Feature Shows Extravaganza - Chapter 34

Chapter 34: Not Y’all Business

Translator: Henyee Translations

Editor: Henyee Translations

TBS seemed to be very sincere.

After Pengda Pictures showed their intention to work with TBS, the latter immediately sent someone over to talk about it.

It was an old friend, Mr. Ishikawa!

“Hello, Meng san, we meet again!”

It seemed that Mr. Ishikawa had been promoted, or that his wife had just given him another child. His face was so glossy that Meng Lang almost couldn’t recognize the man.

After inviting Ishikawa to sit down, Meng Lang asked him, “Has your company come up with a cooperation framework yet?”

“We have some initial thoughts. Once we start preparing for the project, PD will only need to send someone to supervise the production, and we’ll take care of the rest. Our companies will share the copyrights of the final work.” It seemed that Mr. Ishikawa had done his homework.

Meng Lang frowned. “If those are your terms, I’m afraid that we can’t accept them. Mr. Ishikawa, if you would please inform your superior that PD will have sole ownership of the copyrights, not a shared one. That’s our bottom line.”

Are you f**king serious?

It’s like claiming a child to be yours when you’ve contributed nothing to creating this baby!

Despite all the sarcasm rushing through his head, Mr. Ishikawa still smiled. “Meng san, there’s no way that we’ll accept your terms. After all, you’re going to take a lot more than you’re going to invest in this project…”

“Well, that’s easily solved! You won’t have to worry about the shooting. Pengda can do it for you!” said Meng Lang with a wave of his hand. “TBS can take care of the actors’ and actresses’ salary and leave everything else to us. We’ll give TBS the exclusive broadcasting rights in Japan for free…”

Was… that even possible?

Ishikawa was baffled for a moment before asking in a surprised tone, “If that’s the case, maybe there’s still a possibility that we can work this out, but does PD have the resources to make TV works overseas?”

“We didn’t have them before, but we can have them now.”

Meng Lang said teasingly, “Mr. Ishikawa, have you ever heard people saying that ‘whatever you can think of, we can do more than that’?”

It was true that Pengda didn’t have a production company overseas, but they were going to have one very soon.

Nothing couldn’t be solved with enough money. If there was, they would bring TBS into the picture!

TBS was a local media tycoon, if nothing else. Not only was the channel well connected, but it was very resourceful as well. With such a teammate on board, all the potential problems that Pengda’s Japanese branch could run into could be easily solved.

If even TBS couldn’t solve the problem…

Then, they would fire TBS and switch partners! They would find a new tycoon!

Meng Lang had everything planned out, for he was confident that TBS wouldn’t say no.

After all, TBS would be able to obtain the exclusive broadcasting rights by only paying the crew’s salary, and that didn’t sound like a bad deal at all. However, it might not have been all that profitable, for the salary could cost quite a lot.

However, Meng Lang had underestimated how persistent TBS could be.

In principle, Mr. Ishikawa agreed with the mode of cooperation, but he had a different opinion on the “exclusive broadcasting rights in Japan” part.

“Meng san, are you planning to sell the show to other countries or regions?”

“Of… of course not! Haha!”

Meng Lang started sweating and said guiltily, “If it’s going to be a Japanese remake, I’m sure it won’t sell well in other markets…”

He was going to create some Japanese magical girls with TBS’s money. His plan would fail if TBS saw through his intention.

Meng Lang was trying to trick TBS.

They had been talking about making a local version of Balala the Fairies, but in fact, he only tried to use TBS’s funds to incubate a new magical girl series.

Mr. Ishikawa nodded and agreed with that argument.

If the remake was only going to be a Japanese version of Balala the Fairies, Ishikawa agreed that the show wouldn’t have a lot of audience outside of Japan.

He only thought that it wouldn’t be worthwhile for TBS to have the Japanese exclusive broadcasting rights alone after paying all the money…

“How about giving us the international broadcasting rights? Only with that will I be able to convince my director,” said Mr. Ishikawa.

Meng Lang shook his head repeatedly. Give that to TBS and he would only be selling the toys. With Balala the Fairies’s existence, he couldn’t be sure that a new magical girl series would be as popular. Therefore, he didn’t know if it would be worth it for Pengda to put in so much effort into this new series.

“We must have the sole copyrights of everything. That’s our bottom line!”

Mr. Ishikawa didn’t know what to say and had to bid Meng Lang farewell.

“Meng san, I’ll tell my director your request. I’m sorry, but I have no right to make that decision.”

“That’s alright! Mr. Ishikawa, feel free to report to your superior. TBS and PD will always be good friends, whether this cooperation works out or not!” Holding Ishikawa’s shoulder, Meng Lang laughed wholeheartedly.

Affected by Meng Lang’s attitude, Ishikawa spoke in an equally expectant tone. “Great! PD will always be our good friend, too!”

Bottoms up for that phony friendship!

…

Time flew by. Before anyone realized, it was the 15th day of the lunar year, the Lantern Festival.

Apart from the Lantern Festival Galas of all major satellite channels, Balala the Fairies was the most popular show, because Prince Fun, the new character, was going to make his first appearance.

Since the debut of Balala the Fairies, the show had made new records of feature shows. A few days after CCTV-14 broadcasted the show, 15 other TV channels that Meng Lang had struck up deals with started broadcasting the show as well.

The great viewing rates made all the characters in the show popular topics online.

Yan Lili was indeed the “prettiest villain”. In less than a week, Lin Xue had gained more than 5 million followers on her Weibo account, and that was more than a lot of B- and C-list stars. She had become the first young actress who had gained popularity because of the show.

After that, there was Yang Yuqing, the actress who played Blue Fairy. The pretty young woman had played in a lot of major productions before and was known as a reliable supporting actress.

Unfortunately, playing in multiple works didn’t make her a popular actress.

Yang Yuqing had been remembered as an actress who looked familiar, but whose name couldn’t be remembered. Thanks to Balala the Fairies, she finally had her share of the front page.

The next actor who had gained popularity was a rather baffling one…

It was Meng Lang!

His Weibo introduction read: CEO and Production Director of Jiangchuan Pengda Pictures, renowned director, producer. Known for his Blazing Teens and Balala the Fairies.

The mysterious Fairy Prince made his appearance in Episode 19 of Balala the Fairies, making Meng Lang an online icon almost overnight.

The audience didn’t think much of this guest star at first.

However, many people cracked up the moment this “Fairy Prince” started talking.

“Not Y’all Business!

“It’s none o’ y’all business!

“Ride o bike!

“What’s y’all praublem?”

Sometimes the charm lay in the contrast, and that was probably the case with Prince Fun.

He looked every bit a proper prince should have, but when he spoke, he had this ridiculous accent and it made people laugh so hard.

Balala the Fairies didn’t have many adult audiences. The prince’s accent had become a meme on Weibo all because of a mother’s complaint.

“What am I going to do? My baby girl has been watching some fairy show and has picked up some strange accent! I didn’t notice it until her teacher told me…”

It only started off as a mother complaining about the show’s influence on her child’s accent, but the post somehow went viral and more idol netizens watched the show to find out what it was about.

As a result, they found great pleasure in hearing Prince Fun’s strange accent.