Landing Jobs in Hollywood - Insider Tips

Biagio: Hey, everybody. She is Joke.

Joke: He’s Biagio.

Biagio: We’re married, we make unscripted film and television and want to help you do the same, hopefully by teaming up with us. Well, welcome to episode 37 which we’re calling landing jobs in Hollywood. Before we get too far into the episode, yes no music this week, no fancy intro with Biagio’s crazy over-the-top voiceover. We’re a little exhausted because…

Joke: We had our baby boy.

Biagio: We had our baby boy. His name is Toren Jagger, he is a healthy, happy baby boy with a way cooler name than either one of us have. Toren Jagger, I love that name. I guess it’s kind of badass.

Joke: Yes and he also has quite the voice.

Biagio: He’s got his dad’s lungs. He likes to cry. But everything is great, thanks to all of you who sent all the kind wishes via Twitter and Facebook that was very nice, and email, many of you. Thank you, we really appreciated it.

So with that said I have one more little announcement to get out of the way. We’re going to be speaking at the upcoming IDA documentary conference which is called Getting Real. We’re going to be on a panel called Facing Reality. So for those of you who are going to the IDA conference, our panel is going to be October 1st, 2014 which is this year if you’re keeping track. From 10:45 to noon. Here’s the—

Joke: It’s at ArcLight Cinemas in Hollywood.

Biagio: Yeah, it’s the ArcLight Cinemas in Hollywood. Here’s the write-up that they’re promoting. It sounds a little controversial. See what you think: “For some doc-makers, reality is a dirty word. For others, it means bread on the table and money to do personal work. But is the crossover to reality TV having an impact on their work? Are there doc-values influencing their reality work? And does spending time with Honey Boo Boo, the Kardashian’s, and RuPaul change how they look at the world? Three top producers who swing both ways help seek the answers.” We didn’t make any of those shows. We were a late addition to the panel.

Joke: Right. And now, there’s five top producers.

Biagio: And now there’s five producers because we’re the two that they asked to join. We’re very appreciative that they asked us to join. And so for those of you who are going, we’ll be there. Shoot us a tweet, hit us on Facebook, let us know if you’ll be around. Maybe we can say hello before or after. For those of you not going and not planning on going, it is rather expensive so I wouldn’t come just to see us.

Joke: Is it? I don’t know how expensive it is.

Biagio: It’s, yeah, hundreds of dollars. I think it’s less if you’re in the IDA. I mean, it’s great for documentarians, it’s a great three-day affair.

Joke: It’s also sponsored by the Academy of Motion Pictures and Sciences.

Biagio: Yeah, it sure is. And I know Morgan Spurlock is speaking. So that’s why I’m saying, don’t come just to see us. We’re probably not going to say much more than we say on the podcast, but if you’re going anyway, say hello. So now, with all that out of the way, we’ve been doing a lot of hiring lately. Haven’t we, honey?

Joke: Yes. We hired a new assistant, we’ve been crewing up. And one of the things that we’ve noticed in both applying for kind of a staff position or for a job on a show is that, a lot of people out there are making the same mistakes. And so we were like, “Well, let’s do a quick podcast.” Give you some insight on what it’s like on this side of the hiring table to maybe give you guys a leg up on the next job hunt.

Biagio: Yeah, and listen, Joke is being very polite and I will also be somewhat polite. I think—Well because I saw so many mistakes. Listen, okay, it hurt me on the inside. I mean to use the word, a little bit devastated, even? I was a little bit devastated even that so many people reaching out to apply for a job in this industry were making mistakes so big I didn’t even think it was possible. And a while ago, Joke coined a phrase. I think she coined it, anyway.

Joke: What?

Biagio: Uncommon sense.

Joke: Oh.

Biagio: Because a lot of people say, “Oh, it’s just common sense.” But as you kind of go on in life, you start to realize that maybe a lot of things that seem like common sense really aren’t. And I think a lot of us professionals who work in the industry, we assume a lot of things are common sense but clearly they’re not.

Because for one of the positions we had, I’m not exaggerating, hundreds of applicants, and of those hundreds of applicants, I would say 95-96% were automatically discounted, because the mistakes they made were so large and so silly that it really got me thinking that if you just did a few simple things early on in your outreach to whatever company you want to work with, you will drastically increase your odds. Especially if you’re up against the same people who were applying to us.

Joke: Please understand that hiring is possibly the hardest thing that we do. I’d love to hire people, it’s just it’s so difficult to find a right match and we all have different personalities and we work in a creative field. And so, you want someone who is creative but is also professional.

And it’s one of those things where it’s anyway, talk to anybody in our position and hiring is one of the hardest things that we have to do. And part of that is because resumes don’t really give you a complete picture. Referrals, recommendations sometimes are hit and miss because again, everyone has different standards.

And so, it’s really about we just don’t look forward to the process. So if you can make it easier for all of us, you’re just going to shoot right up to the top of the list.

Biagio: Help us help you.

Joke: And one other thing is that, I felt really guilty sometimes just dismissing these applicants without even getting to know them, because the process—the cover letter, the email, the resume was such a mess that I’m like, this person may be perfectly fine and perfectly well-qualified for this job. It’s just the way that they’re presenting themselves. I can’t even get past it.

So I feel like if you really put the picture together in your job hunt and you’re applying for a position and again, we work in a freelance industry. Biagio and I personally had to go and apply for show-running jobs and all that stuff too. So it’s really about presenting the best and easiest picture possible so people can just hire you and get it over with. Because they just want to hire someone, they don’t want to go through a long process.

Biagio: Exactly. So let’s start with how most of you will be first introducing yourself to any company, which is the cover letter or email. And in our business, I think it’s more of the email. Before I even get to my actual points, let me just start by saying, I was again sadly devastated maybe even appalled that way more than half of the emails we got just had blatant misspellings.

I mean, attention to detail is everything in this business. And if you can’t even spell words correctly in your cover letter, it makes me think that you’re not the kind of person who double-checks your work. I mean and I’m talking about jobs spelled with two B’s, our names completely misspelled. I don’t even want to go into misspelling, because again it should just be common sense.

People, I’m telling you, it must not be because we’re getting emails with so many misspellings. At least half of the ones we rejected were just like, well, there’s three misspellings in the first paragraph. This person’s not getting hired.

Okay, so that’s sort of tip number one that I shouldn’t even have to give. Okay, next one make it clear that your email or cover letter is not a form letter.

Joke: Here’s the thing, the truth of the matter is, you’re probably sending form letters or form emails or you have an email that you worked really hard on and you really love it and so you keep copying and pasting it. It’s just we’ll get into more details along the way, but it’s really just about making a few changes to a few key sentences that make it way more personal. The moment it looks like you got it from a Word doc template cover letter it’s not going to work for us.

And again, it’s also a creative industry. So the more corporate that cover letter is, the more distancing it is. And that doesn’t mean that there shouldn’t be some kind of formality, there should. You’re not applying to a job at Bank of America, you’re applying to a job in the entertainment industry.

Biagio: Yes, and so that rolls right into our next tip which will instantly help you avoid a for male syndrome, which is show that you’ve researched the company. I cannot tell you how thrilled I was when out of all of these hundreds of emails we received, somebody would say, “I took the time to check out some of your shows,” or “I visited your website and I was excited to learn that you worked on Caged,” or “A while ago I was lucky enough to see your documentary, Dying To Do Letterman in theaters.”

I mean the people who even took the tiniest amount of time to show that they had an interest in working for us beyond needing a job, I instantly paid attention to. Maybe it’s my ego, maybe it’s all of our egos in Hollywood, but I guarantee you, that if you show that you’ve researched the company you’re applying to, even if it’s just one sentence, you’re instantly going to get their attention because most of the emails we get are form letters. So, just do your research.

Joke: Any kind of relationship in a business sense, even if it’s boss-employee or whatever, it’s a relationship. And so, we want to make sure that it’s the right fit not just for us, but for you that you’re excited about the job. If you’re not excited about the job and you just want a pay check, then it’s not going to work out because there’s going to be ups and downs in jobs and if you’re miserable at this job, then good God, life is full and nice and there’s lots of things for you to go do. We don’t want you to be miserable in this job.

So if you’ve researched the company and you’re like, “Hey, I really like your show,” and it’s not just for a company position, it can even be for a show position. If it’s like, hey, I’m a big fan of this show, I’ve researched the show and fortunately, I’m not able to see it. If it’s not online anywhere and you can’t find it, but I’m fascinated by the topic or something. Then at least it gives us a common ground to start from and it gives us a sense that you might be happy here.

Biagio: Yes. Next up, huge major tip this is probably responsible for most of the rest of the instant rejections- show you understand the job. Listen, our podcast is called Producing Unscripted. We make reality television documentaries and documentary-series. Any position that we’re hiring is going to be working on those types of shows.

Joke: Yeah, so I think what Biagio means by show you understand the job is, show you understand the kind of work we do. You may not know the exact position’s requirements. If we’re looking for a supervising producer, you may not know based on hearing that we’re looking for this job, whether it’s post-based or field-based.

So, I’m not asking you to know everything about the position we’re hiring you for, but you do have to kind of understand the job. You have to understand reality television, documentary television. You have to show some kind of sense that you understand what you’re applying for.

If you’re applying for any job in the creative world and you’re like, “Listen, I need Tuesdays and Thursday off and I can only work 9 to 4,” okay, well you’re in the wrong industry at that point.

Biagio: Yeah, and another—I mean, what sort of got me about this is that we’re very clear, again, that we’re an unscripted television company and we would get so many cover letters from people that would say, “My dream is to work on scripted television shows and I’m really hoping to use this as a springboard to get into scripted TV.”

I’ve got nothing against scripted TV, we sold a scripted television show a few years ago. It’s just not what we do and so I want to hire people that are going to be able to grow and blossom in this industry. I can help you be a real success in the world of unscripted. We’re probably not the people you want to work for at this exact moment if your dream is to work in scripted.

So again, when we would hear from people over and over again that they want to work in scripted or these are the kind of shows they work and they’re real clear and upfront about that in their cover letter, never once mentioning that we’re an unscripted company. It made us think that either they didn’t understand the job they were applying or they just didn’t think enough of our industry to be really excited about making this a long-term proposition.

Joke: Or they’re mistaken only thinking that this would make for a good springboard. And maybe for some people it does, it’s just I don’t want you not being happy working on unscripted programming since clearly your dream is to work on scripted programming. Then go apply to scripted companies.

Biagio: Yeah, and by the way, it’s not like reality TV production companies never do scripted. We’ve done scripted, lots of other reality companies move on into scripted. So it’s not like I’m against scripted, it’s just that when you’re applying for a specific position, you sort of need to show that you understand at least what that position might entail.

Another big tip point out any connections you might actually have to the company. We actually got a few cover letters from people who were working with people we worked with heavily. And so, if they’d even done a modicum of research, they would have known that we have a big connection with their current bosses which by the way is fine. We would’ve said, “Great, I haven’t given you a recommendation. I’d love to meet you.”

But when they go out of their way to say they’re working for somebody, yet never mention that they understand that we also worked with that person, it just makes it seem like again, they didn’t do their research.

If you have a connection to a company, flat our use it in your cover letter, however thin that connection. If it was, I took a workshop from you. If it was, hey, I listen to all of your podcast episodes. Whatever connection you can come up with to show that you have some reason that you’re applying for this job other than needing a job, it’s a benefit.

Joke: Yeah, or if it’s a bad connection, then you know not to mention it. If you’ve worked someplace and you realize, “Oh, we’ve worked with that person,” and you didn’t like working there, then don’t mention it because I may call that person and be like, “Hey, how did you like them?” So, it’s just important for you to do your research and be careful what you mention.

Biagio: Yeah. I’d also say another tip, I don’t know if this is something they teach coming out of college or because people have a lack of work experience, they feel like they need to fill in other jobs in their resume. But I was much more interested even if someone was straight out of school and them talking about projects that they’d worked on while in school, as opposed to listing that they were a waiter at Applebee’s.

Listen, I delivered pizzas for Pizza Hut. I’m very proud of that. It was a hard job. I washed dishes at Pizzutos, I used to bag groceries. Those jobs built character, they taught me how to deal with customers. They were great experiences. I would never take those back. I would also never put those at a resume when I was trying to break in to Hollywood.

It’s not going to get you hired. It’s not going to help. It’s just going to make people, it’s just going to highlight the fact that you think you don’t have any relevant experience as opposed to you shaping whatever little experience you do have into the perfect pitch for you wanting a job.

Joke: Well, I mean, I think that’s what they’re trying to do. I think they’re trying to say, “Listen, I was a manager at the Gap and that showed me X, Y, and Z.” The thing is, it’s like, okay maybe. But if there’s no experience currently on your resume that is exactly what we’re looking for, then you don’t know that that experience will translate because you’ve never experienced it.

So instead of focusing on the things that don’t really apply or things that stretching the things that you think might possibly apply, just own what your positives are. It’s like, listen I’ve never worked in the entertainment industry, this will be my first job and I will bust my behind, I will do everything I can. This is it, this means a lot to me.

You show me passion, you show me research, you show me interest, you show me that stuff. That’s way more important to me than you were a manager at the Gap.

Biagio: Yes. I want to add one more, it’s not on our list. And this is one that I have to admit, I never thought I would take seriously until I saw it. But the question is, to do or not to do a video cover letter. And I got to tell you, I would have thought somebody doing it a little video in their living room, directed at me and Joke, might freak me out a little bit.

But I got to say, a while ago we posted for this position, it was called the ultimate reality TV bootcamp position. It’s basically our assistants here who’s doing everything from handling phones to actually shooting footage, learning how to edit. Basically, we’re looking for someone we could groom into a show runner over the course of years.

And we hired a wonderful young lady named Ellen, straight out of school. And I got to tell you, she sent in a video cover letter. Along with by the way, an email that was so perfect that showed she’d researched the company, that expressed her interest in working on unscripted TV, that named several of the shows that we have worked on and what she liked about them, that pointed out her own small independent projects that she had done and why she thought that had prepared her for this position.

It was already a winner. And then she included a link to a video and I was like, “Oh, boy. Here we go. What’s this going to be?” And I got to say, she really just poured her heart and soul out into that video in a very professional manner and impressed me. I think that was a risk. Clearly for her, it was a risk worth taking.

It’s up to you whether or not you do a video cover letter. Joke, what are your thoughts?

Joke: It depends what the job is.

Biagio: Yeah.

Joke: And it depends what your level of experience is. But again, what she did is she owned her “shortcomings.” She owned the fact that this would be her first real industry job. Yes, she’s gotten jobs through school and stuff, doing documentary work and producing and that kind of stuff. So she’s gotten some experience but she hadn’t gotten the job.

So I think again, she did it because she needed an extra leg up because her resume didn’t have the other stuff. If we’re looking for show runners and all of a sudden a show runner sends to me a personalized interview video, I don’t know.

Biagio: I don’t know. It’s hard to say, right? Because when you say it out loud, it sounds crazy and maybe it’s because we’re getting I mean, I don’t consider us old but certainly, our generation weren’t doing video cover letters.

Joke: Here’s the thing, if the people who can’t spell jobs correctly are going to start doing video cover letters, it ain’t going to work.

Biagio: It’s not going to happen, yeah.

Joke: So to me, it’s like it works when it works, when you got the goods. And it’s flat-out embarrassing if you don’t have the goods. So, everyone thinks they have the goods.

Biagio: Yeah. I got to say, in her case, she had the goods and she also smartly intercut her own video cover letter with footage of her shooting on set and then footage that she was shooting that looked really darn good. So I was like, “Well, here’s a person that’s not afraid to handle gear, that’s not afraid to own what they’ve done,” and we hired her, straight out of school.

So, good for her. Good for you, Ellen, if you’re listening. Right now, she’s working upfront and she’s getting ready to go out and shoot with us. And then after the shoot, she’s going to be marking up footage. She is really just learning all kinds of new skills on this job.

Alright, we’re going to move on to the interview and just a few tips about the interview that we think are important. Number one be available for the interview. Now, this might sound obvious. We received quite a few resume submissions from people that lived out of state and that’s great. As a matter of fact, Ellen lived out of state. But the problem was, we require an in-face interview, as would most companies.

Joke: In person.

Biagio: In person, an in person interview. We’re not going to hire you off of Skype for many reasons. Not the least of which is that, I need to know if you can actually make it to LA. And that might sound silly, but you’d be amazed how many people we know, us included, who’ve been burned by people who want a job, who are out of state, who say they’ll be there, and then realize how hard it is to move and don’t show up.

Joke: Yeah. And there’s one caveat to that if I’m looking for specific production job that’s field-related and that’s out in the field.

Biagio: Oh, sure.

Joke: We have hired those people off of Skype because, again, it doesn’t matter where they live. I’m going to have to fly them to my location anyway. But when we’re talking about an office job you kind of have to make yourself available. And it’s also one of those things where, I know we’re opposed to post-interview people who applied for a job.

And he’s like, “Great, I’m ready to hire you. Can you start in a week, two weeks?” or whatever. And he’s like, “Well, I got to go fly back home. It’s going to take me two months to get ready to come back out here.” It’s like, “Well, okay we’re looking to hire, we want to hire. We don’t want to then just wait for two months to bring you back.”

Biagio: Yeah. And listen, it’s hard but we all moved at Los Angeles at some point. I’m from Cleveland, Joke’s from Belgium. Pretty much everyone that works for us is from somewhere else. So we speak from experience when we say, if you want to work in this industry and you want to work full-time out here, at some point you just have to move.

Joke: Well it also shows that you’re willing to bet on yourself, right? If you’re not betting on yourself, if you’re not betting on like, I can go out there and I can get a job or I can do this or I can do that, then again, it just questions whether or not you’re fully committed to pursuing this career.

Biagio: Yeah and again, for me, I don’t want to have to worry, and this is going to maybe sound like I’m being an A-hole or I’m just being the jerky Hollywood producer, but I just want to be honest and I mean this in the nicest way possible your personal life and your living situation cannot be our problem.

We’re looking to hire you. We need to provide a great work environment for you. We want to make sure that we have our end of it taken care of. But you have to have your end of it taken care of. So the minute you start making us or any company for that matter think that your personal life, that your living situation is going to be a hassle, that it’s going to make it difficult for us to hire you, we shut off.

It’s really easy to avoid that. Just make it happen. So if you really want a job, if you really want a job and you’re applying for it and you’re out of state, just make it seem to the person you’re applying to that it’s not going to be a problem for you to be there, and then show up. Just don’t even make an issue of it.

But the minute you make it an issue, the minute you start asking things like, “Well, do I have to come in for an interview? Well, do we really have to meet in person?” It’s going to raise red flags. And again listen, it’s a personal choice for everybody. I’m just trying to give you the best possible chance at getting a job that you’re applying for. So just know that these things are red flags.

Joke: Yeah, and to bring the softer side to Biagio’s.

Biagio: Am I ranting today? I’m ranting a little bit today.

Joke: Yeah, I think he doesn’t have to edit this so he’s like, “Oh, this is fantastic. I’ll just keep talking.” No, what were we saying? Listen, life happens, right? Family members move on and there’s funerals to attend to, there’s weddings. I’m a mom, we have moms that work here. Sometimes you have to go pick up your kid at daycare, you got to do different things and that’s like we can work around that stuff.

Biagio: Of course.

Joke: But if you start a job interview or before you even get to the job interview, you come up with excuse after excuse after excuse why you can’t even make it to a job interview, it’s just not a good place to start from. Because those things, they should be exceptions. It’s like, oh life happens so I have to go deal with something. Sure, I get it. But if it’s like every day, there’s always something, then it’s just going to get in the way of work.

And so, it’s just, again, it’s just about putting on the best show possible so you can get hired. I mean, not to okay to toot our horn a little bit, how we got the Beauty and the Geek job is because we literally studied every episode that they had already produced. We broke it down, we knew exactly what happened in every act of every episode.

And when Ashton Kutcher and Jason Goldberg Katalyst were interviewing us and they threw out a million different questions just about the show and whether or not we knew, we knew that show backwards and forwards and so it made it very easy for them to hire us.

Biagio: We knew the show better than they did at that point.

Joke: Right. And so, it’s one of those things where it’s like, as someone hiring people you want to hire someone who just has it who you feel confident in. And so, it’s about you being able to present the most confident self of like, okay, I have this. I’ve done my research, I know what this show is. I can express my passion for it, I know what I want to do with it. Yes, give me feedback. Yes, give me direction. But I can do this. You present that to us and you’re hired.

Biagio: Yeah, so there you go. So just to recap some of the tips we gave today. First of all, in your cover letter please no misspellings. Make it clear if you possibly can that it’s not a form email or letter. Show you’ve researched the company. Show you understand at least what the job entails and what kind of company you are applying to.

Point out any connections you might have to the company. Please don’t confuse us about your skills or you’re mixing your completely irrelevant jobs unless you can explain a really great reason why you think that job is preparing you for the one you’re applying for.

When it comes to your interview, be available. And make sure that living out of town, you don’t make that the company’s problem. You make the company feel like if they hired you tomorrow you would be able to start tomorrow. And then when it comes to that video cover letter, hey that’s up to you. I still think it’s a roll of the dice but I got to say it won us over. So consider whether or not you want to do a video cover letter. If you do it, I would suggest, try not to be creepy and make it friendly and short.

So there you go Episode 37 landing a job in Hollywood. Something that can surely help you break in to the business if you’re not coming at it from the complete indie route. If you want to work your way up, you’re going to have to get that first job and I really believe these tips will make you stand out. Because anyone who followed these tips who just submitted to us got an interview. So that’s the truth.

Joke: Alright. We’ll see you in two weeks.

Biagio: Alright, that’s it. We’ll see you in two weeks, everybody. Thanks for tuning in. And we missed you last time but we were tending to our new child. So thanks for letting us skip a podcast up. We will be back in two weeks. Thanks again.

Joke: Bye-bye.