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Hello.

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My name is Esther Simon.

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I am a junior here
at Mount Holyoke,

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and a double major in film
studies and art history.

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This summer, I had not only
my first internship, but also

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my first industry job
at a talent management

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company in Beverly Hills.

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Before this internship,
actually, the only thing

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I knew about talent management
came from the show BoJack

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Horseman.

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[LAUGHTER] A lot of
new experiences for me.

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The company that
I was working for

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was Silver Lining
Entertainment, which

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is a company that was formed
just a few years ago, actually,

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by a number of veteran
managers, and has been joined

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over the years by other really
talented managers, some of them

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coming from agencies,
some of them coming

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from other management companies.

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We have about 130 clients, now.

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Some of them you
might have heard of--

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Jason Isaacs, who
was in Harry Potter,

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and is now in the new
Star Trek show, Josh Peck

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from Drake and Josh,
and Katherine Langford,

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who was in the Netflix
show 13 Reasons Why.

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So, there's a lot of kind
of recognizable names.

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There are also a lot of
new up and coming actors.

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And a big part of what Silver
Lining does as a company,

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is help their clients
find work, help

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them manage their publicity,
help them basically

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with every aspect
of their careers.

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Which, when people ask,
what's the difference

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between an agent and a
manager, that's the difference.

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An agent finds you parts.

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A manager runs your entire life.

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So to kind of break
that down more,

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there are kind of three main
parts of what managers do.

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They find their clients work.

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Often that means kind
of sifting through all

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of the different projects that
are being done at any given

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time, looking at scripts,
looking at pitches

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for reality shows,
sometimes plays, even, say,

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voice acting for a
video game any of that.

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You would just have to
be aware of everything

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that's happening at any
given time, which is a lot.

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Sometimes it also actually
means telling your client

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not to do a role.

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We sometimes got
scripts that were

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so bad, that we would tell our
clients, hey, don't do this.

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It'll look really bad.

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You know, it might have
a really bad reception.

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You might get in just
a lot of bad publicity.

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So that kind of brings
us into the second part

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of that, which is publicity.

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Whenever a news outlet
wants to do a story on one

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of our clients, they
call us, and they

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ask to speak to the manager.

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Usually they don't
get to do that,

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because otherwise we would be
flooded with calls constantly,

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so a big part of my job was
actually filtering those calls.

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That summer was the
summer that there

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was a big feud between
Josh Peck and Drake Bell,

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so I was just told, if they
call about that, just say no.

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Just hang up.

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Don't deal with that.

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And another big part is
accompanying your client

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to events that they are at,
like one of our managers

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who was working with
Katherine Langford went

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to a lot of Netflix premieres
that summer, because it

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was the summer right after
13 Reasons Why came out.

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The last part of the job is
just kind of helping clients

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with creative projects.

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Sometimes that means reading
over a client's script

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for their own film, or
looking at their look

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book for their reality show.

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Sometimes it means
helping them set up

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the right lunch with the right
person to pitch their show to.

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It can be a wide
variety of things.

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Sometimes it's just
these random tasks,

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like we had a client who
wanted us to call a hotel

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and make sure that they
have two-ply toilet paper.

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It can be anything.

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It can be everything.

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It's a really just
all-encompassing thing.

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But what I especially was
doing was actually also

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kind of everything and anything.

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I worked a lot with casting
databases, predominantly

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Casting Workbook, and
the Breakdown which

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are just websites
where you essentially

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go through all of your
client's head shots,

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their audition tapes,
their demo reels put them

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all together into
kind of a package,

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and send them off to the people
who are making these projects.

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So, if you get a
script that has,

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you know, three
available roles, you'll

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kind of send a whole
little package of clients

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for each role and
then hopefully they

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get called in for an audition.

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Another thing I did was
actually editing and uploading

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those audition tapes.

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A lot of our clients,
and actually just,

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a lot of-- a surprising
number of people in Hollywood

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are Australian, so it's
really hard for them

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to just fly from
like Melbourne to Los

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Angeles for a single audition.

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So a lot of times they will
send in a video with like seven

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takes, and they'll
just say hey, I really

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like take one and take five, can
you just edit it down to that,

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and that would be my job.

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I also read a lot of
scripts, and wrote

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coverage, which is essentially
the way people in the film

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industry write about film.

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It's just a really
quick summary.

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This is what it's about.

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This is what I thought of
it, and this is the parts

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that we want to cast.

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So I read a lot of scripts.

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I wrote a lot of coverage.

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I did a lot of clerical work.

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You know, just answering
phones, directing calls, meeting

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with clients, et cetera.

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And just kind of random tasks
for individual managers,

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like assembling kind
of a comedy calender

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every week, from Comedy
Bureau, of things

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for one of our managers who also
worked for Comedy Central to

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[INAUDIBLE].

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So the things that I
actually gained are many.

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So I learned a lot
about the film industry,

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which was incredible, because
studying film academically,

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you learn a lot
about how film works,

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but you don't necessarily
learn how to work in film.

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For example, writing coverage
is the polar opposite

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of writing an
academic film paper.

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Everything they
tell you how to do,

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it's like, "don't
summarize the plot,

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don't focus on the
script, don't--" you know.

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They always tell you to
focus on the visuals,

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which you cannot do when
all you have is a script.

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There are no actors yet.

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There are no visuals, no sound
track, nothing, just words.

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And so you have to learn
how to work with that.

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I also learned a lot
of personal skills.

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I learned how to self-advocate,
which was really hard for me

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because I'm a naturally
anxious person,

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and to suddenly be in a
position where they're like,

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hey can you call customer
service and complain for us,

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is really scary.

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But it's something that you
have to do in this industry,

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and it's something
that, you know,

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will get you even further.

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It's important to
know the right people.

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It's important to go
to the right events.

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But most of all, it's
important to know

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how to introduce
yourself, and how

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to make an impression on
people that they'll remember.

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I learned a lot about how and
when to trust my intuition.

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I didn't really
have a single boss.

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I had five different managers.

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A lot of times I
couldn't always get help.

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I learned how to decide kind of
when to just do my own thing,

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and when I had to ask for help.

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And kind of going on
from that, next summer,

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next years of my
life, I can't say

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that I have a concrete plan.

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I don't think many people,
at this time in our lives,

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can say that we know
exactly where we're

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going to be next week or next
summer or after we graduate.

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Hopefully, I'll find
another internship.

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Maybe it'll be in LA.

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Maybe it'll be closer to home.

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Maybe I'll work on
a creative project.

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After graduation, maybe I'll go
to film school, maybe I won't.

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I went in really sure that I
would, and came out less sure.

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Sometimes that's how
experience works,

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it actually makes you less
sure in what you are doing.

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And eventually, I want to go
into screenwriting myself,

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and I feel like this
internship really

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equipped me with the
skills that I need,

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not just to do the
job that I want,

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but also to know
that I can do it.

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Thank you.

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