Ron Meyer on Hollywood ‘Assholes,’ CAA ‘Monsters’ and Advice for the Next Generation
The Wrap’s Jeff Sneider provided a good summary of a recent appearance by one of the most powerful people in Hollywood:
NBCUniversal Vice Chairman Ron Meyer headlined the spotlight interview at TheGrill on Tuesday, where he sat down for an intimate chat with Jason Blum titled “When Does a Mogul Become a Legend?”
Meyer and Blum had a solid rapport, which comes as no surprise given that Universal and Blumhouse have a 10-year first-look production agreement.
Blum was especially impressed that in a town where executives trade jobs like musical chairs, Meyer has stayed at the same place for 20 years, prompting him to share his secret to longevity.
Here is one quote I found particularly insightful, Meyer talking about how he started out as a young agent:
“I was never the smartest person but I had certain fundamentals that really made the difference. Assumption is the mother of all fuck-ups and it changed my life. I decided I’d treat people the way I wanted to be treated. You can be a chump once but not twice. You can’t always tell the truth but you have to tell the best truth you can and work as hard as you possibly can. No matter what job you have to do, ‘yes’ and ‘thank you’ are the two best words. I said “yes” to everything they wanted and thanked them for letting me do it.”
You could pretty much strip out each sentence in that paragraph as takeaways:
Assumption is the mother of all fuck-ups.
I decided I’d treat people the way I wanted to be treated.
You can be a chump once but not twice.
You can’t always tell the truth but you have to tell the best truth you can and work as hard as you possibly can.
No matter what job you have to do, ‘yes’ and ‘thank you’ are the two best words.
Every May, I send off a wonderful group of college graduates off to internships in Hollywood. I suspect I’ll walk them through each of these tidbits, insight into how Hollywood power brokers think… and pretty good advice for getting ahead in the business.
Here is some video of the session:
For the rest of the article, go here.