CHAPTER 305: CHAPTER 304: IS THIS GUY A MOLE?

"Here’s another one," Steven said, pointing toward a framed poster of a mid-budget drama film that had once been positioned as Oscar bait.

"Studios play with release dates like chess. Award-season films? December. Blockbusters? Summer. Family flicks? Winter holidays. It isn’t about the audience; it’s about controlling momentum. You release the same movie in September, it flops. In December, suddenly it’s an ’Oscar contender.’ Exact same film."

One of the girls frowned. "So... success is timing?"

Steven snapped his fingers. "Exactly. Timing and marketing. We spend more on promotion than on the actual movie. A fifty-million film might get a hundred-million-dollar marketing campaign. Why? Because perception sells better than product. People don’t go because they want to, they go because they’ve been told everyone else is going. Hype is the most valuable currency we trade."

Rex tilted his head slightly, as if only mildly intrigued. Hype as currency... tch. They’re minting illusions and selling them like gold. It’s a scam, but it works. If I could learn to weaponize perception like this... I could sell anything.

He began walking again, gesturing at the endless posters lining the walls. "See those campaigns? Notice how the trailers are all the same? Loud beat, fast cuts, money shot, dramatic title card? That’s not laziness, that’s engineering. We know what tricks work on the brain, and we recycle them because they work every single time. The audience thinks they’re making choices, but we already wrote the script of their excitement months before they even bought a ticket."

The girls shared a look, half unsettled, half fascinated.

Steven leaned closer, lowering his voice as though letting them in on a forbidden truth. "Here’s a dirty secret... most people think box office is pure numbers. Wrong. We buy

headlines. First weekend reports, those big flashy numbers on Friday? They’re front-loaded. Studios will literally buy out thousands of tickets themselves, just to make it look like the movie’s a phenomenon. Once the press declares it a hit, the public follows like sheep."

Rex let a soft, knowing exhale slip from his nose, the kind of sound that could be mistaken for polite acknowledgment. Inside, though, he almost laughed. Buying your own audience to trick the rest... brilliant. Twisted, but brilliant. A con on a global scale, wearing a tuxedo and shaking hands on red carpets. Hollywood really is the world’s prettiest con job.

Steven laughed to himself, shaking his head. "Momentum is manufactured. Awards are manufactured. Even ’word of mouth’ is manufactured, with influencer screenings, paid Twitter storms, fake reviews. Hell, we even know exactly when to plant think-pieces in newspapers to spark a controversy. Sometimes the backlash is part of the marketing plan."

The girls’ jaws dropped, clearly overwhelmed. To them, Hollywood had always been glitz and artistry... hearing it reduced to chess moves and manipulation made it feel more like a casino rigged against its gamblers.

Rex’s lips barely shifted, the faintest smile there and gone. A casino... yeah. But if you know the dealer’s tricks, suddenly you’re not the sucker at the table anymore. You’re the one stacking chips.

He led them into a conference room where a whiteboard was filled with scribbled names, arrows, and numbers.

"This," Steven said, tapping the marker against the board, "is casting strategy. Actors aren’t just chosen for talent... they’re packages. Studio signs a rising young actor, pairs them with a fading star who still has international recognition, then throws in one foreign face to lock distribution in Asia or Europe. That’s how global markets are secured. Half the time the ’chemistry’ you see on screen was pre-calculated in spreadsheets years before the first script draft."

The girls leaned in, fascinated but clearly out of their depth. Rex, on the other hand, remained silent, studying the board with cool eyes. His expression was calm, maybe even disinterested, but behind it, his mind was working fast.

So it really is numbers. Not destiny, not talent, just algebra with prettier faces. One rising star plus one fading name plus one global hook equals blockbuster. Damn, Hollywood out here speedrunning math homework while critics cry about "cinematic magic." Predictable? Sure. Profitable? Always. Somewhere out there, Pythagoras is rolling in his grave.

Steven noticed Rex’s silence. The young man wasn’t dazzled by the glossy anecdotes that worked on interns or tourists, like he knew the outer shell of Hollywood’s workings. Steven felt a twinge of pressure. If he wanted Rex’s attention, he’d have to dig deeper. The real game. The kind of talk industry veterans only shared after two drinks in a locked back room, and that was exactly why he was revealing so much.

He tapped one of the names underlined twice. "You ever wonder why a mediocre actor suddenly gets a breakout role? Or why two stars who hate each other’s guts still get cast as lovers? Because the agency brokered the deal. The talent agency has its own agenda... pushing clients in packages. They’ll trade. ’You want our A-lister for your franchise? Fine, but you take our struggling client in a supporting role too.’ Half of casting is horse-trading, not artistry."

He chuckled dryly, shaking his head. "And most of the time, the actors don’t even know. They think it’s fate, or talent, or destiny. Meanwhile, their agents are swapping them like baseball cards. Testing to see if they have potential or even luck. One bad flop, and you’re quietly benched. The agency pulls funding, drops promotion, and shoves another fresh face forward. And if one actor has connections, then you’ll see his face in nearly every movie being played, acting or skills doesn’t really matter, what matters is relationships. Careers are math equations, not miracles."

Rex’s lips twitched, almost a smile, though he kept his gaze locked on the board.

Horse-trading, packages, leverage... He’s saying it like gossip, but this is a blueprint. All I need to do is follow the math, find the choke points, and I can bend it for myself. Forget talent. Forget art. If careers are equations, then all I have to do is solve them. And I happen to be good at math.

"This is the skeleton under the skin". He said gesturing at the board, "The game behind the curtain. The only way to understand Hollywood is to forget art and think like an arms dealer... markets, leverage, packaging, trades. The rest is window dressing."

The girls exchanged uneasy glances, one whispering, "That’s... kind of depressing."

Steven ignored them. He wasn’t talking for their benefit anyway. He wanted to see if Rex would flinch, smirk, or finally speak up. He wanted to see the recognition in his eyes, that look that said, yes, this is what I came for. Not the tours, not the surface glitter. The machinery under the skin.

The employees at their desks exchanged glances, horrified Steven was showing outsiders this. Their private chats buzzed: Why is he giving away trade playbooks? Is this guy a mole?

Steven lowered his voice further, almost conspiratorial now.

"And distribution... that’s our biggest lever. Most people don’t know this, but studios often deliberately stagger releases worldwide to build hype. You leak it in one country, let pirated copies spread, then suddenly the global audience feels like they’re ’late to the party’ and rush to theaters when it finally drops in their region. Piracy, in some cases... is part of the marketing machine."

(End of Chapter)