Chapter 151: Earn a Small Villa
After posting on Weibo, Gu Wei no longer cared about the online comments, packed up and went to the company.
Since June, several Hollywood blockbusters have been released in the domestic film market. "Edge of Tomorrow", an action science fiction blockbuster starring Tom Cruise, was released on the 6th. It took in 160 million yuan in the first week. After more than two weeks of release, the box office gradually approached 400 million yuan.
On the 13th, a Hollywood monster movie "Godzilla" was released. It achieved a good result of 230 million in the first week and is estimated to fall within 500 million.
Gu Wei checked and found out that "The Breakup Guru" will be released on the 26th, and "Transformers 4: Age of Extinction" will be released right after it. You should know that "Transformers 3" released in 2011 won 1 billion yuan at the domestic box office, becoming the second blockbuster in Chinese film history to break the 1 billion yuan box office, the first being "Avatar".
The IP [Transformers] is still very influential in China. Deng Chao let his first movie compete with such Hollywood blockbusters. We have to admire his courage.
"Mr. Gu, the editing of [Yu Zui] is now available. Would you like to take a look?"
Gu Wei was still browsing his phone in the office when Zhao Mingcheng knocked on the door and told him the news.
He was shocked when he heard it, and stood up and walked out.
"Director Zhang Rui is in the company, right?"
As they walked, Gu Wei asked Zhao Mingcheng beside him.
"After returning to Beijing after filming wrapped, Director Zhang Rui spent every day in the editing room working with the editor on post-production."
Gu Wei nodded after hearing this.
[Yu Zui] The shooting cost of this TV series is 30 million, which may not seem very high, but you have to know that this TV series has only 24 episodes in two seasons, which means that the shooting cost of each episode is more than 1 million.
This is considered a well-made web drama.
The original time and space "Yu Zui" achieved great fame, but later it was not as profitable as people imagined.
After all, the show was released and became popular not long ago, but was ordered to make corrections and then quickly pulled offline. So the revenue was far less than expected, and it can only be said that it did not lose money.
But it’s different now. The filming of "Yu Zui" in the previous life can be said to have no fame at all. There was no star in the whole play except Zhang Yishan, and even Zhang Yishan himself was just an out-of-date child star.
It is already a great achievement to finally sell the film and ensure that you don’t lose money.
Now Gu Wei's company has the success of "The Princess Weiyoung", and now Zhang Tianai, Li Xian and others have joined the crew of "Yu Zui". From the perspective of online dramas, it can be said that the lineup is luxurious.
It is produced by the original team of "The Princess Weiyoung", and all video websites have high expectations for "Yu Zui".
The TV series is about to be completed, and it depends on who it is sold to and how much it will be sold for.
It is impossible to get the same profit share as "The Princess Weiyoung". The video website is not stupid. Knowing that the TV series will be a big hit, it will definitely be bought out. Gu Wei is also worried that there will be subsequent rectifications, so he will also sell it at an opening price.
Gu Wei brought Zhao Mingcheng to the company's small screening room, where director Zhang Rui was already waiting.
"Director Zhang, thank you for your hard work!"
Gu Wei stretched out his hand and shook hands with Zhang Rui, looking at his somewhat tired expression and said.
"Nothing, I just did what a director should do, all for the TV series."
Without much nonsense, a few people sat down and started watching the film.
After watching a few episodes in a row, Gu Wei signaled that there was no need to play any more.
The style of this version of [Yu Zui] has not changed, and the quality is higher than the original.
Gu Wei finally felt relieved.
In the TV series, "Yu Zui" played by Zhang Yishan is of course the absolute protagonist. The characteristics of this role are very suitable for Zhang Yishan. He plays it very naturally and vividly.
What’s even better than the original version is that the other characters in the play, the heroine "Lin Yujing" played by Zhang Tianai, "Jie Bing" played by Li Xian, and "Shen Jiawen" played by Yang Caiyu, are all more outstanding than the original.
Other people watch TV dramas just because they think the actors in the drama perform well, but Gu Wei is the only one who makes comparisons in his mind, so he can better discover the wonderful aspects of their performances.
The same role played by different actors can have very different effects.
After the production of [Yu Zui] was completed, Gu Wei did not waste any time and immediately organized people from several major video platforms to attend an internal film viewing.
Several video platforms are also very active in this web drama that they have been coveting for a long time.
They all sent their deputy general managers in charge of film purchasing to come.
Although they are said to be several major video websites, in fact there are only Kiwi, Tencent Video, Youku Video and the recently emerging LeTV Video.
The three major video websites are old players, while LeTV Video, backed by LeTV Group, is a rising star.
However, LeTV purchased the online broadcasting rights of a batch of TV and movies a long time ago. In addition, LeTV is now at its peak, and Boss Jia wants to build an ecological closed loop for the LeTV series, and the video platform is one of them. Therefore, he is spending money lavishly, with a bit of the momentum of a newborn calf that is not afraid of a tiger.
The boss of LeTV, Mrs. Gan, came in person.
It seems that among these four platforms, Tencent Video is the most powerful. Backed by the Tencent Group, it attracted a large number of members in the past few months due to the hit drama "Go Princess Go". It also made a lot of money from advertising and tasted the sweetness of cooperation with Gu Wei, so it is also very active this time.
Although LeTV Video is slightly weaker than Tencent, it is the most daring in spending money. It has followed Accountant Jia's strategy of rapid development and lavish spending. LeTV people are willing to spend a lot of money to achieve their goals. After all, this money is raised through financing, and they don't feel bad about spending it.
Compared with the other two, Youku and Kiwi are a little lacking in both strength and courage.
The final transaction result surprised Gu Wei a little. Mrs. Gan, on behalf of LeTV Video, beat Tencent Video's offer of 2.6 million yuan per episode with a price of 3 million yuan per episode and purchased the exclusive online broadcasting rights of "Yu Zui".
【Yu Zui】has two seasons with a total of 24 episodes, and the exclusive online broadcasting rights were sold for a total of 72 million.
The TV series cost 30 million yuan, with 15 million yuan in revenue from embedded advertising and a total profit of 57 million yuan.
The online drama took less than half a year to produce and made a profit of more than half a hundred million yuan. Gu Wei was very happy that he had earned enough money to buy a big villa.
However, there is another very important point. After signing the contract with LeTV, you must urge them to pay the money immediately.
After all, it is well known that LeTV owed payments to suppliers in the original time and space.
Fortunately, that was 17 years later, and LeTV is still in a thriving stage.
The broadcasting rights for this web drama were a one-time deal, so they had no reason to delay payment. They paid Wei Ming Tian Xia very quickly after signing the contract.
After the deal was completed, Sun Zhonghuai, the CEO of Tencent Video, called Gu Wei specifically to explain why he did not buy "Yu Zui".
"Boss Gu, after I got back, I specifically talked to Vice President Zhang who went to buy the film.
His explanation to me was that the drama "Yu Zui" was definitely a good drama that could become a big hit, but the scale was a bit too large. If he raised the price with LeTV, the risk of broadcasting it online later would be too high.
Vice President Zhang used to be the director of the program selection department of the provincial radio station, and I have great confidence in his abilities.
I just regret not being able to continue working with Mr. Gu this time."
"Mr. Sun, you are too polite. We had such a pleasant cooperation before, and there will be opportunities in the future."
Sun Zhonghuai explained to Gu Wei why he didn't buy it, and his attitude was very sincere.
He attaches great importance to Gu Wei's company and himself.
Thanks to the game "Go Princess Go" bought from Gu Wei, the three major video websites that were originally on par with each other suddenly became dominated by Tencent Video, surpassing the other two in terms of number of members, video clicks and even advertising profits.
But the situation changed at the beginning of this month, and Youku Video caught up soon after. The reason was that Youku purchased another TV series starring Gu Wei, "Gu Jian Qi Tan". This fairy tale idol drama broke various TV series online broadcast records as soon as it was launched.
Judging from the momentum, it is only a matter of time before it surpasses "The Princess Weiyoung", which will bring a lot of traffic to Youku and make a lot of money from advertising fees.
Sun Zhonghuai was not surprised. "The Princess Weiyoung" became popular because of its novel subject matter, and "Swords of Legends" was simply of high quality. How could a small web drama be compared with a fairy tale drama with an investment of hundreds of millions?
Two consecutive TV series that became popular on the Internet, one produced by Gu Wei's company and the other starring him, made Sun Zhonghuai pay more attention to the cooperation with Gu Wei. So when the cooperation did not go through, he quickly called to explain to avoid affecting the relationship between the two companies.
After hanging up the phone, Gu Wei couldn't help but sigh that professionals have a unique vision and even take issues of scale into consideration. They are worthy of being from a TV station.
At LeEco Group, Boss Jia and Mrs. Gan were watching the online drama "Yu Zui" that they had bought.
After a few episodes, Boss Jia said to Madam Gan, "Wife, you have a really good eye. I think this drama will be a big hit, and it won't be inferior to the previous "Go Princess Go".
Your 72 million is a huge profit for LeTV Video."
Madam Gan's pretty face flashed with a hint of complacency. "I've always had the idea of filming my own web series, but I never had the chance to start. I especially like the series 'The Princess'."
Boss Jia smiled when he heard this.
“It’s not too late now, we can invest in and shoot our own web series.
But we also need to maintain a good relationship with Gu Wei. Judging from his resume, he is an absolute talent, and there will be opportunities for cooperation in the future."
(End of this chapter)
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