Chapter 515: A Conversation with Jobs

Before the Shanghai Film Festival concluded, Duke boarded his private jet for Los Angeles. Aside from leveraging a few promotional events to expand the Rosenberg film brand, his gains from the trip to China were strictly average. In particular, the actual revenue brought in by the simultaneous US-China release of Taken was, at best, better than nothing.

Constrained by market size and the number of theaters, Taken had been in Chinese theaters for exactly a week by the time Duke left, grossing 42.28 million RMB. While this was quite an impressive box office figure compared to most films of this era, a mere thirteen-percent revenue share wouldn't yield much actual profit.

Fortunately, the future was bright. As long as his brand resonated loudly enough, a few years down the line would naturally bring a bountiful harvest.

Compared to China, North America was the true foundation of Duke's career. Taken maintained a steady performance over the four workdays of the week, grossing a total of $41.17 million. Combined with its $51.25 million opening weekend, the North American box office had reached $92.42 million—falling short of breaking the $100 million mark in a single week, but still an outstanding result given the film's genre and budget.

Moreover, audience word-of-mouth had been consistently positive. The CinemaScore audience approval rating remained above eighty-five percent, and even without the deployment of paid online shills, the IMDB rating sat at a lofty 8.5.

However, heading into its second weekend, Taken ran into Spielberg's The Terminal.

In Hollywood, a commercial film's genre and budget were just as critical to its box office success as the star power of its director or lead actors. For example, if Duke had directed a film like The Shawshank Redemption instead of The Lord of the Rings series a few years ago, not even he could have turned it into a massive blockbuster, nor would the rest of Hollywood's slate have bothered to clear a path for it.

By the same logic, none of the films in this year's Summer Season went out of their way to dodge Taken like they had last year. There simply was no need.

Duke had actually chosen this release window very carefully. Having a general idea of which films would become massive hits, he naturally chose to pick the easiest targets.

The vast majority of the time, Spielberg was no easy target, but The Terminal was the definitive exception. It was one of the Jewish director's rare flops.

Over the last few years, DreamWorks had found itself in increasingly dire straits. Whenever the studio ran into trouble, Spielberg would put out a new movie, giving rise to a peculiar phenomenon in Hollywood: DreamWorks would fall into a slump, and Spielberg would step in to save it.

Yet no matter how great the director, no one could single-handedly prop up a company as massive as DreamWorks. Duke couldn't do it, James Cameron couldn't do it, and neither could Spielberg.

Besides, even the best directors stumbled sometimes.

The Terminal was undeniably Spielberg's stumble. Even though it had assembled three major box office guarantees—Spielberg, Tom Hanks, and Catherine Zeta-Jones—its reception fell far short of both DreamWorks' and the public's expectations.

Over the three days of the weekend, The Terminal only raked in $19.05 million in North America. Aside from leaving behind the classic line, "I've been waiting my whole life, but I don't know who I'm waiting for," it was in no way a success.

Although Taken suffered a forty-percent drop in its second weekend, its $30.75 million haul was enough to ensure it held onto its crown at the top of the North American box office. At the same time, it pushed the film past the $100 million threshold, reaching a cumulative gross of $123.17 million!

Back in Los Angeles, Duke rested for the weekend before throwing himself back into work. Taken hadn't drained too much of his energy. At this point, the film was guaranteed to turn a massive profit. With Warner Brothers' distribution and marketing department keeping an eye on things, he didn't need to pay it much attention.

His first priority was to have Tina Fey and his proxy investor, David, form a joint negotiating team to discuss an acquisition deal with Warner Brothers.

Duke Studio held a slew of copyrights, including The Lord of the Rings Trilogy, the Harry Potter Series, and The Matrix Trilogy. It seemed small in scale, but its actual profitability was sky-high. If Warner Brothers wanted to swallow it whole, they would undoubtedly have to fork over a substantial amount of cold, hard cash. Furthermore, Duke wasn't short on liquidity; what he wanted were equivalent shares in Warner Brothers or Time Warner.

Negotiations were never a simple matter. With these talks just getting underway, Duke involved himself in another negotiation: a partnership between Pixar Studio and Warner Brothers.

After steadily increasing his holdings over the past few years, Duke's stake in Warner Brothers was nearing nine percent. The studio's earnings were inextricably linked to his own. Moreover, once the acquisition of Duke Studio was finalized, his shares in Warner would only continue to grow.

Besides, he had other plans in mind.

Given Pixar Studio's current size, if Warner wanted to finalize a merger, they would have to rely on a mix of stock swaps and cash payments. Unlike massive film studios that had to maintain enormous liquid reserves, Duke had plenty of cash on hand; the majority of the profits he'd earned from The Lord of the Rings Trilogy remained untouched.

It was, in effect, a chain of negotiations. Tina Fey's talks with Warner Brothers included one foundational condition, and that condition was inextricably tied to Pixar Studio.

Afterward, Duke made a special trip to San Francisco to meet face-to-face with Steve Jobs, who was recuperating from an illness.

Naturally, he wasn't foolish enough to try and persuade such a stubborn man to accept Western medical treatment. If even his own family couldn't talk sense into him, was he really going to listen to an outsider?

This was simply a conversation about interests.

"Duke, there's no need to beat around the bush."

Sitting beneath the vines of the corridor, Jobs poured Duke a cup of tea.

"Hollywood has the Big Six Companies. Even if we exclude the weaker Sony Columbia, that still leaves five," he said. "Why should I choose Warner Brothers?"

"Five companies?" Duke picked up his teacup, took a sip, and gently shook his head. "Steve, do you really have five choices?"

Without waiting for Jobs to reply, Duke pressed on, "Your negotiations with Disney haven't made any progress. Your core condition for a partnership is that Michael Eisner must step down, but given Eisner's iron grip on Disney, I'm afraid that's a tall order, isn't it?"

Perhaps it was a chain reaction sparked by Duke's own presence, but up until now, Michael Eisner's position at Disney remained incredibly secure.

"Twentieth Century Fox owns Blue Sky Studio, and the two have partnered for years. They aren't lacking an animation division. Even if they wanted to team up, are you sure Pixar Studio would retain the same status it held within the Disney system?"

"Universal Pictures is in talks with Illumination Entertainment—a highly promising animation studio—so their sincerity is already in question."

"Paramount Pictures is indeed looking for a suitable animation partner. But Steve, have you noticed that with DreamWorks struggling, the Big Three want to spin off DreamWorks Animation Studio into its own entity? Word has it that Paramount will step in as the new distributor for DreamWorks Animation."

Steve Jobs quietly looked at Duke, offering no reaction.

Undeniably, even if everything Duke said was entirely true, Jobs still held absolute initiative in the negotiations.

"Warner is different. Warner possesses an extensive distribution network across the globe, and it's the media company with the highest market value." Duke wasn't foolish enough to think a few words could sway a man like Jobs; he was merely stating the basic facts, reminding him of the advantages Warner had over the rest. "Although Warner has an animation division, it's so small it can essentially be ignored. We will give Pixar Studio maximum creative freedom—even more freedom than Disney did."

The issue of pricing was a matter for formal negotiations, so Duke had no need to bring it up. To secure Pixar, they would inevitably have to offer a figure that satisfied Jobs.

"I had someone bring this tea over from India," Jobs said, suddenly pivoting the conversation to the tea. "How is it? Doesn't it taste fresher and more natural than the black tea we're used to?"

"It's very good." Duke gently swirled his cup. "It just isn't to my taste. I'm still more accustomed to Chinese tea."

He abruptly shifted the topic himself. "Steve, your life can only be described as a legend. I'd very much like to produce a biographical film about you in the future."

Jobs's eyes lit up briefly, but he didn't say a word.

When a person entered the business world, all they sought was fame and fortune. Duke knew very well that to Jobs, money was nothing more than a numbers game, but what about the temptation of going down in history?

Just as Schindler's List had done for Oskar Schindler, a successful film could forge an immortal monument for a person in the eyes of future generations.

Moving Jobs was no easy feat, and it was impossible for Duke to thoroughly stir the renowned Steve Jobs with just a few words. Up until he said his goodbyes and left, Jobs offered no particular response.

But Duke believed his words would still leave a mark. As long as he could tilt Jobs slightly toward Warner, that would be enough.

Duke took a helicopter back to Los Angeles, but before he even reached his destination, news of his meeting with Jobs had already reached the ears of Disney's upper management.

"The chances of other companies actually partnering with Pixar Studio aren't very high."

In the spacious office, Dick Cook sat in a swivel chair, looking at Michael Eisner behind the desk.

"Warner and Duke Rosenberg are our greatest rivals," he said.

Michael Eisner steepled his fingers, resting his hands on the desk.

"And what about Marvel Pictures?" he asked.

"Duke Rosenberg has already agreed to direct Iron Man for Marvel," Dick Cook replied quickly. "Marvel Pictures is leaning heavily toward partnering with Warner."

He warned, "Michael, we cannot lose Pixar. We have to make appropriate concessions during the negotiations."

"Without Pixar, we still have the Disney Animation Studio."

Ever since Tarzan, the Disney Animation Studio had been committed to developing 3D computer animation. Countless past triumphs had also led Michael Eisner to firmly believe that Disney's animation division would inevitably rise again.

"We can make appropriate concessions, but we can't let Jobs demand the moon!" he declared.

A flash of anger flickered in Eisner's eyes as he continued, "Hold off on setting a release date for the new film Ovitz and David Ellison are working on. Wait until the new Batman film announces its release date. If they think they can save Batman..."

A cold sneer played at the corner of his mouth.