldn't not do it.

In the future, TV viewership would decline year by year. Whether a show aired on satellite or not wouldn't matter anymore—online video platforms would be the main force for broadcasting film and TV content.

"Oh, General Manager Chen, this is the entire film and TV strategy—you have to help me here." Fang Hong stood up, walked around behind Chen Zhixi, and massaged her shoulders.

"Do you realize this affects the interests of the entire team—the screenwriters, the behind-the-scenes staff including myself, and the other board members? You want to prop up Chang'e Technology by using Jade Rabbit to transfuse blood—I understand you, but can the others understand? How are you going to explain it to them?" Chen Zhixi looked back at him.

(End of chapter)