Volume 4: White Devil Chapter 224 I am used to standing on the side with more people
While enjoying the food, Tommy heard some interesting stories about Hollywood's past from Herbert, the vice chairman of Warner's board of directors.
In the eyes of outsiders, Hollywood is a holy land of film art that is full of freedom, tolerance, and a gathering place of stars. It has hundreds of film companies of all sizes and countless men and women who dream of becoming stars.
But in the eyes of real Hollywood tycoons, it's not that crowded here. There are not even six big companies, but only two major groups.
According to many business magazines, the six major companies in Hollywood today are Universal, Warner, Paramount, Columbia, and Fox.
Apart from the first five, there are different opinions on the sixth place. Some magazines call Disney the sixth major film company, while others insist that MGM should be among the top six.
The reason why the sixth place is controversial is mainly because Disney's film library is much smaller than that of the top five or MGM, and its film output is relatively low, with a single category, mainly concentrated in cartoon movies.
As for MGM, which was famous in the silent film era, its ranking in sixth place is now questioned because MGM's own film library has been bought by CNN. Even if MGM wants to re-release previously shot movies, it needs to go to CNN's boss Turner Jr. to obtain authorization.
Of course, whether it is the Big Six or the Big Seven, in short, in the eyes of the outside world, the real BOSS of the Hollywood film industry are these giants. They are united and impeccable, and often lobby together for certain interest-related bills, or fight collectively with other capitalists who try to extend their hands into Hollywood.
But in fact, these big companies can be roughly divided into two factions. Warner, Disney, and MGM have a very close relationship, and in this small group, Warner is considered the leader of this group.
The other faction is Paramount, Universal and Fox. It doesn't matter who is the leader because Paramount and Fox are under the command of the same boss, Barry Diller. In a sense, it can be said that the two major production giants share a president.
In fact, there is also Columbia Pictures, which should have been considered a member of Paramount. After all, the current president, Dwayne Steele, also came from Paramount's Diller Gang. However, a few years ago, this company had already become a separate faction and had no intention of competing commercially with other film companies. The two major groups also had special feelings for Columbia Pictures, so Columbia Pictures was considered a neutral party.
The reason why they have no intention of competing with other film companies is naturally because all the Jewish executives of Columbia Pictures, from top to bottom, have been focusing on one thing since 1982, that is, to fleece the Coca-Cola Group, the stupid and wealthy layman boss. They succeeded in achieving the proud record of Coca-Cola losing 1.6 billion US dollars during its seven years of holding Columbia Pictures.
Coca-Cola couldn't understand why Columbia had several movies every year that seemed to have good box office results, but why it showed negative growth when calculating profits.
Of course, the Coca-Cola Group was not an idiot. They realized that the executives of Columbia Pictures were swallowing up their own money, so they decided to carry out a major purge and find new people to take over. As a result, Columbia Pictures carried out six major purges of senior management in seven years.
Each time, they were elite talents poached from other film companies. Each of them had the ability to turn stone into gold before joining Columbia Pictures. However, once they took over Columbia, they immediately turned into idiots who only knew how to lose money. The corporate strategies they formulated made Coca-Cola, which only knew how to sell soda, frown.
In short, this acquisition made Coca-Cola realize one thing, that is, it can make money all over the world, except in Hollywood.
Moreover, the purge was ineffective. No matter whether the executives were from the UK or other countries, once they came to Hollywood, they were still helpless. Once they dared to break the rules, various gossip scandals would immediately break out and they would be forced to resign.
This made Coca-Cola realize the power of Hollywood.
Coca-Cola could only comfort its shareholders at the shareholders' meeting. At least the $1.6 billion was not a waste. During the seven years of holding Columbia, Coca-Cola advertisements were placed in all the films produced by Columbia, so the $1.6 billion could be counted as advertising expenses.
In fact, the executives of the other five companies were also indirectly involved in Columbia's seven-year feast. Otherwise, how could Columbia, after six purges, have found so many managers familiar with the Hollywood industry to fill the void?
So even though Columbia Pictures lost money, it always received unanimous praise from its peers and was often recognized by the other five companies as the largest film company in Hollywood. This title also attracted the attention of Japan's Sony Group, which suffered from its lack of popularity in the United States. The company is now in contact with Columbia Pictures and is preparing to acquire it.
It can be said that Columbia Pictures is like a free and easy crane in Hollywood, with an independent status, and can be regarded as the honorary leader of Hollywood held up by other companies.
The remaining five major companies are the ones that truly stir up the Hollywood scene. The two factions are like the two families in Romeo and Juliet, fighting to the death.
Warner's president and CEO, Jewish Steve Ross, became a thorn in Paramount Pictures' side from the day he acquired Warner Bros., which was on the verge of closing down, for $400 million in 1969. His intervention prevented Paramount's plan to swallow up Warner at a low price from happening.
Barry Diller, the vice president of Paramount who planned to swallow Warner Bros. at the time, is now the chairman and CEO of Fox Group. All of Murdoch Group's film and television businesses in the United States are managed by this Jewish man from Poland.
When Murdoch first entered the American film and television industry, his first choice was not Fox, but Warner. The reason why he set his target on Warner was mainly because Barry Diller wanted to avenge his failed acquisition of Warner in 1969.
Warner Bros. and the Murdoch Group fought for three years, with each side showing off their skills, from the studio all the way to the Supreme Court. Finally, Steve Ross found the white knight Herbert Siegel, and Clark Industries invested in the purchase of 25% of Warner's shares to stabilize the situation. Although Murdoch did not get what he wanted, he made a profit of 40 million US dollars through the previous hostile takeover of stocks that were repurchased by Warner, which was considered a small victory.
Barry Diller took over Fox for Murdoch. Don Bruckheimer, who succeeded Barry Diller as chairman and CEO of Paramount, was one of Barry Diller's most proud students and a member of Paramount's "Diller Gang" back then. Therefore, Paramount and Fox have established a very close partnership, or simply put, these two giants have to listen to Barry Diller.
As for Universal Pictures, as early as the 1970s, under the leadership of Barry Diller, it cooperated with Paramount to establish an international company to distribute films, and the cooperation lasted for many years.
Warner's ally Disney's president, Michael Eisner, was previously senior vice president of Paramount and also a favorite student of Barry Diller. He followed Barry Diller earlier than Don Bruckheimer. He fully expected that Barry Diller would hand over Paramount to him after he went to Fox for a high position. As a result, Barry chose Don Bruckheimer to take over the position. This made Michael Eisner, who always regarded himself as Barry's number one henchman, feel that he had lost face at Paramount. He turned against Barry and decisively resigned. He repeatedly sought the position of president of other large film companies. It was Steve Ross of Warner who spoke for him and helped him contact several major shareholders of Disney, which eventually allowed Michael Eisner to get the job of CEO of Disney.
As for the relationship between MGM and Warner, it all depends on CNN's owner Turner Jr., who holds the copyrights of all MGM's films before 1987 and all Warner's films before 1950, and also holds shares in both companies. In addition, like Steve Ross, he has a blood feud with Murdoch, so MGM is almost a natural ally of Warner.
If you want to describe the struggle between the two major Hollywood groups in the past twenty years in a simple way, it is the feud between two Jews, Steve Ross and Barry Diller of Paramount Pictures.
Every Jewish movie mogul, standing on the top of Beverly Hills overlooking the night view, has probably dreamed of taking over the Big Six and dominating Hollywood.
But in Hollywood, with its countless practitioners, the only two old Jewish guys with very different personalities who have come closest to realizing this dream in the past decade are these two.
Steve Ross is nicknamed the Godfather by industry insiders. With his personal charm, generous incentive system and laissez-faire management style, all employees who work for him have the illusion that Steve is the best interpretation of the image of a father in their eyes.
After starting their own businesses, many Warner employees would come to him for advice on business issues, which meant that he had many students and friends all over California. Whenever Steve Ross met his subordinates, he would always greet them with the affectionate word "child".
Over time, people who worked for Steve got used to calling themselves Steve's children.
As for another explanation for the Godfather, it is that Steve Ross is really the gangster godfather of Hollywood. Before entering the film industry in 1969, he was engaged in funeral and cleaning businesses in New York and New Jersey, and his partners were mainly Jewish gangsters and Italian gangsters.
There is also an unconfirmed news that Meyer Lansky, known as the "American Mafia Accountant", is said to be Steve Ross's godfather. After Meyer fled to Israel, Steve became the new accountant for the American Jewish mafia and the Italian mafia in Hollywood.
Compared with the "Godfather" Steve who entered the business world through hacking, Barry Diller is called a "killer" by people in the industry. That's because his performance in the business world is like a killer who is calm and on standby. Once he finds any flaw in his opponent, he will strike without hesitation and make a fatal blow.
Moreover, he started his career as an intern in a brokerage company at the lowest level, and worked his way up to where he is today. Not only has he quickly made a name for himself with his own abilities, he has also formed the famous "Diller Gang" in Hollywood. Completely different from Steve, who has children all over Hollywood, the members of the Diller Gang were all cultivated by him personally, and each one was carefully selected. Their abilities and loyalty are far beyond the reach of others, and each one of them is capable of standing on his own.
In addition to the three secondary movie tycoons who came from the Diller Gang, including Disney's current CEO Michael Eisner, Paramount's current CEO Don Bruckheimer, and Columbia Pictures' CEO Dawn Steele, there is also a group of Diller Gang elites with the Diller mark active in the American film and television industry.
For example, Gus Ancil, who was chosen by Diller at the age of 28 to be the founding president of Fox Broadcasting Company, Don Simpson, the gold medal producer who helped Paramount create the phenomenal commercial blockbuster "Top Gun", and Stephen Cho, the first Chinese executive of Fox Television Network, as well as a dozen middle-level forces who have been honing their abilities in major Hollywood companies and waiting for opportunities to come to the fore, are also members of the Diller Gang.
After Herbert finished chatting about these interesting stories about Hollywood at the dinner table, he picked up a piece of beef with a fork and put it into his mouth, saying vaguely, "In fact, I am more optimistic about Diller. The United States is an elite society. The influence of the Diller Gang is not comparable to that of Steve's children of varying quality. If Steve can buy back my Warner shares at a price that satisfies me, I am ready to invest the money in Fox. Diller is definitely good at it. He can make Steve and Turner busy by standing alone in Hollywood, while Murdoch can happily hold a camera to take photos of naked women in the UK and publish them in The Sun. How many people in the whole United States can make people like Steve and Turner busy?"
Herbert swallowed his food and looked at Julian Farrell: "What do you think?"
Julian wiped the corner of his mouth and said, "I have no interest in the film and television industry, and I don't know Diller and Steve... Diller, I am optimistic about Diller."
"What about you, kid?" Herbert turned his eyes to look at Tommy who was eating spaghetti. "What do you think?"
"It sounds like Steve's children are more numerous and have a stronger mass base." Tommy swallowed the food in his mouth and took a sip of lemonade: "I am more accustomed to standing on the side with more people."
