MTL - I’m in Hollywood

Back to Los Angeles, the first thing Eric faced was the selection of the protagonists of the Marvel movie universe.

In recent months, with the great success of Iron Man, the Marvel movie universe has been fully launched in accordance with the established plan. Among them, the most important task is to select new members of the Avengers.

Since the entire Marvel movie universe program has been advanced for nearly a decade, many of the role players that Eric can refer to are no longer appropriate.

Of course, there are also some actors who are 'ready-made'. For example, Raytheon played, and Eric decided Brad Pitt a few years ago. After the "X-Files" was over, Brad Pitt's development in the film circle was not smooth. The Firefly Group issued an invitation, and the other party quickly agreed to sign and signed a long-term contract for six films.

In addition, eagle-eyed actor Jeremy Reiner has also debuted, Jeremy was born in 1971, this year is 28 years old, and the age is also appropriate. Under the direction of Eric, this role is directly determined.

Others, the Hulk, Captain America, the Black Widow and even some of the more prominent supporting actors are still in the process of selection.

The Firefly Group's plan for the first phase of the Marvel Film Cosmic Program was nine films, spanning from 1999 to 2004, for a total of five years.

Among them, Iron Man and Spider-Man, which have already started, occupy two places in the nine films. "Captain America", "Raytheon" and the final "Avengers" occupy three other places. The remaining two films are The Hulk.

In the timeline, from "Green Hulk" in 2003 to "Invincible Hulk" in 2008, it can only be described as failure. There are many reasons for this. There is no choice of director, actor's random replacement, protagonist. Creative conflicts with the director and so on.

Moreover, due to the special role set of the Hulk, this comic character is indeed more difficult to shoot than all other superheroes. But as one of Marvel's most popular superheroes, once you shoot well, the Hulk can definitely achieve unexpected success.

However, in Eric's view, although the two big Hulk movies can only be described as failures, their respective themes are very consistent with the Hulk timeline, one about the origin of the Hulk, one The ministry talks about Bruce Banner's control of the Hulk.

The new Marvel movie universe will still use this timeline, but it is also necessary to use this timeline. After the original Hulk turned, it was very violent and completely irrational. In this state, Hulk could not join the Avengers. Therefore, Bruce Banner's self-control process must be completed through a sequel.

In comparison, "Captain America" ​​only needs to tell an origin, and "Raytheon" only needs one opening.

According to these plans, not counting the series of "X-Men" that Marvel has authorized to go out, "Hulk" will become the third member of the Avengers Alliance after the "Iron Man" and "Spider-Man". .

The former Avengers series, in addition to the Iron Man played by Robert Downey, other superhero characters are not particularly eye-catching outside of a series of passionate brotherhood.

This time, "Iron Man" has also been successful, but Eric does not want to be like a little Robert Downey, who once held the half of the Marvel movie universe, he still hopes that several other superhero characters can have Better performance.

The "Hulk" series is the hardest to shoot, but if you can take a good shot and use the power of Hulk to destroy the land, there is no doubt that this superhero is likely to be welcomed by the audience like Iron Man and Spiderman.

For the above reasons, coupled with the failure of the original version of "The Hulk", Eric also paid special attention to this superhero movie.

In order to make a complete transformation of the new version of "The Hulk", Eric directly ruled out the former hulks of Eric Barker, Edward Norton and Mark Ruffalo.

The Eric Barker version of the Hulk did not leave much impression on Eric. The uncontrollable character of Edward Norton in the real world also allowed Eric to directly exclude him. The Marvel movie universe could not even be directed by the director. Too much discourse power, it is even more impossible to use Norton, an actor who has extreme control over the script.

As for Mark Ruffalo, because of the success of the former Avengers series, he is undoubtedly the most widely accepted Hulk player.

However, the actor who created this actor has no bright spots, which can be seen from the actor’s remuneration revealed by the Avengers League series. As one of Marvel's most popular superheroes, Mark Ruffalo plays Hulk's pay, but it is even lower than Jeremy Reiner who plays the Hawkeye.

There is no doubt that if Mark Ruffalo is enabled, the Firefly Group will certainly be able to save a large amount of money, but suppressing the actor's pay is never the fundamental purpose of Eric. Although the firefly system has always emphasized cost control, in the final analysis, it is only necessary to control the obvious payoffs within a more fair and reasonable range. If Hulk’s actor can get a $1 billion box office from a single person, Eric definitely doesn’t mind paying a premium of more than $20 million. On the contrary, if the Hulk’s big movie box office fails, Erik will not agree even if the protagonist is free or even posted.

Firefly Studios.

In recent days, Eric has basically spent the last round of auditions in the hands of the Avengers.

Today's audition target is a few candidates for Bruce Banner, and just happened to be able to catch up. Counting Jos Verden, who has also become the core of the Marvel movie universe, today's audition team can be described as 'an unprecedented power'.

Due to the success of Iron Man and the perception of the Firefly Group's emphasis on the Avengers, Hollywood's eligible first-line men have basically expressed interest in the role of the Avengers series.

However, Eric is not too cold for a star who is too famous. He didn't want to see the spectators like "Invincible Hulk" seeing the Hulk. The first reaction was Edward Norton instead of Bruce Banner.

Therefore, in the role selection process, the first criterion of the main creation team is whether the actors fit the role, and the requirements for the coffee position are not too high. This also led to the fact that almost all of the Hollywood first-line stars who were interested in Hulk had been smashed into the final round of auditions. Because of this, the Hollywood media, which has been closely watching the movement of the Marvel movie universe, has appeared in recent days. It is quite lively.

At the end of the day, the last audition was sent away, and Eric and others leaned against the chair with some exhaustion.

There are not many actors participating in the audition today, only the five people who have reached the last level after being selected. But at nine o'clock in the morning, the audition duration of each of the five candidates was close to two hours, so it has been until now.

Although Eric treats every auditor equally, after a day of audition, everyone can clearly feel Eric's personal inclination.

Taking a few mouthfuls of coffee from the secretary, Kasenberg, who was sitting next to Eric, did not immediately mention the audition today. Instead, he talked about another topic: "I met at the reception a few days ago. Richard Parsons, he said Warner Bros. may restart the Batman series first."

Eric looked relaxed and read a piece of information in front of him. He looked at the name of 'Christian Bell' on the name bar with a smile on his face. "I thought it would be "Superman" and now restart. "Batman" is not a good time."

With the great success of the Marvel movie universe, Warner, a DC with a big gold mine, will not fall behind. Eric originally thought about secretly controlling the rhythm of Warner's development of the DC movie universe. For this reason, Nolan was also dug out.

However, due to the change in Hollywood history, Warner did not get the "Lord of the Rings" or the development of "Harry Potter." Then, in order to let its own film business not decline, it is inevitable that the development of DC in advance is also inevitable.

"It is really not a good time. The audience must have not forgotten the "deep" impression left by "Batman and Robin"," Kasenberg has some gloating, saying: "Warner wants to develop Superman, but only The production copyright of "Superman" is controlled by Strong Peters. Now that "Iron Man" has been a great success, Warner has just smashed the reputation of "Batman" two years ago. Strong Peters is naturally waiting for the price. Oh, Warner didn't talk to him and could only turn his attention back to Batman."

Peter Peters was the partner of Peter Cooper with Peter Cooper in the past few years, but before that, Peter Cooper and Peter Peters had their own production company and they were affiliated with Warner. The brothers are similar in nature to Brookhammer's production company.

In order to dig up the two men, Sony also took a big head and paid a huge default fee for the two. Later, the results naturally proved that this big head is not a big one. Of course, these are all off topic.

Whether it is DC or Marvel, before the 1990s, the movie copyright of superheroes was not so important, and there was no strict defense after ten years.

Therefore, during the end of the 1980s, when he was affiliated with Warner Bros., the production company of Strong Peters got Superman's film production copyright and kept it in his hands.

In the 1990s, with the great success of the "Batman" series produced by Warner Bros., the value of superhero copyright gradually emerged. However, for a series of reasons, of course, it is mainly a matter of interest, and the "Superman" series of movies in these years has not been able to start.

Due to copyright reasons, it has not been solved. In memory, after the live-action Superman movie of the Christopher Reeve series in the 1970s and 1980s, it was not until 2006 that the re-released "Superman Returns" was successfully released. At that time, the previous version of the Superman movie was released. It’s been 20 years apart.

The outside world is always relishing the slogan of the Marvel superhero, but in fact, the fate of Clark Kent is actually more bumpy.

At the end of last year, Eric handed over Nolan’s Memory Fragment project to Colombia. The film has now been filmed. However, because of the desire to take the word-of-mouth route, Colombia intends to go through the Sundance Film Festival early next year. "Memory Fragments" was released in the Easter season.

In other words, Nolan needs to wait until next year even if he wants to make a comeback.

Moreover, there is only one "Memory Fragment", which is not enough for Norlan to pick up the guides for the "Batman" series. After all, the fledgling British director may not even be familiar with Hollywood's production process. At least it takes a couple of films to get in touch with the big film.

Although Eric wants to foster the success of copying the Batman series, he will not help the seedlings.

Considering for a while, Eric said to Kasenberg: "Can you find a way to coordinate, let Warner first launch the "Superman" series, even if other superheroes do, I have another arrangement for "Batman." ”

Kasenberg thought for a moment and said, "In fact, it is very simple to say. If you want to start the "Superman" series, you can just get strong Peters."

Eric’s fingertips rubbed the actor’s information in front of him and asked, “What is Strong Peters doing now?”

Kasenberg said: "The "Hurricane Warrior", you should know?"

Eric remembered this last time, and Bill Michalnik mentioned it to him. Strong Peters led Will Smith and Barry Sonanfield to create a retro vintage sci-fi film, Hurricane Warrior. The film completely mimics the pattern of "Black Man." Eric had quite a bit of a sensation at the time, and then Bill Bichenik pushed the boxing dumb of the pigeons of "The Windtalker" of the pigeons to the Warner Bros.

Obviously, although there is no discussion on Superman, this does not hinder the cooperation between Strong Peters and Warner.

Reluctantly smiled, because Jos Weiden was present, Eric did not say too much, just said: "You take the time to pay attention, if you can intervene best, on the surface we can not interfere too much Many."

Kasenberg nodded willingly. The power of the Firefly system in Hollywood is already large enough, and AOL-Time Warner apparently wants to get rid of the label of the Firefly System. Therefore, the investment in fireflies is also the second largest shareholder of AOL-Time Warner Group. Both sides have almost instinctively maintained a low-key state. Even on the surface, the two sides still give people a sense of opposition.

Of course, AOL-Time Warner really wants to compete with the firefly system, but the firefly system only deliberately makes some gestures. Eric has never put a loose A-Time Warner Group in the eye. .

After talking a few words, Kasenberger gestured to the actor information in front of Eric and asked: "So, Christian Bell, Jim Caviezel, which one do you prefer?"

Christian Bell, not to mention, once the Nolan version of the "Batman" trilogy male protagonist. Jim Caviezel, once a well-known role, was John Rees in The Tracker of the Suspect, and was later nicknamed the Four Uncles by domestic American fans.

Eric hopes that the new Hulk actor will want a more docile university professor before he has changed, instead of Mark Lufalo’s kindness or Edward Norton’s evil spirit, speaking, the first edition of Ereli The image of K. Buck is also very suitable, but the performance of the other party does not leave any impression.

Among the last five candidates, based on some of the information in the memory and the specific effects of the audition, Eric is more satisfied with Christian Bale and Jim Caviezel.