"Simon, if that last story didn't grab you, how about this one? Danny is a tough, swaggering cop on the street, but in front of his harsh, quick-tempered mother he's as timid as a mouse that's spotted a cat. One day on duty he meets Theresa, the girl of his dreams, and the two fall madly in love. Danny, however, is terrified his mother will disapprove of Theresa, so every moment with his girlfriend is cautious and furtive, sparking one hilarious mishap after another".
Inside the office.
John Hughes pitched one idea after another to Simon, but Simon remained non-committal.
After Hughes finished describing yet another story and they'd talked it over a bit, Simon asked casually, "John, I think 'Uncle Buck' is going to do well at the box office, so—have you thought about making a more straight-up kids' film?"
John Hughes shook his head as though picturing a nightmare. "Simon, kids' movies are a minefield in Hollywood. Shooting 'Uncle Buck' drove that home; those little fellows ran me ragged. Half the time I wanted to recast the lot. I'm not going through that again".
'Uncle Buck' tells the story of Russel and his wife, forced by family upheaval to leave their three children with the kids' bachelor uncle, Buck Russel.
Under the original deal Hughes had total control; Simon hadn't followed production closely and had no idea there'd been such headaches.
Everyone knows children and animals are the two hardest elements to handle in Hollywood films.
Hearing Hughes, Simon now understood why the idea for 'Home Alone' had never surfaced.
In the original timeline Hughes had got on famously with the three child actors in 'Uncle Buck', Macaulay Culkin especially had impressed him, spawning 'Home Alone'. In this new version the kids were different, all trouble on set, leaving Hughes in no mood to dream up another family comedy.
In a foul frame of mind, the filmmaker simply couldn't muster enthusiasm for another picture full of kids.
With 'Home Alone' officially dead, Simon dropped the subterfuge. "After I saw the uncle buck footage I had a thought, John. The project suits your style, and one of your pitches, the young couple stuck in a convenience store on graveyard shift when two burglars break in, sparked something. So, another kids' picture? If you don't want to direct, someone else can. Your deal would match 'Uncle Buck's, but this time Daenerys Entertainment has a say, especially in casting".
Under their 'Uncle Buck' agreement Hughes received $5 million against ten percent of North American gross for writing, directing and producing.
John Hughes was nobody's fool.
An idea inspired by a Simon Westeros picture was still Simon Westeros's idea. Given the man's recent track record, 'The Sixth Sense' alone was charging toward $300 million domestic, Hughes, a businessman first and foremost, could find no reason to refuse.
"So, Simon, can you lay out the story for me?"
Hughes agreed almost instantly, and Simon sketched the plot of 'Home Alone'.
He felt no pang at handing the project back to Hughes for the same $5 million salary and ten-percent backend.
Having Hughes as creative chief would keep the remake authentically 'Home Alone'. And if the picture duplicated the original's $280 million-plus domestic take, Hughes would deserve every penny of a $30 million payday.
The decision reflected a recent shift in Simon's thinking.
Much like the ten-picture co-financing slate: squeeze every dime for Daenerys Entertainment and Hollywood's talent would lose their incentive to join up.
They talked for about an hour and parted ways.
Hughes decided to stay in Los Angeles another week so he and Simon could hammer out the 'Home Alone' outline.
After the weekend, following some fine-print negotiations, Daenerys Entertainment and Fox Pictures jointly announced the first of the ten-picture slate: 'Sleeping with the Enemy'.
'Sleeping with the Enemy' was a 1987 novel by Nancy Price that had sold modestly. Fox's story department had picked up the rights for $150,000 and then shelved them.
The moment the project was announced the obscure novel shot up the bestseller lists; the publisher rushed out another printing.
Next, Wednesday, 16 August, 1989.
Daenerys Entertainment and Disney Company held a second press conference, unveiling project number two: 'The Hand That Rocks The Cradle', a domestic thriller Simon remembered as a future classic, about a housewife who, after her husband's suicide and her own miscarriage, poses as a nanny to wreck the family she blames.
Like 'Sleeping with the Enemy', the script was little known, written by a woman named Amanda Silver.
This time there was no underlying novel, only an original screenplay.
With both companies keeping a tight lid on details, the press could only guess at the plot from scattered clues.
Neither property was famous by accident.
Hot, obvious properties rarely came Simon's way; he wouldn't share 'Home Alone' with outside partners either. Most of what reached him were low-profile or risky ventures.
Friday, 18 August, 1989.
Daenerys Entertainment and Warner Bros. Pictures staged a third press conference, announcing film number three, another blockbuster-in-waiting: 'The Fugitive'.
The story is adapted from a television series under Warner Bros. and follows a surgeon whose wife is murdered and who, after being framed, desperately fights to clear his name.
In the original timeline, the fugitive starred Harrison Ford and earned more than $360 million worldwide. However, compared with the two earlier projects slated for next year, Simon had made it clear to Warner from the start that this film would be pushed to a 1991 summer release at the earliest.
The reason was Simon's schedule: by his reckoning, 1990 was already hopelessly crowded.
With 'Home Alone' now locked in, Simon could recall five of 1990's box-office giants that now belonged to Daenerys Entertainment: 'Pretty Woman', 'Ghost', 'Dances with Wolves', 'Home Alone' and 'Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles'.
Under Daenerys Entertainment's fixed plan, 'Pretty Woman' would open over Valentine's Day next February; 'Ghost' and 'Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles' were set for next summer; 'Dances with Wolves' and 'Home Alone' would finish the year.
If 'The Fugitive' were put into production now, its large budget, unlike 'Sleeping with the Enemy', which could be produced quickly, would force it into that same year-end slot, pitting it against two $200 million titans: 'Dances with Wolves' and 'Home Alone'.
In Simon's memory 'The Fugitive' had taken more than $180 million in North America, essentially the $200 million tier. Releasing three behemoths simultaneously in December would only wound all three; he was certain the domestic market of this era could not absorb three $200 million level films in a single holiday frame.
And that was before counting the other titles sure to land in the same corridor, making the battlefield bloodier still.
Warner understood Simon's reasoning but still wanted the project announced at once: the news would serve as a welcome boost to their share price.
After Paramount's June ambush wrecked the nearly sealed stock-swap merger between Time Inc. and Warner Bros., every term already agreed upon was scrapped. Having beaten back Paramount's lawsuit to block the union, the two sides now had to renegotiate from scratch.
Time had floated a fresh half-cash, half-stock offer, but the exact price remained unsettled.
Every cent Warner's stock rose would now cost Time that much more.
The announcement had the desired effect: by the closing bell, Warner Bros. shares were up a tidy 2.1 percent.
While Daenerys Entertainment and Warner Bros. Pictures unveiled their third co-production, the North-American box-office numbers for the week of 11–17 August, the dying embers of summer, also arrived.
'Uncle Buck', written and directed by John Hughes, opened on 2,021 screens and grabbed $16.94 million to lead the chart.
An 8,000 dollar per-screen average was shy of a breakout, but it met expectations. With an opening near $17 million, domestic totals should land between $50 million and $70 million, spot-on with Daenerys's first forecast and in line with Hughes's track record.
Even after paying Hughes his $5 million front fee, the picture cost only $15 million to make; another $5–$7 million in back-end still left Daenerys a healthy theatrical profit.
Daenerys's other film, 'The Sixth Sense', held second place in its seventh weekend, earning another $16.71 million.
The phenomenon had now pushed its North-American gross past the $200 million mark to $211.06 million.
Universal's Steve Martin family comedy 'Parenthood' had never topped the chart, but its legs were steady: down just 22 percent this weekend, it added $11.66 million in its fourth round and quietly reached a cumulative $47.32 million.
New Line's 'A Nightmare On Elm Street 5: The Dream Child' opened on 1,902 screens and took $11.1 million, placing fourth just behind 'Parenthood'.
James Cameron's 'The Abyss' plunged 39 percent in its second week, earning $10.69 million for a two-week total of $28.22 million and fifth place. Recovery was impossible; Fox executives remained miserable.
Beyond the top five, every other summer heavyweight was now in its final lap.
With 'The Sixth Sense' past $200 million and clearly eyeing $300 million, the three upcoming projects Daenerys had just announced with its studio partners drew intense scrutiny.
In fact, Simon had more than those three in motion: Fox was already talking to the rights holders about 'Terminator 2', and there was a Columbia title in play. Columbia's subsidiary, Tri-Star, had recently dropped Matthew Broderick, Simon had not been blind to this move.
Sony's negotiations to acquire Columbia, however, were not yet finalized.
Unlike the Time-Warner saga, no rival bidder had jumped in for the lately lacklustre Columbia, so the deal was all but inked. Sony had already begun to steer Columbia's operations; dumping Broderick had come at Japanese insistence.
After Daenerys ran Simon's pick past Columbia, Sony's negotiators asked the company to hold off on an announcement so the project could serve as a triumphant first fruit of the takeover.
Daenerys was happy to oblige.
While the studios threw resources at their slates, the talent agencies of Hollywood began circling.
CAA, of course, was the exception.
Ever since Daenerys clashed with the agency over 'Rain Man' the previous autumn, not a single CAA client had been cast in any of the company's major projects. Of the two summer releases, 'The Bodyguard's male lead, Kevin Costner, was with ICM, while Whitney Houston's acting deal had been signed by WMA. As for 'The Sixth Sense', every principal involved, Robert De Niro included, was a WMA client.
That had not mattered much, CAA's stars were hardly short of work.
But with the unveiling of Daenerys's ten-picture outside-financing slate, pressure inside CAA became palpable.