Big Pimpin' Up In NYC

No two days were really ever alike. As a modeling agent, I never knew how my day would begin and end. I could never anticipate what spectacular, career-changing castings would materialize, or which stunning superstar-to-be would walk into my tightly strung life.

Occasionally, but not often, someone would arrive on my doorstep who would stop my heart.

It was like love. Your pulse races and a feeling comes over you. You ask yourself, "could this be the one?" You wonder if this is the model who will make a name for your agency -- and for yourself.

In most cases, no.

As an agent, like it or not, you become a mother hen who develops a line of adoring little chickies who follow you. You often wonder if they like you for you, or if they're just kissing up to get the castings and the favor. You also try not think about it.

It's not a business that invites you to think too much. It's not about the brain.

Still, many models ride you. You wonder about their intentions. Other times, like when you're partying at a reserved table in a club at three in the morning on a weeknight, it doesn't matter if you're being used. They could use me till they use me up.

You learn that beautiful people have problems too. They have problems with their girlfriends and boyfriends and landlords and parents and other models. They also eat more than you think. And you are there for them. It's not a 9-5 job at all. Lives intertwine dramatically, usually for only a short time.

Models often don't think of themselves as beautiful. I very rarely came across a model who was stuck-up. Most of them come from the middle of nowhere. Many of them are raised by decent, middle-class families and their parents worry about them. Some of them fall in with bad people. Others have their wild ride in New York, go on some castings, and go back home, out of breath.

It is a difficult business. And it is indeed a business. Most outsiders think that the modeling world consists of posed, odd people standing around looking contemporary. But it is hard work, and heartbreaking. It is cold calling and frantic faxes and emails and billing and collections.

It is a sales job that is completely based on opinion. You could be the best salesperson in the world, but if your model isn't winning the audition, you still lose. And if your models don't make money, you don't make money. The models are usually never to blame for this. It's a strange game of chance. A model being placed "on hold" for a job doesn't pay your bills. It's the only business in the world where you can go broke and starve from encouragement.

Casting decisions are almost never explained. You move on to the next casting. There is very little time or room for reflection. You're trying to make a buck, and models appear and disappear like beautiful ghosts.

Bookings are very subjective and often not logical, at least not to me, especially when my model didn't book. It can be very political. My career consisted mostly of cold calling and trying to elbow my people into castings -- especially the good castings, which were always reserved for the larger, more established agencies.

Every day was a hustle. There was no order-taking; it was all about scrambling for castings and trying to get a foot in the door. And winning a casting never guaranteed that you would be called again for the next one. It could be infuriating.

When casting directors have huge budgets, they often didn't bother with the smaller fish. However, sometimes they do throw a bone, and I would leap for it without an ounce of pride and become a hero to my models.

There was nothing more satisfying than being able to give everyone a good number of castings for the day. And it is a numbers game: the more castings you get, the more chance you have of booking something -- anything. And the more likely it is that you are able to keep the good models.

The energy was palpable; the people, beautiful. I took hundreds of Polaroids. Sometimes, but not often, I would be so intoxicated by the surrounding beauty that I would become woozy.

If I thought a model was marketable, or even if they had a twinkle of potential to develop, there was nothing I wouldn't do for them; no door in this city that I would not force open for them.

I'll wind up sounding like a ranting old man, but I will go to my grave insisting that the people I represented were as beautiful and talented as anyone in a larger agency or with an established career. The only thing that stood in the way was fate and luck.

Models would come and go, for a variety of reasons. It was a kaleidescope of attractive faces and bodies and muscles and hips and abs and eyes and full lips and shiny hair, blurring together and coming apart.

Sometimes -- and this was always the most heartbreaking reason of all -- they would leave me for a bigger agency, once they started booking jobs. Most times, however, the reasons were not as melodramatic: they would have their fill of castings and rejection and New York City, and they would go back to school or go back to their suburbs and once again become the hottest person in their neighborhood, or marry early or marry well.

My dreams of stardom for them were never realized. I often wonder what may have been had the stars shined upon us. Where would these kids be today? Where would I be?

I'm sentimental by nature. I have a need to know what happens to everybody I come across. I want to know their fate, and see if it would surprise or shock me. However, I've lost touch with most of the people I've repped. I'm no longer relevant to them. That's not bitterness. It's just life -- the way it goes. People drift apart.

I guess I was used after all. And if it felt that good getting used, it was worth it.

I was older than all of these models, and many agents. I knew something these young people didn't: beauty can often be fleeting. The bloom can be off the rose before very long. And now, for the last cliche: youth is wasted on the young.

However, I hope that the short ride was worth it. It truly was a real adventure, filled with hope and aspiration and drama; there was something decidedly life-affirming about it. People often look at this business as being rather superficial, but for me, I was never more alive.

I did, by the way, book some truly amazing projects for people. The big, expensive, career-making bookings were not consistent, but they happened. An advertising campaign here. A national network TV commercial there.

However, believe it or not, the little bookings are the ones I remember most. I was not supposed to be overly excited about my models appearing in feature photos in magazines ("My Boyfriend Is A Jerk," "How To Tell If She's Cheating"). This was considered low-end work, but every month, I would stand at the magazine rack at Barnes and Noble and marvel when I would see my people appearing in minor shots in Maxim, Cosmo, and Time Out New York. It would be nothing less than a thrill for me.I wanted to approach nearby strangers and point out my models to them. I was so proud.

The same thrill possessed me when I booked my people as extras on Saturday Night Live and Conan O' Brien sketches, or as day players in soap operas, or when I would see them in TV commercials or music videos. I wasn't supposed to get excited over such things. I did, though. Every time.

The little victories are the ones I cherish the most. Because I surprised even myself.