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A
Not-So-Secretive Agent
An
Eye Opening Interview with Agent Patty Mack
by
Anup Sugunan
Patty
Mack is a no-nosense agent representing cinematographers and production
designers. She runs a tight ship but will offer help in the most
generous manner to the eager student. Dealing with agents is an
elusive concept for most artists. Many of them are so busy trying
to just learn their craft that they don't even think about this
aspect and rush into a contract without much foresight. This detailed
article hopes to alleviate some of the mystery behind the agency
curtain.
FI: Many emerging filmmakers have no idea how to deal with an
agent until it is too late; what exactly does an agent do?
PM: Simplified, if we’re talking about
cinematographers specifically, an agent is a conduit between the
cinematographer who needs a job and producer who needs a DP [Director
of Photography] and the reverse - a producer who has a project
and needs a cinematographer and an agent who has a DP who is looking
for the right project.
Basically,
clients are the boss. Agents work for the clients, as opposed
to the other way around. There are a number of people in the agent
world who have that ass-backwards. The truth of agenting, in being
a conduit, in being the communication between two individuals
who either don’t know each other, or two individuals who
do know each other and have experience with each other and are
not comfortable making a deal with each other, the agent is there
to talk between them to keep everything clear.
Agents
are partners with their clients and clients are partners with
their agents. Because I was a producer for many years, in my particular
case, I’m also extremely sympathetic to the production side
as well, because there are often times, especially with younger,
less-experienced [clients]. And that has
nothing to do with talent or creativity. It has to do with practical
business experience. You wind up with clients from time
to time who have sort of a starry eyed view of how it’s
all going to go. So, in many cases, an agent is an equalizer,
one who factually represents their experience based on working
a multi-slate of clients about how indeed things go. How indeed
independents, studio pictures, studio picture with multiple studios
involved, independent companies who are tied to studios who are
being financed somewhere else. There are a jillion different aspects
of how a deal is made and how a person with talent is brought
to a person with a project with some budget, be it from no-budget
to gargantuan budget. In that process is a certain number of things
that are always certain and many, many things that can be handled
in many different ways. So, the agent’s job, in conjunction
with the client and in participation with the producer is to find
the best deal for the client based on what the production entity
can provide and remain participatory through the entire project.
That’s how I agent, you talk to other agents and they work
different ways.
FI:
That leads me to the next topic: you mentioned producers and I
didn’t realize that producers had agents. Also, could you
delve into who all in the industry you represent.
PM:
I specifically represent cinematographers and production designers
only. I was a producer, an executive producer, line producer,
so I have an extra sympathetic bone in my spine for production.
The reality of putting a project together really is that younger
(and older) cameramen have to be reminded that you’re one
of, on a small picture, a hundred people; on a large picture,
250 people. You’re one deal being made and you sort of have
to take in the whole picture. When you hear a number that’s
attached to a film, you have to take into account the whole number
based on the location, the actors above the line, the producers
and the directors being paid.
It’s
an ever-changing world. So yes, there are producers who have agents,
absolutely. A majority of which are line producers who are brought
in by studios once a picture is moving towards a green light.
I know a couple of heads of studios that have agents on their
roster. There are many consort relationships; I have many, many
of them myself, where I’m not actually collecting any money
and someone else is not paying any money, but in knowing each
other for many years, one uses the other, in equal quantity to
widen their net.
FI:
Who would not need an agent? I would assume that a production
assistant or a grip would not need an agent. Is that true?
PM:
Any person who’s comfortable
finding all of their own work doesn’t need an agent. There
are lots and lots of people who don’t need an agent if they
choose to not have one. The realities are that there are many,
many people who make deals all day long, like line-producers who
have lawyers that make their deals or agents that make their deals
because they don’t want to have to make their deals themselves.
FI:
In regards to making a deal, let's say that I’m working
on an independent feature and they send a huge contract. There's
no money involved, it's all deferred payment. Should I still get
a lawyer?
PM:
You should get one. You have to be very clear about what it is
that you’re signing.
FI:
OK, In terms of contracts with your clients…
PM:
I don’t have contracts with my clients. All of my clients
are my clients because they want to be. And any day they don’t
want to be, they’re free to leave. We have rules about how
that happens, like what they're holding on the books, so on and
so forth and I will tell you that it’s highly unusual. There
are very few agencies that don’t have contracts with their
clients. Contracts run, depending on how desperate the agency
is to sign the client, between one to three years. Oftentimes,
I feel that contracts are something that holds a client to an
agent when the client no longer wants to be there or the agent
no longer feels that they can do anything for the client but in
case something comes by, they’ll take the money. It’s
a very cynical thing to say, but in my opinion, it’s also
true. I have a little speech when I take on a client. It’s
a simple little speech. There are three things that you have to
know and you have to agree to. And if you can agree to the three
of those, you can get along fine. And it’s really simple:
No lying, no cheating and no stealing. That’s it - very
straightforward. I make an agreement; when I give my word, I give
my word. I expect a client when they’re giving their word,
they’re giving their word. I have never had the lack of
a contract cause me any problem and I have never lost a client
that I wanted to keep.
FI:
Where does the line between managers and agents blur and where
is it clear-cut?
PM:
The amount that they are legally allowed to charge.
FI:
I thought it was 10% each.
PM:
Nope. Managers can charge up to 15% because managers are managing
other aspects of their clients’ careers and agents charge
10%. The line is clearly blurred and I’m not even sure I’m
qualified to define the separation, but the reality of it for
me as an agent, I’m a different kind of agent than the agents
I know because my way of being an agent is total participation
with my clients. [With] other agents, if the phone rings they
answer it. If someone wants to hire you, you’ve got a job.
A small agency like mine will have built someone to a point where
then the large agency will try and swoop in and take them after
their career has moved to its next level. And at the same time
there are also clients who outgrow agencies, who perhaps feel
that the web isn’t wide enough or there’s some reason
they’re not getting what they want. They could be successful
and unsuccessful, both. Very successful clients can make a choice
to leave an agency that [has] been very successful for them because
they have some other aspect of their career they’re interested
in and that they don’t feel is being serviced. That’s
a legitimate choice as well.
FI:
How are smaller agencies more advantageous to a larger one and
vice versa?
PM:
I really don’t know the answer. I have turned down many
cinematographers who I knew were going to become great, powerful,
working cinematographers because I knew that our personalities,
our mix, would never be correct. That individual would not be
the person he could be with me because perhaps of idiosyncratic
behavior on his behalf, something that I objected to, something
that he couldn’t agree to, or a myriad of things. I have
been rejected by cinematographers I would have liked to represent
for a myriad of reasons, explained or unexplained, but I would
think that sometimes I have been rejected because of two things.
One being that it became clear in the interview that I would be
totally involved and they would be hearing from me and they’d
better like that. Two, another agent appealed to them more. I’ve
had many of those clients come back to me and say, “I’ve
made a mistake. I went to this other place and now I’m back.
Will you take me?” I’ve said no and yes, both. It
all has a lot to do with how they left. The thing is that there’s
midlife crisis that happens in cinematographer’s careers:
total new lawyer, new business manager, new agent, new wife, new
everything. So I need to change something, so I think I’ll
change my agent, business manager or I think I’ll change
my wife. There’s no one thing that creates or deletes relationships
with an agent. It’s a synergy that’s created when
personalities, personalities of company and the personality of
a career meet the human beings involved. If it works, great and
if it doesn’t, it doesn’t. There’s no right
and there’s no wrong to it.
FI:
How would you go about looking for new talent and how would new
talent approach you?
PM:
I look for new talent all the time. I have a couple of huge cameramen
and huge set designers. Then I have the next level [of clients]
which is about to be huge. Then I have a level where they’re
huge in one aspect of the industry and haven’t been discovered
in the other and trying to take them there. For example, they’re
working every day they want to work in commercials, but they’re
not able to break into features yet. Or they’re working
in features and would really like to work in commercials between
features, but they’re two separate industries. The crossover
is getting better and better all the time, but it was a lock out
a few years back when one did not mesh with the other. But more
and more, the industry is picking up those things which they find
attractive on either side.
The
commercial industry is a different kind of industry which works
on a different basis, where a feature is a long-term commitment
and a commercial is a short-term commitment. Some people work
their whole life only in commercials. Some people work their whole
life only in features or music videos or television. There are
many aspects to being a cinematographer and it’s becoming
easier than it has ever been to flow between all the groups of
production for a cinematographer than it has ever been. The problem
with the cinemagraphic pool at the moment is that it’s overloaded
for the amount of projects available for the dollar being spent.
When the cinematographer comes to a moment of recognition, the
caution is there. When someone is recognized and all of a sudden
everyone wants that someone that’s the moment that an agent
and a client work together to control the natural tendency to
become greedy. Because what one does if they cool off and they
have become very greedy, they put themselves out of business.
In my world, what one does when one becomes hot is chooses projects
rather than finances.
Now,
how young cinematographers should go about finding an agent is
to sit down with a list and call them all. First see who calls
them back. Second, make a meeting. You can’t make a meeting
without showing an agent a reel unless you have a project that’s
there and so obvious they’ll all be calling you. The reality
is that if you’re trying to be found, you must have a reel.
The reality of having a reel is to put on it, the best of what
you’ve done. In my world, I tell my younger feature clients
to not build a montage because the producer does not want to see
a lot of isolated frames. They want to see a scene that can be
shot from all angles, lit from all angles, and played from all
angles. They want to see the coverage. It’s fairly easy
to make a single beautiful shot or to have a single sequence of
shots. But the reality of having a scene that actually plays and
is well photographed is more difficult and much more advantageous
when trying to get someone’s attention. Someone who is trying
to work with an agent has to take the work that they have and
create for themselves the best reel that they can for the least
investment so they can survive beyond it. Normally, young independent
cinematographers are not rolling in dough. They have to be smart
about how they put a reel together because it’s expensive
to make a reel. If they’re smart about it and they don’t
try to over do it and show that they can do everything, because
you can’t do everything the first time out.
I
tell my clients sometimes when I’m trying to talk them into
a picture they’re not sure they really want to do, I say
you look at the bottom of anyone’s real resume that they
give you, their real resume, not their edited one, I don’t
care who it is and you’re going to find anywhere between
five and eleven shit-ass stupid pictures that they did. They have
no idea why they did them. They did them to get started the reality
of those things is that the people that you meet in those first
six or seven pictures, their careers go on too. And they remember
you and you remember them and that’s how a network is built.
Oftentimes, you’ll find connection where people met each
other. Usually, where people got their wife. [Laughs] It’s
really funny. The greatest thing that a cinematographer can be
doing is practicing his craft. And as long as he can practice
his craft and that someone is able to provide him the tools so
that he’s practicing his craft and not just fooling around,
there’s no story that’s not worth telling for me,
except pornography. But that’s a personal choice; I have
no interest in pornography. But
shooting a documentary about kids walking to school to shooting
a film, any film, there’s a story to be told. And through
the lens of a camera that story is being told in conjunction with
a director who has laid out and blocked out a way in which he
wants to tell the story in conjunction with a producer who’s
helped find the financing to create the opportunity for the actors
and the wardrobe [department], scripts supervisors, the sound
people, the teamsters, etc, all to be there.
Sometimes,
that looks like no money and sometimes it looks like they have
a little budget. Sometimes it looks like they have a little budget
and we want a bigger bite, so we’ll make some kind of back-end
deal. However, back-end deals in independent filmmaking are becoming
more and more difficult because it muddies the water when a studio
goes in to buy a picture. Their distribution and foreign sales,
etc. with that picture gets all convoluted. So unless the back-end
deal can be paid off by the purchase of the film, then studios
are not going to pick up the back-end deal on an independent film.
Rather, I’m not [saying] they’re not going to, but
it’s rare that they do, in my experience. This is just one
person’s experience, I’m not speaking for the industry.
FI: What made you sign the last talent you acquired? What about
their reel made you sign them?
PM: It’s a very individualized question that’s very
difficult to answer. I should take it to a general position, instead
of the last talent I signed. I only have forty clients and I probably
have another twenty-five really young clients that I talk to on
a regular basis at night and on the weekends. I can’t talk
to them during the day when it’s working time for the clients
I’m representing. Who I don’t represent and who I
give guidance to and who I hope at the time they need an agent
and want an agent, they’ll have created enough of a relationship
with me and me with them that they’ll want to work together.
But, that’s just me specifically. I don’t know a lot
of people who do it.
FI:
You said that you have forty clients, now is that just DPs or
DPs and production designers?
PM: DPs and production designers, about forty. I only have about
nine production designers. The rest of it is cinematographers.
FI:
Who are some of your clients?
PM: Well, I don’t think it’s appropriate because I
represent anywhere from Peter
Biziou to Derek Walski to Matty
Libatique who are all people that everyone knows. However,
in other veins I could give you another three names that you wouldn’t
recognize as well, but in their businesses, everybody knows their
names. I have a very varied client list which is based on, in
my opinion, talent. There are people that at times are extremely
successful and there are people at times where we can’t
get a break. And I mean we. What that is, is that you can never
know and you just keep trying. You just keep going for it as long
as you can bear it.
FI: Actually, that brings me to another point, which is budget.
It’s really hard to get on a project, especially when you’re
starting out, to get a reel going, or to get anything before you
can even think about getting a reel. So, what about shooting in
DV format? Do you object to that?
PM:
Do I object to it? Of course, not! It depends on whom you’re
showing it to, whether or not they object to it. There is a difference
for me, personally, for light which goes through something like
a negative, and light that stops at something else [like a CCD
on digital cameras]. We’re growing the next generation,
I believe, individuals who’ve grown up on Nintendo and whatever,
if they saw a classic film, wouldn’t really understand it.
Now, I’m not saying that’s negative or positive about
that, it’s just different. They live in a world which has
less dimensions, but is more static. It’s audio and less
video. It’s not depth of field, it’s a plane. It’s
going to be interesting in the next ten years to see what evolves
from that. All that has happened in visual effects and in the
manipulation of the image is, on one hand a miracle and on the
other an annoyance because it becomes confusing of who’s
in charge of the optical elements of a film. They’ll get
it all worked out. Someone has to collect the image.
FI: There should be a big revolution with Lucas and his 24p film,
Star Wars Episode II.
PM: Yeah, we’ll see how that goes. However, he did have
to go back to film at one point in his process. So it’ll
be interesting to see. The judge is out, but the reality is that
there is no more capable individual in the world to pull it off
than he and his cinematographer. It will be extremely interesting
to see how that turns out. There are so many new things; everybody’s
got a new camera. Every single camera manufacturer is joining
the digital revolution; some are coming later to the party than
others. It is a fact of life and it has been for a long time.
Now whether the general public knows that it’s been a fact
of life for a long is not really relevant in this conversation,
but the reality of it is that it has been there for a long time.
Every single solitary thing has its use and purpose. In some cases,
it’s funny, people go and do things in visual effects that
actually if the filmmaking world allowed, and there’s no
guilty party, people to have the time to properly prep for a film,
then and only then, would you see that there are things that can
be done in a camera more cost effectively than they can be done
in post [production]. The constant chant is, “Oh don’t
worry about it, we’ll fix it in post.” Well, why did
we do it wrong to begin with? Well, we did it wrong to begin with
in many instances because there wasn’t enough time to prepare
properly to do it in camera. Sometimes, it’s a mistake,
it’s a technical error, but in many cases, it wasn’t
prepped properly.
FI: You’ve touched upon this before, but if you can go in
depth by listing at least five things that a new artist should
do when approaching you and five things they should not do.
PM:
Oh these are so simple. I’m going to give you more than
five because I lived through the labor of this on a daily basis.
Know your own name, address, and telephone number and include
it with your reel.
Neatly
package your reel. If there’s chaos on the exterior of your
reel, there’s no doubt there’s going to be chaos on
the interior of your reel.
Do
not be overly persistent. Do not call ad nauseam. Remember,
you’re calling someone who’s already got a list of
clients; who’s trying to find them work if they’re
doing their job. However, if you don’t get a return call
on your first call, don’t give up.
If
somebody tells you that your work is shit, pay them no attention.
The reality is the numbers of people in the world who have become
great successes, having been told over and over and over again
that their work wasn’t appropriate are much larger than
those whose work is actually shit. And anyone who tells you that,
you should never call them again, because they’re obviously
an idiot.
This
is a human thing that I’ll say, you get all the way through
to getting a meeting, I spend the first ten or fifteen minutes
in a meeting with a cameraman who I can see is a wreck, trying
to relax them. It’s not ok for me to try and have a conversation
with someone about their work when they’re so wound up they
can’t think. They can’t think what to ask, they can’t
think what to say or do and they get in their car and drive away
and ten minutes later they think, “Oh man! I didn’t
ask this or that!" And
I tell every single person that leaves my office that the moment
is going to come when you get in your car and drive away and you
think of all these things that you didn’t ask, so call back
and ask them. Don’t not ask.
Be
clear about what it is that you’re doing. It’s like
in choosing a picture, clients, young clients say it’s because
of this it's because of that. There’s only one reason to
do a film, there’s only one. There’s no other reason.
The reason is that you believe in the material. And you believe
that you can add something to that written page, in conjunction
with the director, that will help tell that story. It doesn’t
matter how simplistic or complicated it is. That’s the only
reason to take that project. Money doesn’t mean anything.
Time doesn’t mean anything. All the other blocks that you
put in your way, they don’t mean anything. The thing that
means something is whether or not you believe in the material
and all the rest of it will come together. But no one should ever
take something, that there isn’t some aspect of cinematography
for them, that will help deliver the story through the director’s
vision within the producer’s budget without murdering the
actors.
Those
are the things to do. The things not to do is obviously the reverse
of those: have a sloppy, horrible mess; call 25,000 times a day,
because what you become is a pain in the ass and then no one wants
anything to do with you.
If
it were me, now this is just me again, I would say to myself:
"What kind of an agent do I want? Not who’s work I
want to emulate." Because it’s so silly, I sit and
listen to people talk to me. All cinematographers have mentors,
whether they’re personal mentors or they’re the films
that they love the photography of. The reality is [that] that
cinematographer they’re in love with, either as a mentor
or they’re an admirer of, did his own work to get there.
Emulating is complimentary. Copying is plagiarism. You should
have original ideas. And those original ideas can be based on
others’ work. But copying, I mean straight copying…
I’ve had guys come into my office, sit down with me, show
me their reel, and tell me honestly in advance that it’s
all spec [speculative]. I watch it and I can see that it’s
all spec, but I can go into my reel room, pull two reels off the
shelf and say you copied this one from this and this one from
that. Is that not true? And they embarrassingly say yes.
Know
where you’re going before you go. Know who [the agents]
represent before you go.
Don’t
ever plagiarize. It happens a lot. When you’re young and
starting out, there’s this level of egocentric confidence
that you do have and there’s a confidence that you don’t
have. No one has that when they’re twenty.
Experience
is an amazing thing, and for me personally as an individual, I
found mentors who taught me well. Many young cinematographers
I meet these days have never worked practically in a camera department.
They don’t know the loader’s job. They don’t
know an AC’s
[assistant cameraman] job. They don’t know an operator’s
job, but they’re now a DP. Some guys can get away with it.
Most can’t. The reality is that the cinematographer is the
top man below-the-line.
It’s his job to know, not only the jobs of his crew, but
those of his grips and electricians. The great cinematographer,
the ones who are successful and still manage to crank out incredible
looking film, know everyone’s job or make it their business
to understand the complexities of the jobs that other people on
the set do. They’re not the only egg being fried.
For
a young cinematographer, the best experience he can get is learn
the timing of a set. If I ask for such and such. What is the time-frame,
with the crew that I have and so on and so forth, that it is going
to take for that to appear? Is it going to take five minutes or
is it going to take fifty? Because that affects the film as well.
If I know that wearing prosthetic makeup takes two hours for the
actor to be ready, what can I do with that time that the director
has not already allotted to me to do something else because he
is waiting on the actor and the actor is not the only thing we’re
shooting. The reality is to learn, understand, and become one
with - which almost sounds spiritual, but true - what the actual
pacing of a set is. How long is it going to take somebody to do
something? Then look at somebody else and see how long it takes
them to do something. Some of those things are going to be idiosyncratic.
There will be those things that are that individual’s abilities
or lack of abilities.
We
all know there is a certain amount of time when you leave your
house from the back door, to get everything you need, get out,
get around to your car, get it unlocked and get into it, sit down,
turn it on, warm it properly, and then to get it into reverse.
That’s a natural occurrence. On every set, there are natural
time frames. Then there are exorbitant time-frames. Then there
are demands for time frames to be shortened. One can’t take
advantage of a time-frame or propel a time-frame if one doesn’t
know what the average amount of time is it should take to do such
and such an activity. So, studying in any way that you can, the
pacing of a set, and those things are completely influenced by
who else is on the set with you and what their positive and negative
aspects are. But there is a norm.
I
strongly suggest to all the cinematographers I work with who are
totally concerned about who their key grip, gaffer, AC, so on
and so forth. The other people they should be terribly concerned
about is the First
AD [Assistant Director] and the UPM
[Unit Production Manager] because they are the people that are
going to make or break you after the director. If you have a really
good AD, you can get through a day and your crew is still alive
and you are still alive and everyone else on the set is still
alive because there is an AD who knew how to take advantage of
the time.
Also,
the UPM can schedule things and could get them in and off the
clock so you could have them, you could use them, and then you
could get rid of them so that they didn’t cost a lot. It
is always a responsibility of the cinematographer to remember
that equipment is expensive. If he can plot his course with the
right director, AD, UPM, and the crew, there’s additional
equipment available if they know that they can get it in and get
it out. If you think you are going to just order this giant package
and it is going to sit there for twelve weeks while you do a film,
you’re kidding yourself. These things are very important
to think about.
Another
thing to remember is not over-ordering, which is a mistake. More
and more cinematographers over-order these days because they know
that they are going to be knocked down. Well, it’s stupid.
I’m not saying to under-order, either. I’m saying
know what you’re doing and explain that to a UPM. There’s
not a UPM in the world that I know of that if you can explain
why you need it, they’ll do everything that he or she can
to get it for you. If you say, "Just because. I want it because...,"
there’s not a UPM in the world that will give it to you.
So you give me your reasons for the piece of equipment and I’ll
give it to you. Maybe because, possibly we might need it? Forget
it! It’s not going to happen, budgets are too tight. There’s
nothing wrong with a UPM that says no. The UPM is doing his job
within the boundaries of what he has been charged with whoever
is the production MD [Managing Director] whoever it is, the studio,
the independent, or his mom. That’s his job to bring that
picture in on budget along with everyone else that is there. That
is everyone’s job.
It’s
the film business. It’s not a film arts and craft show.
It’s not the feature film playtime. The word is business
and it is a business. Yes, it’s artistic, creative, fantastic,
and fun, yes, yes, yes it’s all those things, but in the
end the bottom line is that it’s a business. In a business,
one has to be responsible. You don’t go and buy a Mercedes
if you’re working as a PA [production assistant], unless
mom and dad have money and they’re buying it for you. You
look at the material you’ve been given. You talk to the
man who has been guiding you, which is the director. You interface
with the Line
Producer, UPM, First AD, whoever those entities are and you
block it out and tell them, here’s what I need on this day,
this day and this day. Then you prepare for the unexpected without
going overboard.
FI:
You said you work very closely with your clients. Can you elaborate
on that?
PM:
That’s just me personally and I don’t know what other
agents do. I don’t want to make it seem like I’m right
and other agents are wrong or that I’m stupid and they’re
smart. The reality is that an agent is someone who is representing
you. They’re your touchstone to the business. At the same
time, you as an individual will have to be working for yourself.
You can’t sit at home and wait for the phone to ring. You’ve
got to go out and network too. Everybody is networking all the
time, that’s how the industry works. It’s a shared
experience. Call
up an agent and say, “I’d like for you to be the agent.
You do all the work and find all the jobs,” you’re
kidding yourself. There’s no agent in the world that can
tell you that they can do that.
There
is a trickle-down effect with huge agencies where they represent
above and below-the-line. They can package deals. Mr. Ovitiz used
to do it in an extremely successful manner. However, it doesn’t
always work. It depends on how much individual attention you personally
feel you need. And it is incumbent upon the client to remember
that each time they call their agent during working hours, whatever
the duration of that call is, is time taken from themselves and
everyone else on the client-list who needs a job because the agent
is busy talking to them about something else. My clients know
that I’m available twenty-four seven. If they feel like
they just want to talk to me, then call me at night or on the
weekends because during the week, I’m trying to find them
a job. At the same time, if they’re having a crisis in their
life or if they’re having a crisis in their career - all
of a sudden they’ve gone to
deep and ugly depths - it’s free for them to call.
There are other agents in the office; they can take that call.
If a client needs you, you should be there for the client.
FI:
Ok, if someone starts reading this and says forget about becoming
a DP or a Production Designer or what have you, I want to become
an agent. What draws you into this line of work?
PM:
I started off as a producer for a trillion years and my parents
were ill and I could see what was coming at the end of what I
was producing, which was commercials and it didn’t look
all that attractive to me anymore. I was going to go back to Vermont
and pick apples; I didn’t care. I had to go deal with my
parents. A very good and persistent agent in town hounded me like
a dog and he said that you should be an agent. I just thought
he was out of his mind. The last thing that I wanted to be was
an agent, but he wouldn’t take no for an answer. Finally,
I told him I couldn’t do it. I had to go home and take care
of my parents. He asked how long that was going to take and I
gave him a time frame. He said that was fine and sign a contract
before you leave and come back and be an agent. I thought what
the hell, I’ll do this and see how it works. I
went home and dealt with my parents. After about six weeks of
being home I thought thank god I have somewhere to go. You can’t
go back. You have to always go forward. I blessed that agent everyday,
even though I left his agency, for pushing me to become an agent.
I
grew up in a large Irish-Catholic family and had spent my entire
life bartering as a child and then became a producer, which is
the flipside of being an agent. It was as natural as rain. I love
being an agent. I can go to any set at any time and as soon as
it gets boring, I get to leave. [Laughs] Truth of the matter is
that I don’t get out to as many sets as I’d like to
or as my client would like me to and that’s simply because
my time is better spent on the phone. If they’re working
on the night or on the weekends, I try to get out. I get out less
than I used to get out simply because I’m running a bigger
ship these days. I just moved my office into a bigger location
and I have other agents in my office and my goal is to be able
to shift off some of the work and take on some more clients and
be able to get out more. That’s just my personal goal.
FI: How many agents do you have and how many do you have in your
company all together?
PM:
Ten people total and three of them are agents.
FI:
How many hours do you work during a typical week?
PM:
A normal agent? I have no idea. I work as many hours as it takes.
I overwork; I’m a junkie. I’m not married and I don’t
have kids. My clients are my kids, so the reality is that I’m
available to them all the time no matter how experienced or inexperienced
they are. At the moment where I’m over the top, I don’t
answer the phones. It doesn’t happen very often.
FI:
You mentioned that networking is a strong characteristic of a
successful agent. What are some other factors?
PM:
I think honesty. I think my reputation out there in the business,
I’ve heard it repeated back to me many times, that I’m
tough, but I’m fair. I’m happy to carry that moniker.
I’m no pussy, the reality is that I’m sure I have
people out there who think I am Attila the Hun and there are people
out there who adore me, just like everybody else in the world.
The reality is that you pick your battles. I remember once I had
a client who told me, and this is exactly how he told me, that
a particular producer had told him that he thought I was bipolar.
And my client's response to that was, “Hmmm, that tells
me a lot about you. Because if she did something bipolar, you
must have done something really bizarre." [Laughs] I just
thought that was the greatest answer I’ve ever heard in
my life.
The
thing is that people find each other and they like working together.
I’m lucky to have a big group of people that I really like
working with: young ones, new ones, old ones... it’s fun.
When someone new comes into the company, they don’t quite
have [the experience or knowledge]. No one has had the time (and
again not making anybody wrong because I don’t think that
there is anybody wrong anywhere). But they haven’t had time
to really explain how this [industry] actually works. I will stop,
and if they are an interested student, and give them the benefit
of whatever information I have on the subject matter. If they
get it, great. And if they don’t, great. But I try, because
I believe that we’re all in the business together. There’s
no antagonism between the talent side, and I include cinematography,
and the producing side. We’re all in the same soup and it
takes a leap of faith on everybody’s part to make a film
come out successful. When one does you feel pretty good about
it.
Agents
are really, really important when the deal is being made and then
they’re sort of forgotten. [Laughs] Then you may not hear
from your client, like in features, until there’s trouble.
Ok, there’s some trouble so now we got to ring some chimes
here to figure out what’s going on. And then there are other
clients to whom I talk to every day. I have one of my clients
who is my best friend and I’m godmother to his child and
his wife is my best friend. It’s just all is what it is.
It’s human beings interfacing with other human beings. The
practicality of it all, for a young cinematographer, is the ability
to be patient, smart, constantly networking, constantly learning.
It’s the ability to propel yourself forward with whatever
assets you have working with you; to be humble and to be righteous.
It sounds a little bit like the speech from the top of the mountain,
but honest to god, it flows out it flows in.
FI: What are some goals that you have not achieved yet in your
career?
PM: I’m not saying. [Laughs] You know the truth is, my career
is about my client’s career, so the truth is as successful
as they are is as successful as I am. And sometimes that looks
like I’m having a baby. It has nothing to do with cinematography.
Sometimes that looks like them taking a vacation. There are so
many aspects to the whole thing that for me, I am pretty happy.
There are lots and lots of things out there that I would probably
like to do and at the moment, I can’t think of any of them
that is burning in my heart or anything like that. I love the
daily mash of what is going to happen today - the mystery of it
all. And that’s a really good thing for a cinematographer
to also keep in his pocket, that is the absolute expectation that
something brilliant will occur right before his very eyes.
FI:
What are some of the drawbacks that an agent would face that are
probably not seen or anticipated.
PM: The biggest drawback is not being able to find a client a
job. That’s the biggest drawback for me - the biggest heartbreak
and I will keep trying. I will stick with a guy, a righteous guy,
forever. He’ll have to leave me. I won’t leave him.
Sometimes it just doesn’t happen. But certainly for me,
the most difficult part is when someone you know is really good
and, for whatever reasons that conspire, that person doesn’t
get to work. It’s just heartbreaking.
FI:
What are some of the biggest obstacles to becoming an agent especially
the initial stages?
PM: You have to simply learn the rules. The funny thing for me,
is that I learned the rules, and the rules change constantly,
so keeping up with the rules and knowing what you’re talking
about. You have to be elastic enough in your ability to what you’re
talking about to leave room for a miracle, that you can be hit
by lightning and survive.
Also,
[it is important] to be elastic enough to look at a situation
and not judge it solely on the finance. For me, the financing
of a project starts with the material for my client. I read every
script that any of my clients are considering; because there is
no way that I can guide them if I haven’t read it. There’s
no way whatsoever. It’s a hell of a lot of extra work, but
the reality is I don’t know how else to practically talk
to them. So the truth is, I’ll never be an agency with a
thousand clients, because there aren't that many hours in a day
and I’m a hell of a fast reader. That’s not my interest.
At
other agencies, they do it a different way. For me it’s
just an intimate experience. I would never ever make a decision
on a script. I’ve never allowed a client to ask me, “What
did you think?” before he has told me what he has thought.
Because the reality of the situation is that I have no idea what
may or may not interest him. I’ve been surprised as hell
by clients where I read it and thought, “I’m definitely
not the audience for this.” But the client is ecstatic.
What do you know, the next thing is that it’s a huge film
and everybody is excited about it and thinking that I must be
getting old. The most dangerous part of the business for anyone,
whether it’s a cinematographer, agent, producer, business
manager, PA, or director, is ego - ego and positioning.
For
me, the world is a prism. Which way are we going to bend a light
through this particular deal? What is it? How is it? How are we
going to do it? And there are some times when I absolutely put
my foot down and say, “No! You are not going to have my
client on those terms,” because I know there are better
terms and I know you can afford them. And there are other times
when I tell my client, “Can we do this one for free? They’ve
got no money, but it’s definitely worth it.” At the
same times I’ve had one of those blow up in my face just
this week.. A client found a project and decided he wanted to
do that project and it was a bad match and he left the film. It
was heartbreaking because he was doing it for free. Being on a
bad match where it doesn’t work when you’re doing
it for free is sad. It’s really sad. Now, these are short-films
which have no money and need two or three weeks of somebody’s
time. I’ve had another client of mine who did that, who’s
a hell of a cameraman, but I just can’t find him a good
job, where he just went in and wowed them. He was doing it for
free. You do that. There are many things where you do it [for
free] for who you’ll meet when you’re young. You just
have to have a way to eat at the same time. You have to be responsible.
FI:
When did you become an agent and when did you start your own agency?
PM: I’m not really sure when I became an agent. I became
an agent probably around nine years ago. I started my own agency
about five years ago.
FI:
What are some of the horror stories that you’ve had?
PM: Oh god! The worst horror stories are when someone gets hurt.
That’s the worst horror story. You never want someone to
get hurt. There’s no shot in the world worth someone getting
hurt. The second type of horror story is where the people that
you knew in production prior to the filming of the picture, turn
into someone else when the picture actually begins to shoot. That’s
a horror story. They are all perfect and lovely in prep and everybody
is ready to go and all of a sudden, the individual - whoever they
are, the director, producer, it could be anybody, but it’s
usually those two entities which can drive you off a film as a
cinematographer - turns into somebody you don’t recognize
anymore. It’s very sad to be tied up in a contract. And
I was once actually in a contract with a particular director with
a very popular cameraman that I had, made it actually as a verbal
agreement and wound up with it becoming part of the contract,
that should this director become his reputation in shooting that
my client would withdraw and that would satisfy his guarantee.
It actually happened and he was in Europe. I took him off the
picture. It was bad. I took him off the picture and he had forgotten
that I had made that deal, he was so happy that he brought back
a rug from Morocco. [Laughs]
The thing is that horror stories exist. The thing that I am more
likely to emphasize, repeat, or propagate are the positive stories.
The positive stories are the ones where no one gets hurt, that
people are kind to each other in great adversity, that a family
is created out of a film crew. It becomes devastating sometimes
when the crew travels together and when the film is over, everybody
is back in their life. And these people you were spending twelve
to sixteen hours a day with everyday for six to eight months are
all of a sudden gone. People work really hard, my designers especially,
to try and keep their crews together. It’s really hard to
do that because there are a lot of starts and stops in the major
film business where actors fall out.
You
know actors greenlight
pictures. That’s who greenlights pictures, nobody else greenlights
pictures. It’s about actors in the studio system. What actor
can we afford to put in this picture, who will accept it, to get
us the biggest box-office? That’s what it is. That’s
what greenlights a film. Having a really good director, producer,
and studio are important. And a really good script is most important
and I shame myself by not saying that first. The script comes
first. The development period is so long. You think about it as
a cinematographer. Say you get involved early on a picture. It
will be chitchat for eight or nine months before the picture goes,
but that development group, that director, if he has been attached
to that project for any length of time, has been at it for a year
and a half. The writer of that script has been at it for four
to five years. This is a lot of someone’s life. The reality
of it is that some cinematographers are so under-educated that
they come to the picture believing it started with them. And they
have no, absolutely no sensitivity to how many other people have
been involved with it for so much longer than they have been involved.
A
smart cinematographer, and I happily represent many of those,
gets involved at no salary very early on pictures, on an as-available
basis to create an opportunity for the best possible film to be
made. And working relationships are tested on a daily basis once
the film is in production because the clock is running. The minute
that clock starts to tick, everyone’s a wreck. If you start
not making your [tasks, you become one of the] expendable people
on film. I, unfortunately, represent both of those people: DPs
and production designers. Those are the people who get fired because
that brings the whole show to a halt, legitimately to a halt.
It’s
a terrible thing when a cinematographer gets fired. It’s
terrible for him. It’s heart-breaking for the people that
have to fire him. Sometimes he’s fired legitimately because,
whatever, the synergy isn’t there and sometimes he’s
fired as a sacrifice, so the rest of the film can go forward,
because it stops the clock. For me, the most positive thing about
being in the industry is being a partner with all phases of production.
Being a partner with creative individuals who have either a singular
or collective vision who managed to get that to the big screen
no matter what the adversity. And there is a minefield of adversity
out there. You learn with time and experience, which is why people
should do as much work as they can and [forget about] the dollars.
With the time and experience, comes also the ability to solve
a problem that an inexperienced person would find insurmountable.
It’s
compromise. Filmmaking is a compromise. It’s making the
best of whatever situation is presented, as fast as possible,
without giving up the continuity of your film. So those are the
positive parts of the industry. Plus, there’s a lot of luck.
And the food’s good... [laughs] usually.
FI: Are there any good books to gain knowledge to become an agent?
PM: Oh, I couldn’t read books! You know what happened to
me? I went to work at a fairly big agency with a very good reputation
and extremely good clients. As the only agent there who did that
particular aspect of the business - for whatever reasons, I will
never be able to determine the reasons - left in a very short
period of time. All of a sudden I had a slate of clients to deal
with by myself and I just did it. I was helped by the fact that
I produced; I mean it wasn’t a mystery to me. Coming to
agencies from producing, you’ve been used to being the boss.
When you become an agent, the first thing you have to realize
is that you are not the boss. The boss is the client. I learned
that really quickly. I have an agent with me right now that I
have to keep reminding because she’s been a producer for
so long that you don’t get to make that decision for the
client. You don’t choose it. He does or he doesn’t.
You give him the facts and you let him choose. You don’t
make the decision for him, no matter how stupid the deal sounds.
It’s up to the client; they are in charge. It’s their
career, not yours. No matter how wrong you think he is even if
he passes on something - I’ve got one client I schedule
his work between dance recitals, baseball games, family vacations,
and church groups, and whatever. You know what? He’s a damn
fine cinematographer, so I’m able to do it. His family takes
priority and I’m a big supporter of that. He’s good
enough to where he gets away with it. Somebody else wouldn’t
be able to.
FI: What are your thoughts on film festivals for breaking into
the industry?
PM:
The pool is so huge. The industry has gone from being this man-behind-the-curtain
Wizard of Oz type of thing is what the film industry really was.
It was behind this curtain and it was bigger than life thing and
anyone involved in it was bigger than life. It has become much
more pragmatic. People are much more familiar with the elements
of filmmaking. They’re not as good about learning the business
of filmmaking. You look at a film and say, “Oh they had
a box-office of $120 million! They’re rich!” Well
the reality of the situation is, how many films have that production
entity made that didn’t make their money back? How much
did they pay? The growth industry in filmmaking, the aspect of
filmmaking that’s getting the bigger piece of the budget,
is the selling of the film - marketing. That is the growth industry:
positioning the pictures. Do you know why? Because there are so
many pictures out there and there are only so many screens. When
you buy those screens, you better make sure that those films that
you put in there make it profitable for the guy who owns the screens.
Because on the next round, he won’t be buying your pictures,
he’ll be buying somebody else’s.
Marketing
is unbelievable! And the tie-in between music industry and filmmaking.
The billing block of a feature film is onscreen for most cases
for a picture that is being marketed to a younger audience for
less time than the names of the artists whose records are tying
into that picture. Watch your television. Watch the advertising.
And there’s all kinds of collaborative efforts, like HBO’s
Behind the Scenes, or First-takes or First-looks, or whatever
where filmmaking is going on when filmmaking is going on. Then
you get the behind-the-scenes of the making of a film. It’s
the promotion of the film.
It’s
also getting the actor to get out there and get on the rounds.
They’ve done this in the past, but more so now than ever.
And that’s the real selling of the film. That’s the
growth industry. That’s where a hell of a lot of the budget
is going these days. A lot of people don’t understand that.
Young cinematographers don’t encompass the spherical ball
that a film is. It’s not just about the way it is shot.
There are so many other aspects to it and a lot of costs involved
for producers - both in personal well-being and in financial fright.
There are many tremendously successful films and there are a much
larger share of nowhere as near successful films - films that
don’t make their money back. That’s not true, that’s
a lie. I don’t think there’s a picture in the world
that doesn’t make its money back anymore with home rentals
and foreign films and so on and so forth. I think all films make
their money back. I think they do eventually.
It
should be interesting now, I don’t know about you, but I
get about 688 channels. I’m sitting there going holy god!
I’m into BBC America these days. That’s my favorite
network. We are overloaded with visuals and there is not a story
that hasn’t been told. The truth is in how it’s captured
with the collaboration, here’s another thing that we didn’t
talk about at all.
There
are many best friends that a DP can have, but outside his department,
the best friend that a DP can have is the production designer.
That is the person that a cinematographer has to be very careful
about. A production designer can put a cinematographer in a ditch
out of sheer stupidity or can save his ass through brilliance.
A production designer is a key individual in the world of a cinematographer.
FI: Is that why you chose those two to represent?
PM:
You know, they kind of chose me. Cinematography, definitely. When
I was a producer, I was a lab rat. I’ve always been interested
in the visual appearance of things, of filmmaking. The production
designers sort of found me and I liked them; they’re interesting
people. Production designers are artists, but they’re also
pragmatists and cinematographers are clearly artists, but they
are also businessmen.
The
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4705 Laurel Canyon Blvd
Los Angeles, CA 91607
(818) 753-6300
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