MTL - Exploiting Hollywood 1980-Chapter 918 old friend to the rescue
Talented actors with potential, once they find the right role, the inspired creative state is invaluable.
Ronald carefully took care of everyone's performance status. The biggest difference between the performance status of film actors and theater actors is that there is no way to get real-time feedback from the audience.
When performing a drama in a theater, the audience's reaction will clearly tell the actor how he is performing today. He will adjust the technique of acting accordingly.
But movie actors actually perform against the air. Even if a big company like 20th Century Fox shoots in New York with the second-best equipment in the country, it will have to wait until the next afternoon to see the printed samples. I saw that there was something bad in the acting, so I didn't have time to modify it.
The lighting, recording, and scene notes on the scene are all busy with their own affairs. The photographer is a little better than them, and he can see the performance from the viewfinder, but he doesn't know how the scene will be presented in the editing room in the end, nor There is no way of knowing how well the actors performed.
Only the director Ronald stands behind the camera. He is almost the only audience in the world who can see whether the actors are performing well or not.
Therefore, Griffiths, Baldwin, Cusack and other main actors habitually look at Ronald after a scene, as long as he smiles and nods, and then says from his mouth "Great, today Your performance is great..." and other praises, they feel very safe in their hearts, so that they don't care much about the meaning of "let's change the performance method and add another insurance" that often follows.
"Come, eat some baked cookies, my aunt's secret recipe." In order to keep the actors and staff in good condition, Ronald also asked his aunt to send baked cookies. When taking a break in the middle of shooting, share it with everyone.
For a while, a scent filled the crew, and even the supervision representative sent by the screenwriters union couldn't help but come over to ask for a few dollars.
"I said, when will your strike plan end? What kind of script do you write? You can't write the script now, what should you do if you have no income?" Ronald handed the remaining biscuits to the female screenwriter whose turn it was today.
It’s the second week of the strike. The union members who volunteer to supervise the crew and TV station will have some subsidies, but now those TV crews who are writing and filming are basically shut down.
The TV station took out some old dramas from the past to fill the most precious evening prime time slot, and only the film crew like Ronald who had already started filming was left to start work. Therefore, the number of crews that need to be supervised is also very small, with many people and few positions, and new people are rotated every day.
The female screenwriter is a TV screenwriter. She swallowed the biscuit and took a sip of hot coffee, "Before I went on strike, I actually found a long-term job in a morning soap opera on NBC. If I continue, it might be a good job." Easy jobs are going to waste again."
"When are you going to go on strike? I think the attitude of the Producers Union has softened. The 300 million compensation is a bit more. Everyone sit down and talk about a figure, and then resume the happy hour. I have movies to continue shooting, and so do you." TV work, isn't it great?"
"Did you know? Director, it's actually against the rules for you to discuss the strike with me like this. But your biscuits are delicious, so it doesn't matter if I tell you, now we're in trouble," the female screenwriter said with a smile.
"Actually, I want to accept the terms to end the strike. The gossip says that negotiator Walton wants to accept your $50 million compensation terms, but many members were so encouraged by his previous speeches that they really believed that they could With a quota of 300 million, you can also have the right to decide the casting and director of the script."
"Ah? I, Walton, have the right to decide whether to accept the producer union's conditions?"
"In order to win the support of the trade union members, he will not leave him alone until he gets the best conditions, and reached an agreement in private, stipulating that the union must agree to accept the conditions, but correspondingly, he also promised that the conditions must be internal. It has to be voted on.”
"Oh..." Ronald touched his head, this is troublesome, the low-level trade unionists are incited, really believe that they can get the power that top directors and producers do not necessarily have in Hollywood, it seems that in everyone's opinion Before the energy is exhausted, there is no way to reach a compromise in the short term.
Here we are filming the scenes on Staten Island, the sets and props group, under the leadership of art director Polly Pratt, are setting up the scene of Tess's new office on another floor of the World Trade Center.
Tess's colleague in the old company, that little fat manager Lutz, said that he introduced a manager of the hedging department to Tess, and he wanted to find a new assistant. But in fact, what Tess suspected was not wrong, it was just the object of hunting for the manager.
The hedging department played the most important role in last year's stock market crash. They either made a lot of money or lost a lot. Wins and losses of hundreds of millions of dollars a day all occurred under the extreme conditions of the stock market crash. For example, the Jewish Solo of the Tiger Fund almost lost the fund. Later, I used the gossip on the adjustment of the yen exchange rate to pay back part of the book.
These people are often perverse and violent. This kind of ups and downs in life makes them exaggerated in the relationship between men and women. In search of dopamine satisfaction, they can do very strange things.
According to Ronald's friend Bannon, these people are more messy than Hollywood.
The manager of Bob Spike in the script is such a character. The casting director, Julia, ended up finding an actor who was a regular supporting role in prime-time soap operas, which often had a profiling character, and he was playing a lecher.
After the weekend, the new week of filming shifted to Manhattan, and Ronald received bad news. Because the screenwriters union's strike continued into the third week, the "TV and Radio Artists Union" in the two major actors' unions encouraged actors to take vacations or seek second jobs because of the outage of TV drama scripts.
America’s TV series are generally filmed and broadcast at the same time, and the script will be fine-tuned and revised based on weekly audience feedback. Whichever character is popular, write more about his plot. Guest actors can also become recurring supporting roles.
The general strike of the screenwriters' union completely bankrupted this filming mode, but TV drama actors still have contracts, and they don't want to be entangled in TV dramas that can't be filmed, so they can't find other livelihoods.
The Producers Union does not want the other two of the three major unions and the Screenwriters Union to force itself to make concessions. The two sides hit it off immediately, and the TV stations announced that the actors could choose to take vacations and return to filming after the screenwriters' strike ended.
Suddenly, the TV drama actors of the three major public TV stations all ran away. Some went to the theater stage, some went abroad to film, and more started to work part-time, teaching drama to children in schools or in the community.
The actor that Ronald and Julia Taylor settled on was a Briton. He happened to get a supporting role in a soap opera in his hometown through his relationship.
Here, Ronald, who is sitting on the wax, quickly get Julia Taylor. "Is there anyone in your place who is suitable to play a pervert? There is a fire here, hurry up..."
"How about that Kevin in the bar talking about stand-up comedy? Kevin Spacey?"
"Spacy?" Ronald thought of the actor chatting with Alec Baldwin and Alan Rickman next to Broadway's Candy Box Theater. He openly flirted with the waitress in the bar, which is acceptable in appearance.
"What's his phone number, I'll tell him directly." Anxious Ronald didn't even look for Kevin Spacey's agent, and directly called the actor himself.
"A cameo role as a hedge investment manager? I'm very interested. But I'm preparing for a play recently. In terms of shooting time..." Spacey heard that there was a movie to play, and he had no reluctance. He is preparing to rehearse a new Broadway play recently, and he is afraid that he will not be able to find time.
"It will take half a day. I will ask my driver to pick you up and bring you the script by the way. Just talk to your agent and let him sign the contract for you." Ronald did not wait for Spacey to speak, and simply said Finalize the acting.
This scene was shot inside a car, a rented stretch limousine, set up on Long Island. Renting an extended luxury car is not only to show the luxury of the hedging department, but also to facilitate the placement of cameras.
Choose Long Island, which is more affluent and quiet, because there is less traffic here, which is suitable for repeated exercise and shooting. If this scene was filmed in Manhattan, the drivers of other vehicles would probably have to shout loudly to keep out of the way, and it would not be possible to shoot.
"Cameron, here is your pass." When filming the location, Ronald called Cameron Crowe to give an idea on the spot.
Today is filming on location, so Ronald is not afraid of being caught by the screenwriters union. The screenwriters union, which has been on strike for more than two weeks, has not yet reached an agreement, and those who took the initiative to supervise the crew at the beginning have begun to lose heart. They didn't follow when we went on location today.
"This paragraph needs to be modified for the manager Bob Spike's lines. I need a particularly marginalized character. He is the kind of manager who the audience knows will do dirty things. You can follow Tiger Fund's request. Make it up like Luo."
The actors were changed, and Ronald decided to ask Crowe to rewrite the lines to better suit the well-dressed pervert of Kevin Spacey. He was different from that soap opera actor, he looked gentle on the surface, but he didn't know he was a pig until he opened his mouth.
"If it's a pig, you have to arch..." Cameron Crowe was inspired, wrote a paragraph with a pencil on the notebook, and handed it to Ronald.
"Hahaha, that's it..." Ronald was very satisfied.
The luxury car is already in place, the two cameras have been installed inside the luxury car, the recording and lighting are all ready, and the recorder took out a small clipboard and tried to type in the car. The slates for close-ups and close-ups are specially made, and the actors have to make the slates themselves. Because although the interior of a luxury car is larger than an ordinary car, after the camera crew and recording crew are stuffed into it, there is no room to stuff another scene into it.
Everything is ready, except for actor Kevin Spacey.
"Bud, where have you been?" Ronald was anxious, and found a phone to call his driver.
"We are stuck on the road, and it will take about 20 minutes." Little Bud replied with his car phone.
"Twenty minutes, just now you said twenty minutes. Hey, hey..." Ronald gave up hope on the traffic in Manhattan.
"I'm... going into... the East River Tunnel right now. I'll call you back later." Little Bard's voice came intermittently, and then completely stopped.
Ronald didn't know if the traffic jam would continue to Long Island, so he walked around the set anxiously. This kind of temporary replacement of actors is really annoying. The staff on the set were a little afraid to speak, and it was the first time seeing Ronald so angry since the filming started.
"Director, don't worry, should we make another backup plan?" Today only Melanie Griffiths and the crew came to shoot together, and everyone else was on vacation. She was the only actor in the crew who dared to persuade her.
"Backup plan?" Ronald repeated her words, and the anxiety in his heart had not faded. "Cameron, come and act. I remember you were an actor?" Ronald looked around. Only Cameron Crowe, who came to save the scene and changed the script, had never appeared in the scene, and his appearance fit the script. image of.
"Me? I have indeed been an actor." Cameron Crowe saw that Ronald actually called his name. He dared not say that he only worked as an actor in the university drama club, and his career as an actor was a complete failure.
In order to save the scene, I can’t say more. He couldn’t help but have a wonderful fantasy about the profession of director. He decides the fate of everyone in the crew, and he is a screenwriter. If he is selected, he can come to act.
"That's good, I won't tell you about the play. If you write the script yourself, you will definitely act it yourself. Costumes, costumes, come and try on Cameron's costumes!" Ronald called the costumer, Crowe's figure It is a little taller than Spacey, so I have to change it again.
"This one won't work, Mr. Crowe is too tall." After a while, Crowe got his hair done, put on the suit, and showed it to Ronald. The feeling of a powerful person.
"Go buy, borrow, and see if there are boutiques around." Ronald was in a hurry, and time was passing by little by little.
"Squeak..." There was an urgent brake, and Kevin Spacey, who was picked up by Bud Jr., finally arrived.
"Sorry, sorry, I just finished rehearsal, there was a traffic accident in Manhattan today, we were stuck in traffic for a long time."
Kevin Spacey hurriedly apologized to Ronald and the rest of the staff. He came here today to do Ronald a favor. It would be bad if it caused trouble instead.
Ronald did not speak, and pointed to the suit that the dressmaker had just pulled off Crowe, and asked Spacey to put it on.
Makeup artist and hair stylist, come quickly to make up for Spacey. On the other side, Ronald handed over two pages of the script and asked him what he wanted to ask?
"Everything is OK" Spacey quickly read it and made a gesture of no problem.
"Working Girl Scene X, Article 1," Melanie Griffiths, wearing a mock mink-style sweater, Tess's best, in the back of a stretch limousine . She picked up the clapperboard, tapped it at the camera, and put it under the seat.
"What qualities do you think a good hedging and arbitrage investor needs?" Tess said to the manager Bob.
"Well, we went to the hotel room to discuss that." Kevin Spacey lay half-lying, and then twisted the wire on the champagne cap.
"Hotel room?" Tess understood, not really an interview assistant. There was a bit of disappointment in Melanie's tone.
"Yes, the company has a long-term private room at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel. When there are no customers, we can go there... party... oh..."
Kevin Spacey was very explosive. With a strange cry, he shook the champagne cork and jumped out with a bang. The champagne foam that came out, he deliberately pushed forward and fell on Melanie's clothes.
"Ahh..." Melanie's reaction was also great, her decent outfit was soaked in champagne...but she couldn't blame the other party, so she could only quickly wipe off the foam with her hands.
"Oh, sorry, sorry," Kevin Spacey's improvisation ability of this theater actor comes, and his character who helps Tess with his hands starts to puff those bubbles. Taking advantage of the situation, he put his hand on Melanie's abdomen, and then arched it up with his mouth like a fat pig.
"Bob!" Tess yelled, which was beyond the line.
Seeing that Melanie was about to explode, Kevin Spacey quickly let go of his mouth, then took a sip of the champagne bottle close to his mouth, and immediately searched back in words "Sorry, you know, hedging arbitrage The department made a simple introductory textbook for training business school graduates, why don't I play the videotape, if you have any questions..."
"That's good..." Tess thought to herself, maybe Bob is just a little anxious and still wants an assistant...
"Ah... ah...", the video tape that Spacey put on the car TV began to jump out of the screen. It's not a hedging and arbitrage textbook at all, but a confession video, a man and a woman in an outdoor swimming pool...
"Hahahaha...that's the wrong videotape, of course, unless you want to watch this too..." Spacey's crazy and borderline temperament came out, and the serious financial elite just now turned into a pervert in an instant.
"Bob, don't you really want an assistant?" Melanie Griffith's tone made the audience feel that this was not the first time she had encountered this kind of harassment.
"Um...not now, but I will always open the door to those who are hungry, as long as they are willing..." The Bob played by Spacey really suits his temperament, he can speak nonsense, and he is very convincing people believe him.
"Bob, I'm very horny, but not that kind of thirst..." Tess doesn't want to trade her body for an opportunity. If she wants to, it's not like she hasn't done it before. She wants to be a real manager and have the ability to do a good job. The kind, not a man's vassal vase.
"Excuse me, can you step aside here?" Griffiths said to the camera. When the audience saw this segment, they would feel that she was talking to the driver.
Then Griffiths picked up the champagne, shook it vigorously several times, the champagne bubbles gushed out, and sprayed all over Spacey's face.
"Hahaha, your party, Bob."
"Cut!" Seeing Spacey's embarrassed face, Griffiths was about to open the door and go out, but Ronald stopped.
The two actors played very well in this part. Ronald didn't want to do it again, because Spacey's suit was wet, and his hair and makeup were ruined by champagne. It would take a lot of time to do it again.
"Thanks, Kevin, today's show was great."
"I had a great time playing the role, next time I will give a bigger role..." Kevin Spacey laughed, and it is always good to let Ronald owe a favor.
Ronald owed more than one favor, and the actress who was originally scheduled for the next scene also let go. Ronald had no choice but to ask his old friend, Olympia Dukakis, who played his mother in "Moonlight" for help.
Dukakis was in Boston. When he heard the call, he came to play a guest role as the manager of an employment agency without saying a word.
"Why are you in Boston? I thought you were doing public relations in Los Angeles?" Ronald was very puzzled that she didn't continue to publicize the best supporting actress Oscar and came to the East.
"Didn't you read the newspaper? My cousin Michael, the governor of Massachusetts, has announced his candidacy for the presidency. I'll stand for him and grab some pages by the way."
"Huh? Oh", Ronald really didn't know about it. In fact, this cousin, Michael Dukakis, is not the kind of cousin who is close to Olympia. Michael Dukakis is the second governor of the United States who is a descendant of Greek immigrants.
After he took office in 1983, Massachusetts' economy experienced a strong recovery. The unemployment rate dropped from more than 12% in 1975 to less than 3%. a great growth.
But unlike Deputy Commander George, his cousin is the governor of the Donkey Party.
"Whatever, I won't let go of any exposure opportunities now. I'd rather go too far than regret it." Olympia Dukakis knew very well that this might be the best chance in her life to get a statuette .
"Oscar is hard to say, but you have my vote." Ronald was still very satisfied with the actor.
"Tess, Tess, Tess, you can't get promoted just because you called the manager a pimp", Olympia Dukakis's makeup is completely different from that of the housewife in "Moonlight" His hair is light blonde and has a very professional hairstyle. Two earrings inlaid with black gemstones in gold, paired with light lipstick and light-colored spots, and a white shirt with a large lapel, is another typical strong dress, the favorite of professional women.
"But he is a pimp." Griffiths felt wronged.
"Look, this is the third time I've found you a job in six months." Dukakis acted like a senior manager of an employment agency.
"I'm thirty years old, I took a long time to get my evening school diploma, I can do this job well, you can ask my previous managers, even Lutz, can they say that Tess made a mistake at work ?”
"I don't think they will say good things for you." Dukakis shook his head slightly. The character of Tess is very interesting. Although she is thirty years old, she is still naive in some places.
She looked at the computer on the other side, and pretended to type a few times, "Here is a job. The manager has just been transferred from Boston. The M&A department, named Parker, will go to work on Monday."
"Thanks"
"Tess", Dukakis handed over the information, and then emphasized, "You go home and calm down, this is the last time I can help you, if you mess up again this time, you will be out gone."
"Cut!" Ronald is really satisfied with the performance of these dramatic actors, as long as they are familiar with how to perform in front of the camera, it is very smooth.
"Hahaha, I will vote for you." Melanie Griffiths and Dukakis have a great sense of acting together, and the reactions they give to each other are great regardless of time and emotional intensity. Don't order some biscuits, the secret recipe of the director's family, it's delicious."
"Oh, yes, the last time I filmed him, he didn't have this." Olympia Dukakis ate several of the cookies Ronald brought.
