5
 
 
 entry locked until 08.15.25 
 
3:05 PM, Friday, September 1st, 2023:
 
There is so much in this entry... the end is good, but I've had to skip so much because I wanted to keep the meeting unlocked. But holy mother of fuck what happened this week...
 
...so Thor (glad he has a name now) texts Billy for links to the final pitchdeck and reel on Monday. He let's me know this and I ask where we can meet up with Thor (which should've obviously happened the week before, but at least I can show him the reel now). Billy asks me to link him to a flat version and I outright refuse. I will drive a headset to this dude, but I made literally the opposite of what Thor asked for (the reel is ALL voice-over) and if he has some editing power here (which he does), I need him to edit the actual piece in a VR headset. Flat? None of the 3D will make sense, he will tell me to add words, he will make me cut things because, again, it DOESN'T, WORK, on your PHONE. The fact that I need to tell this to BOTH Billy and Thor makes me FUCKING INSANE. If I had just talked or even met Thor, all of this would've been fine. But he's talking to Billy. Billy comes back with a text that threw me through the fucking wall:
 
"...Thor called me. Loves the upfront slides of the deck. Wants to chat later with me to do a couple final twaks. I was able to keep him at bay with the reel. Demanded we not drive to him to show it. Said he trusts me that it's good lol. Wnats to move forward hypothetically for post pitch with the idea that I'm producing and directing a piece for the NFL as a test with Adam Kontras."
 
<my brain splits in half>
 
He continues: "Need cost breakdown. 15-20 minutes. 5 cameras...."
 

It continues but my eyes are already glazed over because I had said all week this 5 camera thing wasn't going to happen - Thor is still looking at this like it's a flat piece, he really needs to talk with someone who has done this before... these cameras CANNOT ZOOM. We cannot be covering gameplay. The processing time alone for the files on these cameras could make a $10,000 test over $50,000 with no advantage. Again, everyone is making shit up and proving they have NO CONCEPT of this format. It's the blind leading the blind and the one person with eyes is being treated like a replaceable part of this process. Fucking hell man. But honestly, the Billy "producing and directing" line was the end for me. What, am I gonna spend all my time training Billy on how to direct this? Am I gonna have him use my studio to even understand how camera movements translate? He has no equpiment, he's never directed this... fuck. So I was actually relieved and happy I could move on from this whole thing...

 
"Looks like we don't have a meeting on Wednesday. Call when you can. Literaly can't agree with any of that, Wish you would've talked to me before you got yourself involved in this."
 
He calls and we proceed to have a knock down drag out. Well, he's as calm as can be, I'm not. Before he called I went to my kids with tears in my eyes and apologized as I didn't see any possible way to salvage the friendship. I wrote to Billy's wife asking if Taya and I could talk:
 
"Talya and I really need to talk to you alone at some point. Things are devolving quickly and I want to make certain the kids still have a connection."
 
I then called my dad and a few other people to let them know I had to bow out. I couldn't do 100% of the work and then not only let someone else take all the credit... but actually have to train him to take over my position. It's so fucked. And I have New Zealand and other contacts... I'm good.
 
I break down. I cannot believe it's over and then he calls and although I start calm, it doesn't last. Because everything he says is the opposite of what happened. "I was only trying to help you." is the theme which is complete horseshit. The gaslighting of "At any time you could've asked me to bow out" knowing full well he painted me in a corner and played middle man between me and Thor so he retained control. The more he lied, the angrier I got. You could tell he could NOT go back to Thor and say the meeting wasn't happening. He then threw a tiny wrench into things. He said that Thor was NOT part of the pitch, in fact we were kind of pitching TO him. Which would actually explain why we never met, but not why he had all these notes about the creative side of things? But the pitch is JUST me and Billy, Thor is observing and introducing everyone.
 
It's confusing, but that actually shifted things a bit for me. We continued to talk for 3 hours, with the second half far more calm. We left it with: we'll do the pitch and see where it goes from there.
 
I was exhausted, hadn't slept well for 10 days and just wrecked. We get to the pitch day and I've prepared 3 headsets and Billy picks me up so we can talk about the pitch driving there. As most men have the ability, we just played make-believe, focused on the task at hand and put every other emotion behind us.
 
I meet Thor, show him the reel and he proclaims "OH NO." and takes off the headset. We cannot show the girl in the one-piece bathing suit to female execs. Apparently they can't even show cheerleaders anymore in their productions. We brainstorm and just decide on taking off the headset at the scene before, skipping ahead, and then putting it back on. It works, but of course I'm angry 'cause this would've been solved had I brought the headset to him on Monday and I'm sure Billy is pissed because he would've caught it had I made a flat link - but as I said above, I wasn't going to share that flat. Ever.
 
We get past that and as I say in the unlocked entry the pitches go very well. Billy has clearly done this before and it was awesome having a front man hype up what they were about to see in the headset. As we went through the day it was a nice rhythm and I wouldn't want to do a pitch of this size without a wingman. It added credibility and it made the corporate peeps feel a sense of familiarity in an unfamiliar world. I now absolutely understand Billy's value if he were to simply focus on the business side of things (that's all the slides focused on) while I handled everything else. Still no idea what % that would be but for the first time in this entire fiasco, I at least saw him add to the process.
 
Before the last pitch (the big guy with all the money), Thor and I were talking and got onto the subject of how to stream this to which I told him the compression is remarkable. You can do it like ANY streaming file. They have an NFL+ app - it could totally be part of that app if they simply made a downloadable VR version. Fuck I could almost make that app with a little research. They already have the bones of it done... transferring it wouldn't be the hardest thing. He says: "Why didn't anyone tell me this before now!?!"
 
Guys, I wanted to fucking jump out of my chair. Maybe because you never asked to even meet me? Maybe because Billy wanted complete control and to act like he knew everything? It would've been the FIRST THING WE TALKED ABOUT if I had met Thor: all the ways to make this happen. But, nope. You guys talked amongst yourselves like you knew everything and here we are.
 
But alas, we still got the test, and it doesn't matter. But it's pretty clear Thor was a pretty crucial part of this pitch and NEEDED TO TALK TO SOMEONE WHO UNDERSTOOD VR180 distribution. Fuck, ME Billy.
 
So we drive home and have a good talk. I say stright up:  "I never want to be in a pitch meeting like that without you... definitely made for a good pitch team." I celebrate that night and then the following day (yesterday) I go to put together the invoice and I have no idea how to include Billy. I talk to a bunch of people, go back and forth... but for the test? It makes no sense. I told Thor as we were walking out that for just one camera and 2 hours of footage roughly cut together? $5000. I mentioned this to them a week before and Billy told me Thor laughed at the amount and could get much more. But this is a test, almost a location scout... I'm not gonna mark a whole bunch of things up - this is simply to see if any gameplay footage will translate as we know all the other stuff will. At THAT point I can give a real production budget for if we need more cameras, etc. Thor texts Billy after the pitch meetings and says he's just gonna add $2000 for Billy which, honestly - I'm fine with for the test. Billy and Thor are clearly friends and Thor is doing him a solid.
 
The following morning I look over an NFL day and realize that 2 hours of raw footage may be a little low. I quoted based on the baseball game, but I may need to prepare for more considering that. I write my very first email to Thor and he says it will indeed be more like "4ish" hours of footage and that the $7000 has to include everything and Billy. Which means now Billy is 30% of my production budget and I have to cut 50% of my rates to meet that.
 
Ahem.
 
As well? I have to write this invoice in a way that protects me going forward. I don't care about losing money on this test, I care about Billy somehow being 30% of the production budget when he honest-to-fuck has zero experience in this field. I don't even know what to name him. So I just make a budget and take 50% off - then add in "Executive Producer - Billy $2000". It looks absolutely insane because I'm taking these cuts just to pay Billy. But again, I just do it because time is crucial here. They need to get us in the system as soon as possible to even be vetted to get the passes to even be on the field. So I send a worksheet to Billy to look at and my friend Paddy and I are talking. He agrees the whole thing is way off and suggested I speak with a mutual friend who is a producer (like a real one, real credits) and Paddy sets it up for this morning at 10am.
 
Dude saved my fucking life. Probably saved the friendship... saved everything. Apparently when productions get big? They add in a "Production Company Fee" which is 10% of the entire budget. That way they can divy out percentages to people that WON'T EFFECT THE BUDGET. And voila. We're here. That is what we will do. He also tells me what to put in the production sheet even though I'm waiving all of it: that way they understand what the future budgets will look like. Done and done.
 
I send it to Billy, call him on the phone and he actually seems relieved. I said "let's just come up with a percentage of the production fee." which he agrees. I tell him to just give me a number so we can figure out what's fair. Then - if we do end up having multiple cameras - I'm happy to teach him how to do specific things so he can get a line item in the budget ON TOP OF aportion of the production fee. So he can make more if he wants, but he's always assured that percentage either way. And then going forward literally ANY business he gets? He gets that percentage of the fee. Now he's motivated to move forward, I'm motivated to help train him because it's not costing me my literal budget and everyone wins.
 
AJ TESLER, I PRAY I CAN MAKE THIS PUBLIC SOMEDAY or at least sing your praises. I'll say it now: about 20 minutes into the call I started recording it because I didn't want to forget what the fuck you were saying and had to play back certain sections like 3 times to get the full gist. Hopefully all goes well, we bring you on as a line-producer in some capacity and I can tell you I did that. I didn't want to betray your trust, but goddamn I needed to record that. I'd love to make a portion of it public so everyone can see how fucking badass you were and how generous you were with your time. Helping me without a second thought or without what it would do for you. Ya know Billy, how actual friends interact? And I hadn't spoken to AJ in like 15 years. But would do the same for any of my friends. As I was telling this to Talya I broke down HARD. Like holding in the yelps hard because it meant so much to me for Paddy and AJ to just HELP. Period. I would bring them on in a HEARTBEAT if there's ANY POSSIBLE way. And I have a ton of people I would do this with who I've had business relationships with in the past. Which really does kind of suck that I'm forced to use Billy here. Can you imagine how many texts I got from actual people in this industry that would HAPPILY hold a fucking camera if necessary? Who would happily train and who have experience already? Tough pill to swallow, but as AJ said: "If Billy is willing to learn? There's value." And of course they both said that anyone this insanely motivated... to the point where he'd steamroll over a friend just to be involved? It's someone you can use on your team, you just have to have a contract protecting you. It's not great for a friendship, but in terms of getting things done? Find a way to hold onto that type of asshole. Just get 'em to sign something.
 
That made me feel a ton better. I'll figure out a percentage with Billy before the test and then, yes, he will be rewarded for the slimy shit he did and... welcome to Hollywood. His value to me is future pitches and I'll give up a percentage of the fee for that. As for how well he performs directing a B or C cam? Time will tell. But it's my choice. I'm the company trying to make this work. So the power is actually back where it belongs and Billy is motivated to get a ton of work. He gets what he wants, I get what I want.
 
Exhale. I think we found a way to thread this needle. One-year Anniversary tomorrow.
 
...and GoBucks. It's that time of year!!!
 
Adam