Powerhouse: The Untold Story of Hollywood's Creative Artists Agency

But then another agent said, “When I spoke with him a bit later, he sounded a little more into it,” so I thought, Oh, okay, these two guys represent Chris Reeve. And then another person says, “I think there’s an outsider contender here, he was talking about this other script.” I remember nudging the person next to me and asking, “Who represents Chr

we were a group that worked together, that we weren’t just one agent with one client. That was our pitch.

The five of us made sure to meet every day and we talked about everything and did whatever we had to do to help each other. We stayed close with our agents and always knew what was going on with them. This meant, for instance, if important writer clients wrote an unattached script, rather than sell it directly to a studio, we would put it together

In film, CAA represented more Academy Award winners in above-the-line categories over the past five years than the next four agencies combined. Year-to-year results are also striking:

We always had a very low attrition rate.

Ovitz was brains and science; Meyer was heart and culture.

Hospital. I put this whole coterie together. I became very interested in packaging—putting things together rather than just individually handling clients, which turned out to be the base of CAA.

with ideas and then turn them into reality. I wanted to get close to them, to understand how they work, and at the same time couple the creative process with the business process.

He knew his place, but he became a big part of the culture there, because he made sure things were fair and honest. He was a man of his word and expected the same of others.