Exploiting Hollywood 1980.

Chapter 1576 Ovitz's New Thriller
"Hello, it's me. What's up, Michael? What's going on?"

In the middle of the conversation, Ron Mayer suddenly received a call from Ovitz. Mayer turned on the speakerphone of his phone...

"Ron, the news that we are going to MCA has been leaked to the media, and there will be news in the newspaper tomorrow." Ovitz's voice sounded a little tired and a little excited. He was not sure about the upcoming opportunity, whether it was a good springboard or a difficult challenge.

"Fuck, these media outlets are really omnipresent. How did they get the news? We are the only two people at CAA who know about this, right?"

"I suspect that Edgar (Bronfman) Jr. accidentally let it slip. You know this guy, he is still a little immature in managing a company with a market value of tens of billions, and he needs some experienced people to help him."

"Hahaha, that's true. Michael, how are you going to respond? Will you accept media interviews? Are you going to announce it to the agents at CAA?" Ron Meyer took the opportunity to ask some important questions.

"I didn't know that it would take a very long time to liquidate the shares of CAA. I will probably need 10 months to deal with all this. If there are no other changes, you will go to MCA first on my behalf and help me take care of our business there."

"Okay, do you want me to meet with Mr. Bronfman Jr.? He needs to build a team to deal with the media now."

"Yes, that's right, Ron. It seems you have already got into the role. Go to New York to meet with Bronfman Jr. and talk to him. Find out what he has to say. As for MCA, its current boss, Lew Wasserman, and Sheinberg, how to deal with it... I will fly over to join you after I get to work on Monday and stabilize CAA's internal affairs."

Ovitz never thought that his core phone number would be leaked. But Ron Mayer also apologized to Ronald and had to book a night flight to New York. During these 10 months, he would act as Ovitz's agent at MCA to lay a solid foundation for the two people's future management career here.

Mayer left in a hurry, and Ronald was alone in the car thinking. Although Mayer was now a partner with him, if Ronald could not stop Ovitz from becoming the CEO of MCA and help Mayer get a senior position in MCA, it was not impossible for him to go back and work with Ovitz.

Ronald and his conspiracies will become history by then, and no one will mention them again.

Ronald wrote some numbers in a notebook. Ovitz's shares in CAA may be worth $2 million. Once he really leaves to join MCA, these shares cannot be held at the same time due to legal regulations to avoid conflicts of interest, so they must be sold.

As CAA is a partnership, the best buyers for these shares are the current partners within CAA.

Once Ovitz officially started the selling process, these partners, known as the Young Turks, would spontaneously unite to cut off Ovitz's path back.

……

On Monday morning, CAA held its regular morning meeting, and Richard and Niceta also attended the meeting.

After the brief morning meeting, Ovitz immediately set off to fly to New York. The brokers who were able to participate in this morning meeting were all at a certain level, and many were partners.

After the meeting, they rushed back to their offices as quickly as possible and picked up the phone to call their biggest stars. Ovitz's move will have a profound impact on the Hollywood agent industry.

"What did he say?" Ronald was already waiting for their call. After receiving the call, the first thing he asked was what Ovitz said.

"He dodged the question and just said, 'You've read the newspaper, I've read the newspaper, now let's move on,'" Richard paraphrased Ovitz's words.

The newspapers Ovitz mentioned are several influential newspapers in the entertainment industry, such as the Los Angeles Times, the Hollywood Reporter, and Variety. They all reported on Ovitz's key role in promoting Seagram's acquisition of MCA in their weekend pages, and mentioned that he might become the CEO of the new company after the merger.

"What's everyone's reaction?" Ronald asked again.

"They rushed back about the same time as us and called their big-name stars... They were all afraid that International Creative Management (ICM), William Morris (WMA) and United Talent would come and poach CAA's biggest clients," said Niceta with a smile.

In addition to Stallone, Barbra Streisand, Dustin Hoffman and others who are personally led by Ovitz and Mayer, other celebrity clients will also consider whether the privileges they enjoy at CAA will be weakened if Ovitz leaves.

After all, the power that stars represented by CAA enjoy in pay negotiations with studios is largely due to Ovitz's personal abilities.

In addition to Michael Jackson and Tom Cruise, two of CAA's biggest celebrity clients, a large number of other stars received calls from their agents this morning, telling them that Ovitz would not leave, and even if he did, they could guarantee that their clients' treatment would remain unchanged.

These stars, including Robert Redford, Demi Moore, Kevin Costner, Paul Newman, Robert De Niro, Al Pachino and others, also received calls from several other agencies later, inviting them to discuss future film developments.

At the same time, CAA's director clients such as Barry Levinson, Ivan Reitman, Martin Scorsese, Oliver Stone and others also received calls from CAA's competitors. Although their commissions were not high, everyone had tasted the power of the packaging strategy of bundling directors, screenwriters and stars in the competition with CAA in the past fifteen years, and they all wanted to take advantage of Ovitz's retirement to replicate his successful strategy.

It was because of Ronald's special identity that William Morris's former agent Ed Limato, relying on his familiarity with him, made a phone call, asked about the situation and then gave up the idea of ​​poaching him.

"Ovitz would never have imagined such a huge chain reaction..." Ronald asked with a smile.

"Haha, he is too confident. He thinks these young Turks are still the same young people who were just starting out and regarded him as their idol." Richard made a rare comment.

Ovitz did not express his opinion at the company's morning meeting. He put aside the question of whether he should leave CAA or join MCA Global.

If he is still the largest shareholder and boss of the largest agency, who owns more than half of the highest-grossing stars in Hollywood, then there is nothing wrong with this approach, and these young people below can only be angry but not speak out, and silently complain in their hearts.

But after rumors appeared in the media that he was leaving to join Universal MCA, Ovitz did not deny it, which to some extent confirmed the correctness of the rumors.

Ovitz was unaware of the strong position he had gained in the Hollywood industry over the past 20 years. In fact, a lot of this was due to the influence he had gained from famous directors and stars, not because his own strength was so strong that the seven major studios had to rely on him.

Only a truly strong person can wait until a later time to express his position. Ovitz did not have such strong strength, but he did what only a truly strong person could do. The consequence of this was that both sides were dissatisfied with him.

Of course, he is still the chairman of the board of CAA and his relationship with Bronfman Jr. is in its honeymoon period, but once the seeds of doubt are planted, they will grow and develop if the right opportunity is found.

"Then let's add fuel to the fire and make those young agents at CAA realize the situation thoroughly..."

Ronald immediately called Ed Bastian and told him that everything was going according to plan.

So before lunch time in New York, a package was delivered to the editorial office of the New York Times and given to veteran journalist and playwright Bernard Weinraub.

"Ahaha..." Bernard Weinraub was just writing a story about Ovitz and MCA, and the email contained a description of what happened at the CAA meeting that morning, and a list of all the stars who might switch agencies at CAA...

It all happened so coincidentally that Bernard Weinraub picked up the phone and called CAA.

"Hello, I'm looking for Mr. Ovitz. I'm a reporter from the New York Times. There are some rumors that he will leave CAA and go to Universal MCA. I want him to respond."

After all, the New York Times is one of the three most influential newspapers in America. Ovitz's secretary did not dare to neglect the call and transferred the call to Ovitz who was tens of thousands feet in the air.

"No comment..."

"So, 'You have read the newspaper, I have read the newspaper, now let's move on.' Did you say this at today's morning meeting?" the reporter further asked.

"No comment..."

"Does this mean that you neither confirm nor deny this rumor?"

"No comment!"

Ovitz refused to comment further, so reporter Bernard began to use his imagination. Of course, reporters need to have factual basis to write such articles. He will write all the factual things in the paragraphs, and add some guiding words such as "it is said" and "generally recognized in the industry" to his own speculations.

For example, "Mr. Ovitz's departure from Creative Artists will not only send ripples through the film, television and music industries, but in many ways it is also likely to have a significant impact on the talent agency industry, which CAA has dominated for at least a decade."

This will highlight the importance of this news figure in the industry, and allow viewers who are not familiar with the entertainment industry to have a direct understanding of the importance of this rumor.

Another example is this paragraph: "Mr. Ovitz, a powerful dealmaker in Hollywood, has previously publicly denied any interest in running MCA..."

Ovitz did reject Panasonic's offer a few years ago because he didn't want to be inferior to Lou Wasserman and Sheinberg. There is nothing wrong with what the reporter wrote.

“Moreover, although Mr. Ovitz is wealthy, he aspires to be on the same financial level as his friends, such as Michael D. Eisner, chairman of the Walt Disney Co., and Barry Diller, the former chairman of Fox.”

There is nothing wrong with the report based on public facts. As we all know, Walt Disney Chairman Eisner and former Fox Chairman Barry Diller are both worth more than Ovitz. According to Disney's annual report, Eisner earned nearly $1993 million in 2 after cashing in his stock options, while Barry Diller founded the QVC network after leaving Fox in 1992 and tried to acquire Paramount. Both of their personal wealth should be less than $10 billion, but more than Ovitz.

Anyone can infer from common sense that Ovitz is definitely not as rich as his two friends. When playing golf together, he may not be so tough.

"There are several reasons why Mr. Ovitz might want to leave Creative Arts. He feels uneasy, and caring for and nurturing movie stars, no matter how lucrative, is not particularly appealing to the middle-aged Ovitz. Dealing with an emotional actor like Dustin Hoffman, or an indecisive person like Warren Beatty, or a difficult person like Barbara Streisand, can be irritating."

In the whole article, the reporter Bernard is most proud of this paragraph. He used the words "maybe", "think", "perhaps" to perfectly avoid the responsibility of spreading rumors. Then he cited several very famous Hollywood stars as examples, whose character weaknesses are also very big. As we all know, they happen to be clients of CAA, for which Ovitz himself is also the agent.

As for what conclusions the readers will draw, for example, that these stars' weird tempers made Ovitz unbearable to the point that he wanted to sell the company to Universal MCA, those are the readers' own associations and have nothing to do with him.

Of course, the title of this article is what he spent the most time on:
"New Thriller: Will Ovitz Go to Universal MCA?"

The comparison of Ovitz's possible move to Universal MCA as a Hollywood thriller fits the nature of the industry and also uses a pure metaphor to convey the risk of Ovitz accepting the new position. It's also very eye-catching.

As we all know, it is completely legal for journalists to use metaphors when writing news reports. Even if the audience has some bad associations after reading them, there is no way to hold them accountable in law. After all, the law cannot deprive a free American of the right to use metaphors.

Sure enough, the editor liked the report very much and put it on the front page of the entertainment section. At night, after the final proofreading was completed, the report was sent to the printing factory. At three o'clock in the morning, the New York Times, with the scent of fresh ink, was sent from the printing factory to the subscriber distribution points and newsstand wholesale stations in various places.

The next morning, when most people were still asleep, those hardworking newspaper boys rode their bicycles to deliver newspapers one by one to the doorsteps of their neighbors in their community.

"Hahaha, this report is really well written..."

A few hours later, even Ronald, on the West Coast, read the report in his living room.

He thought about it and wanted to add fuel to the fire of Ovitz's whereabouts, so he picked up the phone and called Richard, "Hey, Richard, please help me get through to Mr. Sidney Sheinberg of Universal MCA. I want to invite him to participate in my new director support program for college students, and tell the next generation of geniuses how he discovered Spielberg."