Full-time actor

Chapter 462 [27] Marvel Studios is here!

Regarding some of Marvel's copyrights, especially "Iron Man", Chen Yu, as an industry professional, obviously knows something about it.

In the 80s, in order to cope with the financial crisis, Marvel began to sell the copyrights of its heroes to various Hollywood studios.

Coinciding with the huge box office success of Warner DC's "Batman" in 1989, Universal Pictures also began to look for related superhero themes to film.

At this time, Marvel entered the field of vision of major Hollywood studios.

Universal Pictures acquired the rights to the character "Iron Man" in 1990.

However, projects related to this mecha hero have not yet been finalized.

The reason is actually very simple, because no one knows whether Marvel's heroes will work, so Universal Pictures did not plan to invest too much money in the Iron Man project at the beginning.

Because Iron Man's reputation at that time was really low, and few people who were not comic fans knew about it.

The heroes that the public is familiar with are Superman, Batman and Spider-Man, so Universal Pictures just wants to make a low-cost superhero movie to ride on this trend and make quick money. This has always been a good thing for Hollywood movies. This bank.

Initially, Fox was very interested in the Iron Man project. After news of the project spread, it attracted the interest of heavyweight actors such as Cruise and Nicolas Cage, who both expressed their willingness to play the role of Tony Stark.

Fox also plans to let Tarantino direct the film.

Movies with such a popular character as Batman have been scrapped, so who dares to make movies with other characters?

In the blink of an eye, the copyright expired again, and Fox transferred it to New Line Cinema.

The reason why New Line is so interested in "Iron Man" is not because the New Line leadership led by Shea is very visionary, although it is true that the current New Line team is known as the team with the most vicious vision in Hollywood.

To put it bluntly, if there is too little money, it is impossible to film the kind of plot in the Iron Man story.

They accurately saw that the "Lord of the Rings" series would be a hit, and devoted all their efforts to support the filming. In fact, in Chen Yu's view, this was really not a matter of vision, it could only be said to be luck and desperate efforts.

At that time, Fox could be said to be Marvel's favorite guest, because it spent a lot of money to buy the copyrights of heroes such as the X-Men, Fantastic Four, and Daredevil from Marvel.

After all, they had money and power, including hiring George Whedon, who would later be the director of "Avengers," to direct, and also inviting a number of screenwriters who had written superhero movie scripts to make a good story.

But the selling point of Iron Man is the various armors. Let’s not talk about whether the technology of the 90s can produce such cool effects, but purely from a production perspective, the cost cannot be too low.

So when "Batman and Robin" affected the market, Fox was unwilling to invest so much money in a character that was not very popular.

You know, at that time, Marvel's most popular hero team was not the Avengers, but the X-Men, and the Fantastic Four were also very popular.

In Fox's project process at that time, X-Men was definitely ranked the highest priority, and Iron Man could only hehe.

After all, even for "X-Men", Fox only gave a budget of 7500 million U.S. dollars. If you want to shoot Iron Man, it will cost at least hundreds of millions of dollars; in fact, the production of "X-Men" alone was not enough at the time. It has already been full of twists and turns, and it is almost impossible to complete it smoothly. Iron Man, who has the lowest priority, can't even see his shadow.

No matter what commercial blockbusters the Big Six spend money on every now and then, the most profitable ones are always the movies that follow the trend; Austin Powers is the Ace Agent that follows the trend. After the popularity of 007, there have been many spy movies.

Besides, apart from the starring role, the investment required for the Iron Man movie is very expensive.

After New Line Cinema obtained the rights to Iron Man, it didn't take long for New Line Cinema to start producing the project very seriously.

After six years of tinkering, the copyright split regulations were triggered. In 6, the copyright of Iron Man was transferred to 1996th Century Fox Pictures.

However, the project was still not confirmed for a long time. First, Tom Cruise's salary was too high, and no one was willing to take such a high risk on an untested superhero character.

What's more, in 1997, Warner's "Batman and Robin" suffered an unprecedented failure, making superhero movies the hardest hit area in Hollywood at the time.

Tom Cruise even went to audition, and there are still photos of him auditioning for Iron Man online.

But they did succeed.

In fact, New Line wanted to make Iron Man because Fox's "X-Men" had already been released at the time and was a success at the box office, proving that the superhero market affected by "Batman and Robin" had begun to return to normal. .

Of course, what's more important is that it proves that superhero movies don't have to be Superman or Batman to be successful.

In 2002, Sony's "Spider-Man" caused an unprecedented sensation and broke the record for superhero origin movies in North America.

20th Century Fox's "Fantastic Four" released this year also took in $3.5 million at the box office.

Under such circumstances, how could New Line Cinema not value "Iron Man"?
Eh, I really don’t care.

This project remains unresolved.

There are of course many reasons, and it’s interesting to talk about. One is that Iron Man’s copyright has expired again, which is now.

Second, in fact, it is because New Line has no shortage of movies and scripts. Iron Man’s weight in New Line is very low. A superhero with little fame needs to invest so much money; in addition, New Line has been acquired by Time Warner Acquired, and Marvel’s deadly rival DC happens to be owned by Warner.

Warner would not be so stupid as to let its subsidiaries cause trouble for itself.

Who doesn't know that DC is currently Warner's heartthrob, and would it be stupid enough to develop Marvel's IP?

Warner is strong, but it is not strong enough to develop two major IPs at the same time.

And to put it another step back, even if Warner has that strength, why would it want to shoot two major genres separately? Isn’t it good to continuously develop a single IP?
Chen Yu didn't believe that Warner Bros. would make such an unknown "Iron Man".

If we want to film it, it’s also "Captain America"!
This is like Warner's style.

That's why Shay made such nonsense in front of the media, saying that Iron Man is a stupid guy and that this hero has no meaning.

The copyright of "Iron Man" is currently with New Line, which is almost like scrap. Otherwise, the copyright would not be renewed and Marvel would directly repurchase it at the end of the year. However, Shay does not pay attention to this copyright at all.

……

"I've actually always liked superhero movies, but it's hard to get the rights to many popular ones, so I had to ask Mr. Shea?"

"Are there any expired heroes in New Line?"

Chen Yu said with a smile. Robert Shea squinted his eyes, looked at Chen Yu and said, "You look a lot like me!" "Oh?"

"In what way are they similar?"

"They all have ambitions!"

Xie Yi laughed, but Cheng Long next to him also didn't understand: "Yuzai, why did you buy the copyright of the American hero? We don't understand their culture!"

"Jackie!"

Although Xie Yi didn't understand what Cheng Long said in Chinese, he basically guessed what it meant: "Chan is different from you. He has seen the success of our American superheroes, and he should also want to invest in filming one?"

"Just like when I watched Lord of the Rings!"

Robert Shea said proudly, and Chen Yu, of course, followed the stick and echoed: "Yes, I want to bite the bullet and invest in a heroic blockbuster!"

"Then you are very lucky!"

"We happen to have a hero in the new line whose copyright is about to expire, Kevin——"

Shay shouted behind him, and a guy wearing glasses immediately raised his head and walked over.

"The manager of our copyright department, you can talk to him directly!"

Sure enough, Robert Shea really didn't take "Iron Man" very seriously, and the most important thing is that this thing is like a hot potato. If you don't sell it and keep it there, there will always be reporters, friends, and colleagues who will remind you. There is a copyright that has not yet been developed. Do you want to...

Xie A doesn't have the energy to worry about this. All ten movies he plans to shoot this year have already been approved.

There is no money left to develop others.

The most important thing is that his life is not easy now. The estate management foundation of Tolkien, the author of "The Lord of the Rings" and the British fantasy literature writer, has just filed a lawsuit against New Line Cinema in the Los Angeles court, accusing the company of concealing the secrets of the movie "The Lord of the Rings". King" trilogy in order to avoid paying royalties on box office revenue to the original copyright holders.

HarperCollins, the American publisher of the "Lord of the Rings" novels, also participated in the lawsuit as a co-plaintiff.

In addition to demanding compensation of US$1.5 million from New Line, the two plaintiffs also requested that the court impose a certain amount of fines on New Line and terminate New Line's other Tolkien-owned productions of "The Lord of the Rings" prequel "The Hobbit" Film adaptation rights of the work.

They all agreed that the global revenue of "The Lord of the Rings" from box office, video discs and peripheral products reached 60 billion US dollars, not the so-called 30 billion US dollars, which was a full 30 billion US dollars difference.

Many people thought that the Tolkien Foundation was crazy. In fact, Chen Yu had eaten this melon in his previous life.

The revenue of Lord of the Rings is indeed as high as 60 billion US dollars, which is simply a super money-grabbing tool.

The Tolkien Foundation ultimately won the lawsuit, and New Line directly encountered a financial crisis and bankrupted itself.

So this guy Shay is indeed a lunatic who regards wealth as his life.

Chen Yu chatted with Kevin, the head of New Line's copyright department, and quickly confirmed the acquisition of the copyright for "Iron Man". However, there was another problem like Japan's. The copyright in the United States was only applicable to American companies.

So Chen Yu had to open an American company.

This is not a big problem, just let CAA handle it. If he wants to join Hollywood, he does need a studio.

300 million US dollars, this is the cost of the copyright of "Iron Man".

"Are you really planning to make an American hero movie?"

After leaving New Line Company, Cheng Long couldn't help but ask Chen Yu.

"Yeah, why not?"

"Looking for an American director? Are you going to star in it yourself?"

"Not necessarily. I want Tom Cruise to star in the show!"

"..."

Cheng Long felt that Chen Yu must be crazy. Of course Chen Yu was crazy. He was just joking.

Tom Cruise?
Instead of using Robert Downey Jr., a cheap actor who has hit rock bottom due to drug addiction, use Tom Cruise, who is extremely controlling on the crew?

Of course Chen Yu doesn't have this hobby.

If Tom Cruise is to act, with his current fame, he will definitely need both salary and dividends. He may also have to be an investor in the production or something. The key is the final box office, which may not create much of a sensation.

In the previous life, "Iron Man" had a global revenue of close to 6 million U.S. dollars, which killed Tom Cruise's global popularity and soared to 7-8 million, right?

With an extra 1-2 million US dollars at the box office, using such a dangerous guy is really not cost-effective.

It would be much cheaper for Robert Downey Jr. to sign a contract for 5-10 years or something in one go, which would save a lot of filming costs; the key is that the two signatures of Iron Man and Marvel are actually enough to be used for hype Yes.

There is really no need to add Tom Cruise.

"All I can say is, good luck!"

Cheng Long shrugged, as if he was meeting Chen Yu for the first time. Isn't this guy very courageous?
When you first came to Hollywood, were you ready to become your own producer?

Cheng Long himself didn't dare to do this!
After sending Chen Yu downstairs to CAA, Cheng Long said hello and left directly.

Chen Yu still has to shoot a few commercials before the Oscars.

Two days passed by in a flash.

Chen Yu's studio has been registered, but just when he was about to leave for the Oscars, an unexpected phone call surprised Chen Yu.

Kevin Feige, the current vice president of Marvel Studios, actually called him!

(End of this chapter)