Accompanying her to all kinds of medical checkups, notifying friends and family, arranging her pregnancy diet and daily schedule, Simon stayed busy from Tuesday all the way through Friday. Naturally, he continued staying home with her on Saturday and Sunday as well.
The commotion was too big to hide, and the media inevitably caught wind of it.
They simply made an official announcement on the Ygritte portal: The Westeros family's first child was on the way.
This triggered another wave of congratulations and blessings from all sides.
The media discussion was equally lively.
Some analysts examined the differences between Simon Westeros's first heir being a boy or a girl. Others debated how much wealth the child might inherit in the future. There were also guesses about what name the Westeros couple would choose. The speculations went on and on.
On Friday, Anthony Johnston even flew in from Melbourne with his family to visit his newly pregnant sister on behalf of the family.
After confirming the pregnancy one hundred percent, Janet quietly donated ten million dollars in the name of the Simon and Janet Westeros Foundation to several children's charities, including UNICEF. In Janet's words, she was accumulating good fortune for the little one in her belly, hoping the child would grow up healthy and safe.
Westerners generally view charity as a social obligation, with the more pragmatic among them seeking the corresponding social prestige. They do not have the concept of "a family that does good deeds will enjoy lasting blessings."
Since Simon was fundamentally an Korean at heart, he had no objection to Janet's actions.
[TL/N: It's confirmed! From now on, Every mention of China will changed to Korea. (Except for few details that might be important later on)]
Because she had successfully become pregnant, Janet also celebrated her thirty-first birthday in a small way, even though she had originally wanted to ignore it. However, it was only a quiet birthday dinner at the Dume Point estate with a few close friends and family, far less lively than Simon's party the previous month.
After the birthday dinner, Anthony and his family returned to Australia after a week in Los Angeles, and Simon finally went back to work.
Janet, on the other hand, went straight on maternity leave.
She stopped working.
She was only a little over three weeks pregnant and was already taking maternity leave.
The pregnant woman was the boss now.
Who would dare object?
Fortunately, Janet had always believed in delegating work to others. Most of the time she only set the general direction for Cersei Capital and left the majority of the work to the heads of the three subsidiaries. Therefore, her departure would not have too much impact on Cersei Capital's operations.
Of course, even though Janet was taking early maternity leave, Simon could not completely step away from Cersei Capital.
Currently, Cersei Capital's Cersei Fund Management Company, Apollo Management Company, and BlackRock Asset Management Company together managed more than twenty-one billion dollars in assets. The first two each handled around three billion, while BlackRock, which mainly dealt in low-risk stocks, bonds, and fixed-income investments, had grown to fifteen billion dollars.
Although the heads of the three subsidiaries had been carefully selected and all possessed top-tier investment talent on Wall Street, no one could guarantee that these professional managers would not do something reckless once given too much power and insufficient oversight.
There were countless cases of Wall Street fund managers making unauthorized investments that caused massive losses for their firms.
In Simon's memory, Salomon Brothers, a firm that had once stood shoulder to shoulder with Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley, would fall into crisis later this year due to a bond bidding scandal involving its traders and eventually disappear from the ranks of Wall Street's top investment banks a few years later.
Janet's previous work at Cersei Capital had been split evenly between setting direction and financial oversight.
After Janet went on leave, Cersei Capital quickly restructured and established an investment committee. Simon, James Rebould, and the three subsidiary heads all joined as members.
Simon took on the role of overall control, while James handled financial supervision.
All major investments by Cersei Capital going forward would require approval from the five-person investment committee. Of course, as the controlling shareholder, Simon still retained veto power.
In his heart, however, Simon's plan was to interfere with Cersei Capital's management as little as possible.
Unless it was a project he remembered was destined to fail, he would not deliberately block the fund managers' decisions. A good boss had to be able to tolerate failure from his subordinates. The main purpose of establishing the investment committee was simply to prevent the three subsidiaries from running wild after Janet stepped back.
Janet had never been particularly passionate about running Cersei Capital anyway. Now that she was pregnant, she would definitely devote more attention to the little one. As long as the investment committee proved effective, they could maintain this system going forward.
This year's Easter fell on March 31, so the Easter box-office window would open on March 22.
Daenerys Entertainment was releasing two main films for Easter: Madonna's documentary about her ambitious Blond Ambition Tour last year, Truth or Dare, and Children of the Corn III.
If Universal was included, there was also one more film: John Hughes-produced Crazy Night.
Crazy Night told the story of a supermarket clerk and a runaway rich girl who encounter two thieves while spending the night in the store. The premise shared many similarities with Home Alone, but it was not a copycat. The film had also been shot the previous year. The similar plot was simply due to John Hughes's habitual mass-production style.
Simon did not have high box-office expectations for this film that he barely remembered. However, the female lead was quite noteworthy: Jennifer Connelly from Once Upon a Time in America. The actress was twenty-one this year and at the absolute peak of her beauty.
As time entered the second half of March, the summer box-office season was actually not far away.
Simon began devoting more energy these days to a series of films related to Daenerys Entertainment.
For the upcoming summer season, the four core June and July releases, Batman: The Dark Knight, Terminator 2, The Fugitive, and A Few Good Men, were all co-productions distributed respectively by Warner, Fox, Warner, and MGM.
Outside these four mainstream commercial films, Daenerys Entertainment's only solo releases were three niche independent films from Highgate Pictures.
This was actually Simon's deliberate arrangement since he had anticipated taking over MCA this year.
The Daenerys Entertainment distribution team would use this summer season's work to complete the takeover and integration of Universal Pictures.
To Simon's disappointment, however, Universal's four summer releases, Backdraft, Jungle Fever, Problem Child 2, and Fried Green Tomatoes, clearly lacked major hit potential.
Looking at Universal's 1991 slate, only Cape Fear and Fried Green Tomatoes, tentatively scheduled for year-end, had decent box-office prospects. Even so, neither film had broken one hundred million domestically in his memory. That meant Universal would likely have no 100-million-dollar film this year.
The ups and downs of Hollywood studio performance were clearly visible here.
This also highlighted just how sharp Daenerys Entertainment's edge had been in Hollywood over the past few years.
To minimize or reduce losses from Universal's 1991 film business as much as possible, Daenerys Entertainment had recently canceled production and distribution plans for seven Universal films. However, because most projects were already in substantial production stages, many already completed, the final number of remaining films still reached sixteen.
On Daenerys Entertainment's side, the three labels had confirmed twenty-three films scheduled for 1991 release.
Added together, the new Daenerys Entertainment would release a total of thirty-nine films in 1991.
Fortunately, Simon had already made plans in advance.
Of Daenerys Entertainment's own twenty-three films, eleven came from Highgate Pictures. Although niche independent films and art-house pictures had created several box-office miracles in recent years, their overall scale was still limited and would not cause too much impact on the mainstream commercial system.
After replanning, six of Universal's sixteen films were also assigned to Highgate Pictures.
In total, Highgate Pictures would release seventeen films in 1991, all leaning toward niche independent and art-house titles.
New World Pictures received eleven films, mainly thrillers, horror, and lowbrow comedies.
The final eleven mainstream commercial films included co-productions such as Batman: The Dark Knight as well as solo Daenerys Pictures releases such as Toy Story.
These three clearly divided distribution systems would become the main framework for Daenerys Entertainment's future film business.
Each distribution line would produce and release a volume equivalent to that of a major studio.
Although Daenerys Entertainment still maintained an open attitude toward external cooperation, this structural adjustment to its film business clearly carried strong aggressive intent.
After all, traditional major studios usually released only a dozen or twenty films per year, rarely exceeding thirty. After the adjustment, Daenerys Entertainment's annual film distribution volume would reach forty titles. With North America's box-office market capacity basically fixed, this would naturally squeeze the living space of other Hollywood studios.
Simon had no intention of restraining himself just because other Hollywood studios felt the pressure. In the past few years, he had already offered enough olive branches. Next, he planned to personally push for further consolidation among Hollywood's major studios, reducing the number of media giants in Hollywood to five or even fewer ahead of schedule.
In this process, some traditional major studios would inevitably be swallowed up and disappear. Once the restrictions on horizontal media integration were lifted, the media giants would gain even more monopoly resources. For newcomers trying to rise in Hollywood, it would become far more difficult.
Dume Point estate.
Today was March 22, a Friday. Another week had passed without notice.
Since Janet had become pregnant, Simon had been leaving work promptly at five o'clock almost every day.
The moment he stepped into the Shell Villa, Simon saw the living room filled with all kinds of baby products: strollers, formula, plush toys, Lego sets, piles of clothes, stacks of tiny shoes. It looked like a children's goods flea market.
Making his way through the "flea market," Simon found the woman lying on the sofa by the glass wall, using a remote control to operate a toy truck on the floor.
She looked thoroughly engrossed.
The toy truck bumped into Simon's foot twice with a clacking sound, accompanied by the woman's playful, childish voice-over: "Beep beep beep, Daddy is blocking the truck's path. Daddy, move aside."
Simon did not know whether to laugh or cry. He walked over and gave the woman, who was sprawled on the sofa with only her head poking out, a light smack on the backside. "Buying so many things. Does this family own a mine?"
Janet naturally did not understand the reference in Simon's words, but that did not stop her from replying righteously, "We do."
Simon paused.
Fair enough.
This family really did own mines.
He walked around the sofa, sat down, pulled the woman into his arms and onto his lap, then snatched the remote from her hand. The toy truck began running across the polished floor again.
Hmm.
It was actually quite fun.
Seeing Simon quickly "get into it," Janet reached out discontentedly to grab the remote. "This is for the baby."
Simon dodged. "Don't snatch it. The baby still has a few years to wait. Let the baby's dad play for a while first."
Janet rested her head on Simon's lap and reached out a few more times with her little paw, but to no avail. She finally gave up and burst into delighted laughter.
After laughing for a while, Jennifer gently stroked her small belly and asked, "Simon, what do you think we should name our little one?"
"What do you think?" Simon replied.
"I want you to choose."
"I'm not very good at naming."
"Yeah, like Seattle or something," Janet suddenly laughed again and patted him. "My child is not getting such a weird name."
Simon smiled as well. "How did Jennifer tell you about that?"
"Hmm hmm hmm."
Janet refused to explain and simply hummed smugly a few times.
Simon thought for a moment. "If it's a boy, we'll call him Melbourne. If it's a girl, hmm, Melbourne too."
Janet clenched her little fist and started hitting him. "Melbourne? I'll give you Melbourne!"
Simon did not dodge. He laughed. "You told me to choose. I think this name is pretty good. Melbourne Westeros."
Janet hit him again. "My child is not going to be called Melbourne. Even Seattle is better than that."
Simon was easygoing. "Then you choose."
Janet rolled her soft body across the sofa once, still looking troubled. After a moment, she finally "compromised." "If it's a boy, Melbourne is fine. If it's a girl, Seattle."
Simon said helplessly, "Don't steal things from Jennifer, okay?"
Although his assistant had been very dissatisfied with the name Simon had suggested early on, one could imagine the chaos if Janet stole it.
"I don't care. If she has the ability, she can have a baby before me."
"If Jennifer has a baby first, I think you might secretly kill me in the middle of the night."
"No, I won't." Janet shook her head. "I wouldn't even wait until midnight, and I'd take both of you out together."
"Uhm, really?"
"Just kidding," Janet reached up to touch Simon's face. "I couldn't bear to."
Simon breathed a sigh of relief. "That's good."
"But I still won't let you off the hook."
"Hmm?"
"Figure it out yourself."
"No need to think about it. You're already pregnant anyway," Simon put down the remote, leaned down to kiss her lips, and said, "So, how about Melbourne?"
"It sounds so bad."
"You'll get used to it. Now who dares say Westeros sounds bad?"
"Westeros never sounded bad to begin with."
"Here's what we'll do. From now on, say Melbourne Westeros to yourself a hundred times every day. In one week you'll be used to it. The power of habit is strong."
"I still think Seattle Westeros sounds better."
"That's exactly because you've already said it to yourself many times."