How can you become a star without money?

Chapter 145 Has the speed-up button been pressed? [10,000-word update, please subscribe]

Upon hearing this valuation, both Zhang Chen and Shen Teng's faces lit up with joy.

"Judging from the company's operational history, it is more likely to be a cultural and creative company. Relying entirely on box office revenue for commercial monetization is a major taboo, as a single monetization path is not a good thing."

"I believe I can help you in five areas: funding, fixed theaters, commercial monetization, talent supply, and online platforms," ​​Wang Yao continued.

"Alright, that's like I'm being kept by him. If I had met President Wang earlier, I would have been a movie star long ago. Zhang Chen, you're really wasting my time." Shen Teng clapped his hands.

“Be serious.” Zhang Chen glared at Shen Teng, then looked at Wang Yao and said seriously, “What President Wang said is exactly what we lack. We initially got together just for the sake of our hobby. None of us have actually done business before. The one with the most business experience is Xiao Kai, who used to run a small shop.”

We've tried all of what you mentioned, but after hitting a few walls, we gave up and focused on our theater business, making good productions to retain audiences. It's only in the last two years, with increased profits, that we've started thinking about expansion. We also hope to find a truly capable and experienced investor to lead us.”

Although Zhang Chen's words were somewhat official, you could feel his sincerity.

"Ten million, I want 30% of the shares, and six million of that money should be used to pay for the theater rental business of Kanpianer.com. I've watched about 210 of your performances a year, of which 150 are in Beijing and Tianjin, and the remaining 60 are touring more than 20 cities across the country."

These movie-watching websites generally have partner theaters covering these areas. Additionally, I'll help you rent a permanent theater in Beijing for a year; it'll be called the Mahua Theater. In the future, it won't be limited to the Beijing area, but will become a nationwide theater network.

"In the first year, Kanpianer.com will provide you with some basic promotion and ticketing services for free, but starting from the second year, it will be charged," Wang Yao said.

Upon hearing this, Zhang Chen's face lit up with joy. Based on last year's expenditures, nearly ten million yuan was spent on the venue alone. If the venue were to expand this year, the increased number of performances would also increase costs. Wang Yao only needed 600 million yuan to lease the theater for the entire year, which was definitely a friendly price.

Moreover, having a permanent theater means the troupe will no longer be nomadic but will instead become agricultural, having its own base to interact with the audience and greatly increase the convenience of equipment setup and other tasks.

Most importantly, they had a signboard. The Deyun Society's signboard became increasingly well-known after a theater was built in Tianqiao.

Moreover, he had originally planned to set up a permanent theater this year. He had chosen the Geological Auditorium, but the other party was asking for too much money. The main theater alone would cost 500 million yuan per year, and with the addition of renovations, the investment would be at least 800 million yuan, which is equivalent to investing all of last year's profits.

“Mr. Wang, could we use the Geological Auditorium for this permanent theater? It’s the place where you watched the dance drama last time. Don’t be fooled by how run-down it looks, it’s in a good location and the audience is used to it,” Shen Teng said.

“This shouldn’t be a big problem. I’ll have someone inquire about the price later.” Wang Yao nodded. “Also, I will provide some variety show, TV series, and even movie resources, but only to artists who are willing to sign with me.”

Upon hearing this, Zhang Chen looked at Shen Teng.

"What do you mean? Mr. Wang, are you really going to sponsor me?" Shen Teng asked with a smile.

"Besides my interest in small theaters, my main reason for investing in Mahua FunAge is my recognition of the comedic performances of Teng Ge and others. I am currently in talks with Sohu about an online variety show collaboration, similar to a sketch/crosstalk competition program called 'Comedians'."
We're open to all comedy genres, no matter the format. I've already secured Stephen Chow as the title sponsor, and once Sohu confirms the collaboration, Zhao Benshan will also be a sponsor.

"Moreover, the lowest-tier artists signed to our company are guaranteed a leading role in at least one film/TV series every year," Wang Yao said with a smile.

"Sign it, you have to sign it. I'll sign it even if I have to leave Mahua," Shen Teng said seriously.

Although it was a joke, who would want to be stuck in a small theater for the rest of their life if they could appear on the big screen?

Hobbies are hobbies, but people's pursuits change over time.

“I think it’s very reasonable, and it’s a matter of mutual consent. Mahua didn’t sign actors back then because they were afraid of hindering their future. Now that President Wang is helping to provide a safety net, I can say that I’ve found a way out for my brothers and sisters.” Zhang Chen said with a smile.

This request actually has nothing to do with him, because the company doesn't have any signed artists, and the exposure provided by Wang Yao will eventually be used by the artists to support their offline performances, unless the artist gives up performing in small theaters.

Although a 30% stake is a lot, it can bring in a lot of resources and 400 million in working capital, and solve the biggest cost issue of theater rental.

After reaching an agreement on cooperation, Zhang Chen took the equity investment template, while Shen Teng took the artist contract back to discuss it.

The next day, under the guidance of the professional legal team hired by Wang Yao, Tianhuo Media invested 10 million yuan in Kaixin Mahua to acquire a 30% stake. Subsequently, Mahua and Kanpianer.com Cinema Line drafted a 6 million yuan annual theater rental contract.

Kanpianer.com signed a 10-year long-term lease contract for 7 million yuan per year, with the rent increasing by 5% annually. Zhang Chen plans to transform the entire nearly 5000-square-meter theater into a Mahua-themed club, which can serve as the starting point for fan economy operations. Two small theaters with a capacity of 100 people will be retained, while the rest will be demolished and renovated.

In the future, the Beijing branch can also hold any rehearsals or conferences here. Among the main creators of Mahua FunAge, Shen Teng, Ma Li, Wang Ning, and Allen are all affiliated with Xinghuo Cooperative in a studio model, while several main creators and directors have directly joined the Beijing branch. In addition to the small theater, they can also help the company with the creation of web dramas.

The Mahua system still has a significant advantage in training directors and screenwriters.

Their main reason for joining was that they hoped to bring the scripts they had accumulated to the stage in various forms.

Wang Yao carefully selected three familiar scripts for this year: Shen Teng's "The Earl," Yan Fei and Peng Mo's "Goodbye Mr. Loser" and "Hello Mr. Billionaire," and Zhou Shen's "Mr. Donkey." He planned to polish them in small theaters first and then consider adapting them when the time was right.

With four projects underway at the same time, Mahua FunAge suddenly faced a shortage of actors. Shen Teng and others immediately mobilized their connections and poached the Love Laughing Brothers, who were in an awkward situation.

Led by Zhang Zidong, and with Ma Li and Shen Teng acting as guarantors, the Ai Xiao Brothers, who already had conflicts with the company and the black platform, collectively terminated their contracts, and each of them had to pay Wang Yao tens or hundreds of thousands of yuan in breach of contract fees.

The creative team has grown considerably, and Wang Yao has finally overcome the temporary talent shortage after signing a strategic cooperation agreement with iQiyi.

A new program schedule for Kiwi has been drafted.

"Love Laugh Theater": Continuing the self-written and self-directed system of the Love Laugh Brothers, it incorporates a creative approach centered on product soft advertising, mainly embedding products such as snacks, daily necessities, and electronic products. Since their main audience is male college students, although this group does not have much purchasing power, the key is that there are enough of them. Wang Yao personally found a meat floss cake brand to cooperate with and took a 30% commission to see how the conversion rate would be.

"What's Up Today?" is a sister show to "Campus Belle," also produced by the "Smiling Brothers." It features restaurant reviews and food guides, and the partner is Meituan, which has recently made rapid progress in the Beijing group-buying market, with an average commission of 20%. Wang Yao designed the slogan "Eating meat without garlic is like missing half the flavor." The show is led by the two brothers, Qiao Shan and Xiu Rui, and each episode features a model from a photography company to boost viewership.

"Professor Talks Cars": A car review program led by Yi Xiaoxing, which uses parody and car models to shoot promotional videos for cars. The core idea is to attract general traffic through the contrast of criticism.

"Living Towards Death: Countdown": This documentary is led by Guo Ke, a newly signed documentary director. Guo Ke signed with Xinghuo through a request for help from the Women's Support Association. He was hoping to get funding to make a documentary about comfort women called "Thirty Two". After signing him, Wang Yao provided him with funding and asked him to take several other documentary directors of the same type to find suitable subjects in major cancer hospitals across the country.

They eventually found a 26-year-old female PhD student who was unfortunately diagnosed with early-stage brain cancer. She had a cheerful personality and quickly came to terms with her terminal illness. She chose conservative treatment, gave up her studies, and began to realize her dream of traveling around the country while working and visiting various places.

"When you realize you only have one life, your second life begins." This theme of the program aims to raise public awareness through a unique perspective, while also leveraging its exposure to crowdfund donations to those in need.

This program combines travel guides with spiritual purification sharing. Although it is expensive, it received sponsorship from many people within the company during the initial preparation stage. After the program is launched, it will inevitably generate heated discussions. Any tourist city with a strong online presence will take the initiative to seek cooperation.

Including "Campus Belle", a total of 5 programs will be exclusively released on the iQiyi platform. The first three programs will promote products through links in the comments section to the Mulan Street platform for product seeding and conversion. The remaining two programs will wait for the platform to accept advertisements.

After signing the contract and receiving the first advance payment from iQiyi, all content of "Campus Belle" on platforms such as Youku was deleted and re-uploaded to iQiyi. Moreover, it was a completely new version with richer content. Then, through the private domain groups that had been accumulated before, it brought nearly 10,000 new registered users to the platform on the same day.

iQiyi created a separate "Web Series" section and gave Wang Yao's follow-up program a prominent recommendation, which shows their excellent attitude.

It's highly likely that Gong Yu was caught by Zhang Chaoyang that day, and fearing that Wang Yao would turn around and cooperate with Sohu, he injected a lot of traffic into the school beauty on the first day. In addition, with the cooperation of popular copyrights held by Wang Yao, the user retention of iQiyi in the early stage will not be small.

Wang Yao also specially borrowed 20 experienced editors from Dongfang Xin to edit these popular copyrighted and Korean drama clips and promote them on public platforms such as Baidu Tieba and QQ Space to attract traffic.

Tianhuo secured another annual contract worth 2000 million yuan for 60 billion exposures. However, this money remained in the company account for less than two days before being used as an advertising sponsorship to promote Mulan Street's artists.

From the moment the copyright cooperation agreement was signed, keyword searches for these films and TV series all redirected directly to the iQiyi platform, making it almost impossible to find redirect links to other platforms.

This is truly cracking down on piracy at its 'root'.

Other video platforms wouldn't offer this kind of preferential traffic treatment. Wang Yao waited for six days, but Meishe remained silent, and even Chengtian Entertainment and Bona seemed to have made no move.

Was I too hasty?

After handling matters in Beijing, Wang Yao returned to Shanghai with some doubts. Lei Jia came to pick him up at the airport as soon as possible because she wanted to make a car talk show, but she didn't have any fame in the early stages and couldn't get sponsorships from brands, so she had to pay for the filming herself.

Wang Yao purchased ten RVs currently on the market under the name of Xinghuo Media as a review of the first ten episodes of "Professor Talks Cars," with a budget of nearly ten million yuan. He then resold them to Tianhuo Media at a high price, since Tianhuo has many artists filming there and they can use them in the future.

Lei Jiayin's Mercedes-Benz Marco Polo campervan was the most expensive, and the company unanimously agreed that no one except General Manager Wang was qualified to use it.

After getting into the car, Wang Yao took a look around. Inside, there was a private bathroom, a double bed, and the in-car TV had even been modified to include a kitchen and bathroom system. It was aptly called the president's mobile office.

"Don't you have any scenes to film today?" Wang Yao asked Lei Jiayin casually while browsing news on his tablet.

“Bai Baihe’s schedule is quite tight, so we’ll prioritize filming her scenes. I have more time and am available whenever needed,” Lei Jiayin said with a smile.

For him, having acting opportunities and occasional stage performances is the pinnacle of his life.

"How's the progress?" Wang Yao asked.

"I don't have many scenes in 'Temptation,' but I check every day to see if there's anything I can help with. We've filmed almost a fifth of the way through now. The main problem is that the male lead has difficulty communicating with the two female leads."

"Whenever they have a scene together, it's either a Three Kingdoms period or a Chu-Han Contention. It's always very exciting. Next time they have a scene together, I'll take you to see the excitement!" Lei Jiayin laughed.

"That depends on the actor's conviction. Has there been any trouble before?" Wang Yao squinted.

With dozens of people coming and going in a film crew, even Wu Zhuli's old team will inevitably have some conflicts of interest and disputes, which will inevitably lead to trouble. Therefore, managing a film crew is a great test of the director's and producer's abilities.

Wang Yao is using this project as a test to see what kind of talent Wu Zhuli and the others have to offer before considering future collaborations.

"Everything's fine. Sister Li and the others are old partners. Apart from a little commotion at the beginning because of the language barrier, everything else has been fine," Lei Jiayin said without changing her expression.

"That's good. What about 'Loss 3'?" Wang Yao asked with a smile.

"Director Guan is very professional and strict. I had done a lot of stage plays, so I got a lot of scolding at first, but I adjusted quickly later. Everyone else was fine. Jiang Yan is quite amazing; Director Guan praised her," Lei Jiayin said with a smile.

In the end, the role of the second female lead went to Jiang Yan, and Wang Yao only found out about it recently.

Lei Jiayin then recounted some amusing anecdotes from the various groups when Wang Yao was away, and the atmosphere seemed peaceful. It was unclear whether he was oblivious to the underlying tensions or if there were genuinely no major conflicts.

Wang Yao returned to his office and was about to call Ni Ni to report on her work when he suddenly remembered that she had already joined a special training program in Beijing. He asked in the management group who was at the company.

Chi Xin was the first to reply, and soon after, she knocked on the door and came in.

"President Chi, Meishe has gone public. Didn't President Xu call you back?" Wang Yao was somewhat surprised that she was still in Shanghai.

"I'm now the COO of Skyfire, and I'm under President Wang's command," Chi Xin said with a charming smile.

"I met with President Xu and we are ready to fully support Meishe's IPO. If President Chi needs to go back, just let me know in advance," Wang Yao said with a smile.

These words made Chi Xin feel somewhat embarrassed. They implied that her presence or absence didn't seem to have much impact on Tianhuo, and that Wang Yao still didn't consider her one of his own.

“Meishe doesn’t have much overseas business. Tianhuo is Meishe’s biggest partner right now. It’s very convenient for me to coordinate between the two sides. Besides, I only own 3% of the shares, so they won’t need me for the IPO,” Chi Xin said with a smile.

"That's good." Wang Yao looked relaxed and began to listen to her report on her recent situation.

90% of Meishe's business revolves around Wang Yao's industrial chain, but 10% is handled by people like Chi Xin from the Meishe system. Although this part is not large and involves relatively dirty and tiring work, such as online trolls and impersonation, there are still some unexpected surprises from time to time.

Previously, Zhou Yougen was in charge of the business line, but now, after the acquisition, he has provided the company with top-tier contracted models such as Guo Biting.

Yang Ying has been registered with Xinghuo Independent Studio, and currently she is mainly promoting Guo Biting, who is the main model for Huang Shengyi in the variety show "Fairy Robe". Her online sales price is now 2000 yuan per set of photos.

"You remember Chen Yun from WMA Company, right? She's in charge of Zhang Ziyi and Liu Yifei. She wants to invite you to dinner to discuss any potential collaboration opportunities," Chi Xin said.

"I have an appointment with Mr. Min from Damai.com tomorrow, and I'm going to the Shiba magazine charity gala the day after tomorrow. Let's meet then." Wang Yao thought for a moment and decided to meet him anyway.

Gu Tianle and Liu Yifei's film "A Chinese Ghost Story" definitely needs publicity, and Zhang Ziyi has been heavily suppressed online by Fan Bingbing recently, so he can probably guess what Chen Yun is anxious about.

"Okay, then the day after tomorrow?" Chi Xin was delighted.

She profited quite a bit from my introduction of Zhou Yougen last time.

“Okay.” Wang Yao nodded, and was about to ask about the crew’s situation when his phone rang. It was Ren Quan calling.

"You go ahead and get busy," Wang Yao waved for Chi Xin to finish her work, then answered the phone.

"Have you seen the news? Chengtian issued 2000 million shares to Meishe through a private placement, as a 13.5% mutual holding. They just called me and said this private placement won't affect our 10%, and they'll make up for any losses themselves," Ren Quan asked in a low voice.

"Finally, there's some movement. I thought I'd been working for nothing." Wang Yao chuckled.

"That's quite a lot. Does Wu Kebo think so highly of Meishe?" Ren Quan asked in surprise.

As companies that mutually hold shares, any changes to one party will affect the interests of all parties.

“It shouldn’t just be Wu Kebo.” Wang Yao found the news that had just come out three minutes ago and laughed after seeing this shareholding ratio.

"Will it affect us?" Ren Quan asked cautiously.

"It's unclear for now, but it's highly unlikely they're after the porn site." Wang Yao squinted, repeatedly refreshing various portal pages.

Finally, two minutes later, an official statement about Chengtian Entertainment appeared on Tencent News.

1. Private placement and mutual holding with Meishe.com.

Second: The Chengtian 66 Film City project has been officially launched, and cultural tourism partners are being solicited in second-tier cities across the country. The project plans to invest 6 million yuan to build the largest film city in China and the most advanced in the world.

Third: Announced a co-production with Juli on the special effects blockbuster "The Legend of the White Snake," with an estimated investment of 2 million yuan and a global release.

Wang Yao narrowed his eyes, a smile playing on his lips.

"Did you press the accelerator button?"

(End of this chapter)