Echoes of Hollywood

Although she made several calls every day, Gal Gadot didn't mention her meeting with Carey Mulligan to Murphy. She knew very well that some things were not appropriate to come out of her mouth. Many people at the warehouse set knew Carey Mulligan, including the gossip-prone Old Lynch at the coffee shop and Kara Faith. These people were much more suitable to describe the situation.

Moreover, Gal Gadot was confident that these people's words would lean in her favor.

Old Lynch didn't have a good impression of Carey Mulligan, and Kara Faith never seemed to like that British woman. As for the people in the crew, Gal Gadot was quickly becoming one of the leaders of the production team.

No woman likes to see someone threatening her relationship, and Gal Gadot, smart as she was, was no exception. She understood that relationships needed to be maintained and protected.

Murphy inspected a yacht club in Rhode Island before heading to New York. While on the phone with Kara Faith to understand the funding status from 20th Century Fox, Kara Faith mentioned Carey Mulligan. However, Murphy knew he was not suited to get involved in anything related to Carey Mulligan.

Just as he hadn't endorsed Elizabeth Banks back in the day, Carey Mulligan was simply not fit for the role of Naomi.

Back then, he was a novice in relationships with admittedly low emotional intelligence. Although he hadn't improved much now, he had made some progress. Only an idiot would foolishly hire Carey Mulligan.

Some things, once in the past, are best left there. Murphy wouldn't look back.

Upon arriving in New York, Murphy went straight to Manhattan. He first went to Wall Street with Philippe Lachel and Helena Espora. They had been there before and had communicated with the New York authorities. If possible, they wanted to film some exterior shots on Wall Street.

After all, this seemingly unremarkable street represented something extraordinary.

New York is a popular location for filming, and Wall Street has appeared on the big screen countless times. As long as the regulations are followed, shooting here shouldn't be a problem. Murphy talked with the New York officials again and basically reached an agreement for filming.

He then went with Philippe Lachel to meet a photographer who wanted to join the team.

Just like Murphy, people in other industries faced various temptations and poaching by other companies and projects once they achieved something. Philippe Lachel's assistant, David Nagel, had left Murphy's team this year to join another crew and officially became a cinematographer.

Such things are unavoidable. With Philippe Lachel around, Murphy couldn't promote anyone else to be a cinematographer. The person wouldn't stay just to be an assistant when they had a bright future ahead.

He didn't come with a halo of invincibility.

Since entering Hollywood, many people had followed Murphy and stayed with him, but some chose to leave to pursue their career aspirations.

This is the most normal commercial cooperation situation.

People constantly leave, and Murphy keeps absorbing new members, which also helps maintain the team's vitality.

Murphy stayed in New York for three days. The third day was mainly to handle personal matters.

He met up with Grace, who came over specifically, and met with a real estate agent to look at a few carefully selected apartments in the Upper East Side.

After looking at two apartments, Murphy wasn't satisfied. Accustomed to the manor-style residences of Beverly Hills, he found these apartments too small.

However, he found the last one quite good.

"This apartment is located on the top floors (73rd to 75th) of the CitySpire luxury apartment building on West 56th Street in Manhattan, hailed as the 'crown jewel' of the building. It spans 8,000 square feet, with six bedrooms, nine bathrooms, a media room, a dining room that can accommodate 20 people, a formal gallery, and a conference room."

While taking the private elevator, the real estate agent vividly described the apartment to Murphy. "The master suite occupies the entire top floor. Besides the building's dedicated elevator, the apartment has its own private elevator running between the three floors."

Murphy nodded slightly, feeling that it sounded good.

The agent seized the moment before the elevator arrived. "On the 72nd floor, there are staff quarters and a wine cellar that can hold a thousand bottles. Additionally, each floor of the apartment has a 360-degree wrap-around terrace, making it the highest terrace in Manhattan. From the terrace, you can see the entirety of Manhattan Island."

"And the price?" Murphy asked.

There was no need to guess; such an apartment would not be cheap.

"Forty-five million dollars," the real estate agent said, smiling. "However, the original owner is willing to sell it for forty million dollars upon hearing that the buyer is the famous director Murphy Stanton."

At this point, Murphy had only heard the agent's endless talking and hadn't seen the apartment yet, so he wouldn't make a decision just yet.

The elevator reached the 73rd floor, and Murphy and Grace followed the agent out of the elevator, entering the super-luxurious apartment spanning three floors.

In a place as valuable as Manhattan, sky-high luxury homes are everywhere. Even a top-floor unit in a high-end residence can cost tens of millions of dollars.

Manhattan is the heart of New York, and anyone with some knowledge of it knows about the extravagant lifestyle of the Upper East Side. Former artistic director of Vogue, Elwood Linda, once said, "When you truly live at the top of a Manhattan skyscraper, you feel like you're at the center of the world."

Here, top-floor apartments offer not just comfortable living but also signify status and wealth.

Murphy entered the top-floor apartment covering the 73rd to 75th floors of the Upper East Side.

Led by the real estate agent, Murphy and Grace took a good look around the entire apartment.

Upon exiting the dedicated elevator, they were already inside the apartment.

The elevator's exit led to a restroom connecting to the art gallery. The spacious living room was connected to the library, with three sets of large dual windows facing the street. From the windows, the Metropolitan Museum of Art and Central Park were in full view.

Leaving the library, they entered the kitchen. What caught Murphy's eye were large glass windows, custom luxury furniture, and a black granite matte countertop. The adjacent dining room was connected to the art gallery.

They then went upstairs. The 74th-floor master bedroom featured an en-suite bathroom and separate walk-in closets for the male and female occupants. The secondary bedroom was designed as a spacious suite, equipped with a dressing room and bathroom.

The 75th floor, as described by the real estate agent, was entirely designed as a massive luxury bedroom, complete with several bathrooms of different configurations. All the bathrooms were fully tiled with custom marble and fitted with the most advanced bathing equipment, and each bathroom had windows, allowing for a view of Manhattan even while bathing.

After a tour, Murphy discovered other features of the apartment: a direct view of the Metropolitan Museum of Art from the art gallery, a remote-controlled ultraviolet protection system, a remote-controlled bedroom blackout system, an embedded AMX system with a touchscreen for controlling audio, video, lighting, and temperature, and custom closets with private storage rooms.

This meant that after purchasing, Gal Gadot would only need to make some appropriate surface adjustments based on her preferences without having to completely renovate everything.

This would save a lot of unnecessary hassle, making Murphy quite pleased.

After inspecting the terraces on each floor, Murphy and Grace, led by the real estate agent, went to the building's rooftop. All the rooftop areas were part of the apartment's amenities.

The rooftop was mainly designed into two functional areas: a large helicopter landing pad and a refined rooftop garden.

Besides accommodating large helicopters, the helicopter landing pad didn't offer much else. The rooftop garden, on the other hand, caught Murphy's eye with its design, connecting the rooftop garden with the apartment through vertical space, providing users with a fantastic view of Manhattan.

This eco-friendly rooftop garden incorporated various natural and artificial materials such as carpets, recycled glass, reclaimed walnut wood, and plants, blurring the traditional boundaries between interior and exterior, natural and artificial.

Although he liked the apartment, Murphy didn't show it and left afterward.

"Grace, focus on following up with the last one."

In the car back to the hotel, Murphy instructed his lifestyle manager, Grace, "Isn't the real estate market down now? Try to negotiate the price down as much as possible."

His money didn't come easily, so he had to save wherever he could.

"Don't worry, Murphy," Grace promised confidently. "Leave it to me."

Murphy had confidence in Grace. As a CAA elite, her capabilities were unquestionable.

After settling the apartment matters and confirming the photographer with Philippe Lachel, Murphy flew from New York to London to finalize the exterior locations for filming before returning to Los Angeles.

With follow-up funding from 20th Century Fox and Megan Ellison in place, everything was going smoothly with the crew's preparations. During the second audition for the female lead, Murphy chose a young actress named Dakota Johnson to play Naomi, finalizing the main cast of the film.

At the beginning of May, with another North American summer box office season kicking off, Murphy didn't join the fray. Instead, he led the crew at the Venice warehouse set to begin filming "The Wolf of Wall Street."

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