Don't let your ego get in the way of your paycheck.

The art equivalent of blood in the water is deciding the official credits for any project. Credits, not cash, are the lifeblood of the industry. Anyone with a producer title, whether it be assistant or executive, has a career that can be interpreted as ascending. Same as anyone that officially gets listed as a staff writer, consultant, etc etc. It's verifies the nature of your work. Not only are you good enough to move ahead of half these schmucks, you're SO good (or connected) that we're going to let the world know via a credit. What else do credits mean?

Royalties.

Ahh - the dirty little secret in hollywood. Fuck your pay, what you REALLY want is the royalties, because when you have royalties, its like a christmas present in the mail every month that supports your addiction to cocaine, blondes with figures that run silky smooth like coca cola bottles, and exotic foreign cars that people never drive.

So first lesson: Always get a credit.

Second lesson. It will be impossible to get a credit unless its in your contract, you're a shrewd negotiator, you saved the producers life, or the producer personally brought you on the project. You see, a thousand other people will work on that writing staff and will want their contributions to be noticed, and the day the director comes in and says I've been talking to THIS GUY and he's got some good ideas too, lets give him some credits.

You're not going to get that credit. Welcome to the suck.

Don't believe me? Well you don't have too. It's happened to me though. One of the first people I ever connected too was Scott Brown, a writer/director out of USC. He was a nice enough guy, posted status updates about the right things on FB and had a solid reel. This is someone I should KNOW I thought to myself. I pitched him a little idea I had brewing in my head, a cross country project between people at USC, NYU, and Grand Valley State University (the college I was attending at the time) The show? A story about a public access news station called Critical Information. Scott liked the pilot enough (Disclaimer: He was far too kind, the pilot was, and still is, shit.)

Funny side story: Scott thought I lived in Minnesota until I met him in LA - He also said 'the only reason I'm working with you is because you're not from LA' Proving that Scotts much smarter than I when it comes to entertainment, maybe I'll have him write a rebuttal to this column.

Critical Information didn't get the proper instituational support, it was mismanaged (by me, mostly) and overall didn't fulfill the high expectations I had of it, mostly sweet misguided daydreams of a fantastic P and A campaign and random girls at the bar saying YOU CREATED THAT will promising to give me the three way of my life.

Needless to say, Not much came out of CI aside from the networking I did, and it was beneficial to say the least. Flash forward to last summer when I moved to Los Angeles to intern at Lionsgate studios. Scott was kicking around an idea called 'Making Bank' about four slackers who graduate from college and find the job market, slim to say the least, and decide to take control of their lives by, what else, robbing a bank. He agreed to let me come on as a consulting producer and a staff writer, not a shabby deal to be growing a future relationship with a guy I really looked up too.

This proves three things. One - Scott's a fucking good writer. Two - Scott's a really good friend. Three - Scott was a dumb shit for giving me a title without clearing it with his other writers.

What? he's the director! you say. Well yes, he is. he created and oversaw the project. But here's the kicker, we were all working for free. You give a shit what your writers say when they leave and you have to find 'FREE' replacements who are just as good. Remember earlier, credits are the life blood of the entertainment world. IF you're not garnering a paycheck that motherfucker better give you a job title of your choice. Or a place on his bar tab.

Well the writers on Making Bank weren't too pleased I was coming aboard. They've bee working with Scott for a few years and now this stupid fucking kid who moved out for the summer, who they didn't even KNOW and didn't have enough credits worth SHIT was garnering the same job titles as them? Potentially taking away a written by credit and being a consulting producer? This shit wasn't going to fly, and Although I wasn't there for that meeting, it's plain to see - They told him - them or us.

And here's the delimma. I was an unknown from chicago. they were his main collaborators from USC. I was a solid writer, but I wasn't good. Who's he going to choose ladies and gentlemen? Yes, you in the back...That's right. Not me. compounding the issue was Scott sent me the IM while i was at my internship (Everyone chats via AIM or Yahoo). The first message, 'Dave you're gonna think I'm an asshole, but I can't give you a writing credit.' My response: Me saying out loud. What the fuck you piece of shit.

I may have overreacted. Maybe I didn't.

I certainly don't fault Scott for his choice, and if he could of done it again, if he had a little stronger hold on the project, he probably would of told them to fucking deal with it, he was in charge. Not because I was that good, but to remind everyone HE was in charge.

So what did I do? I told Scott to go fuck himself. I didn't talk to him for a week. But then I had a shit week at Lionsgate. I sat at home thinking, Fuck man, What do I got? Then I remembered Scott taking time out of his schedule to help me with Critical Information. Was a title (I was still consulting producer) worth throwing a friendship away? Was it worth throwing away a FUTURE GUY who I wished would hire me?

I called him up. My first line. Scott your a fucking asshole, and you made a dick move, but that's not going to change our friendship. Me him, and our friend Alex Garcia went our for mexican food near USC, and guess what, he picked up the tab.

My first business lunch. We'll, my fifth - but we'll let Scott think it was my first.

Needless to say, I had an ego, a large one, big enough to fill a pilgrim ship and sail for a new world. But I didn't. It wasn't worth it. So how did it pay off?

I was Executive Producer on Scott's new web series, the critically acclaimed 'Blue Movies'. I personally put him in touch with one of his producers, and I put him in touch with the financing company. What did I get out of this? A CREDIT. so life blood, for starters. Also I got to keep a pretty good friend who remembers I'm from Michigan now and helps me out with a project much bigger than Making Bank (With a lot more explosions at least). The point. Don't let your ego get in the way of your future paycheck. You're gonna get fucked, some on purpose, some because it isn't your time yet, and some because of reasons beyond that person's control.

Just don't fuck yourself, because that's the worst way of getting fucked.