Hidden Talent: The Emergence of Hollywood Agents

Posted on Jan 28, 2010

www.ucpress.edu

By Tom Kemper

Editor’s note: The excerpt from Kemper’s book, “Hidden Talent: The Emergence of Hollywood Agents,” begins after a brief introduction by the author below. The excerpt is from Chapter 9, “Tall in the Saddle: Agents in the Producer’s Chair.”

I began this project as an inquiry into the general role of the agent, a topic that hadn’t really received serious analysis. Like many film fans (and historians and journalists), I assumed that agents really only became important Hollywood players in the 1950s with Lew Wasserman and then surged in the 1970s with big brokers like Mike Ovitz, the rise of CAA and ICM, and right on up to Endeavor’s Ari Emanuel (aka Ari Gold). When I dug around in various historical sources and archives to see what agents were doing in the 1930s, the classic Hollywood studio era, I thought this material might serve as the preface to the book. What I found completely surprised me: Agents were there at the start of the studio system and played a crucial role to its functioning as a big business. These discoveries became the entire book.

Certainly, the studios (and even the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences) resisted the role of agents. I document those battles in the book. But major agents like Myron Selznick, Leland Hayward and Charles Feldman established tremendously successful agencies (their salaries surpassed those of many studio execs), while managing huge talent like Jimmy Stewart, Fred Astaire, Carole Lombard, Irene Dunne, Alfred Hitchcock and others. I was equally surprised by how these agents gained their clients’ percentage points on film profits, independently packaged clients for productions, and gained limited contracts with powerful clauses (script approval, star approval, final cut, and such) for their clients—all conditions we associate with the modern era of Hollywood. On Turner Classic Movies and in many historical books we hear about the iron-clad contracts of the studio era. So I was surprised not only to discover the incredible role played by agents in this era, but also by the many exceptions to these contracts and the degrees of autonomy held by so many great Hollywood artists. Claudette Colbert made “It Happened One Night” thanks in part to her agent’s work on contracts. Howard Hawks produced probably his best work when he signed up with a new agent.

The excerpt below gives some indication of the success and struggles of clients and their agents. It deals with the early 1940s as some changes were under way in Hollywood, thanks in part to agents like Charles Feldman, whose own charisma, I have to admit, worked on me even through the archival papers.

 

 

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Charles Feldman fashioned a distinctive character for the role of the 1930s Hollywood agent. Dapper, gregarious, and All-Pro, Feldman sported an expansive demeanor, both in his business dealings and his social engagements in the world of Hollywood; his manner served him well. For if agents aid in the commercial fabrication of individuality, honing their clients into distinctive commodities, then agents also fashion their own sense of personality or character as a way of selling themselves. Agents represent a modern phenomenon not only in the sense that they spring from our era’s complex integration of culture and industry—and this tension circulates throughout the agent’s discipline, balancing the artistic needs of clients with those of business—but also in the sense that agents exemplify the modern practice of marketing personality, of selling one’s self. In this regard, Feldman showed a profound interest in developing identities for his clients, tending to and even tailoring their unique talents and their own self-fashioning, whether by molding new roles for them, doting on their individual performances, stitching screenplays to embroider their particular skills, tactically weaving them into packages with other clients, or by generating proper recognition and attention for their roles in title sequences and advertising. To accomplish these goals, Feldman constructed his own distinguished persona within the industry: gentlemanly, charming, and learned. Friends called him “Gable” for his rakish resemblance to the star. In all of his endeavors, Feldman played the courtly diplomat. Even at his most aggressive, a stance he did not shy from, Feldman took a dialectical approach to negotiations, hearing out the opposing side, while developing persuasive compromises or pinpointing holes in their positions that worked to the advantage of his clients.

Over one hundred talent agencies operated in Hollywood at this time, so Feldman certainly had rivals, even with his stellar client list, which included Claudette Colbert, Michael Curtiz, Irene Dunne, and Warner Baxter, and other major box office attractions. Myron Selznick led the pack, along with his partner Leland Hayward. They managed the careers of Carole Lombard, Henry Fonda, William Powell, Leo McCarey, and many others. Feldman’s career stands out for the strong creative advice he gave his clients and the dual role he played when he set up his own production company in the early 1940s. Throughout the 1930s and 1940s, Feldman carved out new deal strategies and paradigms that set competitive milestones for other agents. From the start, Feldman promoted a limited notion of freelancing through juggling nonexclusive contracts, signing clients to short contracts—two-film deals or two to three year studio terms—that allowed them to work at other studios simultaneously. No doubt harnessing his legal training, Feldman proved a probing reader of contracts and a nuanced writer of inventive provisions. This agent understood that contracts represented a process and a dialogue, not a final step, providing a platform for all parties to parse out terms and conditions favorable to both sides. In Feldman’s hands, contracts became both more flexible and more rigorous, depending on his goals and the interests of his clients. In a business dependent on a complex network of contracts—between talent and studios, exhibitors and distributors—Feldman’s career presents an alternative perspective on the so-called golden age of Hollywood, illustrating the numerous exceptions to this era’s alleged adherence to the ironclad option contract. To illustrate this point, take two of Feldman’s clients—John Wayne and Marlene Dietrich—as examples of the strong collaborative role he played in their careers and creative activities. Feldman’s actions—consulting and advising clients, managing their selection of projects, and even collaborating with them on productions—demonstrate some of the flexibility of the studio system. In this regard, managerial decisions extended beyond the studio walls and the moguls and could include figures like agents.

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