Eric Bogosian
What You Need to Know to Make it in Hollywood
March 8, 1999.
Since most movies in Hollywood are unmemorable or just plain suck, and since half the Hollywood budget is in marketing movies, Hollywood is actually in the business of selling shitty movies.
Everyone knows which movies are going to be "good" long before they are released. Deals are made with the stars of the hits before the hits have been released. Ergo "new" stars seem to have a flurry of movies all at once.
As William Goldman points out in his book, "Adventures in the Screen Trade" most stars of today will not be stars ten years from now. Virtually none of the female or youth stars will be stars.
Extreme genre films (horror, ultra-actor, gross comedy) do not need "names" to be a success.
Comedies need barely recognizable names because they are cheap to produce. (In fact they are almost always expensive only when big stars "want" to make them. And then the movie fails at the box office. Examples: "Ishtar", "1942", "Cable Guy").
Drama is a money-losing proposition without a real box office star in the lead. [6a. There is no such thing as "independent cinema." The "independent" films that make the big bucks all feature either extreme violence, sex or gross sentimentality. Never drama.]
Once a dramatic actor is over-exposed on television he cannot return to feature films.
Young actors, usually comics from slightly successful TV series, can transfer to features and become major movie stars (Travolta, Eastwood, Hanks, Williams, Depp)
Female leads for the most part have a very short shelf-life in Hollywood. Female leads almost always have to have larger than average breasts.
Although budgets are going up all the time in films, since stars (above the line expense) command higher and higher fees, less is being spent "below the line". This creates a faster-paced, but more difficult and dangerous set with fewer personnel. Result: to the degree that movie-making was ever fun, it's less so now.
No one will help you out. If they tell you they "love" you, they are lying. You have no friends.
Agents and studios are constantly trying to get the upper hand on each other. The studio wants to build a picture on the back of the star's previous success and the agent wants to carve out the biggest paycheck possible.
Ten years from now, most of the agents will still be in the business, all of the studio people will still be in the business and only half the creative people (talent) will still be in the business. Agents serve the folks who will be here in the future - the studios. In other words, agents are like matchmakers between studios (who always find a match) and "talent" (who once in awhile find a match), rather than what they purport to be, advocates for the talent.
Agents, no matter what they say, do not believe in the longevity of their clients. So again, no matter what they say, their abiding credo is "Get it now, while you can." This philosophy precludes clientele working on projects because they "want to" rather than for "bucks." If an agent represents ten clients, the agent will usually try to help his priciest client first.
Although young talent (under twenty-five) is wooed intensely, told that there has never been anyone like them before and that they are the "next generation" etc, in fact, all the producers know the young turks will be cold pizza in about two to three years and a new crop of faces will show up. There is no substitute for youth.
Older talent (like Eric Bogosian) is considered grumpy and difficult when in fact they are doing their job. Producers have endless patience for "stars", no patience for "artists."
Very very few people out of all that participate in "Hollywood" achieve the combined status of wealth and quality projects. So if you are trying to plan your career, think about which is the priority for you and aim for your goal. If you want to do art, don't expect to make tons of money, and if you plan to make tons of money, don't expect to make art. (But always claim your intentions are to make art. Of course, no one is in it for the money.)
Virtually everyone who's had longevity and presence in Hollywood has serious emotional problems. Sane people get out of the business and are never heard from again.
The business is more twisted than you can ever imagine. But no one will tell the truth. Don't believe what you read. Including this.
Smiling is important all the time. People who think they are big shots are suffered for as long as they have clout, the minute they lose the clout they are out of the game permanently as punishment for their hubris.
There are endless rules like these. If you have any to contribute, e-mail them in. If I like 'em, I'll post 'em.
A final thought about celebrity and the media biz. Every star you see is an actual person. And unless he or she was born a prince or princess, he lived in a private world until that private world became public. That private world has its priorities and the new public life has its priorities. In time, one takes over from the other. It's no wonder stars take drugs.
