April 23, 2014
As I learned from Johnny Hyde, never fall in love with your client. They are many things that make a successful client, but one thing they are not, is an object of love from the agent’s point-of-view. To be successful, you have to see your talent as an object, and know what that subject is worth the open or even closed market. Johnny made the mistake in believing in his star client, when instead, he should have admired her from afar, like her fans. He would gain a better understanding of her appeal and the needs of her fan base.
What is it about guys who fall for their meal ticket? They now come to you because they insist on vision and security of some sort. If you cross that line, you become powerless in front of their eyes. To be honest, it makes me sick to my stomach to see it happen to my type of guy in my type of occupation. Once I see an artist at work, it becomes a narrative right in front of me. There is a beginning, a middle and of course an ending. The thing is to be prepared for that crash in the third act, and make sure your client is comfortable when that time comes.
I took my client to a nice bar for a intimate drink and to discuss business. Roy Orbison’s “Only The Lonely” is playing softly on the jukebox, and I told her that we need to make some drastic, but positive, plans. There was a war photographer who freelances by the name of Lee. She drinks like a fish and she had the guts to take a bath in Hitler’s tub right after the liberation of Munich. I knew Lee for a long time, we were pals in Paris before the war, and at the time she was living and working together with another photographer, whose name doesn’t come to the front of my head at this moment. But she did fashion, and she’s talented with the lens.
I had a script with me that is based on Shakespeare’s “Richard the Third.” The movie was going to be original by updating the narrative to contemporary times. Yet, keep the Shakespeare language intact. I didn’t know if this would work or not, but my client did Shakespeare in her school, so I figure this would be a natural for her. As I told her more about this project, she seemed to get less interested and was fidgety, and not drinking any of her drink as well. She then asked if I would take her to an address in South Pasadena. She just wanted to show me something there. The address that she gave me was on 1071 South Orange Grove Avenue.
When we arrived it was dark already, and it seemed to be a charming sleepy neighborhood in South Pasadena. She indicated to me that there used to be a house here, not this one, but another one, that was destroyed by an explosion. The house was the property of a scientist who worked for the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, and was known to be as an explosives expert. He and his wife were getting ready to move to Mexico to work and live, but he accidentally dropped some chemicals, which in turn, caused an explosion and therefore his death. Also both of them were under the tutelage of Aleister Crowley. She mentioned this all to me, and just wanted to bring this story onto the big screen. Me, being me, tried to link a Shakespeare theme or narration as she told me this very minimal but nevertheless interesting Mise-en-scéne. At least that’s the way I looked at it. We both sat in the car and stared at the property, not saying anything to each other. I had the motor on, and over the radio we listened to Sergei Prokofiev’s “Romeo and Juliet, Op. 64., Suite No. 1, Op.64c: Monagues and Capulets.”
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