The Best Movie Actor In Hollywood!

Chapter 702

"Taylor, you're aiming to be like Madonna, right?" Matthew asked, seeing Taylor Swift agree with his line of thought. "You can only achieve that by crossing over into pop music, can't you?"

Taylor Swift nodded slightly. She moved closer to Matthew, leaned toward his ear, and whispered, "I'll tell you a secret, something I've never told anyone. I'm planning to transition to pop after another one or two albums, and even those albums will have strong pop elements."

Matthew listened, understanding that Taylor Swift had been planning her future for a long time.

If someone wanted to become a true top-tier diva, pop music was a mandatory path.

When it came to his knowledge of pop music, Matthew was clearly out of his depth compared to Taylor Swift, so he quickly changed the subject. "Are you heading somewhere tomorrow?"

"I have a couple of really important shows in New York," Taylor Swift explained, gently running a finger through her blonde hair. "Then there are some promotional events. I have singles charting right now, and they really need the publicity."

Matthew nodded slightly. "Singers are much busier than actors."

Taylor Swift, however, caught his meaning. "Don't worry, I'll find time for you."

"You don't have to," Matthew quickly waved a hand. "Work is more important."

Taylor Swift didn't linger on the topic. Instead, she turned and asked, "My agent said you're a master of self-promotion. Is there anything I can use? Or could you teach me how to do it?"In truth, after being photographed by the paparazzi last time and enjoying a good night, she had gained a lot of attention, immediately rocketing up the online search rankings. But that kind of news would eventually become routine, and the media would grow accustomed to it. She needed another explosive angle.

Especially with her first-ever world tour just around the corner.

If she could invite Matthew as a guest at a concert, perhaps everyone would be surprised?

Unfortunately, his singing was terrible—or to be more precise, hopelessly bad.

Matthew thought for a moment, recalling the promise he'd made to Taylor Swift the day before, and said slowly, "Care more about women and children."

Taylor Swift was a smart girl and quickly caught on. "You mean fans, some of whom might be in urgent need of help."

"You should pay attention to that. You have a professional publicity team, right?" Seeing Taylor nod, Matthew suddenly remembered a piece of gossip he'd once read and added another idea.

"Befriend powerful female celebrities or models and form a squad of best friends. Meet up often when you're not busy. Later on, you can also ask them to rally to your defense if anything happens."

Hearing this, Taylor Swift's eyes lit up. "That's a great idea." She unconsciously stood up and paced back and forth a couple of times. "I'll go back and have my agent find the right people."

"Don't pick anyone with a bad reputation," Matthew warned. "Otherwise, it will backfire."

Taylor Swift smiled and replied, "I understand."

Matthew looked at Taylor Swift standing before him, an idea involuntarily crossing his mind: if Taylor Swift really did create a squad of girlfriends, and he maintained this inspiring and unique relationship with her, then in the future...

"What are you thinking about?" Taylor Swift said, a hint of annoyance in her voice.

"You're getting distracted while we're talking."

She reached out and pulled Matthew to his feet. He stood beside her but certainly didn't voice the thought that had just occurred to him. Instead, he said casually, "I was thinking about how to promote you."

Taylor Swift asked curiously, "Did you come up with anything?"

Matthew nodded and answered, "I did."

Taylor Swift tilted her head and looked at him like a little girl waiting for a sweet piece of candy.

"Have your agency's team pick a rival for you. Preferably someone of similar standing, with potential for growth in the future."

"How, exactly?" Taylor Swift didn't quite understand.

Matthew could only give her a rough idea. "Online, especially on social media, you can take shots at each other, but don't make it too overt or aggressive. Just enough so people know who you're talking about. Then you can build up the hype by becoming rivals."

Taylor Swift raised her eyebrows high. "Will that work?"

"It's just a suggestion," Matthew shrugged. "You'd better consult with your agency and your publicity and public relations team."

Taylor Swift thought for a moment and replied, "What you said is definitely a good idea. I'll discuss it with my agent tomorrow."

They chatted a bit longer, went downstairs for a snack, and then returned to find more... inspiration.

The next day, Taylor Swift left the Horner Estate early in the morning, asking Matthew to send a car to take her to the Los Angeles airport to meet her agent before catching a direct flight to New York.

***

Matthew arrived at Warner Studios to continue filming "Inception," shooting scenes according to Christopher Nolan's direction.

Compared to his past roles, the character of Cobb had practically no sunny side.

Christopher Nolan was also satisfied with his performance.

Matthew was gradually developing a clear picture of his own acting abilities. After years of training, he could confidently say he was at a level slightly above average.

At the very least, he considered himself no worse than Tom Cruise or Brad Pitt.

Currently, many entertainment media outlets often compared Matthew, Johnny Depp, and Leonardo DiCaprio. The three had certain traits in common: they were all top Hollywood superstars, yet they were consistently overlooked by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

Unlike Matthew and Leonardo DiCaprio, whose media comparisons were wide-ranging, it wouldn't take long for Johnny Depp to fall from his superstar status once the "Pirates of the Caribbean" series went awry.

This was also due to the different styles of the three. To a certain extent, Matthew had embraced the path of the handsome, cool guy, a persona that was especially popular with audiences. Johnny Depp's acting was darker and his range was very broad, but none of his roles were considered mainstream, and he had the distinct characteristics of his own school of acting. Leonardo was a classic academic-style actor, and both he and Matthew were particularly well-suited for creating mainstream Hollywood roles.

Relatively speaking, both he and Leonardo DiCaprio had a broad range of roles. Although he was a typical action star, his forays into science fiction, shootouts, war films, and fantasy epics had all been box office hits. Among them was a genre like "I Am Legend," which had practically no action scenes.

This had broadened his acting career.

If "Inception" also became a huge success, his future path would be even wider.

Furthermore, in addition to his role as an actor, he was also transitioning into the roles of investor and producer, and he had a successful case like "Twilight" to his name.

***

After completing the scenes at Warner Studios, the film crew prepared to head to Morocco for location shooting. But before the trip, Christopher Nolan gave the cast and crew a short break for a few days, and Matthew used this time to attend to other aspects of his work as quickly as possible.

On behalf of his production company, Bella Anderson was negotiating with ABC and Disney regarding television broadcast rights for

"Twilight," and Matthew dedicated half a day to signing the authorization with Walt Disney.

For the next ten years, Walt Disney's television networks would hold the exclusive television broadcast rights to

"Twilight," with a licensing fee of $10 million.

In return, Disney also secured the right of first refusal for the television rights to the "Twilight" sequel.

In addition, Matthew made a trip to officially sign a contract with Netflix.

The online rental company acquired the online streaming and rental rights for "Twilight" for the next ten years for a total fee of $12 million.

From any perspective, this was a very solid contract.

These copyright fees, unlike box office receipts, could almost entirely be attributed directly to profit.

A film being shown online was becoming more and more like an advertisement: once it gained popularity online, its offline revenue could easily surpass its box office earnings.

This sum of $22 million was only for North America.

During negotiations for overseas copyrights, with the exception of markets with well-established copyright laws like Western Europe, Matthew planned to entrust the licensing negotiations to intermediaries who frequently provided services to major companies like Walt Disney and Warner Bros.

"Twilight," including box office and merchandise, had brought him a gross profit of over $70 million. Even after he filed his tax return, the profit would still be substantial.

Therefore, Matthew had high hopes for another youth-oriented film:

"The Hunger Games" already had a completed script. After reading it, he asked Patty Jenkins and Suzanne Collins to appropriately enhance the action scenes.

He also wanted the series to draw male audiences into the theaters.

After several months of preliminary planning, Matthew set the production budget for "The Hunger Games" at $80 million, based on the plan developed by Nina Jacobson.

After all this, Matthew met up with the "Inception" film crew and flew to Morocco, where, in addition to filming, he was scheduled to join a UN team on an expedition to refugee camps in Africa.