Thursday, August 6, 2009

The Absence - And Triumphant Return

Note: I have switched over from www.importanthollywoodagent.com to this blogger page. My Mac died…it’s a long story that I’ll put in another post.

I have been absent for over a year. I am sorry, but it will not happen again. Let me explain myself…

Optioning blogs was the new thing a year ago. Obviously, my blog had “value” and people wanted to turn it into a book. I started this blog to educate, but once people started making offers, I realized I had true talent as a writer. It feels good to be both and artist and part of the corporate cycle that destroys artists.

Being a lit agent, I created fake buzz about this blog. Apparently people like to read about the workings of a Hollywood power player. I got an amount in the low six figures as an advance, with percentage of the actual sales.

Then the economy fell apart. The book never went to press… it was never finished actually. It’s funny how quickly you can spend 6 figures, even when living cheaply. Bottle service once a week? I might as well be selling Chiclets in Tijuana.

The question that I’ve been asked is “why didn’t you just go back to your job.” Well… I “burned a bridge.”

After the option sale, I realized I needed time to switch from spectacular literary agent to writer. I needed to quit my job but wasn’t sure how to break it to my boss. I knew that once my career took off, I would have writing job after writing job or I could just live off the royalties of my book, like JK Rowling.

It was 10:45 AM on a Wednesday last summer. My boss had been a real douche bag. He told me that he was getting some “troubling” stories from some of the assistants. Long story short, we had a big blow up and I stormed out.

He said, “I’ll keep a position open in the mail room when you fail. Maybe you can work your way up to assistant by the end of the year, but only if you do good work.”

I told him, “I fucked your wife last night… too bad she wasn’t half the lay your daughter was” (neither of which was true but really fun to say). Bridge. Burned.

So that was that. I got my bonus, but used it up. Then I got unemployment, which was nice, it paid for a couple meals at Nobu each week. Thanks, taxpayers.

So after some changes in agency structures, I was able to move to another big agency down the street. I’m back in the lit world, agenting again.

Know this fans. I’m back. I will never leave you again… unless this blog gets optioned again. I’m still listening to offers.

And I’ll have you know, my former assistant has moved up to Jr. Agent and has a grudge against me. It’s on.

1 comment:

  1. Excellent, nice blog ... I'm linking right now as we speak (tho' my blog is on its annual summer hiatus while I finish a project, it will be active soon, by Labor Day) ...

    Hey, you gonna keep writing, bro? It's hard not to when you love it, right?

    ReplyDelete