The Oscars PR campaign for Gravity was still ongoing. With the final voting not yet concluded, no contender would give up easily. Gravity had also passed its third weekend in the North American market, with the box office trend still holding strong. It dropped only 35% compared to the second weekend, earning $37.29 million. Adding the earnings from the previous four weekdays, the North American box office had already broken the $250 million mark, reaching $258.97 million.
Overseas, the number of release regions had increased to 108, and the international box office was growing rapidly. The global box office had steadily passed the $500 million milestone, reaching as high as $527.88 million!
More importantly, after such a long run, the film's reputation was still holding strong, which was extremely favorable for its Oscar campaign.
As time slowly moved into late January, when Sunday came, Duke threw aside all his work and headed to Pasadena, a suburb of Los Angeles, aiming for the famous Rose Bowl Stadium.
This stadium, one of the most famous in the United States, could now hold more than 90,000 people. Built in the 1920s, the Rose Bowl became famous for hosting the annual college football bowl game, also known as the Rose Bowl.
However, during the NFL season, it temporarily served as the home field for Duke's Los Angeles Raiders.
After relocating from Oakland to Los Angeles, the Raiders, without a stadium of their own, had to lease this famous venue as a temporary home. But Duke had already secured land and completed the design. The construction of the new Raiders stadium had officially started in the summer.
At most two seasons later, his Los Angeles Raiders would be able to move into their own home stadium.
Joining Duke to watch the game were Leonardo DiCaprio and George Clooney. But when they walked through the stadium's long corridor and were led to the VIP section by the team's designated reception staff, they saw many industry peers as well.
For instance, Mark Wahlberg, Matt Damon, Ben Affleck, and Jessica Chastain, among others.
Although this wasn't the Super Bowl, it was the AFC Championship. The winner between Duke's Los Angeles Raiders and the visiting Pittsburgh Steelers would go directly to next month's Super Bowl.
"Hey, Duke."
"Hey, Duke…"
Sitting in the box specially prepared for the team owner, many familiar faces nearby came over to greet him. Duke responded one by one. Not only were those people he had seen earlier, but among those who came over later, there were quite a few other familiar faces too.
For example, Orlando Bloom, with whom he had worked before. Also, a newly rising Canadian singer Justin Bieber.
For some reason, Duke noticed that something seemed off between Justin Bieber and Orlando Bloom. Though they were seated far apart, they exchanged a glance full of obvious hostility when passing by Duke before returning to their respective spots.
"Attendance isn't bad at all."
Looking around the stadium, Leonardo DiCaprio said to Duke, "Much better than I imagined."
"Your imagination?" Duke leaned back in his seat and said, "Did you think the entire stadium should be empty?"
"Of course not." Leonardo shook his head. "I thought half the seats filled would already be decent."
George Clooney had gone over to chat with Ben Affleck, so only Duke and Leonardo were left here. Their conversation was more relaxed and casual. Leonardo often threw out jokes and teasing remarks.
"I got it!" He pointed to the two large stands on the left and opposite sides that were covered with giant Raiders logos and said with a sudden realization, "You guys covered those two big stands, so it looks like attendance is higher."
Duke shrugged without saying anything.
Although he wasn't directly involved in the club's operations, he knew that the Raiders hadn't completely become Los Angeles' team. Even though Nancy Josephson's ICM and the team itself had done a lot of promotion work, achieving that goal still required time and accumulation.
Plus, with the Rose Bowl's nearly 100,000 capacity, the direct consequence was that the team's game attendance wasn't particularly high. Due to the NFL's strict attendance regulations, on game days, the team would simply cover the upper-level stands of the Rose Bowl, so the empty seats wouldn't appear too obvious.
This was actually a common practice across all major professional sports leagues in the U.S.
Last year, the Los Angeles Raiders' attendance rate was far lower than now. Professional sports always relied on performance. This season, the Raiders not only made the playoffs but had entered the AFC Championship. Just two steps away from the Super Bowl, this significantly boosted the market. Since the playoffs began, game day attendance had improved greatly.
Los Angeles is the second-largest population center in the U.S. and a massive market. Whether the Raiders could grab a big enough piece of the pie among all the professional sports teams would depend on whether they could deliver strong performances.
If the team could win a Super Bowl within the next two years, market promotion would undoubtedly become much smoother.
"Hey, Duke."
Another greeting came from the side. George Clooney returned with Ben Affleck. Duke stood up and shook hands with Ben Affleck. "Hello, Ben."
Hollywood's upper circle wasn't that big. They weren't very close, but had met many times before.
"The Vegas odds are favoring your Raiders now."
Unlike his usual tough public image, Ben Affleck remained modest in front of Duke, praising without being obvious, "The Raiders are hot right now. The combination of Tom Brady and Marshawn Lynch is unstoppable. Making it to the Super Bowl shouldn't be a problem."
"Thanks."
After the brief politeness, Duke gestured to the seats inside the box. "Sit wherever you like, Ben."
Just like Ben Affleck said, after more than a season of running in, the Los Angeles Raiders were already on the right track. But to make the Super Bowl, a team needed more than strength and the right tactics it also needed luck.
A few of them sat together and chatted about the Raiders for a while. Before the game started, Ben Affleck suddenly shifted the topic to movies.
It was clear this was the real reason he had come over.
This Hollywood star, whose acting career had been declining but had revitalized it by transitioning into directing, said, "Duke, have you ever heard of Hollywood's Argo Project?"
The name sounded quite familiar, but Duke couldn't recall it for a moment, so he simply shook his head. "Feels like I've heard it somewhere, but I can't quite remember."
After saying that, Duke looked at Ben Affleck, waiting for his explanation.
"It's like this: in 1979, when Iran's Islamic Revolution reached its peak, militants attacked the U.S. Embassy in Tehran and took 52 hostages, but 6 Americans managed to escape. The CIA, in order to rescue them, collaborated with Hollywood to come up with a movie project called Argo. They intended to extract the escapees by posing as a film crew going to Iran for location scouting…"
Upon hearing "Iran's Islamic Revolution," Duke instantly understood what Ben Affleck was referring to, but he didn't interrupt and instead patiently listened to him finish.
"I want to adapt this event into a movie."
After saying this, he glanced at Duke. Seeing no reaction, he continued, "I've already secured the adaptation rights and am currently looking for someone to write the script. It's just that I haven't found a suitable investor yet."
Duke thought for a moment and asked, "Ben, who are you planning to get to direct this project?"
"Well…" Ben Affleck scratched the back of his head. "I want to direct the film myself."
Although he had directed one film before, in the directing world, he was still a complete rookie. Ben Affleck was well aware of this.
Considering that previous film, the investment likely wasn't very high, and it seemed the box office did okay. In fact, films like this had a certain market in North America especially since, thanks to the mainstream media's decades-long smear campaigns, certain countries had become synonymous with terrorism in the minds of the American public.
This film could really capitalize on that and had a solid audience base.
Because of that, Duke only thought about it briefly before saying, "Alright then, Ben, get a detailed plan together as soon as possible. If everything checks out, one of my film foundations can invest in your movie. As for distribution later, we can hand it over to Warner Bros."
Ben Affleck clearly didn't expect things to go this smoothly. His long face lit up with delight, and he quickly said, "I promise I'll get the proposal to you as soon as possible."
He was very tactful. After finishing, he stood up on his own. "Duke, I won't disturb you any longer. See you another day."
"See you." Duke nodded slightly at him.
The decision to invest in Ben Affleck's film wasn't just because the project had low costs and potentially decent returns. To some extent, Duke was also doing a favor for George Clooney after all, it was Clooney who had introduced Ben Affleck to him.
No matter what, after the release of Gravity, George Clooney had put in a lot of effort into PR work for the film and had activated his network of connections.
After that, the three of them focused on the game that was about to start. Perhaps stimulated by the Raiders making it to the AFC Championship Game, this match broke the attendance record for the Raiders since relocating from Oakland to Los Angeles, with over 60,000 spectators buying tickets and entering the stadium.
For the Los Angeles Raiders, this was a gratifying result and also meant the team was gradually becoming rooted in Los Angeles soil.
However, to truly become a part of Los Angeles, the Raiders still had a long way to go but Duke had plenty of patience.