I’ve been married for more than five years and we don’t have kids. At this point, I don’t think we ever will. My wife isn’t gung-ho on the idea, and, to be honest, neither am I. Why? Because I’ve already got 100 of them at work.
I don’t mean to imply my clients are infantile—that’s not it at all. What I’m saying is that despite my best efforts, my paternal instincts kick in around them and I always end up feeling like they’re my children. And the longer we work together, the stronger those feelings get. I become very protective. I begin to experience their wins and their losses as if they were my own. And I go the extra mile for them, just like any decent parent would.
Case in point: Olivia.
She’s a woman in her 40s who was a bit of a name back in the day. When I signed her about six months ago, Olivia wasn’t working as much as she used to. She didn’t even have a reel. I wasn’t sure about us getting together, but I took her on anyway because it’s hard to pass on someone you grew up watching on the big screen.
Olivia definitely needed a lot of emotional support, so despite us being the same age, I started to feel like her parent. The industry didn’t love her anymore? Well, that was just unacceptable! I became determined to get her career back on track.
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My plan was simple: The best way to sell Olivia effectively would be to remind casting directors of her past glories. So I helped her create a “greatest hits reel,” five minutes long, packed with short clips from her most famous roles. This was easier said than done, because my client was not technically savvy and she didn’t have a manager that could help, so I had to step in and spend a lot of free time tracking down all that footage she needed.
An editor friend of mine donated his services because Olivia’s money was tight. I send this dude a lot of business, so I figured he owed me one. It was a smart move, because he is great at his job and his reels always make an impression.
Getting all that footage together and waiting for the editor to finish working on it took forever, but the wait was worth it. The finished product was a winner. It was like watching a career retrospective for someone you forgot had a career, and every single scene was my client opposite a major star. The only person who enjoyed watching it more than me was Olivia.
Then Olivia used that reel to attract a bigger agent and she fired me.
Nothing hurts more than the betrayal of a child. You want the best for them. You want them to succeed. And it rips your heart open when they leave.
An agent-client relationship is a lot like a parent-child relationship, but there’s one major difference: The kids have all the power. And despite my years in this business, that’s a lesson I’ve had to learn over and over.
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