I've posted about many of their failures in the past, but I thought it might be interesting to look back on my entire roller coaster ride of representation.
Before I joined the work force, I went to film school. It was there where I heard various tales of these mysterious agents. Everyone pretty much said the same thing: getting an agent is harder than getting a job. But once you do get an agent, you're in the system and it's all good!
This seemed hard to believe. I mean, if I could get far enough to be a working writer, why wouldn't an agent represent me so they could make money too? Well, it turned out those people at film school were half right. But I'll get to that.
As stated before, I was writing on "The Soup". Even though the President of E! didn't find it funny, some folks in the industry respected the stuff we were doing. And right as that was happening, I got fired.
But luckily, I had made a few connections. These connections offered to help me get an agent. They told me to write up some monologue jokes and some sketches and they would send them to agents they knew.
I couldn't believe that I could possibly get an agent from this. Monologue jokes? Writing monologue jokes proves nothing. But I did it anyway, what did I have to lose?
Here are some of the jokes that were in my packet that I sent to agents in 2004:
The makers of the Ray Charles film "Ray" are producing a film biography of baseball pioneer Jackie Robinson. And in preparation for the inevitable Oscar speech, Jamie Foxx has killed his other grandma.
Seal and Heidi Klum are expecting their first child together. And that means if the couple has a girl, I have no idea whether or not I’d want to fuck it.
Ben Affleck will make his feature film directing debut later this year. There is hope for the film though...cause Ben Affleck isn't in it.
Director George Lucas says that the next Star Wars will be like "'Titanic' in space”. The two will also be similar in that Titanic’s Gloria Stuart will play Yoda.
Athletic sisters Venus Williams and Serena Williams have been given their own reality TV show. It's actually a game show where the audience has to guess: "Which One's a Dude?"
The Rev. Jerry Falwell was hospitalized and is now in critical condition. Where's your precious Jesus now, fat man?!?
The national director of programs for the Boy Scouts of America has been charged with possession and distribution of child pornography. Suspicions were aroused when the man gave a young scout a "my first pubes" badge.
So I took 2 pages of this crap, and sent it to guys at CAA, APA, and Broder (which has since been taken over by ICM).
Here's the cover letter:
Dear Agent Agentstein,
Joe Smith said that I could submit some of my materials to you. My name is Irwin Handleman and I am currently writing on E's "The Soup" (that was a lie, I was already fired), and a movie that I rewrote called "Dying for Dolly" is currently in production. It is being produced by Lions Gate and Fox, and is directed by Ron Underwood and stars Usher.
Enclosed you will find a list of my credits, three sketches - "History's Mysteries - Hitler's Real Motivation", "The Committee", and "Sleeper Cell Blues", as well as a sample of my jokes. I also have a reel of my produced joke and sketch work if you are interested.
Thank you for your time and I look forward to hearing from you.
I really didn't think this would lead to anything, I mean, did you read those jokes? But somehow, someway, an agent at Broder called and we had a meeting. It went fine. He blew smoke up my ass, telling me all the things he could do for me. He's an agent, he lied.
I waited a few days, hoping that one of the other agents would call. They didn't. I had no other options, so I called the guy and said "let's do it". But one thing stuck in my head that I didn't like - he mentioned that one of his clients was Beth from the Real World San Francisco. Yikes. I mean, if it was Puck that would be one thing, but Beth? Come on.
And then 3 weeks passed, and that smoke was no longer residing in my ass - I hadn't heard from him since. And that's when the guy from CAA called...
So I went to see him, and he was WAY better at kissing my ass than the Broder guy. I mean way better. The guy french kisses ass like you wouldn't believe. He's a professional salad tosser in a suit. He said all the right things. And as he was talking, I knew that I was fucked.
The last thing in the world I wanted to do was screw over that other guy. I dread confrontation. I didn't want to make that phone call. But it was CAA! The big boys! And I hadn't heard from the guy in weeks!
So I went with CAA, and I waited. 3 more weeks passed, the Broder guy finally called, and I broke the news to him. He was beyond pissed. He said I'd never work in this town again, which was funny, because I pretty much hadn't even really worked in this town in the first place. But the deed was done, and I was free. Incidentally, that guy got fired soon after and never worked as an agent again.
I was in with CAA, a small fish in a giant pond. It was true, it was harder to get an agent than get work, but I wasn't in the system and it most definitely wasn't all good.
And I didn't know it yet, but I had just signed on with probably the worst agent in Hollywood...
Later this week on the next chapter: I fire CAA...
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