Birth of an actor

London, Tower Hamlets, Canary Wharf.

In an office on the top floor of First Canada Place, a meeting is being held.

No matter how many times he came to this skyscraper, which has become the tallest building in London and the new financial center of the United Kingdom, Adolf Smith is still not used to it: black wallpaper, black conference table, gray carpet, gray glass floor-to-ceiling windows, The entire floor is decorated in an almost spotless clean style, there is not even a single decorative painting on the walls, and when the shutters on all four walls are open, the interior is almost as dark as the cold London sky outside Mixed up.

Or maybe this is what Lance Roderick wants, when the shutters are opened, Buckingham Palace, the Houses of Parliament, the Tower of London, Westminster Abbey...even London, which was built for the millennium and has not yet been officially unveiled The eyes are slowly unfolding around, and the 360-degree view of London is unobstructed. At that time, the office with the best view on this floor does not need any furniture decoration, because the entire city of London is already its best decoration.

I have to say that the feeling that this floor brings to people is really similar to that of Adolf Smith's boss, indifferent, arrogant, mysterious and unpredictable.Even if the other party was less than half his age, he didn't dare to say that he really understood Lance Roderick.

Compared with this kind of futuristic skyscraper, Adolf Smith really misses his Georgian-style office in the West End of London. He is an old-fashioned person living in London, so of course he would prefer things full of history.

However, when Adolf Smith stepped out of the direct elevator today, he quickly noticed that there was one more thing here, which was completely different from the high-cold style of this office, and was even incompatible with it—a set of colorful Easter eggs.

Easter had passed, if Adolph Smith remembered correctly.

So, why does Adolph Smith's boss keep these holiday eggs, even clinging to them?

Those pictures of a Spider-Man and a man with a shield on his back and a man with a hammer-sorry, Adolph Smith only knows Spider-Man, because his ten-year-old son happened to be watching a Spider-Man animation recently In the film, he happened to catch a glimpse of it-a man in a gold-and-red armor, and a green giant, and other Easter eggs of black, purple, red, and silver comic characters, which should really appear in someone as old as his son. The boy’s desk, instead of, uh, the heir of a super multinational group, a billionaire who used to show his arrogant and indifferent face, placed it on the conference table of the top office of First Canada Square.

Jesus Christ, there's even a meeting now!

But Lance Roderick didn't realize it. He was wearing a pure white shirt, a black vest, and a blue fine-striped tie in the middle, which was exactly the same color as the deep eyes of Roderick's heir. The Hinton Palace lawn buffet will not be impolitely dressed, but the more you sit, the more you lose your shape. Your upper body is tilted in the seat, and you are playing with a golden Easter egg with your left hand. You don’t leave the eyes of the others, and you change it from time to time. Holding the observation with great interest in his hand, it seems that he has not paid attention to the ongoing meeting at all.

The elites in suits and leather shoes on both sides of the long conference table naturally noticed the abnormality of Roderick's heir, but none of them showed it on their faces. Adolf Smith bet that their inner activities must be very rich, about ten Nine and a half of us are thinking: Never seen someone paint a comic book superhero on an Easter egg before, this set is both novelty and fun, but Roderick Jr. is not such a kid at all.Weird, this is really weird.

Adolph Smith also knew that many of these people must be wondering about the meaning behind the Easter eggs - who sent them?What does it mean?What is the deep meaning behind it?Is the pattern depicted on the egg actually a code that only Roderick can understand?

Adolf Smith was so sure because he thought so himself, and he never believed that this was just an ordinary Easter egg.

Because no one, so far, no one in the world will send a few easter eggs from the United States to the United Kingdom as a way to test the energy of the American Express Centurion Black Gold Card.

That's right, the unusual appearance of these Easter eggs is the most important reason that caused the participants to speculate-most of the people who were able to attend the meeting at the top of First Canada were from the financial, media, and military industries. In the industry, no matter what their identities are after leaving the First Canadian Building, whether they are the top lawyers in London or the heads of real estate companies, they have only one identity here, and that is to manage the property for Lance Roderick.Some of them have served Roderick or the Waddington family since decades ago, and some were promoted by Roderick Jr.'s insight, but without exception, they are all top talents in their respective industries. .

Although no company named Roderick II has yet been formed, Adolph Smith and his colleagues here have already considered themselves board members of this nonexistent group, and they believe that maybe this year, maybe in a few years In [-], it is not true that existence will become existence sooner or later, because they are involved in more and more industries, and the affairs have become so complicated that they must have a formal group operation team to solve them.

These elites are already in a business that can control the lifeline of a country's economy. They are not billionaires, celebrities, or political leaders from various countries. The customer launched a black gold card made of titanium and printed with a centurion pattern. It has unlimited credit and a 24-hour life assistant team. You can't take the initiative to apply but can only be invited to handle it. The first batch of invited customers in the world There are only hundreds of people. Of course, Adolf Smith cannot become the holder of the Centurion Black Gold Card, but he specializes in providing legal services to those people at the top of the British pyramid. He knows that only ten people in the UK have received invitations to apply for the card this year. And Lance Roderick is one of them.

It is still in this position, and these people who attended the meeting, on Easter Day, when they gathered in the early morning for an acquisition transaction involving a multinational company, the helicopter of the American Express Company stopped with a huge roar On the roof of the building, and under the gaze of everyone, a beautifully packaged gift box with the blue bow still maintained was delivered to Roderick's heir. .

The person sitting in the co-pilot position of the helicopter stepped down and handed over the gift carefully. He introduced himself as the life assistant of American Express, and was requested by an American centurion black gold card customer to give the gift before breakfast on Easter Day. , sent this box of eggs to Lance Roderick, and after receiving the request from the client, American Sports Company worried that the airline’s long-distance flight would not be on time, so it even chartered a flight directly from Los Angeles to London. Arrived at Heathrow at five o'clock, and then contacted Lance Roderick's secretary at 0 o'clock, took off a helicopter at the airport, and arrived just on time.

American Express used both chartered flights and helicopters to transfer a box of Easter eggs from one customer to another for thousands of miles. Now, who would believe that these eggs were really just regular Easter eggs?

——These Easter eggs must be meaningful, and the colorful patterns on their shells must also be full of secrets, otherwise, I am too sorry for the brains that the elites in today's meeting died thinking about it cell up.

……

Probably thinking that the boss's attention was no longer on the meeting, John Baines, who was in charge of the British media business for Lance Roderick, secretly yawned, and the voice of the report became lower and lower, which sounded like The appearance of falling asleep at any time: "Since the newspaper price war with Murdoch's News Corporation, the share price of the United News Group has been fluctuating. Although the sales of "Daily Mail" and others have increased by about 17%, However, when they asked advertisers to increase their advertising prices, they were rejected. Advertisers should wait and see, and wait for the situation to become clearer before making a choice between United News Corp. and News Corporation. Because advertising fees cannot be increased. In this quarter, the profit of the United Newspaper Group will drop by three percentage points compared with the same period last year. Now some shareholders have wavered, and they are likely to sell their shares. As long as the quotation is generous, the shares of these shareholders will be worth 9.8%, combined with the 27.6% you currently hold, will reach 37.4, which is already 2.1% higher than the shares held by the current largest shareholder, the Harmsworth family..."

"Wrong." When John Baines cut corners and finished his report, Lance Roderick, who had been lowering his head to play with Easter eggs, suddenly raised his head and glanced at John Baines casually, but After the other party gave a severe shock, he said: "Yesterday's dinner brought one more shareholder who intends to sell the shares of United Newspapers. Now we can buy 13.5% of the shares. If we can buy them all , we will hold 5.8% more shares than the Harmsworth family. Such a high ratio is the safest. And, Mr. Baines, you only reported the situation in the UK, and I don't seem to have heard it Where did you say that the acquisition plan by the United States has progressed?"

"The acquisition of the American Times-Mirror Group is not going well. Our biggest competitor, the Tribune Group, raised their offer yesterday..." John Baines took out a handkerchief and wiped it. Khan, he stammered a bit.The acquisition case he was in charge of was not going well, which is why Baines just talked about British affairs, but he said nothing about American affairs. He thought that Lance Roderick was not thinking about the meeting. He would not have noticed these things, but he was so wrong.

Adolph Smith glanced at John Baines' nervous expression, and sneered in his heart: Want to perfunctory Lance Roderick?Even Murdoch no longer regards him as a junior, but as a competitor.Knowing that this acquisition is the most important thing for little Roderick now, and the efficiency is still so low, maybe the next meeting, the seat under Baines' butt will be replaced?The two acquisitions discussed at the meeting, one involving United Newspaper Group, the oldest media company in the United Kingdom, and the other involving the American Times-Mirror Group, which owns the "Los Angeles Times", once the acquisition is successfully concluded, no matter for For the media industry in the United Kingdom or the United States, it will be a big earthquake——

Now when people mention the media empire, they always think of Keith Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation. In fact, the United Press Group is the oldest media company in the UK. Harmsworth, who holds the title of Viscount, founded the earliest British media company. Several newspapers, such as the "Daily Mail", also owned "The Times" in the early 40th century. Although News Corporation owns 60% of the media industry in the UK, it has never acquired another [-]%. Including United Press, another British media giant.

Waddington has owned the shares of United Newspapers Group for decades, but one is that he owns less shares, less than 8%, and he is not ranked among the top three in the board of directors. He is a talent in the media industry, so he has always been just a shareholder who attends the financial report meeting at the end of each year and waits for dividends. But all this, from the new owner of these shares, Lance, who is also the heir of the Roderick family After Roderick appeared, he gradually changed.

In more than three years, Lance Roderick has successfully changed his shares from less than 8% to 27.6% by transferring, purchasing and absorbing odd shares. Seduced and persuaded by minority shareholders, Roderick will soon end the 100-year rule of the Harmsworth family over the United Newspaper Group and become its largest shareholder.

This is a force on a par with News Corporation in the British media industry. It is absolutely no exaggeration to say that it controls the tongues, pens, and even cameras of half of the British journalists.

Because Lance Roderick inherited the shares of the United Newspaper Group from the Waddington family long ago, changing the distribution of rights from within is a relatively easy acquisition method, but the situation in the United States is much more complicated.

The Times-Mirror Company, which owns major newspapers such as the "Los Angeles Times" and "Chicago Sun", has nearly 70 employees around the world. The newspapers sell well and make good profits. The market value and stock price are about US$80 billion to US$20 billion. It is easy because the shareholders' equity is too scattered, and the shareholder with the most shares is less than [-]%. But there is also a problem, that is, another competitor, the American Tribune Group, is also eyeing the Times-Mirror Group.

Adolph Smith didn't know how Lance Roderick, the heir of a military industrial group, was interested in the media industry—before he launched the acquisition plan for the Times-Mirror Group, Roderick Jr. was even a member of many American companies. The behind-the-scenes boss of the tabloid newspapers, the strange thing is that the headquarters of those newspapers are mostly in Hollywood-but he clearly understands that no matter how reluctant the Harmsworth family is, no matter how powerful the American Tribune Group is, The last one to win must be Lance Roderick.

Because in the opinion of Waddington's family lawyer, Adolph Smith, who also handles British industrial law matters for Lance Roderick, too many incredible things have happened to this young man. In his opinion, Lance Roderick Derek was going to be a John D. Rockefeller figure sooner or later.

……

Ten minutes later, Adolph Smith decided to take his words back.

That's right, the one that described Roderick Jr. as the next John Rockefeller.

Because a super rich man, a capitalist with full courage, will absolutely, absolutely not do such a thing willfully——

Just now, Roderick Jr.'s secretary knocked on the door and walked in, interrupting an important topic in progress. The purchase price of the shares is determined.

The elites thought that the secretary was here to convey something more important, but what came out of the secretary's mouth was: "The tailors of Jermyn Street and Savile Row are here, Mr. Roderick, and the jewels you requested Merchants and Leather Merchants."

——Saville Row, with all of London, no, the best men's tailor tailors, shirt makers and handmade leather goods makers in the UK. The positioning of Jermyn Street is similar to Savile Row, but Jermyn Street is not like Savile The street is almost full of high-end custom shops, but here is more fashionable, with more brands, men's stores and jewelry stores.It's worth mentioning, though, that both Savile Row and Jermyn Street are synonymous with being expensive and requiring an appointment.

According to Roderick Jr.'s attitude towards poor John Baines just now, the elites believe that this secretary who looks very shrewd but has no brains and dares to interrupt an important meeting will definitely be ruthlessly driven out. Maybe she You can also get a verbal resignation statement immediately.

But Lance Roderick said something that made the jaws of the glasses drop in the conference room: "Great, let them in." He didn't even put down the Easter egg in his hand.

The elites on both sides of the conference table looked at each other. Adolf Smith and John Baines stared at each other for three seconds. They all thought they were hallucinating.

Then, the elites suspected that they had hallucinations.

About 1 men appeared one after another from the direct elevator, all of them were older, dressed in neat and clean clothes, with meticulous expressions on their faces, either holding suitcases or albums in their hands—beside the conference table A few people's eyes widened slightly, and they recognized among these merchants the tailors in Savile Row or Jermyn Street they had patronized, or the jewelers who had bought tie clips and cufflinks. Even if their income is already in the top [-]% of the UK, they can't afford customized products from head to toe. They just make one or two sets a year for important occasions, and they still wear Burberry or Armani.

These custom-made merchants who specialize in serving the royal family, the rich and celebrities lined up, walked into the meeting room one by one, and quickly showed Lance Roderick the items in their hands. Those even had matching socks, which had been set The folded three-piece suit and the jewelry carefully placed in the blue velvet box, after Lance Roderick nodded slightly in affirmation, these people showed a rare expression of relief.

Then, the elites felt that today's meeting was actually a dream, not real.

Because after Lance Roderick and other custom merchants walked out of the meeting room, they handed the secretary a black credit card and said: "Except for the three pairs of unqualified gemstone cufflinks, all the rest will be signed and sent to you. Heathrow, call Amex and let them know the plane is ready to take off."

After finishing these things, Lance Roderick turned his attention back to Adolf Smith and the others. He showed a sweet smile to everyone who had been left out by him for a while, his blue eyes sparkled, Her lips were as red as if she had just kissed her lover: "I'm sorry to delay everyone's time, but the flight is not waiting for anyone. Where did we discuss just now?"

Adolph Smith opened the document in front of him and was about to speak when he saw Lance Roderick suddenly remember something, and told the secretary: "Don't forget to put the letter in, and, by the way, pass it on to Will , let’s just say I love his Easter eggs, especially Spider-Man.”

Everyone at the conference table: "...!!!"

Will?William Bradley?The Easter eggs he painted?He sent it?

What about the promised secret easter eggs full of mysteries and passwords?Really, just an Easter gift? !

Among all the people who have a rushing Thames in their hearts, Adolph Smith's mood is the most ups and downs. Although his expression is still unchanged, he knows the most about Lance Roderick, which is enough for him Connected all the details.

Since Lance Roderick can use the black card to swipe the plane to send clothes to his friends, then his friend, William Bradley in Hollywood, another owner of the Centurion Black Gold Card, can indeed do it. What about chartering a plane just to deliver a few Easter eggs?

Adolf Smith was suddenly curious about the mood of the AmEx life assistants who took over the two orders. He thought that the inner activities of those people must be: God, what kind of crazy customers are these two.

Even if he has been in touch with enough billionaires, Adolf Smith has never seen that "how to spend money to quickly change from a super rich to a beggar" is a kind of joy in life, and he plays a variety of tricks people.But now he saw it.

……

A set of Easter eggs in exchange for three social seasons of clothes, from shirts to socks to cufflinks and even silk scarves, is a good deal, isn't it?Although it's not clear how Lance got his latest costume size, his figure has undergone visible changes twice in three months.

The Easter eggs were even painted by William himself, which is a huge profit, no, nothing.

However, facing the letter out of the window, seeing the traces of ink appear more and more clearly under the refraction of light, William wondered a little confused: Does Lance really understand the meaning of the set of Easter eggs he sent? ?Does he know why he didn't draw Superman or Batman Green Lantern, but chose all the hints of Marvel's superhero theme?

Thinking of Lance's words that he especially likes Spider-Man, William put down the letter, and the corners of his mouth curled up. He knew that the other party must have understood the riddle he deliberately played, because they had a similar idea a long time ago. When they were just two young boys obsessed with superhero comics.

"Will? Hello?"

The shout in the microphone pulled William out of the state of memory, and he said to the phone: "Yes, I am, Amy."

The person on the other end of the phone is Amy Pascal, who used to be an executive of Columbia Films. When Sony acquired Columbia, her position did not fall but rose. Now she has become the vice chairman of Sony Pictures and one of the most powerful women in Hollywood. one.

"What are you thinking? Will, you don't need to argue with me. To be honest, the money Sony is willing to pay for Spider-Man is definitely beyond your expectations." Amy Pascal tried to persuade her The enemy retreated: "And what Marvel requires is a box office sharing agreement. Once Spider-Man is really successful in adapting the movie, the higher the box office of the movie, the more Marvel will get. You said, if you only want to make more money Will the president of Marvel, who saved the company's bankruptcy crisis with a knife, sell Spider-Man to Sony, one of the seven major Hollywood studios, or will Willot, who only made one "Blood Together"? Who would think that a superhero movie made by a film company is more likely to sell well, and it must be Sony rather than Willow-"

"How much will Sonny pay for the rights to the Spider-Man movie, 1000 million? 2000 million? No, no, don't be silent, Amy, and don't pretend it's a higher price, because I know you're asking Marvel The quotation is only $700 million." Although the person on the other end of the phone couldn't see it, William still showed a smile, which came from his inner joy: "It is impossible for Marvel to sell Spider-Man to you again, how much is it?" It's impossible. No, it's not that I paid a higher price for Peter Parker, but——Willott wants to buy the entire Marvel."