Chapter 66: Enough money saved to buy a house
"The Sprout" has no objection to the radio station adapting the book into a radio play, because the book has already been serialized in "The Sprout" and even if it is broadcast on the radio it will not affect sales. On the contrary, it is a good thing. There will definitely be many people who have not bought "The Sprout" who will buy the book after hearing the radio broadcast.
Niu Xinliang was sent to the radio station to discuss the adaptation fee with the person in charge, Tang Botao. The people at the radio station were unwilling to pay more, saying that at present each radio station only gave a symbolic fee for adapted works, and there was no reason to pay more.
But Niu Xinliang was prepared. "You are wrong. When the country restored the system of remuneration for writing, it said: for those who put in mental labor and write texts, and publish them in the national publishing and radio and television departments, they will be given a certain amount of remuneration to encourage them to continue to work hard on writing."
"So, when it comes to remuneration, it's not just our magazines and publishing houses that have to pay the authors. If your radio station wants to use the authors' manuscripts, it naturally has to pay them too. And when you collect radio manuscripts, don't you always pay the authors?"
Tang Botao was suddenly stuck, because what Niu Xinliang said was indeed true. The radio station had so many programs to broadcast every day, they could not write so many scripts by themselves, and could only collect them from the society.
Authors can also receive royalties for their contributions. Generally speaking, a manuscript of several hundred words can get around 20 yuan. The total royalties paid by the radio station every month is not a small amount.
"That's different! The manuscripts we collected are all re-written by the authors. Now Gao Jialin has already received royalties from you once. His mental work has been duly rewarded. How can he ask for high royalties from us again?" Tang Botao tried to defend himself.
"Even if Gao Jialin has received royalties from us, other newspapers and magazines still need to pay royalties if they want to reprint his articles. Of course, this does not apply to textbooks used in schools. But your radio station is not a textbook, so if you want to use the articles, you must pay!"
"And TV stations and film studios have to pay adaptation fees if they want to adapt a certain author's work. It's impossible for your radio station to be an exception, right?"
Niu Xinliang has been eating Gao Jialin's meals a lot during this period. With so much delicious food in his stomach, his fighting power is very strong. He quoted a series of classics and left Tang Botao speechless.
Tang Botao was planning to give up this project, but then he thought, "Young Friends Come to Meet" is so popular among young people, if it can be adapted into a radio drama, the listening rate will definitely not be low, so he was a little reluctant.
Then we can only talk slowly. "Even if what you said makes sense, isn't twenty per thousand words too high?"
"Then calculate it according to the cost of adapted scripts for TV dramas! Right now, original feature film scripts cost 1,500 to 4,000 yuan each. For film scripts adapted from other literary forms, 20% to 30% of the above standard is paid to the original author, and the rest goes to the adapter. Radio drama scripts are easier to adapt than TV dramas, so Jialin can do it. Just give him 4,000 yuan!"
This is the current market standard. When Zhang Yimou was filming "Red Sorghum", he gave Mo Yan 800 yuan for the adaptation fee. When CCTV was filming "Ordinary World", due to tight funding, it only gave Lu Yao 680 yuan.
Tang Botao laughed angrily, "This book only has a little over 200,000 words in total. If you say so, I might as well just calculate it as 20 per thousand words!"
"That's fine too!" Niu Xinliang said calmly.
"Four thousand yuan is the salary only for big screenwriters and authors. Jialin is a newcomer after all, so let's just calculate it as fifteen hundred!" Tang Botao took a step back.
"No, at least three thousand five!"
"two thousand!"
"Three thousand two!"
The two argued back and forth for a long time, and finally reached an agreement on a price of two thousand five hundred. This was also thanks to the fact that Shanghai is a big city and the radio station has ample funding, otherwise Tang Botao would not have been willing to pay so much money.
Gao Jialin invited Niu Xinliang for dinner, and then went back to start revising the radio drama script. Just as Niu Xinliang said, radio drama scripts are indeed easier to write than film and television dramas. Most of the content can be copied verbatim, and only the narration and character names need to be added in the front. In this way, the announcer recording the radio drama will know which part he should read when he gets the script.
It took me half a month to revise the script and submit it, and I got another 2,500 yuan.
This is not the end. When Gao Jialin arrived at No. 675 Julu Road, Niu Xinliang told him another good news, "The publication of "Young Friends Come to Meet" has been finalized, and the first print run is set to be 100,000 copies!"
Gao Jialin was not surprised to decide to publish a book so quickly, because Mengya has its own publishing house, and it is very convenient to publish excellent works that have been published in magazines. However, the print run was a little surprising to him. "The first print run is 100,000 copies. Aren't you afraid that it won't sell well?"
"Don't worry. From the resumption of the college entrance examination in 1977 to now, hundreds of thousands of people have entered college every year. Over the years, there are at least two million college students. These are the natural readers of your book! Add to that the high school students who have not yet been admitted to college but are very curious about college life, there are even more! If we add other reader groups, a mere 100,000 copies will not be enough!" Niu Xinliang seemed full of confidence.
"That's true. You all are so confident, why should I worry about it alone?" Gao Jialin nodded.
"Your royalties are indispensable. Your book has more than 226,000 words, so I'll give you 227,000 yuan. 18 yuan per thousand words is 4,086 yuan. The royalties for a print run of 100,000 copies are equivalent to 37% of the basic royalties, which is 1,511.82 yuan. The total is 5,597.82 yuan. My goodness, just for this book, you got nearly 10,000 yuan from us. If you add the script fee from the radio station, you'll have saved enough money to buy a big house!"
After settling the accounts, Niu Xinliang was filled with envy but not much jealousy, because he knew that this was what Gao Jialin deserved.
"Hehe, once you give me the royalties, it will be enough to buy a villa!" Gao Jialin still couldn't help but reveal his family's financial situation. When he thought that the villa of more than 500 square meters would soon become his, who could resist!
"Where did you get the money? Are you supplying articles to other magazines behind my back?" Niu Xinliang felt betrayed.
He guessed correctly. The remaining money was naturally given by "Story Club". Gao Jialin was bored at home during the winter vacation, so he wrote two stories. After returning to school, he used the time between studying and writing for "Mengya" to write another one.
After taking these three stories to Story Club, Feng Jie immediately applied for the highest level of remuneration for him. The three stories brought him several thousand yuan in remuneration. Together with the money he got from Sprout, Gao Jialin's savings successfully exceeded 20,000 yuan, and he could ask Xie Chao to buy a house.
After receiving the royalties, Gao Jialin immediately called Xie Chao and asked him to help him make an appointment with the owner to sign the contract. He didn't want to wait any longer.
(End of this chapter)
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