Chapter 227: Different Choices

Columbia gave Cao Yang 13% of the total box office and subsequent ancillary revenue shares, but it was not without conditions; they required Cao Yang to cooperate with Columbia's operations.

Specifically, it could be divided into two parts.

First is casting, mainly the choice of the film's lead.

Second is the choice of filming location.

With a total budget of 160 million USD, such a super-production cannot be careless in the choice of the first male lead; the first choice is naturally a member of Hollywood's "20 Million Club."

Columbia had two candidates in mind.

In today's Hollywood, there is a private saying that any script will first be sent to Leonardo; only when Leonardo doesn't like it does it fall to others.

Although this saying is somewhat exaggerated, it reflects from the side Leonardo's current popularity and status.

Columbia's two candidates were Leonardo and Depp.

Whether in Hollywood or globally, Leonardo's popularity and influence are among the top tier of actors, and collaborating with the currently red-hot Cao Yang is the biggest gimmick.

Although Depp is still a bit behind Leonardo in terms of popularity, his advantage is that he is an old partner of Cao Yang; the two films they collaborated on both won awards and sold well, and the word-of-mouth was excellent, so collaborating again would first give people a reliable impression.

The reason Columbia wanted Cao Yang to cooperate was to rely on Cao Yang's fame and influence to achieve their goal.

What goal?

One must know that members of Hollywood's "20 Million Club" not only have a salary exceeding 20 million USD, but more importantly, they all demand a share of the film's box office.

No film company is willing to "cut their own flesh."

On one hand, film companies want the popularity and box-office-carrying ability of "20 Million Club" members.

On the other hand, all film companies are unwilling to give up even a tiny bit of box office share.

Facing a super-star, if you don't split off box office shares, it is generally impossible to get it done; giving even a fraction of a percent less is unrealistic.

However, there do exist some special situations in Hollywood, and that is the director.

To be more specific, it is the art-house film director.

Don't even think about commercial film directors; even if they are in the top 10, they are basically not in this category.

When a super-star meets an art-house director, as long as they feel the film has potential—not necessarily in terms of winning awards, but even just raising their prestige—they often not only don't ask for box office shares but will even lower their own salary.

If they particularly like the script, there are not a few who perform for zero salary, and even some who pay out of their own pockets.

In the field of art-house films, since letting Depp win the Oscar for Best Actor again, Cao Yang's popularity in Hollywood, to be modest, is certainly no worse than Martin Scorsese and Eastwood.

Just like when Cao Yang first came to Hollywood to film "Milk," the two male leads he first valued both stood him up, and he chose Eastwood with almost no hesitation.

What if it were now?

If Sean Penn and Tim Robbins received an invitation from Eastwood again, they would certainly politely say to Director Eastwood: "Sorry, sir, I have already promised Director Cao Yang; I hope we have a chance to collaborate next time."

This is actually already a very remarkable achievement.

On a foreigner's turf, others used almost a lifetime to reach their current achievements, and how many years has it been since Cao Yang came over?

Columbia can be certain that as long as the news is released that Cao Yang has a new film plan, both Leonardo and Depp will be interested.

As long as it is operated well, it is very possible to get them to give up box office commissions.

If Cao Yang were filming a low-budget pure art-house film, even if Leonardo joined, let alone box office shares, his salary would be halved, or even just a symbolic amount.

Who told them this is a large-investment project? Even if it goes under the name of an art-house film, even if the actors are willing to give up box office shares, their agencies will not be willing, so they must find a way to operate it.

And what Cao Yang needs to cooperate with is just not to say in front of the media that he must use so-and-so; it is best to maintain an ambiguous attitude, and Columbia will handle the rest.

As for the choice of filming location, Columbia also told Cao Yang clearly that in order to reduce production costs and lower risks, the filming location can only be chosen from a few places, and these places all have tax incentives.

Columbia gave Cao Yang a list, and he can film in these places.

First is Canada, where many provinces have subsidies; for example, the subsidy ratio in Quebec can reach 36%–40%, and Montreal has one of the largest studio clusters in North America.

Second is Hungary in Europe; they give tax rebates directly, with a ratio that can even reach 30%, and there is no annual budget cap, plus additional benefits—the VAT within the EU is the lowest, only 5%, far lower than the normal 27%.

Third is New South Wales, Australia; they have a 25% production expenditure rebate, and international projects can also stack an additional 10% federal subsidy.

Fourth is Ireland; they have a 32% cash rebate subsidy, with a single-project subsidy cap of up to 25 million, and approval completed within 8 weeks at the fastest.

Fifth is New Zealand; their subsidy is a tiered rebate mechanism—from 5 million NZD to 20 million NZD, there is a 30% rebate incentive, and as long as it exceeds 20 million NZD, they can even give a 40% rebate incentive.

According to the current exchange rate, 1 NZD is approximately equal to 0.6 USD.

Furthermore, if collaborating with a local special effects company, an additional 8% subsidy can be stacked.

For example, the "Lord of the Rings" series, because the main filming location was New Zealand and they used a local special effects company (actually a special effects company specifically set up locally by Director Peter Jackson for "Lord of the Rings").

After stacking subsidies, it reached a 48% rebate, thus saving over 120 million NZD in total, which converted by exchange rate is over 70 million USD.

Columbia's list was not aimless; these five places all have perfect photography bases, the local governments do not have the situation of "reneging on debts," and they are all filming locations frequently chosen by Hollywood.

Columbia really racked their brains for this matter; they were afraid Cao Yang would have opinions on a designated filming location, so they gave him five to choose from at once.

Cao Yang did not have any resistance to this; after all, the preferential subsidies from the filming location government fall into reality, and he has a share of it too.

In the following days, Cao Yang either wrote the script for "Inception" or went to Fox Searchlight to edit "Juno," not caring how Columbia operated the male lead selection.

The script for "Inception" was actually very easy to write; when Cao Yang was writing the novel, he wrote it based on the film, so it was very simple to adapt.

Since his contract with the William Morris Endeavor agency expired in '98, Leonardo did not renew it, but instead took his management team and went independent, establishing a personal management studio.

From '98 to '01, the resources Leonardo received during this period using his personal management studio were hard to describe; it wasn't that he couldn't get good resources, but his judgment was indeed a bit problematic, and he was even nominated for the Golden Raspberry Award for Worst Actor.

If it were other stars, with no outstanding films in three years and the films filmed during that period almost all flopping, their status would certainly drop.

But Leonardo's blood was too thick, and the impact of these on him was minimized.

Leonardo also realized the problem, and starting from '01, he tried to contact the Creative Artists Agency (CAA) for non-exclusive cooperation, gradually transferring resources.

CAA was also very sincere in order to get Leonardo.

They directly brought Leonardo high-quality resources like "Gangs of New York" and "The Aviator," allowing Leonardo's career to advance further.

Although Leonardo is still in a non-exclusive agency cooperation with CAA now, in fact, apart from CAA, he has no cooperation dealings with any other agency.

Columbia did not contact Leonardo through CAA but contacted his personal management studio directly; doing so was not wrong, after all, Leonardo had not signed an exclusive agency contract with CAA yet.

Columbia just wanted to use this point; they had dealt with CAA too many times and knew that CAA was particularly difficult to handle and was a famous "big trouble" in Hollywood.

For Hollywood studios, if one were to pick the most hated agency, CAA would definitely rank first.

In Hollywood, the first person to fight for a share of the initial total box office for directors and actors was CAA founder Michael Ovitz, this guy who made every studio hate him to the bone.

In Hollywood, it was again Michael Ovitz who started the "packaging" service, making every studio almost become a "supporting role." Tang Mu Rothman represented Columbia and served as one of the producers of "Inception"; it was he who contacted Leonardo's personal studio.

Tang Mu Rothman could be certain that as long as he dared to contact CAA first, CAA would 100% produce a "packaging" service project surrounding Leonardo that looked very tempting in the shortest possible time.

Staff, actors, funds, filming locations, etc., a series of nested "services."

Don't think that's the end of it; Leonardo's box office share, that is impossible to reduce even a little bit.

This is CAA.

Leonardo was very moved by Columbia's invitation for him to star in Cao Yang's film.

The manager of his personal studio is Rick Yorn, who was his agent at the Endeavor agency and had also been the agent for Martin Scorsese and Cameron Diaz, having come out of Endeavor with him.

"Rick, are you sure it's Director Cao Yang's film?" Leonardo asked.

Rick Yorn collected a large amount of information in a short time; he flipped through the information in his hand and nodded affirmatively.

"It shouldn't be wrong; this film is adapted from a novel, and the novel is excerpted from 'Cao Yang's Fantasy Journey'; that's right, the author is Director Cao Yang. Who would have thought he is also a best-selling author."

!

Leonardo said with some surprise: "I've heard of this book; I thought it was just a name with the same pronunciation. Is it really the same person as Director Cao Yang?"

"Yes, that's right, it's the same person."

Rick Yorn answered while flipping through the information: "'District 9' is also a piece in this novel collection; this is really too unexpected. Many people have the same thought as you, thinking it was just a name with the same pronunciation."

"Then what is there to hesitate about? Why not just set it? Being able to collaborate with Director Cao Yang is something many people dream of."

Leonardo looked at his partner, not understanding why he wanted to tell Columbia to consider it.

Rick Yorn is one of the people he trusts most; he believed Rick Yorn would definitely give him a reason.

"Leo, Columbia said 'Inception' is an art-house film; I think you can understand what they mean."

Rick Yorn spread his hands, shrugged his shoulders, and said with a wry smile:

"In fact, according to the information I got from the inside, the budget for 'Inception' is definitely over 100 million USD. This is not an ordinary art-house film, so I think we cannot treat it as an ordinary art-house film."

"Is their offer very low?"

Leonardo asked with a frown. For such a large-investment film, if they were to cut the salary in half, that would be a bit insulting—I can take the initiative to reduce my salary on the premise that I like the script, but when there is no lack of funds, you cannot do this.

"That's not the case; they tentatively offered 18 million USD, but there is no box office bonus."

Leonardo was silent. He is a smart person, and from this, he could also see that the salary should still be negotiable, but the box office bonus is probably difficult.

This feels a bit neither here nor there, very contradictory.

He certainly wants to collaborate with Cao Yang, but for such a large-investment film that doesn't lack funds, there is no reason not to talk about bonuses. But the other party said this is an art-house film; is it a bit excessive to talk about bonuses for an art-house film?

But for such a large-investment film, if an exception is made not to talk about bonuses, what about other films? Exceptions are not so easy to make.

If someone else said such a large-investment film was an art-house film, Leonardo and Rick Yorn would definitely spit in their face—Pah, what kind of pretension is this? Since when can art-house films have such a large investment?

But this is Cao Yang's film. The other party hasn't filmed a pure commercial film so far. Calling it an art-house film, even if it is filmed with the rhythm of a commercial film, it must have substance.

"Rick, have you read the novel 'Inception'?"

Leonardo asked. He was a bit indecisive, but he is not yet a prize-chasing maniac. Although he craves awards, he hasn't reached the point of madness and still has rationality.

However, if the novel is good and it's a collaboration with Cao Yang, would it be okay to make an exception once?

"Flipped through it roughly; didn't quite understand it. Regarding dreams and dreams within dreams, there are too many settings. It looks very headache-inducing; it's like... stream of consciousness?"

"Stream of consciousness? Dreams within dreams? What is that?"

Leonardo started to frown. Why does it sound so unfriendly? If this thing is filmed, can others understand it?

"Then don't rush to reply to Columbia; I'll read the novel carefully a few times first."

Contrary to Leonardo, Depp received a notification from his agent saying that Cao Yang had a film he wanted to invite him to and asked what he thought.

Depp looked at his agent as if looking at an idiot and said coldly: "Give me a reason."

"What?" The agent didn't quite follow Depp's train of thought.

"Is your head filled with shit? That's Director Cao Yang's film; why do you still need to ask for my opinion? Hurry up and agree to it, dog shit!"

The agent silently cursed back in his heart. These damn weirdos are hard to deal with; they don't even use their brains when they speak. Of course, we also want to collaborate with Director Cao Yang again, but the key is that the conditions haven't been negotiated well.

"John, it's not that we don't want to collaborate. You are now one of the top actors in Hollywood and have consecutively won the Oscar for Best Actor; your status is different. As long as we talk about collaboration, it certainly cannot be separated from box office bonuses..."

The agent looked at Depp and explained: "The key is to look at Columbia's meaning; they don't want to give you box office bonuses, and this is unacceptable..."

"So what?"

Depp emphasized again with an expressionless face: "That is Director Cao Yang's film."

"I..."

I can't communicate with you, damn it. You didn't want bonuses before winning the Oscar, and you still don't want bonuses after winning the Oscar again; then wasn't this Oscar won in vain?

"I heard that company partners Martin Lesek and Jason Heman defected to CAA, taking away comedy star Will Ferrell and director Christopher Nolan."

Depp dropped this sentence and left without looking back, looking extremely dashing.

"You damn!"

The agent kicked the sofa in anger, then let out an "Ow" and clutched his foot, gasping for air, not knowing if it was his foot that hurt or his head.

A threat!

This damn thing is a blatant threat!

Will the company be afraid?

Yes!

Is there any way?

Not a damn way.

Two partners, one star, and one big director just ran away, damn it. If the company's "Number One Brother" Depp leaves in a huff, can the company still operate?

Wouldn't it become Hollywood's biggest laughingstock? That is certain.

Everyone says Depp is a weirdo and hard to deal with; I've finally seen it, damn it. He actually didn't give me, this company partner, any face at all.

Just very angry!

And no way!

Fuck the weirdo!

(End of chapter) ===== CHAPTER 228 =====