I’m in Hollywood

March 17, this was the first weekend of the Easter season, many new films were released on this day, this includes the highly antic.i.p.ated film 《Road House》. For this movie, United Artists used 1927 screens in the opening weekend, more than the number of screens used in 《Pretty Woman》 by a few dozens. United Artists has been using a lot of money to grease the pockets of the critics, to get them to praise their film, but the next day after the premiere, the film was criticized by everyone.
 

"The hero character setting is very strange, he has a P.H.D., and he is also a master of mysterious oriental martial arts, but he is willing to work as a bodyguard in a bar, plus he dresses like a cowboy. And then, the director awkwardly built him into a paranoid avenger, but not a qualified Avenger, he can kill the henchman without any care, but he"ll show mercy to the big villain who he hates the most. To make a long story short, It"s a funny movie with a very ridiculous plot." The Chicago Tribune

"The film is full of anarchy, lawlessness, destruction and unbridled violence. It"s a farce." Movie Guide magazine

"I only saw a stream of brawls, broken beer bottles, and groups of big breasted girls and splashes of fake blood. The story was pale and lame, Richard Gere acting was dull, he wasn"t even on the same level as the villain." Montreal film magazine

"A ridiculous and noisy film" The Reel Movie Review

"You can remove the lead actor from this movie, and the plot wouldn"t change, The villain wants to control the Town, so he commit some violent actions like starting fights, murder, arson, and then the intolerable town residents revolt, kill the villain and his henchman. I can"t believe Richard Geregive up Eric Williams film 《Pretty Woman》 for such a movie, I don"t know how he can sleep at night." The Hollywood Journal

"The film was nothing but a rock and roll soundtrack." Rolling Stone Magazine

Because of the strong publicity, on the first day the attendance in the 1927 screening rooms United Artists got for 《Road House》 reached more than 70%, but with the one-sided criticisms after the movie release, the attendance quickly plummeted.

Three days later, the film box office started dwindling as the first weekend the Easter season ended. This was also the sixth week since 《Pretty Woman》 was released, and with no surprise 《Pretty Woman》 box office was up by $2.4 million more than last week, reaching 11.27 million US dollars, winning the first place at the box office. In just six weeks the film acc.u.mulated $97.69 million at the box office, Eric believes that before the next week ends, his third film will break the $100 millio

n mark at the box office. A month before he celebrated his nineteen birthday, the results will once again usher a wave of speculation and uproar in the media.

Although 《Road House》 has nearly two thousand screens to work with, after the first day the attendance fell sharply, the film only got $5.25 million in the first weekend ranking second at the box office, less than half of what 《Pretty Woman》 got.

Universal Pictures crime comedy film 《Fletch Lives》 won the third place, earning $5.04 million at the box office with 1400 screens.

Because Columbia increased its support, 《Home Alone》 the film that was Released eighteenth weeks ago still was able to win $4 million at the box office, Steadily approaching the $300 million mark. For twelve weeks in a row, 《Home Alone》 box office topped the list, for more than four months this dark horse has been shocking everyone again and again.

Perhaps someday soon 《Home Alone》 box office will cross the $300 million mark, he was sure this will create another media storm.

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The next week, Eric finished the casting auditions of 《Running Out of Time》, as for 《The Others》 and 《Scent of a Woman》 auditions, he was going to leave it to the two directors. He was going to start running around the Greater Los Angeles Area to select the places he was going to shoot in.

Although 《Running Out of Time》 doesn"t have many scenes outside, there are a lot of scenes that need him to seal roads to complete the shooting, but finding a suitable place is not an easy thing.

At the same time, Eric also discovered that he lacks connections. As the base of Hollywood, Los Angeles policy support for the film industry is very strong, but that doesn"t mean a film crew can do whatever they want, many scenes require the approval of various munic.i.p.al departments, although their flexibility is great, the process is very complex.

Moreover, having connections is essential, Eric is famous now, But compared to the big directors who have been famous for years, he is still small. If it was another director of the same caliber as him, with just a phone call, he could probably get everything done, but Eric had to personally call repeatedly.

Fortunately, this movie is very important to Columbia, so to ensure that Eric can start shooting as soon as possible, they specially sent an experienced producer to a.s.sist Eric in preparing, which significantly shortened the preparation time.

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When Eric was running around trying to find the right places to shoot his film, another big thing also occurred.

The storm began when Richard Gere, who was nearly forty years old, saw 《Road House》 first weekend box office result. He started to feel bitter about giving up the role in 《Pretty Woman》, he knew he had missed a rare chance to become an A-cla.s.s superstar. So he became more and more upset, especially after the recent box office failure of 《Road House》.

After a series failures, Richard Gere was desperate to get a chance to turn thing around, he felt that CAA had the responsibility and obligation to help him, if it weren"t for Michael Ovitz personal grudge, he wouldn"t have given up the chance to star in 《Pretty Woman》.

After he finished filming "Road House" his broker Horner Willie, recommended for him a small cost horror film, even though he took fancy to a medium cost production film made by CAA for universal pictures, Richard thought he wasn"t asking for too much. But Horner Willie didn"t agree to win the role for him, he knows why he refused after he saw 《Road House》 reviews, CAA wouldn"t risk giving a big budget film to an actor who"s reputation has fallen so much.

Horner Willie is one of CAA early group of brokers, he can be considered a gold broker, even A-level actors are polite to him, which slowly contributed to him having a big ego. When Richard Gere made the mistake of refusing to star in 《Pretty Woman》, he put all the blame on CAA body, and with the acc.u.mulation of grievances in his heart, coupled with Horner Willie refusing to fight for that role, all that acc.u.mulated anger broke loose.

The two had a big fight in Horner Willie"s office, if not others people come in time to break them apart, the two are likely to start fist fighting.

After this incident, Richard Gere completely cut ties with CAA. On the third day after the incident, relying on a friend"s introduction, Richard joined another big brokerage firm called "William Morris Agency" also known as (WMA).

Countless job-hopping events happen every year in Hollywood. Even the CAA who claims to have a perfect system to stop actors from leaving, can"t stop this from happening to them.

CAA so-called system is there to prevent the brokers working for the firm from leaving, the five founders of CAA Mike Rosenfeld, Michael Ovitz, Ronald Meyer, William Haber, and Rowland Perkins originally worked at William Morris Agency, know the danger of letting the talents they nurtured for many years leave. So they put the system in place from the start, to prevent that from happening. As for top stars, they don"t have too many constraints, they can leave whenever they want. As for second and third line actors, as long as they are willing to pay liquidated damages, they can easily leave. But now CAA-owned film and television industry chain resources are very large, so most of the stars can"t be lured away by other companies.

Moreover, because CAA promptly stopped the rumors about Horner Willie and Richard Gere quarrel from getting leaked, they thought that this matter was over, but they forget that Richard Gere is one of the parties involved in this fight.

In order to get back at CAA, in an interview with "The Hollywood Reporter," reporter Richard painted himself as a victim and mercilessly discredited CAA.

The next day after the interview, an article t.i.tled "Richard Gere: why I lost the protagonist role in 《Pretty Woman》." appeared in "The Hollywood Reporter" front page.

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"Recently, the famous actor Richard Gere who was expected to star in Eric Williams blockbuster masterpiece 《Pretty Woman》 suddenly left CAA the brokage firm he worked with for many years, in an interview with our reporter, Richard Gere finally told us why he refused to star in 《Pretty Woman》.

The following is Mr. Richard Gere original words: when I first saw 《Pretty Woman》 script, I thought that this was going to be an excellent film and that the character was in sync with my image, I even did some preparation for the role. And although Eric Williams is very young, but after watching his first two works, I found that he was a very talented young man. But when I made an appointment with him, Horner Willie my agent, suggested that I refuse the offer.

I was puzzled at first, then Horner Willie told me that because Eric Williams brought Kapoor Sid Agency and started working with him. Mr. Michael Ovitz who have a deep dispute with Kapoor Sid, won"t allow any artist to cooperate with Eric Williams, he made it clear to me that Michael Ovitzwant"s to ban Eric Williams.

Then, to appease me, CAA give 《Road House》 protagonist role to me, when I first saw the script, I said to Horner Willie: No, this character isn"t suitable for me. Although I played in action films before, this role was too violent for me, and that perhaps finding a man with more muscles than me will be more appropriate.

Horner Willie said I have no choice, and that I would have to take a meager pay in the film. To be more in line with the character image, I had to do a high strength workout for many months, but the film still failed in the end.

The reason why I"m exposing all these things now is that I think CAA has forgotten who they are. Because they monopolize too many resources, they become unscrupulous, doing whatever they like. Because of a little personal grudge, and to show how powerful they are, they will treat their artist"s career as a joke. CAA even started treating other companies tens of millions of dollars investment as chips to play with as they want, this is a terrible thing. Brokerage companies should serve their artists, and should always keep their employer"s interests first, this is the only way a brokage firm can survive for a long time, but now that CAA started treating their artists as p.a.w.ns, sooner or later they will self-destruct."