"Xiyi, where do you live?"

Lee Sung-man and Yoo Hyun-woo looked at the villa in front of them with a slightly unnatural expression, and it is estimated that all Korean artists can have such a big villa in Cheongdam-dong with no more than one hand.

Zheng Xiyi got out of the car, pointed to the villa next door with his hand and said to Li Chengman and Liu Xianyu: "Inside, I live here, my sister lives there, since I have recognized the door, Brother Chengman and Brother Xianyu can simply come in and sit down." ”

Li Chengman stretched out his wrist to expose his watch, tapped the dial with his finger and said, "It's already a little faster, we will come to pick you up early tomorrow morning to go to the crew, so I won't sit down for now, and there will be opportunities in the future." ”

Zheng Xiyi nodded and waved goodbye, "Brother Cheng Man is right, then I won't keep you, hurry up and go back to rest." I'm bothering you today, and it may be hard in the future, thank you. Brother Xianyu, drive slower on the road and pay attention to safety. ”

Liu Xianyu didn't speak, nodded with a smile, the two of them waved goodbye to Zheng Xiyi, and then drove away, Zheng Xiyi stood in front of the yard and watched the nanny car go away, and turned around and couldn't see the tail lights anymore before turning around and going in.

"Brother Chengman, the villa in Xiyi XI has to cost more than a billion, right?" asked Liu Xianyu while driving.

Li Chengman was thinking about something, but was awakened by Liu Xianyu's voice, and hesitated for a moment before reacting, "How can I buy more than a billion, I estimate that it will have to be multiplied by at least two." ”

Liu Xianyu pursed his lips unconsciously, "Two or three billion, it seems that being an actor in the United States is really much more profitable than in South Korea, even top actors like Zhang Dongjian and Lee Byung-hun can't afford this villa, right?"

Li Chengman laughed, "If you want to buy it, it is estimated that they can afford it, but after buying it, it is estimated that they can only eat ramen every day, and it is estimated that Bae Yongjun XI is the only actor who can afford it." ”

Liu Xianyu suddenly remembered what Zheng Xiyi said when he got out of the car, and gasped, "Did Xiyi XI say that Director Lin Xiyin lived in the villa next door to him just now?"

Li Chengman was stunned, nodded and said, "It seems that I said so, I didn't pay attention at the time, and all my attention was focused on the villa in Xiyi XI." ”

Liu Xianyu thought for a long time and didn't know what words to use to describe his mood, so he could only hold back the sentence "Dafa!"

Li Chengman frowned, and the expression on his face became serious, "Xianyu, you just need to know this place, don't go out and talk about it, don't talk to anyone, it's best not to even say anything about Xiyi XI living in the Qingtan Cave villa area." ”

Liu Xianyu nodded hurriedly, since he is Zheng Xiyi's assistant, he still understands what can and can't say anything, but Li Chengman is not at ease, and explained a few more words, "Xiyi XI is different from other artists in the company, I am the largest shareholder of the subsidiary, and Lin Xiyin XI is the director of S.M." We are now the agent team of Xiyi XI, we are our own people, we should remember what we should remember, and we must forget what we shouldn't remember, you know?"

Liu Xianyu also got serious, slowly parked the car on the side of the road, and then turned around and said to Li Chengman: "Thank you, Brother Chengman, I remember what you said, and I will ask Brother Chengman to take care of me in the future." ”

Li Chengman saw that Liu Xianyu's attitude was very sincere, so he put his mind at ease and patted him on the shoulder with a smile, "Oh, I'm just old and nagging." Although I haven't partnered with Xianyu many times before, I still know what kind of person you are, and Director Lin Xiyin also told me about the last time you drove them back to the company twice, and she wouldn't have chosen you if she didn't worry about you. In the future, our buddies will be in the same boat, and if you don't take care of it, helping you is helping myself. ”

Liu Xianyu also laughed happily, started the car again and drove back to the road, "It's not early, tomorrow, ah no, I have to get up early today, I'll send Brother Chengman back first." ”

"Oh, Xiyi XI is already speaking Pingyu with us, so you don't have to say honorifics to me anymore, just Pingyu. It's hard to take a taxi so late, so I'm welcome, but I'm just sorry for you. ”

Li Chengman and Liu Xianyu are both smart people, and after saying this, they can be regarded as having a preliminary understanding of each other's personality and temper, and they relaxed a lot when they spoke, and they laughed all the way to the depths of the night.

Zheng Xiyi returned home, washed up first, and then sat in the small courtyard behind the house and thought about the process of meeting Li Chengman and Liu Xianyu again today, and felt that there was no problem, so he went into the house and went back to sleep.

Of course, he had a good intention to ask Li Chengman and Liu Xianyu to send him to the door of the villa. These two people will be with themselves for a long time in the future, and some of their own personal ** will be completely exposed in front of them, and it is very necessary to use the Cheongdam-dong luxury villa as a bait to test whether the mouths of the two people are tight. If there is no news outside that he lives in a luxury villa area after a week, then even if the two of them pass the test, Zheng Xiyi will slowly let go of some personal ** to let them know, otherwise he will naturally change other agents.

As for whether the news of his residence in a luxury villa area will have any bad impact if it leaks out, Zheng Xiyi has also seriously considered it, he is also an American movie star, a child star and has been filming for so many years, even if the Korean people are a little surprised by the wealth he has, it is estimated that there will not be much negative impact, as for what kind of extravagant and flashy bad comments are irrelevant to him, he can't prohibit others from eating grapes and saying that grapes are not sour.

In fact, Zheng Xiyi still underestimated the shock of buying two luxury villas for Koreans, because he really didn't know the real income of Korean artists.

In 2004, the average salary of South Korea's top actors starring in a movie was more than 100 million won, and in 03, Lee Byung-hun starred in "ALLIN" The salary of 15 million won per episode was already a record-breaking salary at that time, and how many movies and TV series can an actor star in a year?

So in this way, the annual salary of a top actor is actually 200 million to 300 million won, and the salary needs to be shared with the agency. In South Korea, Zheng Xiyi's 37% (30% of the company) is the best contract, and it is only possible for those same top actors, and then they have to pay taxes first, and then they will withdraw 30% from the agent. That's right, the agent takes 30% of the net profit instead of before tax, because in that case, the agent has to pay more taxes, so the actor really gets no more than 40% in the end, which is about 100 million won......

Of course, the real bulk of an artist's income is not the salary, but from advertising and commercial activities. Artists really have to work hard to accept advertisements a year, thirty or forty or even fifty or sixty is not a problem, Kim Tae-hee and Lee Hyo-ri were almost this number when they were the most popular. But as a top actor, you can't accept any advertisements such as fried chicken and milk tea like Kim Tae-hee and Lee Hyo-ri, you must be a big brand commensurate with your identity. The number of advertisements with these signing fees in the unit of 100 million is small and there is a lot of competition, after all, there are so many big Korean brands, and you have to consider whether the image of the brand matches the actor, you can't let Song Kanghao Xue Jingqiu go to cosmetics like this.

In addition, it is only 2004, the trauma caused by the Asian financial crisis in 98 to South Korea has just healed, and the highest advertising signing fee is only 300 million won, and the others are only one or two hundred million won.

However, they probably could not have imagined that two years later they would be able to earn billions of won a year (Note 1).

At seven o'clock the next morning, Li Chengman and Liu Xianyu rushed to the door of Zheng Xiyi's villa, but Zheng Xiyi did not come out of his house, but ran out of Lin Xiyin's villa next door, holding a sandwich in his right hand and a small paper bag in his left hand.

Jumped in the car and said hello to Li Chengman and Liu Xianyu, Zheng Xiyi reached out and handed the small paper bag to Li Chengman, "Brother Chengman, have you had breakfast, I brought you a sandwich made by my sister." ”

Li Chengman took the paper bag with a smile, opened it and looked at it, and then handed it to Liu Xianyu in the cab, "I've eaten it, and if I don't eat it, my wife won't let me go out." However, Hyun Woo said on the way here that he didn't eat breakfast, so I'll leave it to Hyun Woo. ”

Zheng Xiyi glanced at Li Chengman's left hand, with a plain ring on his ring finger, and then looked at Liu Xianyu, the ten fingers were empty, and he couldn't help but reach out and pat Liu Xianyu's shoulder, "Brother Xianyu, we single dogs were shown affection by Brother Chengman early in the morning, what a sad start!"

Liu Xianyu turned his head to look at Li Chengman and Zheng Xiyi, stupidly didn't know how to pick up Zheng Xiyi's strange words, but Li Chengman quickly understood what Zheng Xiyi meant, laughed and said: "Hahahaha, Xiyi is really funny when he speaks, it seems that I can learn a lot of trendy terms in the future." ”

Zheng Xiyi pretended to be disgusted, and grabbed Liu Xianyu's shoulder from behind the driver's seat and said: "Brother Chengman, you are almost 40 generations, let's be honest and be a stable middle-aged man, Brother Xianyu and I are still in the 20s, and we will leave the trend terms or something to us." ”

"Ahh

Zheng Xiyi smiled like a little fox, "Brother Chengman, that's what my sister-in-law said in order to comfort your aging heart, don't take it seriously, if you are serious, you will lose." ”

Liu Xianyu held a paper bag in his hand, looked at Li Chengman in confusion, and then looked at Zheng Xiyi, who was smiling treacherously in the rearview mirror, and suddenly felt that he was a middle-aged man, why didn't I understand what these two people said......

Note 1: Bae Yongjun is very profitable, but his way to make money is through stocks rather than artist income, and in 2006, he paid more than 9.6 billion yuan in taxes alone, with an estimated income of 30 billion won. The income of South Korea's top artists has risen sharply since 2004, and the remuneration of first-line actors has doubled every year, and the salary of Korean first-line actors has increased five-to-sixfold from 2004 to 2009, thanks to the recovery of the Korean economy, mainly due to the contribution of the Chinese market. Online games and electronic products have occupied most of the Chinese market in the past few years, and the Korean Wave has also begun to sweep China in recent years, but even so, the income of ordinary Korean artists is still very low, although the income of top stars is getting higher and higher, but the income of low-level artists is getting lower and lower, in 2014, the total average annual income of Korean artists is comparable or even lower than the total average annual income of the ordinary white-collar class in South Korea, and it is better to be a second- or third-tier artist than to be a white-collar worker.

PS: A lot of the data in this chapter is calculated based on the data found on the Internet, which is definitely not accurate, but the error should not be large, but there are more or less other ways for artists to make money, so this can't be calculated. The reason why artists like to engage in side hustles is also because they can't make much money just by relying on salary, album income, and acting expenses, don't look at their annual income compared to ordinary people, but their expenses are also huge. Liu Zaishi's former agency didn't settle for him for eight months, and Liu Zaishi couldn't bear it financially before he sued to ask for salary and terminate the contract, because the salary of the agent team was borne by the artist himself, and the agency did not settle the artist, but the artist still had to pay the salary of the agent team on a monthly basis.