ASK AARON - April 2000 Answer
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Tags: agent problems
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From Alice, OH
I get the feeling that my agent has no interest in working with me. When I call her she seems to only want to get me off the phone as quickly as possible. Is it time to find a new agent?
Dear Alice:
I would not pay any attention to the fact that the agent kind of blew you off on the phone. That is normal. They are very busy, and might have been right in the middle of having to make 3,000 phone calls to models for go-sees. Agents make their living on the phone. That is how they get work for the models and actors they represent. When their time is taken up with phone calls from their talent, who want to chit chat, or find out if there is anything happening for them, then there is less time for the agent to do her job. If you want to have a stronger relationship with your agent, call him/her up and set up an appointment. Sit down with the agent and tell the agent that you haven’t heard from him/her and wanted to know if there was something you can do to help get more work.
You might find out that the agent was out of your head shots or composite sheets, and therefore was not submitting you for jobs. Maybe your photos that are being submitted are not strong enough, and you need to get new photos taken. Maybe you are being submitted for the wrong types of jobs.
That exact situation happened to me. For many years I was being sent out regularly by an agent in New York. All of a sudden I hit a stretch of about 3 months where I was not hearing from the agent. I set up an appointment and the agent told me that she was told not to call me unless I either had a booking or had a request go-see. That is when the photographer or people from the ad agency specifically ask for a model to attend the go-see (audition). She said that neither of those situations occurred, so that is why she hadn’t called. I told her there must have been some mistake because I never set up those conditions, and to please call me for any go-see that is appropriate for me. After that conversation, I started getting phone calls again.
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