Paying Managers to Be Babies: Why?

Last week, I went to a fashion show at the Dream Downtown in NYC. The week before, I'd personally modeled in a show there for Wicked Threads, a great brand you may want to check out. The designer is awesome & those shows have been some of the easiest I have done due to the lack of pressure and stress involved (at least as non-stressful as being a model in a fashion show gets). I personally had no problems and saw no issues with the venue; in fact, it's a very classy looking and gorgeous venue with ambiance & views. The ladies room is also one of the nicest I have been in NYC.

That week was part of my 4 days of crazy busy since I was in another show the next night at the Empire Hotel, was doing a TV appearance the next day, went to see Bayside! The Musical! that night (it was hilarious but oh, so wrong; don't go if you're easily offended or toting young kids/people who have zero sense of humor) & then had my photo shoot to finally do my comp card. After all that, I decided to take a bit of a breather & no one had asked me to model or posted anything saying they needed models so I decided to go to a fashion show that Friday as a spectator. I'd also known about it in advance & when you tell me about something in advance, I'm far more likely to make an effort to attend.

My husband also had an event to go to (and ended up networking; I told him I think my influence rubbed off on him) so no reason for me to sit at home. Plus, I've been going to events to try networking & build contacts.

You know what's great about going to fashion shows if you're a girly girl? You can get away with a lot as long as your outfit is semi-dressy. I also decided to try putting my hair up & didn't totally screw it up even though I'm nowhere close to good at creating an updo. Since I love a free opportunity to dress up, my going to fashion shows just makes sense for that alone. I also knew someone who was modeling in that show & worked with one of the designers before so I wanted to attend to support these people.

Other people I knew were in attendance so I talked to them & even met some new people. One photographer I hadn't met before actually came up to me & asked why I wasn't modeling that evening. I said "Nobody asked me," which was true.

Turns out it may have been a good thing I wasn't modeling that night. The show I was at was shut down by the venue's manager in the middle of the second show.

To put this in some context, the show that was interrupted was a swimsuit show. Lingerie & swimsuit shows are apparently more attended since people (men, in particular) like to see attractive young women in less clothing. The fact that I have worn less clothing in shows I've done is a compliment in my book since if I didn't have the body, no designer would want me going out on the runway representing his/her brand (especially in underwear or the like). There are also quite a few drinkers in the fashion world. Getting free drinks is a major issue after a show & I've seen people get mad if you aren't doing that for models and people involved in the shows.

Not to mention that fashion people have contacts, looks & some even have money. That would be the crowd any high level venue would want to attract & keep as customers. I don't recall hearing about Studio 54 being horrid to fashion people though they built their business around keeping people out & being exclusive. I have been to a number of fashion shows in my time (even before I was modeling in them myself) & that has never happened at any show I went to or participated in.

Well, for whatever reason, the manager at the venue we were at decided to curse out the designer, shoved a model, banished all the photographers (and I knew at least one who was there) & open the curtain where models were in stages of undress. Apparently, the night crowd was more important than this fashion show or maintaining goodwill at this high level event. I saw the organizer of the event later on (who is a Facebook friend I hadn't previously met in person) & told her if they wanted to look into legal action to contact me since I know a ton of attorneys and happen to be an entertainment one myself.

I also made sure to mention this little failing on Yelp and on their Facebook page along with telling the model I knew that if the girl who got shoved or anyone else wanted to pursue legal action, they could contact me. That really pisses me off since I have modeled myself & this jerk easily could have tried that with me. If he had, he'd have lived to regret it & I surely would have told him he just shoved an attorney.

This was far worse than what I saw when I did the show at the Empire Hotel the week before. That manager, a woman, apparently had a problem with the designer pulling out clothes to show models who were waiting outside the bathroom (since we were told we couldn't stay in the bathroom once we had changed & obviously couldn't go out where the general public was since you can't have people seeing your outfit before a fashion show). We end up getting moved to a darkened area with almost no lighting for anyone to see dresses & with no actual bathroom or formal changing area. There were gaps between this part & the part where we had to come out to model (which was quite lighted & filled with members of the general public alongside photographers, who we're used to seeing & aren't being a bunch of leering creepers trying to see naked ladies for sport). There wasn't really a changing area per se so we were getting dressed in this darkness near the non-curtained windows (though we were at the rooftop on a very high floor).

Now, one thing you should know about being a model is you can't be one of those super bashful girls when it comes to changing clothes. You're not likely to get a private changing area & junior high changing may not work for you depending on the outfit. I'm an expert in junior high changing (this is when you change your clothes in plain sight & do it without any glimpse of private parts) but there are garments you can't do that with. Sports bras are one of them. Pantyhose would be another.

If you've been to Joyce Leslie & tried anything on, you can't be bashful there either since they don't have fitting rooms but instead have one large room that women folk have to change in (at least at the one I went to near 8th Street & I was trying on a bra that day). Being in entertainment or going to Joyce Leslie should cure you of that bashfulness about changing in front of other women; you're too busy trying to get yourself ready & as others would point out "we all have the same stuff" so it's not worth freaking out over.

At the same time, there is a principle at work so I made sure to mention it to someone I knew. Still need to work on that Yelp review but been so busy lately with other things.

All these events irk me for another reason, though. Why in God's name are these managers being paid a salary by these venues to be shitty to guests? There are far more mature ways to handle a conflict than cursing someone out, shoving people, invading their privacy & so forth. I own a business & if I had a manager doing that in my business, I would fire their ass in a second. I don't know if they have contracts for the events but regardless, what about hospitality? These jerks are in the hospitality business; you're supposed to be NICE to people in it. If you hate people, don't work in that field. Come to think of it, there are lots of fields you should stay out of if you hate people. Not those who have done something to piss you off or are liars/jerks/etc.: I'm referring to hating people as your default position.

How many people are unemployed or underemployed in NYC? How many would do twice the work at half the pay & be damn appreciative and glad to have a job in the first place? What business owner would pay a manager to be a dickhead to people who are bringing crowds, alcohol sales & the like to their venue? What did I just say about fashion people & fashion shows? Why in the Hell would you want to alienate those people? You should be doing everything you can to make those people happy & get them to come back, invite their friends, talk you up & have a positive experience.

Not to mention the legal liability involved in making people change clothes in the dark, shoving women wearing very high heels & breaching contracts (oral or written). What if someone had gotten injured & ended up having to go to the hospital? Guess who'd be getting sued? The shitty manager might get named but the venue has deeper pockets so YOU owner(s) would be fucked over in that situation.

So along with bad PR, legal liability, potential backlash in desired demographics (I also don't advise pissing off photographers since they're actually fun people), high employee turnover (since God help the people who have to work for these assholes; the other staff members involved in these incidents were fine, including the security people) & creating a workplace where immaturity is allowed among so-called "professionals," why in the world would anyone with half a brain keep that kind of manager employed in their company? I, as a model, would certainly not feel comfortable modeling at the Dream Hotel Downtown if that asshole was in charge since who knows if that fucker would go invade MY privacy or lay a hand on ME? Where's the safety to models & anyone else providing entertainment at an event? If I'm thinking this, you know others have to be as well.

If someone told me "Oh, they were drunk," that would make me even less happy with a venue. How many episodes of Bar Rescue do you see where Jon Taffer is berating an owner for letting employees drink on the job & lecturing people about drinking at work? That's just announcing your workplace is unprofessional & a lawsuit waiting to happen.

The next day, still fired up from the Dream Downtown incident the night before, I went to Target & ended up calling up the manager to complain about a lazy fuck who refused to provide me with service when I asked for a rain check on an item. He apparently thought I was supposed to go get him an item number from a section when I don't work at Target, wouldn't know where the item number was & there's no real staffing in the section. He couldn't even be bothered to get a circular to look for the item! I would never have done that when I worked in retail & gee, we have phones so he could have called and tried to get the information but just wanted to be lazy.

At the end of the day, my attitude is "I earned my position & had to work for my paycheck. You need to be doing the same or getting the hell out of the way so someone who gives a damn will actually do the job." You have no sympathy from me when you're being unprofessional, rude, nasty, etc. & you work in customer service or hospitality. Low wages, my ass!

I worked in retail for 7 years & I didn't take out my unhappiness or attitude about my employer onto the customers (I also didn't hate my job or take one I know I would hate 100%). It's not their fault YOU hate your life or your job. That's a problem YOU need to deal with. Either make an attempt to change your lot in life or accept it; regardless, don't come bitching to customers about it. They do not care. Why is it that I got this lesson at 15 while there are people far older than I am now who don't get it? If you are a manager & you try defending laziness/unprofessionalism/so on & so forth against me & mine, I will give you hell for it. Just a fair warning.

Haters: A Sign That You've Made It

Seems everyone I know who is actually doing something has haters. You know what a hater is, right? Someone who's got nothing better to do than threaten, harass, stalk, impersonate or do anything & everything to bring someone else down.

Here's what haters aren't:

A) Ambitious/Hardworking. People who are ambitious are too busy doing things for themselves to try sabotaging others.

B) Important. Important people are needed & far too busy to send threatening messages, create hate websites, stalk people or bother others.

C) Somebody. You won't stay a somebody very long by threatening others or sabotaging them because you'll never have time to focus on your own career and your own work.

D) Smart. Haters don't think about how they just make the object of the hatred more important & noticeable. If someone has haters, it means people have some reaction to them instead of total indifference.

I know people who have vocal & downright pathetic haters. Any recent haters I have would be saddened to know that they're not the first and certainly not the brightest people to hate me. I'm sure they won't be the last, either.

They should also be praying harder than anyone for my success. After all, idle time on my hands means I have time to hunt down saboteurs like wild animals & come up with some truly vicious psychological torture that will make them cry for the sweet release of death. Ever think of that??? Or that you might just move up to the tip-top of the list?

Haters who think they can silence me are sadly mistaken. In fact, it's been my goal in life to exist just to piss off anyone who'd dare to stop me from doing anything. No one will take my voice & I'll die free before I live a coward.

So I have to agree w/the wisdom that says "If you have haters, you must be doing something right."

Haters also seem to take out their hatred of life & personal situation onto others instead of working to make life better for themselves. You're also pretty pathetic if you go around hating people who aren't even mega-famous or millionaires. At least one could have some sympathy for those haters instead of thinking you're too sad and miserable to go get laid, find a nice job or do something more productive. I know there are much better things to do in life than hate the author of this blog, who's neither famous nor rich. You'd have to be insane to want to live my life from birth to the present.

And I know there are better things to do than create hate websites dedicated to people who don't even live in the same country as you.

At least haters give those of us who have them badges of honor & proof we're doing something right. So there.

Friends or Entourage Members?

So, the specter of something being up with my friend has really gone up. Yesterday was my birthday & usually, she'd call or at least write me a Facebook Wall post. She didn't.

Anyone who knows my friend knows that she's not the type who'd ever ditch her friends. When she & I reconnected after she got married, she told me she'd never ditch her friends because of her husband. There were definitely friends he didn't like, I might add.

She was also MIA to do something with my sister, another bad sign. She did find out she wasn't pregnant, but what was this douchebag's reaction? "I want you to have my baby. Why aren't you pregnant already?"

It is my firm belief that a true friend, a real friend, tells you when you're throwing your life in the gutter. Real friends aren't "yes" people or around to watch you self-destruct. That is an entourage.

I had to finally speak my piece about all this. She will probably be pissed but I don't care. I'm hoping that the words of someone not using the specter of religion will get through. Putting aside any religious disagreements you may have with adultery or divorce, shoving the good book at someone doesn't work. You're just creating a climate of judgment & shaming someone. That doesn't help anyone.

I was quite blunt & direct, as anyone who knows me knows I'm going to be. I pointed out that I do have some real life experience to speak as I did & said she was allowing this guy to treat her like a whore. Considering what I discussed before in this blog, what would you call someone who fights with some guy's baby mama over which one of them will get to sleep in the bed with him? I said she could do far better than this scumbag & that if he's laid a hand on her, he will get what's coming to him. Far too many people we know wouldn't let that slide & live a lot closer to them than I do.

I also asked her if she'd want a guy treating her daughter that way or for me to be taking that kind of abuse.

I'm also seeing what other people who know her make of all this. I can't be the only person who thinks something has to be done. You can't help everyone & I certainly can't make her wise up but I do tend to be honest in a situation + people tend to take me seriously when I speak in other contexts.

This also hits harder for me since I'm not going to have many real friends soon. You can get an entourage pretty quickly but people who really have your back without judgment & will tell you when someone is being abusive? Not so much. I could care less about the religious aspects; I care about the example her child is seeing & her letting a man treat her like shit. As someone who still remembers what it was like to see an alcoholic parent, I think her child deserves better than that & her mother should know it's going to have an effect on that relationship.

I hate to say it but I do think a judge would probably want to consider having that kid stay with her father if her mother's just going to be some possible illegal's whore on the side. If she's going to do that, I think her daughter is safer elsewhere. You know, I have to wonder why it is that most of the illegals I know of in NC are abusive scumbags while there are plenty in NYC who have nothing but the utmost respect for people & wouldn't try running a harem in their house. Do my sister & I just know people who attract these cretins like magnets? Is it any wonder I really don't keep in touch or have real friendships in that town?

Are there any decent illegals in that area of NC who have any ambition for themselves or are they all just sexist, misogynistic pigs who beat up little children & pass on STDs? This cynic would love to hear about some who are single so people we know would have a better dating pool to consider.

A Douchebag Move

Okay, kids. Rule #1 of the Entertainment business:

Never, I repeat NEVER, make someone an enemy unless it's absolutely necessary.

If the person has stolen from you, flaked out multiple times or done something else completely unprofessional, go right ahead.

Rule #2: It's not only your prerogative but your DUTY to tell everyone you know in the business about that person's crappy treatment of you.

Just like in other industries, we can & will tell people when you behave like a douchebag or do something so outside business norms that it deserves to be called out. It will affect your career. Remember, you don't know who is friends with who or who is someone else's relative, classmate, etc.

Go STARTING trouble & bad mouthing people, though & pretty soon you'll be branded as a liar/moron + petty instigator. Most of us call people out on that shit too; only an idiot wouldn't.

An entertainment lawyer who contacted me with interest in participating in the TV network's attorney reality show said during my conference call with him that if we "needed an attorney to help us out, I'll be happy to help." This guy KNOWS that this is a network that is getting ready to launch & doesn't have buckets of money to shower on people. Sounds an awful LOT like volunteering, right?

So b/c I've only done film contracts & have been asked to do a lot of the in-house legal documents since I can write them simply & not make them overly burdensome to our beginning actors + other creative people who hate dealing w/this stuff, I have a feeling I'll be the one doing talent contracts. Like any rational, responsible person I've been trying to do my homework & not assume that film contract=TV contract.

Since this lawyer so generously makes this offer, I figure I can ask about the nuances of these contracts since no one's given me an answer yet & it's harder to research this stuff.

Now, there are MANY lawyers in this profession who will gladly pass along a sample document if you need it & help you if you ask for advice w/out demanding $. These are the people who are forward thinking & realize that they have a duty to help people coming up in the profession since they're going to need to know how to do things once the experts retire/die/go insane.

This douchebag asks to be co-counsel & wants a fee. Even though I'M being paid a very low amount since this is pre-launch & DOING the actual work. He also put a smiley at the end; now as I understand 'net speak, that means "I'm kidding" or might be "joking" w/you. I wrote back that I hoped it was a joke since I'm not making much & I'm doing the work. NO ONE is going to steal MY show, thanks. I'M also the one people are trusting here, NOT YOU.

Apparently, despite what was said, he wasn't. That warranted me mentioning that I've got the memory of an elephant. You mess w/me, especially when I'm starting out, I'll make damn sure you don't get my help on anything. I'll actually go & tell people NOT to work w/you b/c you're a money grubbing douche who spits on up & comers (with a retelling of the story so people come to that conclusion all by themselves). Believe me, word travels & can go anywhere. My contacts AREN'T small time, let's just leave it at that.

I'm still appalled by this considering that in this business, there's more "pay it forward" than you might think. I've told actors I know about auditions w/the TV company & told lawyers who wanted to get into the business about opportunities. I don't expect anything in return, their success will make me happy. I know what it's like to be miserable & upset b/c things aren't happening for you + I feel like it's my duty to help the dedicated & true talents if I can. I'm definitely NOT the only person in this business who'll do it. You just have to convince people that you have something, are 100% dedicated to what you're doing & that nothing will stop you; I wouldn't help someone who didn't believe in themselves, take opportunities that could help them or do a damn thing to get closer to what they claim to want.

In my book, professionals in any field have the SAME duty to up & comers. Eventually, those people will be gone & if you don't teach the up & comers how to do things, how do you expect your industry to continue once you die or retire? The up & comers could also surpass you & will remember who helped vs. who didn't. This is very true in entertainment & a HUGE reason why I think most interns aren't treated like crap; most higher-ups know better. Maybe some lawyers should get THAT memo.