“Xiao Jing, it all depends on you whether our program can break through!” Outside the Jiahua Hotel in Shanghai, a young man said to the woman beside him.
“But boss, I think we should forget it. How could they possibly agree to invite our little program? They are the biggest boss in China now!” Li Jing couldn’t help but feel a little hesitant.
“How do you know if you don’t try? What if they want to be on a variety show now?” Dai Jun advised, “Xiao Jing, the show has been airing for two years, always stuck in the middle. I heard the company is already considering giving up on our program. If we can’t invite a heavyweight guest this time to boost ratings, we’ll both be unemployed. Are you really willing to face such an outcome?”
“But why not you?” Li Jing rolled her eyes, “Why do you always assign such critical tasks to me?”
“Isn’t it because you’re beautiful?” Dai Jun said quietly, “With our Xiao Jing on the case, aren’t there any male guests you can’t handle?”
“Come on, the secretary beside him is probably way prettier than me!” Li Jing sighed, but she didn’t refuse anymore.
Because this was one of their few remaining opportunities. If their program couldn’t invite a heavyweight guest again, the program might really be terminated.
With a sense of desperation, Li Jing finally walked into the Jiahua Hotel.
However, Li Jing had not made any arrangements with this biggest boss in China. In fact, so far, apart from CCTV, no one else had been able to invite this boss to a variety program.
But this time, she found an opportunity to meet this boss, which was the film selection meeting being held this time.
This time, Tangren Film and Television launched three TV drama works at once, planning to broadcast them in 2003-2004. Therefore, they invited representatives from television stations across the country to attend this film selection meeting, intending to sell the premiere rights of these three TV dramas.
It should be said that this film selection meeting was the first of its kind in the industry because TV dramas have always been a buyer’s market, where TV stations pick and choose from these dramas.
After all, there are only so many satellite TV stations in the country, and only so much broadcast time each year. However, the total output of TV dramas is several times, or even tens of times, that broadcast time. Every year, a large number of TV dramas cannot be broadcast, or can only be broadcast on local stations.
TV stations are never worried about not being able to buy TV dramas, while TV drama production companies can only drag TV stations along.
Therefore, it is often the TV production companies that actively send sample films of TV dramas to various TV stations, begging them to review and then asking them for a price to buy them.
When did such an arrogant situation arise, inviting representatives from major satellite TV stations across the country to hold something like an auction to sell the copyrights of TV dramas? This was definitely an act that broke industry conventions.
Logically speaking, TV stations would not be willing to attend such a film selection meeting. Attending would mean bowing to the TV production companies, which was absolutely unacceptable.
Yet, almost all satellite TV stations across the country, except for a few notoriously poor ones, such as Hunan Satellite TV, Dragon TV, Beijing Satellite TV, and Anhui Satellite TV, had sent representatives to attend this film selection meeting.
There was no other reason than the fact that the company organizing this film selection meeting was Tangren Film and Television.
And Tangren Film and Television had been in the spotlight in the first half of this year. A drama called "Drawing the Sword" had almost swept the entire television industry. In just over half a year, "Drawing the Sword" had already started its seventh rerun, can you believe it?
Even more outrageous was that even in its seventh rerun, "Drawing the Sword" on Hunan Satellite TV still dominated the top spot on the TV drama ratings charts. The second place was "Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils," which had reached its middle stage, and the third place was again "Drawing the Sword," being rerun on Anhui Satellite TV.
In fact, among the top 10 TV dramas in the national rankings, four were "Drawing the Sword," which was ridiculously outrageous.
It was rumored that Tangren Film and Television alone had earned an astonishing over 100 million RMB from charging for rerun copyrights, making it the highest-grossing TV drama in history.
This time, Tangren Film and Television came with three TV dramas at once, which made people have to take it very seriously. Perhaps the next "Drawing the Sword" was hidden among these three TV dramas.
Of course, in reality, there was a high probability that a hit TV drama was due to luck. It was rare for production companies to consistently produce hit TV dramas. And the performance of "Drawing the Sword" was too abnormal; it was a drama king that could be seen once in ten years. It was basically impossible for a hit like "Drawing the Sword" to appear among the three TV dramas.
However, major TV stations across the country still came because one of these three TV dramas, which had already attracted a lot of attention before it even aired, was "Chinese Paladin."
Since the "Warcraft III" National Finals last year, "Chinese Paladin" had attracted a lot of attention. With the popularity of "Drawing the Sword," as a work from the same production company, a large number of media quickly used "Chinese Paladin" to piggyback on "Drawing the Sword" to attract attention.
On the other hand, Jiangnan Group also spared no effort in providing various online publicity resources for "Chinese Paladin." Coupled with the fact that "Chinese Paladin" already had a large number of loyal game fans, the overall publicity and promotion were definitely at a king-level, many times greater than the momentum before the premiere of "Drawing the Sword" a few months ago.
Although there was a possibility of it bombing directly after airing, at least in the first few episodes, it was bound to achieve a rating of over 5%, which was enough.
At the same time, TV stations were also very concerned about another characteristic of "Chinese Paladin," which was that it was a very youthful TV drama.
The youthfulness here did not just refer to the fact that most of the main characters in the drama were no older than 25 years old, but rather that the audience of this drama was young people.
In fact, in 2003, how to attract young people back to the television screen was a problem facing many TV stations and production companies.
With the popularization of the internet and computers, young people now had more enjoyable entertainment options than television, which was playing games.
After a survey conducted by a TV station, it was found that 70% of young people chose to play games over watching television. To use the words of this program, young people were abandoning TV dramas, especially young men, who had lost interest in TV dramas and were only interested in games.
The young people of today were the middle-aged people of the next 10 years, the main force of the future. They must be attracted back to the television screen.
Therefore, a TV drama with game plot as its main theme became a panacea for many TV stations. Since young people liked to play games, would a TV drama about playing games be able to attract young people back?
At this time, if any TV station could attract a large number of young people's attention, wouldn't it be holding the main market of the future?
It was precisely because they understood this point that many TV stations put aside their pride and proactively participated in this film selection meeting. Li Jing was one of the representatives of Beijing Satellite TV attending the film selection meeting this time.
However, she also secretly added a task for herself, which was to invite Huang He to be a guest on his "Super Interview" program.
At this time, Huang He was very famous in China, not only having the title of "Firefighting Hero" but also the title of "Richest Man in China," although it was disputed and unclear whether it was true.
If Huang He were invited to participate in her interview program, the ratings would surely soar.
In fact, many TV stations had already extended invitations. It was said that CCTV's "Face to Face" program had extended two invitations, both of which were rejected by Huang He.
Even CCTV faced such a result, and the TV stations that dared to invite Huang He naturally felt a chill, so Li Jing was not optimistic about her invitation this time, but she had to take a gamble for her future.
At this time, the lobby of the Jiahua Hotel was already decorated with banners and pull-up banners welcoming participants to the film selection meeting. At the entrance, beautiful service staff were personally guiding the guests to check in and then taking them to the venue to familiarize themselves with the layout. The film selection meeting would begin at 2 PM.
Li Jing took a short nap and deliberately did not eat lunch, keeping herself in a perfect and clear state. Finally, she stepped into the conference room punctually before 2 PM.
At this time, the entire conference room was already filled with people. Many of them were industry big shots, including many influential figures who could easily ruin Li Jing with a single word.
This made Li Jing cautious, sitting in her seat without making any noise or disturbing anyone. As a first-tier satellite TV station in China, Beijing Satellite TV's seating area was relatively forward.
Of course, Li Jing could only sit behind her leader. While talking to her leader, she surveyed the seats in the front row.
Those sitting in the first row were all big shots in the industry, as well as Huang He himself. Yes, Huang He himself would also be present at the venue. This was the only opportunity for Li Jing to meet Huang He and extend an invitation.
And at this time, Huang He was already seated, chatting and laughing with several TV station big shots beside him. It wasn't until the film selection meeting began that a handsome young man took the stage to host this film selection meeting.
“What a handsome and clear-headed young man!” Seeing this young man, Li Jing was a little surprised, and even a little smitten. After all, this young man was really handsome.
Later, through his self-introduction, she learned that he was Hu Ge, an artist signed by Tangren.
Hu Ge did not decisively display his intelligence and handsomeness but honestly asked a few leaders to speak before directly saying, “Next, let’s watch the first TV drama that our Tangren Film and Television is launching today, "Soldiers Sortie"!”