This office screw-up went viral because it’s very funny with a heartwarming twist
We’re grateful to someone called Quinn Cummings, a one-time actor and now a writer who shared this brilliant story about the time she worked as a talent agent.
It’s a very funny story but what happened after she shared it is even more amazing. Over to Quinn on Twitter…
https://twitter.com/quinncy/status/1060303097178673152
1.
A long time ago, I was a talent agent. I worked for a woman named Susan Smith, who had her own small boutique agency. She was known for three things:
1. She had fantastic taste in clients. If there is someone you admire, odds are good that at some point, she was their agent,
— Quinn Cummings (@quinncy) November 7, 2018
2.
2. She could negotiate a deal like few who have ever trod the earth. Casting would give her all the money they had budgeted for that part, plus a little more, plus promising to get her dog Barnaby groomed. She was magnificent to watch.
— Quinn Cummings (@quinncy) November 7, 2018
3.
3. She was insane.
— Quinn Cummings (@quinncy) November 7, 2018
4.
I’m sure you’re thinking, “Quinn, it’s the entertainment industry, they are all insane.” Yes, many are. So consider this; if you told someone you worked for Susan, people who worked for insane people would look and you and whisper, “I hear she’s insane.”
— Quinn Cummings (@quinncy) November 7, 2018
5.
Volatile, capable off toggling between rage-screaming and whispered tears in 90 seconds. An unerring instinct at knowing exactly what you doubted about yourself and musing aloud about it. A level of vitriol to subordinates that was outlawed by the 13th Amendment.
— Quinn Cummings (@quinncy) November 7, 2018
6.
She went through assistants with comical speed. One young man – who had endured the rigors of law school – went to “move his car” after ninety minutes on her desk and never came back.
— Quinn Cummings (@quinncy) November 7, 2018
7.
I was her assistant for six months. If I hear a phone that sounds like the one we had in the office, I still get nauseated.
— Quinn Cummings (@quinncy) November 7, 2018
8.
But oh, did she love her clients. She had no husband, no children; her clients were everything. Specifically, Kathy Bates and Brian Dennehy. She had discovered both of them when they were doing off-off-off-Near Hackensack-Broadway. She adored them. One could argue she made them.
— Quinn Cummings (@quinncy) November 7, 2018
9.
For years, Brian had wanted to do DEATH OF A SALESMAN on the stage, in Chicago. For years, for a number of reasons, it hadn’t happened. Finally, with superhuman strength and negotiating prowess on Susan’s part, DEATH, with the perfect director on the stage Brian wanted, went up.
— Quinn Cummings (@quinncy) November 7, 2018
10.
Brian got the kinds of reviews he deserved. The play was a huge hit. So huge, in fact, that it went to Broadway. Again, Susan hammered out the seemingly endless details of moving a production to a Broadway theater. She went to the opening. The reviews were love letters to Brian.
— Quinn Cummings (@quinncy) November 7, 2018
11.
Susan was ecstatic. But the real joy came when Brian won the Tony for his performance. I watched it at home and I was 99% thrilled for Brian and 1% thrilled for us at the office. Susan had a tendency to walk in the door screaming instructions and grievances.
— Quinn Cummings (@quinncy) November 7, 2018
12.
I was now an agent, not her assistant, but Susan didn’t hold with such distinctions. We all got screamed at, we all became miserable, we all started whatever self-soothing behavior allowed us to not cry in the hallway. At the very least, Brian’s win would delight her.
— Quinn Cummings (@quinncy) November 7, 2018
13.
And then Brian forgot to thank her.
— Quinn Cummings (@quinncy) November 7, 2018
14.
The next morning, we walked around with the resigned despair of a tank of sentient lobsters. We were all to be boiled alive, it was just a matter of when. Susan flew in the door, raced to her office, slammed the door shut. The quiet was actually worse.
— Quinn Cummings (@quinncy) November 7, 2018