SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA JOB MARKET : Stalking That Elusive Job in Show Business

In the everyday world people look for work. In Hollywood, they hunt it down like prey.

William Morris Agency President Jerry Katzman knows all about that. He had just begun a golf game recently when his caddy revealed that he was an aspiring comic and screenwriter. Before long he’d pressed Katzman to read his script and view his shtick on tape.

After nine holes, Katzman gave up the game and fled as if from a predator in a teen-age horror movie.

Most established people in Hollywood have had similar experiences. Martin Scorsese’s film “King of Comedy,” in which a comic finally “makes it” by kidnapping a talk show host, may have been a piece of broad satire. But industry executives, accustomed to pestering by waiters, mechanics, janitors and relatives, could easily relate.

Those on the inside have always been greatly outnumbered by those looking in, and the balance has only tilted further as studio cost-cutting has left more writers, actors, technicians and executives out of work.

“I get hit up something like 10 to 20 times a day by people in the business who have recently lost their jobs,” said Peter Dekom, a leading entertainment lawyer.

Dekom has these suggestions for those who remain committed to Hollywood careers: People with executive ambitions should start early, since Hollywood has a reputation for being distrustful of outsiders. On the creative side, Dekom said, graduates of major film schools often have a leg up. He recommends that would-be screenwriters complete at least four scripts before seeking out an agent in order to prove the consistency of their work.

“Who you know” still counts for an awful lot. Hollywood’s personnel rosters are littered with familiar surnames. Producer Richard Zanuck is the son of legendary 20th Century Fox mogul Darryl Zanuck. Actor Tony Goldwyn and Paramount executive John Goldwyn are the grandsons of another legend, Samuel Goldwyn. Alan Ladd Jr., son of the late actor Alan Ladd of “Shane” fame, now heads MGM-Pathe Communications Co.

The proverbial mail room, where such Hollywood power brokers as Creative Artists Agency Chairman Michael Ovitz, Fox Inc. Chairman Barry Diller and record mogul David Geffen got started, is another common entry point.

But the competition is stiff. Modern-day mail rooms are filled with lawyers, investment bankers and MBA’s running errands in Armani suits, all for the chance to hang an agent’s shingle on their door one day. The three major talent agencies--Creative Artists, International Creative Management and the William Morris Agency--still rely heavily on the mail room as a training ground. Katzman said 90% of Morris’ agents came up that way.

Morris’ mail room applicants are interviewed by five agents. “Assuming that you get approved, you go into the mail room,” Katzman explained. “From there you get promoted to dispatch, then to an agent’s desk as an assistant. From that point on it’s up to the assistant to prove himself and hope there is an opening. Promotions depend on openings and need.

“Some people go into the mail room and find they don’t want to be agents,” he added. “But through contacts they’ve made in the industry, they go into (other entertainment) jobs.”

Why do people put themselves through such a demanding apprenticeship? As the saying goes: If you have to ask, you’ll never know. Money, glamour, power and the opportunity to make movies are four good reasons, not to mention the chance at a window seat at Spago someday.

Even in the face of economic woes, Hollywood continues to offer head-spinningly high sums to people at all levels of the business. Junior executives can command hundreds of thousands of dollars a year. Talent fees have spiraled into the stratosphere.

But the mail room isn’t the only entry level course. MCA Inc. Chairman Lew R. Wasserman got his start in show business as a theater usher. Columbia Pictures Chairman Frank Price was in CBS’ story department. Alan Ladd Jr. made B-movies in Europe. Actor Harrison Ford was a studio carpenter.

More than 230,000 people work in film and related service industries, according to the California Film Commission. The $12-billion-a-year business is among California’s top 15 industries. It’s also the country’s third-largest generator of trade surplus, behind aerospace and defense.

Perhaps partly due to its connections-oriented hiring practices, Hollywood has never been known as a land of opportunity for women and minorities.

For women, though, the picture appears to be improving. However important it may be in popular imagination, the casting couch doesn’t play a major role in hiring, although actresses often complain that women who aren’t gorgeous needn’t apply. And one recent study showed that women now hold 30% of a wide range of middle management jobs in TV and film. Columbia Pictures employed the highest percentage of women, 38%. But no studios are headed by women.

The outlook for minorities is cloudier. Minority filmmakers enjoyed a breakthrough year with such films as “Boyz ‘N’ the Hood” and “Jungle Fever.” But last year the Beverly Hills/Hollywood chapter of the National Assn. for the Advancement of Colored People issued a report suggesting that opportunities for blacks were better 10 years ago.

To deal with the increasingly complex demands of the international marketplace, Hollywood companies occasionally turn to executive recruiting firms to help fill management positions. William D. Simon, managing director of Korn/Ferry International’s entertainment division, said marketing experts are especially sought after.

“The primary focus now is on non-entertainment industry backgrounds for marketing positions,” Simon said. “There’s a greater need for marketing people. But in (lower level) jobs, it’s still a matter of who you know.”

A personnel director at a major studio, who asked that his name not used, said his bosses make hiring easy.

“Most of the people on the filmed entertainment side are pretty familiar with who is out there,” he said. “And they usually come up with a list of names for any given position.”

Others come through less conventional channels. One of ICM’s mail room workers is Cecil Cox, a Harvard graduate and former Detroit Lion who came to Hollywood after an injury forced him out of football.

Dennis Petroskey, vice president of corporate communications for Fox Inc. is the former director of communications for the Michigan Republican Party. His case proves that blind applications are not always a waste of time. Petroskey moved to Los Angeles to become a screenwriter, ended up working in public relations and was hired at Fox after sending in an unsolicited application for the No. 2 spot in his office.

Like the talent agencies, many of the major film studios have training programs for entry-level executives. One of the most sophisticated is run by Sony Pictures Entertainment, which each year hires 10 people for a two-year management associates program.

Kimberly Marteau, 32, has been in the program about 10 months. She formerly worked on the national advance staff of the Michael Dukakis presidential campaign, has a law degree and once appeared on the TV show, “Welcome Back Kotter.”

Sony associates go through six-month rotations in various departments and at the end of the program are considered for permanent jobs. Marteau has worked in business affairs for Columbia Television and in the office of the senior vice president of TriStar Pictures, both Sony units.

“The studios run this town,” she said. “I believe it’s very important to see that side of the industry and be on that side of the industry. A program like this offers an opportunity to see many sides of a studio.”

In the end, however, the only side of the studio that most people see is the outside. Los Angeles is littered with people who have little but frustration to show for years of banging on Hollywood’s door.

David DuBos arrived in Los Angeles in 1983 with a communications degree from Loyola University in New Orleans. At 30, he’s still trying to sell his first script.

“I was naive,” said DuBos. “I though they would welcome me with open arms. I’d made films in college. But that’s not the way it is. There are 10 million other people out here thinking the same thing I am.”

DuBos supports himself by working in the entertainment division of a local bank. He writes screenplays at night in his small Santa Monica apartment, and has completed six of them.

“Every time I’m ready to give up, something happens,” he said. “A short film, or a documentary project. Something always happens to give me some dim hope that there is someone willing to take a chance on me.”