Hollywood Road

"Murphy, you can't always be like this."

As soon as he walked into the Milton Café, Murphy was stopped by the owner, "This is the cafe, not your office."

Because the studio was too small and simple, after recruiting most of the positions, Murphy put the first production meeting established by the crew in the Milton Café, but the frequent interviews some time ago have made the boss here full of complaints. Now Of course he was dissatisfied with Murphy's approach.

"Linch, we order coffee every time we come."

Pausing, Murphy looked at the mixed-race old man who was leaning on the counter opposite, "The money for coffee is not less than once for you."

The old man named Lynch had dealt with Murphy before. Knowing his difficulty, he turned to look at Jessica Chastain on the side, and kept his eyes on her conspicuous red hair for a while. "This A beautiful lady, you have been with Murphy this rascal many times. It should be clear that no matter how many people come, he only orders two cups of coffee, but takes up a deck for several hours!"

Having said this, his eyes widened, and when he turned to this side, he seemed to kill Murphy with his gaze.

It was the morning, and there were no customers in the store. Old Lynch had no scruples, stood opposite Murphy with his hips, and stopped him and Jessica Chastain.

Murphy rolled his eyes, walked over, and said in a low voice, "Do you know what I do? Do you know what I am going to do here today?"

Lynch said nonchalantly, "I know you are a miser, that's enough."

On the other side, Jessica Chastain almost laughed, agreeing with what Lynch said. She interviewed many people with Murphy, and watched him cheat free interns, trying everything possible to reduce the number of hires. Salary, usually all expenses are saved if you can save...

Regardless of Old Lynch’s attitude, Murphy raised his hand and patted his arm gently, pointing to himself and said, “I’m a film director. I think your cafe is very special and very suitable for my shooting requirements, so Put the film crew’s executive meeting here to discuss the feasibility of filming."

Hearing that his cafe might appear in a movie, Old Lynch unconsciously put his hands on his hips down, "What you said is true?"

Murphy nodded, "Of course it's true, when did I lie to you."

"That way, more people will be able to see my cafe..." Old Lynch muttered and immediately put on a smiling face, "Good! Good! No problem, what I can do, I will definitely cooperate with you. "

He made a gesture of please and led the way to the largest deck. He seemed to have thought of something. He quickly turned around and asked, "You don't charge advertising fees, do you? I won't do it if I charge money."

Looking at Old Lynch, Murphy considered it very seriously before saying, "Linch, we are all old friends, how can we collect your money."

Old Lynch's face bloomed with a smile.

At the end, Jessica Chastain stared at Murphy's back curiously, and muttered to herself, "How can this be possible without receiving money? He will change sex?"

"We are too far apart when we talk about money."

As expected by Jessica Chastain, Murphy's words rang out again, "You only need to be responsible for the coffee and food when we were shooting here."

This seems to have made a lot of concessions.

Old Lynch thought it over, patted his chest and said, "No problem, it's all on my body."

Taking Murphy and the two to the largest deck, Old Lynch almost changed to another person, "I'll send someone to prepare coffee for you. You will sit down for a while."

Although the deck is very large, it won’t be able to seat everyone for a while. Murphy pointed to the surrounding aisles, “Can someone put more chairs? There are about ten people on my side.”

"I'll get someone to do it right away!" Old Lynch responded, and walked back to the counter.

Seeing Old Lynch walking away, Murphy tapped the table lightly and reminded the person opposite, "Jesse, remember to sign a formal contract with him and write everything I just said in it."

"Yeah." Jessica Chastain nodded seriously.

Of course she could understand that Murphy calculated that this cafe might not be a day away, and what it actually did was excellent. Not only did they have free shooting venues to use, they also provided coffee and catering, at least they could save thousands of dollars in expenses. .

Although she is not optimistic about this project, sometimes she has to admire the fact that this guy who can be regarded as a gangster on the other side has really extraordinary abilities.

Not long after the old Lynch brought coffee and left, Murphy hired personnel to arrive one after another. His lawyer Robert will also serve as the legal counsel of the crew, specializing in dealing with contracts and possible legal disputes from the crew.

This is North America, where lawyers are an indispensable standard for almost any crew or company.

In addition, there is an accountant who participated in the conference.

Murphy has always had a sober self-awareness, knowing that no one is omniscient and omnipotent. Financial tasks such as the salary payment and capital expenditure of the crew are outsourced to a small accounting firm, so that he can save a lot of time. Put most of your energy on the filming and production of the film, rather than being too distracted by messy chores.

In addition to lawyers and accountants, as well as Murphy and Jessica Chastain, there are many people participating in the meeting. Behind-the-scenes careers such as makeup artist, prop artist, set designer, and lighting artist are essential. Three students from the California Academy of Arts and the USC Film School who were tricked into signing internship contracts by Murphy.

Of course, this can't be regarded as coaxing, just like cooperating with old Lynch, both sides also get what they need.

At the beginning of the meeting, after Murphy briefly introduced everyone to know each other, he asked Jessica Chastain to send the copied script to everyone's hands. The label on the script was the name of the movie project-" Fruit hard candy.

The name seems to have nothing to do with Loli and Uncle Wei, but people who have followed the Internet can basically guess the general content from the title.

On the Internet, "Hard. Candy" specifically refers to underage girls.

This kind of drama conference will not last too long, and there is no too substantive content. The most important thing is to let the crew get to know each other, establish a smooth communication channel, and handle their respective tasks well. At the same time, the drama can be formed into a team that works hard together.

Any film is the product of teamwork. Even greats such as James Cameron and Steven Spielberg must also have the support of the team.

Murphy knows very well that in order to successfully complete this project, he, the director and producer, must work closely with these Hollywood losers.

Among the currently identified behind-the-scenes staff, there are a total of twelve including him and Jessica Chastain.

Makeup artist Jack Watson, who has been in this industry for more than five years, does not have any decent qualifications. The biggest reason Murphy hired him was because he thought he was good at abilities, and the other was that he was cheap enough. His weekly salary was only 300. Fifty dollars.

The lighting engineer is called Douglas. He is the owner of a lighting equipment store. At the same time, he works as a lighting engineer in a community theater. His salary is also very low, with a weekly salary of only four hundred dollars.

Prop designer Mia Sucre is the most experienced of all. He has participated in the shooting of three 500,000-dollar films, and Murphy paid him a weekly salary of 500 dollars.

The set designer is a young woman named Sunny Clegg, who only graduated from the California Institute of the Arts the year before, and had been an assistant to others before. This was her first independent work. Murphy deliberately lowered the price and only gave her three A weekly salary of one hundred dollars.

To put it simply, this crew is a large collection of inexperienced and losers.

In short, excluding lawyers and accountants, including Murphy, who is unpaid, no one in the crew now earns more than one thousand dollars a week.

And these people are not members of the trade unions of their respective professions. Just like the actors' unions, Hollywood trade associations such as the lighting artists' union and the makeup artist's union also set their own minimum daily remuneration, which is basically more than one hundred US dollars. Employment unions For members, the money spent will undoubtedly be more.

In Los Angeles, some people will not join their respective trade unions. First, Hollywood's respective trade unions have barriers to entry, so they are not allowed to join casually if they want to join. Second, they must pay a certain fee, for these low-income earners. , This is also a burden.

There are three unpaid interns...

In fact, Murphy would like to find a few more people like this, but not everyone eats his own set. It is not bad to have three free labor.

According to his plan, it will take at least ten to fifteen weeks for the work contract between the two parties to officially start today until the filming is completed. Even if it is the highest estimate, the salary can be controlled within 50,000 U.S. dollars.

Don't forget, not only these members, but also actors, editors, and soundtrack expenses.

Murphy does not intend to invite professionals to compose for the film, nor does he plan for this part of the funds. He plans to find the use of past music or appropriate songs as the soundtrack.

The North American copyright law is relatively complete. After choosing a good song, as long as he pays a fee to the relevant copyright agency, he can legally use the music or songs he likes.

There are also equipment rental fees. Like all the crews in Hollywood, Murphy plans to rent all the equipment, which is also a very expensive expense. The rental fee for the 35MM professional movie camera is not cheap.

Then, it was time to choose the leading role.

After the meeting, Murphy took Jessica Chastain to the Actors Guild first, spent a small amount of money inside the Association, published a job posting, looking for 14-18 year-old actresses and 22-35 year-old males. actor.

Leaving the Actors' Guild, they drove to the San Fernando Valley, where there was a detached house for rent in the valley area.