The streets of Manhattan can give people a very wonderful sense of time and space disorder. Walking on the street, you may be a dilapidated red brick building that may have a century-old history. A modern building with seventy or eighty floors will appear one step further.

Vera Farmega walked beside Eric, looking at the scattered lights around the middle of the night, feeling that Eric had not spoken for a while, and asked, "Eric, what are you thinking?"

"This is Hell's Kitchen?" Eric retracted his thoughts and said casually, but before Vera Farmega could answer, he turned his head and looked at the girl beside him, and smiled, "I also said I would take you home. I forgot to ask, where do you live?"

The two left the August Theater and had been walking along West 52 Street for a while. Vera Farmega was still nervous about where Eric Williams was going to take him. He heard his question, and quickly replied: "I live on West 55 Street and walk north from the 10th Avenue in front."

Eric nodded, put his hands in his trench coat pocket, noticed the doubts and hopes in his eyes of Vera Farmega beside him, and smiled and said, "I forgot to talk about business. There is a movie, I want you to try it."

Feeling Eric's understatement, Vera Farmega suddenly lost too much excitement and asked, "Eric, is it the movie you directed?"

"No," Eric shook his head and said, "The director is Gore, the guy you just saw."

Vera Farmega nodded, and put his hands in his down jacket pocket like Eric, but his steps inevitably became lighter. He hesitated and said, "Then, Eric, why are you here tonight?"

Eric explained: "Although it was not directed by me personally, this is a very important project for Fireflies. I plan to let you play the leading actress and of course I have to come and see your performance."

"My performance is OK, right?" Vera Farmega asked with a little disconfidence.

Eric smiled and nodded: "If it doesn't work, I will definitely leave early, and someone will contact you for the next thing."

Vera Farmega nodded, and the two arrived at the intersection of the 10th and turned to the north. Inadvertently, they saw a black sedan following the road next to them. Vera Farmega knew that it was Eric's bodyguard, and remembered something and said, "Eric, you come here in person today, I will be in trouble for the next day."

Eric asked with a smile, "What's the trouble?"

Vera Farmega said: "I don't know yet, but the competition on Broadway is very fierce."

Eric knew when he heard Villa Farmega's hint. Villa Farmega suddenly encountered a good opportunity. Her colleague in the theater was jealous and would not give her any small shoes out of her: "If this is the case, wouldn't you just quit tomorrow?"

"It can't be like this. I will at least have to wait until Andrew finds a replacement actor," Vera Farmega said after looking at Eric. "I don't know if I can do this role yet. I must audition, right?"

"Of course, but your acting skills are fine and your image is fine. If you don't ask for a sky-high salary, this role is probably yours."

"Haha, I don't have the right to get a sky-high pay. The last time I participated in the TV series, I only had $2,000 per episode."

"It's that "Roar", I saw you in that TV series yesterday. Are you not the heroine? Why is the pay so low?"

"This is a group drama. I am just one of the two heroines. I am a newcomer. $2,000 is no less." Villa Farmega explained, and smiled and said, "But, after you said, this TV series can bring me good luck. Even if I didn't have a pay at the beginning, I would be willing to act."

After chatting so casually, the two of them had already arrived outside a red brick apartment on West 55th Avenue.

"I'll live here," Vera Farmega pointed to the apartment, kicking her thick-soled boots gently on the ground, her eyes flashed, and then she said, "Eric, are you going to go up and sit?"

Eric smiled and said, "Aren't you afraid that I will not leave after sitting for a while?"

Vera Farmega's face suddenly turned a little rosy. He didn't dare to look at Eric's eyes and whispered: "If you want to do it today, you can only sit for a while."

"Although I really want to pretend I can't understand, but, okay, this is a shame."

Vera Farmega lowered his head shyly and said, "It will be the New Year in a few days. If you have time, you can call me."

"Ha, let's talk about it then," Eric smiled. He was leaving Manhattan and returning to East Hampton tomorrow. He must be with the children in the New Year: "Then, that's it today. Go up, I should go back too."

"Well, goodbye," Vera Farmega nodded, just walked up the steps at the door of the apartment, turned back, took out a business card from his bag and handed it to Eric, and said, "I almost forgot that there is my mobile phone number on it."

Eric took the business card and put it away. He watched Villa Farmega enter the apartment before turning around and leaving.

The first week of "Jurassic Park 3" spans the New Year, and the final box office was $86.61 million in the first week, which is a bit higher than "Museum Wonderful Night 2" during the Thanksgiving period, but it still showed a significant decline compared to the first two movies.

Affected by several new films including "Jurassic Park 3", "Peak Hour 2" lost 55% the next week, and closed another $45.22 million.

However, due to the strong first-week box office, the cumulative box office of this movie, with a budget cost of US$70 million, has reached US$149 million in two weeks. Because of the ladder-style box office share contract with theaters, this means that Firefly has recovered the entire cost of "Peak Hour 2" in two weeks. The subsequent North American and overseas box offices, as well as other channel revenue, enters the net profit stage.

In addition, "Monster Electric Power Company", released during the Thanksgiving holiday, entered its sixth week. Although the box office fell to US$8.04 million in a single week, the cumulative box office also successfully exceeded 200 million, becoming the third movie in 1997 to exceed US$200 million. Although "Pulse Hour 2" and "Jurassic Park 3" both have the potential to hit the box office of US$200 million in North America, as of December 31, 1997, the box office of both films remained within US$200 million.

MGM's "Museum Night 2" was released for five weeks, and the single-week box office also fell into the range of $10 million, with a cumulative box office of $159 million. According to the current decline, it is unlikely to hit $200 million.

Just after the New Year, with the latest week's box office data released, the media also began to count the annual box office data in 1997. Then, a box office data that caused an uproar in Hollywood appeared in front of everyone.

In 1997, even based on the deadline of December 31, only the top ten movies under Firefly Group that squeezed into the annual box office list include "Finding Nemo", "Monster Electric Power Company" and "Russian Hour 2", which is not counting "Jurassic Park 3", which is expected to be around 200 million US dollars in North America.

MGM's "007 Casino Royale" and "Museum Night 2" also squeezed into the top ten box offices. Fox's 3D animated film "Ice Age" and Julia's romantic comedy "My Best Friend's Wedding" also made it to the list.

Therefore, as of December 31, on the top ten annual box office data list in North America in 1997, the three major film companies with the Firefly system accounted for as many as seven.

The only movies that are not firefly systems on the list are Universal Pictures' Air Force One, Paramount Pictures' Lion King 2 and Sony Pictures' Godzilla.

"Batman and Robin", which was highly anticipated by Time Warner, has barely exceeded 100 million US dollars under the secret operation of Warner Bros. It is currently only ranked 13th on the annual list, and even falls behind MGM's "Scream 2". However, the production cost of "Batman and Robin" is five times that of "Scream 2". Two movies with similar box office data, one loses terrible losses and the other makes a lot of money.

In recent years, it is a critical moment for Hollywood's global rise. Faced with the strength of the firefly system, several other major Hollywood film companies have also begun to increase their expansion. Faced with the current firefly, some unconventional competitive means have no effect. What other major film companies can do is to imitate the development model of the firefly system as much as possible.

As four animated films emerged in the top ten of the annual box office rankings in 1997, stimulated by the huge profits, Time Warner, Universal and Sony all increased their investment in the animation department that they did not pay much attention to, and once again began to wave their hoes to poach people from several animation studios in the Firefly system. In the end, even MGM could not calm down. After Amy Pascal and Eric talked several times, MGM also began to form its own 3D animation film department.

In terms of live-action movies, with the support of several other major film companies, Hollywood special effects companies also sprung up like mushrooms after a rain. The box office failures of special effects blockbusters such as "The Fifth Element", "Godzilla", and "Starship Team" in 1997 did not hinder the development of the special effects industry at all.

After all, in addition to the emerging animated films, films such as "Museum Night 2" and "Jurassic Park 3" also shine in this year's box office rankings.

Moreover, even if it is impossible to get a clear distance from popular non-special effects movies such as "Rush Hour 2" and "My Best Friend's Wedding", in terms of global box office, the overseas box office of special effects blockbusters is usually far more popular than that of North America, and the videotapes and peripheral products of special effects blockbusters are also more popular than ordinary non-special effects movies.

For these reasons, in recent times, hot money from films that have poured into North America from Europe and Southeast Asia has also given up the previous strategy of big-star productions and has begun to be keen on investing in special effects blockbusters.

Eric remembers that with the acquisition of Pixar animation, Marvel Entertainment, and Lucasfilm in the original time and space, Disney's film business has become increasingly strong, often occupying half of Hollywood on the annual list, and even gained the nickname of "Dianchi". The market value of the entire Disney Group was once close to US$200 billion, far exceeding Time Warner and Viacom, which have only a few billion dollars in market value.

However, judging from the current situation, it was only in the late 1990s that Fireflies had completed the layout that Disney would have completed more than a decade later.

In a recent issue of Business Weekly article about Firefly Group, the valuation of Firefly Group has reached US$100 billion, and this valuation data has also been widely recognized by Wall Street.

In comparison, whether it is Time Warner, whose stock price has begun to soar with the wave of new technology, or Viacom, which has just swallowed up CBS Group, its market value remains within US$50 billion, less than half of Firefly Group.

With the disclosure of the valuation data of "Business Weekly" on Firefly Group, many media once again turned their attention to Eric's net worth predictions.

Eric's shareholding in Firefly Group remains at 73.7%, which means that Eric's shares in Firefly Group are worth US$73.7 billion, an increase of US$10 billion compared to last year.

Moreover, as the new technology wave continues to ferment, the market value of several high-tech companies under Eric's other important industry, Firefly Investment, has also seen a sharp increase in its market value.

Eric had no time to care about various media information. After the New Year, he quickly returned to Los Angeles.

Although the media's valuation of Firefly Group hit a new high, as Eric invested more than $3 billion in the Nasdaq market this year, the company's profit situation has been significantly reduced this year, which inevitably caused concern among some other shareholders of Firefly Group.

Last year, Eric's investment in technology stocks had significantly lowered Firefly Group's annual profits. This year, although Firefly Group's business is stronger, because Eric increased its investment in technology stocks, Firefly Group's expected profit for the whole year may even be only a few hundred million US dollars.

After all, not everyone is optimistic about the continued rise of the Nasdaq market, and there have been many funds on Wall Street that short the Nasdaq index.

The total amount of funds invested by Eric in the Nasdaq market in two years has reached US$5 billion. Although the stocks purchased by this fund have basically received very generous returns, this is just a very unstable book wealth after all. Once the Nasdaq market collapses, it may only take a few days for the stocks held by the Sanleaf Fund to become worthless.
Chapter completed!