It came to my attention that the chapters were not in order, thanks to you guys I was able to correct that you can read the chapters in order now
---------------
Because of its low latitude and coastal location, Los Angeles' climate is much warmer than Chicago's.
Riding the gentle sea breeze, the motorcade quickly arrived in Hollywood.
Although Pete and Brad had already arranged a hotel in advance, it was still early and not mealtime, so Josh and the others decided to first take a look at the two companies.
At this time, although Hollywood was already renowned, it was still far from what it would become in the future.
The famous Walk of Fame hadn't yet been established—it wouldn't be built until 1958. This, for Josh, was actually an opportunity.
As long as he proposed the idea, the Hollywood city government would likely have no reason to reject such a clearly reputation-boosting concept.
The group first went to Rose Pictures but came back out not long after, because as previously mentioned, it was just a shell company—with only an office space and nothing else.
As the local host, Brad was a bit embarrassed, but as a former puppet manager, there wasn't much he could've changed anyway.
However, there was a huge pile of female artist contracts... and surprisingly, the quality was quite high. As for those photos...truly artistic!
"Very nice, aren't they?" In the car, watching Josh flipping through the stack of photos and materials with great interest, Margot finally couldn't resist and pinched him several times.
"Hehe, I'm just seeing if there are any good prospects worth nurturing!" Josh quickly said with a smile.
Margot rolled her eyes, clearly saying, "Yeah right." If it weren't for the fact that she had read the two screenplays he wrote, which were indeed quite intriguing, no one would believe a guy who had never touched the film industry could come up with anything worthwhile.
Yes, the main reason Margot trusted Josh so much was because he had prepared a few scripts in advance and showed them to her, which she found quite interesting.
Of course, calling them "scripts" was generous—they were more like story outlines.
After all, Josh had never really worked in film and didn't know how to write proper screenplays.
But he could write novels!
In his past life, during his spare time at work, he had also followed the online novel trend and written a few. Though they might not have been great, he could still clearly tell a story.
And although there were no computers in those days, there were typewriters. Drafting a story outline didn't take much time.
Later, he could hand it off to professional screenwriters for refinement, and that would be good enough.
After all, movies of this era were still quite rough in many ways—the dialogue was thin, and as long as the actors performed decently and the story was appealing, the film would likely make money.
Soon, they arrived at Siegel Pictures.
Compared to Rose Pictures, Siegel Pictures was in much better shape. Although small in scale, it had all the necessary components.
However, while heading toward the general manager's office, the group heard a heated argument.
"What's going on?" Josh frowned upon hearing it.
"Oh, she's a somewhat well-known actress—ever since the previous boss Siegel died, she's been making a fuss trying to terminate her contract," manager Pete replied after listening briefly.
"Oh? This company actually has a celebrity? What's her name?" Josh asked in surprise.
Whitney Frost? Hearing the name, Josh exchanged a glance with Margot.
They hadn't expected it to be a fairly famous actress—someone they'd seen at last year's USO show, the same one Captain America attended.
They hadn't thought she would be an actress at Siegel Pictures.
"How long is her contract with the company?" Josh asked with interest. In those days, actors generally signed directly with film studios. Though talent agent systems already existed, they held little sway against studios because there were too few platforms.
"Not that long, only three years left," Pete replied.
"Three years isn't long. So? Has our company mistreated her?" Josh asked.
"Not really. Even though we haven't made many movies, she's basically our leading lady and gets treatment equal to top-tier stars. It's just that after Siegel died, our access to resources diminished..." Pete explained.
"Oh, then there's nothing to discuss. Just handle it by the book," Josh nodded, saying no more—he certainly wasn't going to suggest releasing her from the contract.
Though she was famous, in the end, she was still just a money-making tool for the company—nothing earth-shattering.
And they didn't have any real personal connection—just one brief encounter so Josh wasn't going to take her too seriously but then, he saw a troubled look on Pete's face.
"What? Is there a problem?" Josh asked him.
"Well, Mr. Kane, the reason this woman dares to make a fuss is because she recently got involved with a powerful business figure—someone not easy to deal with!" Pete leaned in and said quietly.
"A big businessman? Who?" Josh frowned.
"Calvin Chadwick! Owner of Isodyne Energy Group!" Pete whispered.
Just like with Whitney Frost, Josh didn't have much of an impression of the name Calvin Chadwick. Although he had watched most of the Marvel movies in his previous life, he hadn't really followed spin-off shows like Agent Carter, so he didn't know what the names meant.
But Isodyne Energy—Josh had heard of.
One reason was that after connecting with Yuri, the tech mogul, via the dimensional trade device, the energy industry had already become a planned part of Josh's future development. So naturally, he had done some research on U.S. energy sectors.
Isodyne Energy was one of the major energy corporations in the country, controlling electricity supply in several major cities like New York and Los Angeles, with considerable power.
The other reason was that the company was one of the participants in the still-secret Manhattan Project.
Of course, the Manhattan Project was a secret.
But while researching the American energy industry, Josh had found that many energy companies were involved in a project located in Tennessee called the "Manhattan Engineering District." With his knowledge as a time traveler, it was hard not to associate it with the famous Manhattan Project.
No wonder Pete felt this matter was tricky.
If this actress really had tied herself to the boss of such a company, then she might indeed have become a phoenix flying onto a high branch.
___________________________________________
To read 20 advanced chapters you can visit my Patreon:"https://patreon.com/Hiddenfanfics''