Chapter 224: The X-Files
Putting the newspaper aside, Eric crossed his arms and looked at the woman sitting opposite him. During this era, whether in film and television or in reality, quite a lot of women seem to like to wear shirts.
Of course, Eric also prefers women who wear shirts and jeans since it makes women look more mature and gives them a slightly androgynous look.
At the very least, he feels that these women look much better compared to women of the future who only wore odd dresses.
Moreover, in Eric"s opinion, a woman in a shirt can also ooze s.e.x appeal, especially when a woman wears a large mens size shirt without anything on the bottom, displaying her two bare long legs...
Elisabeth noticed Eric staring at her intently and her courage quickly dissipated. She put her arms on the desk and covered her chest before she yelled at Eric, dissatisfied, "Hey, what are you looking at, you b.a.s.t.a.r.d?"
"Nothing, I was just thinking, are you going to wear this to work?" Although she looks pretty good, the shirt and jeans are obviously not fit as office attire.
"Of course, I"m your a.s.sistant, not an office girl. Do you want me to wear a skirt and high heels while I run around with you on the set?"
Eric realized that she wouldn"t budge, so he shook his head and acquiesced. Anyways, he never expected that she would actually prove helpful since she was essentially Murdoch"s spy. He would just focus on his work and forget about her. Of course, he didn"t plan on letting her become privy of his company"s private affairs.
Eric opened the drawer in his desk and began to look through it.
Elisabeth smiled triumphantly as if she had defeated Eric.
Eric found a doc.u.ment and a pen next to it and gave it to Elisabeth before he said, "This is the contract for your position as my a.s.sistant as a crew member of Sleepless in Seattle. There"s one copy for you and one for me."
Elisabeth picked up the doc.u.ments and began to peruse through it, not rushing to sign it. Eric looked at his watch and picked up the newspaper and began to read it, once again.
After a while, Elisabeth asked Eric, "Eric, I signed it. What should I do next?"
Eric put one copy of the contract back in the drawer and replied, "You can go back now. When the crew leaves for Seattle a few days later, someone will inform you."
"Wha..." Elizabeth opened her mouth slightly and quickly realized that Eric didn"t plan to keep her around. She angrily yelled, "How can you do this?! I protest! If you don"t a.s.sign work to me, I... I will not leave your office today!"
Eric frowned and began to regret agreeing to Murdoch"s request. Just when he was considering how to get rid of her, a knock sounded on his office door and Alan walked in as he said, "Mr. Williams, the writers have arrived. They"re waiting in the conference room."
"Alright, I"ll be there in a moment," Eric replied and waited for Alan to leave before he said to Elisabeth, "Liz, I really don"t have any work for you here, so you should just go back. Someone will inform you when the time comes."
"I won"t go. Since I have signed a contract, you should a.s.sign some work to me."
Eric was starting to feel a little annoyed. Suddenly, he noticed the coffee machine nearby and said, "Since you want to work, go make me a cup of coffee."
Elisabeth retorted, "I"m not your servant!"
Eric chuckled and said, "This is part of the job of a director"s a.s.sistant. If you don"t want to do it, just go home and wait for the crew to inform you."
"You..." Elisabeth frowned as she glanced at Eric. Finally, she got up and brought Eric a cup of coffee.
Eric looked at Elisabeth"s stubborn face and picked up the phone and dialed a few numbers before he said, "Alan, bring two copies of the confidentiality contract you had signed."
Elisabeth"s eyes flashed as she remained silent. Soon, Alan walked in with two copies of a confidentiality contract.
Eric picked up the contract and said with a serious look on his face, "This is the confidentiality contract that Alan signed when he became my a.s.sistant. As Mr. Murdoch"s daughter, I believe you"re what its contents entail. If you violate this contract, you will have to pay a huge amount of liquidated damages and you might even go to prison. After you sign it, you will be able to follow me around during the filming of Sleepless in Seattle and temporarily act as my personal a.s.sistant to help share some of Alan"s work."
This time, Elisabeth didn"t mess around. She took less than a minute to flip through the over ten-page contract before she quickly signed her name.
Eric nodded and said, "Okay, come with me, and, at least while we"re in L.A, don"t come to work like this. You should buy some official office attire."
"I understand," once again, Elisabeth didn"t retort and quickly followed Eric back to the conference room.
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There were about eight people sitting in the conference room, six men and two women, all seemingly in their late-20s or early-30s. These eight people will form the screenwriter team which Eric has created for the new TV series.
Fox Network had signed a preliminary letter of intent for equity transfer with Firefly a few days ago, meaning the transaction will be completed within a month. Therefore, Eric began to work towards fulfilling his promise to Murdoch to prepare a TV show and a variety show before he got started on the last two Firefly films of this year.
According to the plan, the variety show will be broadcasted during the spring season of 1990, but since the variety show that Eric intends to produce is relatively simple, it won"t require too much of his time or effort. Meanwhile, the TV show will be broadcasted during the fall season of 1990. This TV show, however, had encountered a small b.u.mp.
Although it is created by Eric, after learning that the average production cost of each episode might reach up to $2 million, Fox suggested that he should only shoot a pilot for now and then shoot episodes each week if the ratings are good.
Eric, however, rejected this suggestion. First, he was very confident in this show, and second, he was worried that considering the theme of the show, week-by-week shooting would lead to a fall in the show"s quality due to the hasty production.
Initially, neither side was willing to make concessions. Eric even said that if Fox was unwilling to take the risk, Firefly could invest in the show alone, but this would mean that Firefly would solely own the show"s copyright. This proposal was immediately rejected by Barry Diller. After all, who can guarantee that this new TV show might not turn out to be as popular as Friends?
The two sides remained in a stalemate for a few days before Murdoch personally made a decision. He announced that since Eric was so confident, can"t Fox, one of the Big Six, even take such a small risk? After all, despite the huge profits from Friends, Fox will still acc.u.mulate a loss of tens of millions of dollars for the year 1989 due to the many failed projects. Therefore, even if the cost is higher, Eric"s project is less likely to fail, so it"s a better choice.
After receiving Murdoch"s approval, Eric got back to work. The TV show which Eric had planned to produce was The X-Files which, according to his memory, was the only hit show, which was not a cartoon or sitcom, produced by Fox during the "90s. However, the ratings of this show during the first few seasons were not great.
In fact, if it weren"t for the die-hard fans, The X-Files, which was extremely popular on streaming in the future, would"ve likely been cancelled after the first season. Even though the style of the first three seasons of the X-Files was very unique, the ratings only started to grow from the fourth season after the show"s unique style was changed.
In his opinion, the biggest reason behind the ratings of the first three seasons being low was due to the lack of a main storyline. Although there were strange monsters or supernatural events in each episode, the lack of a main storyline led to a low audience retention rate.
It wasn"t until the show"s screenwriter Chris Carter connected the seemingly random clues revealed throughout the first three seasons in the fourth season that The X-Files turned into a complete sci-fi story.
Another reason for the initial unpopularity of The X-Files was due to the sci-fi elements being unpolished and dull. Eric believes that this might be due to Chris Carter not having conceived the entirety of The X-Files" main storyline at the start. Nevertheless, initially, he had sent an invitation to Chris Carter to become the lead screenwriter of The X-Files. After all, he had been the show"s creator, so he might have some ideas even if he hadn"t yet conceived the entire story.
Chris Carter, however, is not a fledgling screenwriter. He is currently working as a screenwriter for Disney. When Eric sent someone to contact him about The X-Files, Chris Carter replied that he was not interested in a science fiction TV show, so he rejected the offer.
This event once again allowed Eric to witness the awesome and mysterious power of the b.u.t.terfly effect. The father of The X-Files stated that he was not interested in creating a science fiction TV show. Needless to say, Eric"s reaction was...very wonderful.
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After walking inside the conference room, Eric pointed towards the end of the large table to let Elisabeth sit down and walked towards the front of the table. He greeted everyone and had the six men and two women introduce themselves. After the self-introductions, Eric stood up and walked towards the large white board at the front of the room. He picked up a black marker and wrote a word on the white board: The X-Files.
"Ladies and gentlemen, all of you present here are writers who specialize in writing science fiction for movies and TV shows, so you must have realized that I have called you here to write for a sci-fi TV show. The name of this TV show is The X-Files."
Under the nine pairs of curious eyes, Eric put down the black marker in his hand and continued, "Alright, let me first introduce the background of this sci-fi show I have conceived."
"The story begins from the origin of life. The universe is so large that we can"t imagine how far it extends. There are infinite possibilities in this vast universe. During the hundreds of millions since the supernova, across the vast universe, our planet was certainly not the only one that can produce intelligent life. The Brett star is the origin of this whole story."
-TO BE CONTINUED-