To Succeed in This Town, Be Your Own Best Agent

Trying to get an agent is like trying to get a bank loan; a bank will lend you money only when you can prove you don’t need it.

I was an unknown commodity when I arrived in Hollywood as an aspiring writer in 1981. But agents like proven clients who will make money for them. John Rappaport, formerly a writer-producer on “MASH,” suggested that I contact the Writers Guild of America West, which sent me its literary agency sheet. There in alphabetical order was a listing of Hollywood agents, with what I thought was an especially helpful annotation indicating those who were taking new clients. I called a number of them and got the same response: “We’re not taking new clients right now.”

While sitting in Union Station a few months later, discouraged and holding a return ticket home, I opened a piece of mail. An agent had responded affirmatively to my form letter shotgunned to listings in ZIP Codes 90210 and 90027. I tore up my ticket. Now, surely, success was just around the corner.

Excited, I showed my agent’s letter to veteran TV writer Phil Davis, who said he’d never heard of the agency and, besides, he didn’t like the address. It was a building at Hollywood and Vine.

During the next few months I did more legwork for myself than any agent ever would have done. I naively assumed that I could sit back and concentrate on writing while the agent would do all the hard selling. But it turned out that if any contacts were going to be made, I’d have to make them myself. So I got in touch with studios and production companies on my own. Most people assume you can’t make any headway in Hollywood without an agent, but in fact, the studios and production companies are polite and accommodating. At some point in every conversation I was told, “Have your agent send over the script.” Which I did. Which I thought was all there was to it. Which there is, if your agent is with ICM, CAA or William Morris. Which mine wasn’t.

Not only was I low man in the Hollywood pecking order, so was my agent. Through another friend who’d written and produced a made-for-TV movie, I got lucky and moved up from a third-tier to a second-tier agent. It didn’t make any difference--nothing got sold--but at least the agency had some name recognition.

Through the intervention of a friend I was able to get Tom Patchett, producer of the sitcom “Alf,” to read a spec script I’d cowritten. Got it into his hands without the help of an agent, even got an enthusiastic letter from Patchett’s production company that it was interested in “possibly producing your script.” It didn’t come to pass, and my cowriter is convinced that it would have if we’d had a good agency going to bat for us.

I came that close to breaking into show business.

Years later, I’m still a scriptwriter manque, agent-less, struggling to land that first big Hollywood deal. There are a few irons in the fire as I write this, any one of which could ignite. I’ve been through four agents, none of whom was big league enough to help my career. But this is Hollywood, and I’ve learned how the system works. Anything can happen for anyone at any time.

It’s just a matter of time before I get my script produced, become a known commodity--and then I’ll be in a position to get a good agent.