Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: This podcast is a collaboration between costart and Touchstone productions and the dads from the Crypt podcast.
[00:00:06] Speaker B: Well, my father was a mechanic.
His father was a mechanic. My mother's father was a mechanic.
My three brothers are mechanics. Four uncles on my father's side, a mechanic.
[00:00:16] Speaker A: Alfredo, your family's obviously qualified, but have you ever worked as a mechanic?
[00:00:23] Speaker B: Yeah, in my father's garage. Yeah, as a mechanic.
[00:00:36] Speaker A: Hello, and welcome to another episode of the how not to make a movie podcast. I'm Alan Katz.
Everybody needs a good mechanic, am I right? But not all mechanics are created equal. For a decade or so, I had a great mechanic. Well, he wasn't actually a mechanic. He was my agent. His name is Nick Mechanic, but most people called him just mechanic. If I tell you he's a character, I'm underselling him. Mechanic was and is a force of nature. And his story, like his stories, they're going to blow your mind, because in addition to being a great agent and living the Hollywood life on a knife's edge, Nick also has been a drug addict, a fall down, pass out drunk, a criminal, and now, thankfully, a person in full recovery, fighting that good fight every damned day. Not your average Hollywood story, Nick mechanic. Not even remotely.
You were introduced to me by Scott Nimmerfron.
[00:01:41] Speaker B: Yes. Our dear friend.
[00:01:43] Speaker A: Yeah. Who is no longer with us. Scott died a bunch of years ago.
He had an unusual cancer. And it wasn't actually the cancer that got him. It was.
Oh, he suddenly bled out one day. One of the part of the blood flow that went to the tumor ruptured and, oh, all the silly ways.
[00:02:02] Speaker B: Nothing you could do about it. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[00:02:04] Speaker A: But Scott was, as we've talked about on the podcast, he was. He wrote more episodes of tales from the crypt than anybody else, and great episodes.
[00:02:15] Speaker B: He's a hell of a writer.
[00:02:17] Speaker A: Terrific writer. And he went on to work on Hannibal and pushing daisies and.
[00:02:22] Speaker B: Good storyteller. Oh.
[00:02:24] Speaker A: And Scott understood. I think we'll jump ahead a little bit here. When you started representing me, I think if I would have been Scott Nimmer fro, you would have been so happy.
[00:02:37] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:02:38] Speaker A: I mean, not Scott literally, but if I had, because Scott always had a script or two in his pocket, two or three more in his head. He was always putting stuff out and. But we'll come to that. So, anyway, so Scott says, you know, Scott knew I was. After being fired and being down in the dumps, he knew that I was.
Yeah, I desperately needed representation. And he said, there's this guy. He's at the agency. His name is Nick Mechanic. Give him a call.
So I called you.
[00:03:16] Speaker B: Nice.
[00:03:17] Speaker A: And the agency was in Century City, correct. In a high rise. Were you on, like, the 12th floor.
[00:03:27] Speaker B: Or something like that when we met? Where we. I think we were on Beverly Glen and Santa Monica. Then we moved into Century Park east.
[00:03:36] Speaker A: Right, right.
[00:03:38] Speaker B: Because we go way back.
[00:03:39] Speaker A: Oh, gosh, if that's right. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[00:03:42] Speaker B: 30 years. The building where Lunaria restaurant used to be.
[00:03:46] Speaker A: Right, right.
Now, how did you get to the agency? How did you get into being an agent to begin with? Let's go back there.
[00:03:58] Speaker B: I used to sell clothing for a living. I was. I did. I was really good at it. I could coordinate men, and my clients were John McTiernan, Kevin Spacey, who. I rescued his dog. We became dear friends. He actually paid me to come over to his house in West Hollywood, trying to f. Me.
You could say, I could have been one of his.
[00:04:19] Speaker A: You could say, go ahead.
[00:04:21] Speaker B: I could have been one of his victims. And Kevin and John McKiernan and David Seltzer, amazing writer and other people. I say, nick, you should not be selling clothing for a living. You should be an agent. I'm like, sounds great.
[00:04:36] Speaker A: Now, before you were selling clothing, where'd you grow up? What. What part of. What part of the world?
[00:04:41] Speaker B: I grew up in upstate New York, but it wasn't even upstate Spring Valley, 25 minutes outside of Manhattan. My dad was in the trucking business and had warehouses in Jersey.
[00:04:51] Speaker A: Your dad was in the trucking business?
[00:04:53] Speaker B: Yeah.
Dealing with people he shouldn't be doing. So he lost his business and he didn't rat anybody out. We were given 72 hours to move out of our little. Our city, and we moved to LA to restart.
[00:05:08] Speaker A: Can I ask. That's. That's interesting. You were given 72 hours to move out. What. What does that mean exactly? That's.
[00:05:15] Speaker B: He was. He was in bed with the five families.
And like, for example, there's supposed to be 50,000 pallets of harsh mountain animal products on his. On his chain of trucks. There'd be 200,000 boxes from point a to point b to point c. And he knew who's. What was going on. He was in the middle of it. He probably orchestrated it and got caught doing it. You know, harsh Mountain and Schwinn bicycles. And. And those primarily were the two big ones. And they caught him doing it. And he didn't rat anybody out. And because he didn't rat anybody out, he was able to walk free from the mafia.
[00:05:56] Speaker A: Did he have to change his identity in any way?
[00:05:59] Speaker B: No, he went to court. He had a full trial and was found not guilty. And my sisters and I were dragged to court every day for court. Look at Mister mechanics three. Look.
[00:06:11] Speaker A: So your dad gets caught by the feds, interstate trucking stuff. I guess so it's FBI. So the FBI comes in and they put your dad on trial. He doesn't rat anyone out to the mob, and they lose the FBI and the federal prosecutors lose the case against him. So, yeah. Really and truly, yeah, he got the magical outcome. And the best thing he could possibly do for himself and for all concerned was to take this moment in time and walk away.
[00:06:45] Speaker B: As my dad. My mom used to tell me after my dad died, I love playing pool. So my dad bought me a professional pool table when I was like five years old. And they would have the five families over for dinner. And little did I know it, I was playing pool, doing pool tricks for the heads of the five family. And they gave me like a $1,000. Just do it again, kid. Do it again, kid.
[00:07:07] Speaker A: I've known you for all this time. I've never heard this fucking story before. This is why I'm trying to wrap my head around it as I'm hearing it.
[00:07:15] Speaker B: Please do. One day he comes, comes home with a. 38 loaded revolver. You know, I'm like, oh, no. He's like, I'm gonna kill your uncle. He could have been the rat, we don't know. But it was a great house to live in. It was a great family structure. Very upper class. And nobody fucked with us. Nobody fucked with my dad's son ever.
[00:07:35] Speaker A: Then you moved out to Los Angeles and your new dad started over.
[00:07:40] Speaker B: He started. He worked for a big superior industries. He wrote tariffs for shipping.
They manufacture wheels, not tires, but the actual aluminum and metal wheels for cars. They had a big, big factory out in Van Nuys. And I love trucks. So I used to, on a Saturday, my dad would bring me over to the. To the office and I'd spend the day on a. Driving with one of the tractor trailer drivers, which I love. When I grew up in New York, I didn't have a toy room or a playroom. I had a truck room because it was filled with planes and trucks and all kinds. I was very into that.
[00:08:17] Speaker A: How old were you when your family made the move from east to the west?
[00:08:22] Speaker B: 13. And then he died within a year. So he died. Remember sitting in my 7th grade classroom and the principal coming in asking for me, saying, we need to let you go. Your mom's on her way. Your father passed away. Now, that didn't affect me on the outside, because all I knew is dad wasn't coming home again. I remember that afternoon playing baseball with my friends.
I just knew he wasn't coming home. But what it did affect was me. And I didn't know how deep that scar was and feel. It's definitely traceable to my drug addiction and my alcoholism. You know, it was because I was. I then became really good friends with all of these cool guys. Like, I was one of the cool guys. And all my friends came from a lot of money, and I gravitated towards their family, their fathers. So I had, like, all these new stepdads, if you will. And I hung out with them a lot. So I was always missing that father influence because I know my dad wouldn't have let me do what I ended up doing. They would forget about it.
So with just my mom in charge and me in charge, I was able to do what I want.
[00:09:36] Speaker A: What did your dad die of?
[00:09:38] Speaker B: Heart attack. He was. My parents were separated. He was living in San Francisco, started another company up there, and he lived on Coit tower, so he had a three story step up to his condo, and he couldn't handle that. He was overweight. He smoked two packs of cigarettes a day. He drank, you know, Jack Daniels like it was going out of style. We were at one of his business associates party during the holidays, and we got pulled over, and I remember hearing the CHP officers pull over, go to the Denny's right there, and sober up. The only reason I'm not taking you to jail and you're getting a DUI is be sure with your son now. Treat him right and go get sober.
Yikes. Yeah. Then he died and, you know, things changed. Although my parents were separated, but things changed. My dad was not violent, but he could be mean. You know, he grew up in the streets of Brooklyn. He was, you know, a tough motherfucker, if you will. I have. There's an article I have from him when he got out of the navy. He's driving a cab in Manhattan, and he hears screaming, help. Help. So my dad parks the car, runs up and down the street, finds a bar where the man is yelling from. The guy was being robbed in broad daylight.
And my dad beat them up and took them out with a chair.
And then his fist called the cops. And I have this actual article from the whatever magazine. It was at the time or newspaper that my dad was a hero. He was also a purple Heart recipient. He saved his admiral from the ship.
It was the real deal.
[00:11:28] Speaker A: He had. He had something in him.
[00:11:31] Speaker B: Yeah.
Yeah.
And smart.
[00:11:35] Speaker A: But he had demons.
[00:11:37] Speaker B: Yeah. We all did. Yeah. He was married before my mom and went off to the war, and he came back and his then wife, this is the story I've been told. His then wife had told her kids that their died dad in combat, and they have no father, so he wouldn't, they wouldn't. Had nothing to do with my father. My sisters tried contacting him, and my mother tried contacting my stepbrothers who always say, our dad is dead. So I have two stepbrothers that I've never met.
[00:12:08] Speaker A: Do you have any idea why that is?
[00:12:11] Speaker B: No. We could never find out.
[00:12:13] Speaker A: Fascinating character, your dad.
[00:12:16] Speaker B: Where do you think I come from?
[00:12:19] Speaker A: You know? So your dad is gone. You said things change.
How did they change? And in what discernible ways?
Your life took a different direction than in my.
[00:12:31] Speaker B: Hey. My mom got really sick with the mental abuse my dad gave her. And she had severe, severe migraines. And so when he died, those migraines went away and she became a free person and was not a hostage. And she became that loving, which she always was.
Woman. You met her, you know my mom?
[00:12:56] Speaker A: Oh, I knew your mom quite well.
[00:12:58] Speaker B: Yeah, I know.
[00:12:59] Speaker A: Wonderful. Loved her.
[00:13:00] Speaker B: Yeah. And I then realized that I had no boss because my mom couldn't control me. But I was a really good kid. Um, all I did was smoke pot and play baseball every day I was on. I played, um, junior high school. I played for my high school. I played for junior college for a couple years. I could throw the ball. But I found that I wanted to get high and do coke and. And smoke pot more and fuck girls more than I wanted it. I wasn't big enough to go, bro. Maybe I was at the time because I wasn't big, but I could throw the fucking ball hard. Metro counts. So, you know, I started to see. Didn't graduate high school, then took my GED, you know, because I was too interested in fucking girls. And if I could redo my life over, I mean, I would have gone to law school and become a prosecutor or a litigator.
[00:13:51] Speaker A: Oh, you have it in you. God, when you are on top of your game, there you are. Awesome.
[00:13:59] Speaker B: Yeah, I love to litigate. I love to. I love to meddle in cases and get involved.
I love it. And I win. I haven't lost one. I was threatened to be banned from 20th Century Fox. And as I'm going through this Horatius shit on their part, I get an off the record call from the guy I did the deal with on this particular deal. And he said, nick, are we off the record? I said, yeah. He goes, good work.
Because they wanted to ban me from life, from ever doing business at fox. I'm like, ban me. That's fine. You've seen me through the ropes.
[00:14:34] Speaker A: Yes, I have.
But before you got to that point where you could make fox hate you, you were selling clothes. What kind of clothes were you selling? Where were you selling these clothes?
[00:14:47] Speaker B: In a great store in Brentwood called Maxima. It's no longer in business in the Brentwood garden. So my clientele were very high end. And I would suit, shirt size, some casual wear, but I would literally go into the client's house, go through, charge $250 an hour charge for them, and throw out all their old stuff, have them buy a full wardrobe. And then I would go in and number the pants, shirts, jackets and suits.
[00:15:16] Speaker A: So you were doing makeovers, but before they were. Before they were doing makeovers. If you had just been. If you videos doing this, man, you'd have been a be rich curve.
[00:15:29] Speaker B: So a lot of my clients were like, Nick, you are so dynamic. You should be in the movie business first. I got hired to be a commercial film rep, and at the age of 21 or 22, I was making a thousand cash, a thousand take home a week. So I was doing it. But I was doing a lot of starting my cocaine tour back then, and it didn't work out. I wasn't working.
[00:15:51] Speaker A: That's one way to put it.
[00:15:53] Speaker B: So I was going to Vegas. It just happens that there was a men's apparel show, and which is the world that I knew, and I figured I'd go away for a couple of days, and it just so happened that I had the only reel of this new director we were signing, and he was getting awarded the California non smoking campaign with the dead bodies. It was called body bags. Very happening, director.
We lost the commercial because I was in Vegas with the one tape where they called me on Friday afternoon saying, we need that tape. On my outgoing voicemail was a message my roommate Danny left. Hey, it's Nick and Danny. Danny will be in the USC at finals. Nick is in Vegas and not available till Monday.
Now, if I would have just told my, my bosses I was going to look for business, and at the men's apparel show, they would have said, go.
But of course, me and my thinking, which is the cause of my demise, even though there was no demise, but there kind of was, you know, that's what told me it was okay to do.
[00:17:06] Speaker A: You thought a little outside the box. And what did it get you?
[00:17:10] Speaker B: A hole in my nose.
[00:17:12] Speaker A: Damn.
[00:17:13] Speaker B: Basically a lot of. Don't. Don't get me wrong, I had a lot of good times when people, you know, I'm in a now and I'm sober three years, and I had eight years. But I realized after my mom passed and my then girlfriend and I broke up and Covid happened, and I had a nice, long relapse. But it was pretty bad. It was, you know. But, you know, when I go to a meetings and I hear people say, my worst day sober is better than my best day drunk, I'm like, well, you didn't hang out with the right people because I got to go to Paris, France, with Vince Neil from Motley Crue and my friend Steve Gross, who owns national thirsty rent a car, plastered out of our ass, not knowing where we're going at three in the morning. I had some interesting times, you know?
[00:18:06] Speaker A: Well, you did.
[00:18:07] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:18:09] Speaker A: All right, so you've got people in the business who say, you know, Nick, you. You should be doing sort of what we're doing.
[00:18:18] Speaker B: So Kevin Spacey calls Kevin Yuvain, who was, like, one of the top guys over there, and said, I have a guy I want you to meet.
[00:18:26] Speaker A: A top guy over.
[00:18:27] Speaker B: Over at CAA.
[00:18:29] Speaker A: At CAA at the time. CAA, one of the monster big agencies, right?
[00:18:34] Speaker B: And then John McKiernan put a call and I met with him. Jake Jacobs, Abby Robinson, Abby Edwards. And they all hired me on the spot. Like, you're exactly what we're looking for. And then I did my. Yeah.
And then I met with our Jean Argierio. I'll never forget her name. She was head of human resources, and I had to fill out paperwork. And you have to have a four year degree to get in their training program. So I lied, of course, and said I went to Northridge. So a couple of days later, I get a call that they have no record for me and they have to dehire me.
So I called Ron Meyer, who was running the place. I didn't know him. He didn't know me, but thoughtful enough, the man returned to every call he ever got. And he returned my call Monday morning. And I went through the process and who recommended me. And he's like, nick, as you know, I don't have a high school diploma. And even though I'm, you know, CEO or COo of creative artists, I made it a promise to my. My partners that I would never get involved in any issues regarding schooling and degrees. So what you can do is go, became an agent, become hot, and we'll hire you. And that's exactly what happened. They wanted to hire me, and I found this out later in my career, but they had just lost one of their top young agents, who is just like the man in the man and his.
I'm drawing a blank on his name. I'll come up with it.
And they then said, you know what? We know you're a cocaine addict. We know your history. We're not going to go down this road. So we're sorry. So when I got dehired, I just got on the phone and started blind calling smaller to mid sized agencies. And I got, I interviewed with all of them and got hired by the agency and started my career not knowing how to type.
[00:20:32] Speaker A: So you met with Jerry Zeitman.
[00:20:36] Speaker B: I met with my then boss, head of the talent department, Karan Champeau. And she made the decision and then told human resources. And I met Jerry, and I. And Jerry loved me. He just loved me as an, as an assistant. I was signing. I couldn't sign them, but I brought in actors who were friends of mine with credits, people who were actively, you know, on, on soap operas and in Karate kid, the movie. And so I brought in cashflow as an assistant. And then when I wasn't working out with Karan, my boss and I quit. And Jerry called me up Monday and said, I don't want to lose you, so I'm going to transfer my assistant to go work for Quran, and you're going to come work with me. So great. You learn a lot working for the CEO of a company. What not to do. And all the complaints for clients who are unhappy go to him. So I started working for clients that were unhappy as an assistant.
Within a year, I sell a pitch to Simpson Bruckheimer, Disneyland called Triads for $550,000. Front page of the daily variety in Hollywood Reporter. Nobody was buying pitches. Nobody was buying pitches. For $550,000. I got a $500 bonus from my, my boss. Gee, thank you very much.
[00:21:54] Speaker A: $500. Wow. There goes the profits.
[00:21:57] Speaker B: And then six weeks later, I sold another one to MGM for 250. So he's like, I don't think you want to be my, my assistant anymore. I'm like, not really, Jerry. So he promoted me, and the rest went from there. And I became a young Turk and was, was. I was selling everything I went out with. I was making a lot of money, doing a lot of drugs, calling you sick at least once a week. You know, that's a whole nother chapter. It got to the point where every time I had a flat tire, when I called in sick, Jerry was, like, bringing receipts. So one day, I had to have him. I go to the car, place big old tires, ask for some receipts. They said, no, you have to buy the tires. So I had a brand new Mustang convertible. So I had to pay for three brand new Mustang convertible tires. Cost me $750 to get the receipt. Never used the tires.
One time I called in sick. Didn't even call in. Just never showed up. This is sadhesthe. And my mom came over. I was missing in action once again. She said, did you know your best friend Chris just killed himself? He committed suicide. He hung himself.
And that was my excuse for not coming in. So when I went into work the next day, I was like, no, I had tragedy. My best friend hung himself. That's where it led me to, like, using my best friend's suicide as an excuse. Really bad, no class, just horrible. Always looking out for myself.
[00:23:28] Speaker A: I have one particular Nick got fired memory.
I was at the agency one day after I signed on with you all, and I forget what it was, but Vince Girardis was there. Was Vince.
[00:23:45] Speaker B: Your assistant, Jonathan Rosenblum, was at the time.
[00:23:49] Speaker A: That's right. But Vince was also. Vince was there.
[00:23:52] Speaker B: This is on his way in.
[00:23:54] Speaker A: Yes. And I, Jerry Zeitman decided to fire you. And I left. And Jerry said, you know, as a Monday, I'm representing you, so don't worry about it. Okay. And you and I were getting together.
[00:24:13] Speaker B: That's right.
[00:24:14] Speaker A: You showed up at my house, and as you walked in the door. Yeah, yeah. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. And we. We were not planning to do anything other than get higher as it got together. We.
And as you walked in the door, I. I said, you said, how was.
[00:24:29] Speaker B: Your day at work, Nick?
It's great, Alan. And then you said, did you know you got fired today? Nope.
[00:24:38] Speaker A: Because I had been to your. To your place of employment, but you had not.
[00:24:42] Speaker B: It was right.
[00:24:44] Speaker A: And then you said to me, but you know what? You said? I'm not worried about it. You said, Monday morning, it'll all be fixed.
[00:24:52] Speaker B: And I had to threaten the Hollywood reporter not to write any articles that were false. And I got Stuart Rosenthal, my, then our, then attorney, involved, and he threatened them as well and said, do not write. Write anything that's not accurate because it's never happened. So we had to get lawyers involved, and that was fun. And Jerry and I made up that Monday. Then I had to go to rehab.
[00:25:16] Speaker A: Over the weekend, backstage, Stuart Rosenthal was really going at them.
[00:25:24] Speaker B: That's right.
[00:25:25] Speaker A: Your attorney and my attorney for quite a long while.
And that's what happened. Because I don't think I even knew that. All I know is that come Monday morning, things were okay.
[00:25:38] Speaker B: A lovely article in the hollowed reporter that it was just a mistake.
Yeah.
Then I went to rehab. And the deal was, if Jerry, I did 30 days, came back, he still paid me while I was gone. When they took me back from rehab just to see if my apartment was okay, I had like an 8th of coke, an 8th of an ounce of cocaine just in the cracks in my coffee table. They had to take it apart and scrape it off.
And so then I was sober for a while. But I started to drink a little bit and started doing drugs again. And I missed work again. And Jerry said, all right, time to go to the lab and get drug tested. So I'm like, I'm fucked. So my neighbor was home. He was a music video director. And he was sober. He wasn't in the program. He just never drank or used drugs. So he gave me a big vial of liquid bee.
So I went to. I drove to the valley, which is where the lab was. But first I stopped at a Starbucks and got a large cup of boiling water to put the vial in to keep it hot.
The problem was when the lab called to tell my boss that I was negative, his urine was 165 degrees. His liquid was boiling.
[00:27:04] Speaker A: You were sitting in a hot car.
[00:27:06] Speaker B: It was in the hot. It was in my 711 cup of hot water. I didn't realize it would get that hot. That's how bright I am. But, you know, this whole time, as you know, I was functioning four days a week as an agent. I got you a tremendous gig doing outer limits.
[00:27:22] Speaker A: Absolutely. The fact that I got outer limits was entirely your doing.
[00:27:26] Speaker B: My clients were working.
[00:27:28] Speaker A: When you are on your game, there is nobody better. You are. You are a. A pit bulls. Pit bull. You. You are, you're a monster.
[00:27:36] Speaker B: And when I call. When I called you. When I called you from Los Angeles county men's, men's Central County Jail.
Allen, it's Nick. Well, you're receiving a collect call from Nick.
[00:27:49] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. First person. La county collect call from the county jail.
[00:27:53] Speaker B: And you answer the phone. I'm like, don't hang up. I've got great stuff. Stuff they tell you.
[00:27:58] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, yeah. But. But before we get to that, there. There was still, you know, outer limits was. Was a great gig. And really I owe that to you. We. I should have had it a year earlier, but a certain someone. A certain someone who is now my friend kind of. Kind of got in the way of that.
[00:28:19] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:28:20] Speaker A: Yeah. That was an unfortunate thing. I won't go into any details, but the next year, Mark Stern. You went back and Mark Stern hired me, and I went to.
[00:28:30] Speaker B: They hired you. I remember the deal. It was guaranteed. They were doing 22 episodes. But he only guaranteed. He only. He only guaranteed you six to try you out.
[00:28:41] Speaker A: Right.
[00:28:42] Speaker B: And he called me after the first episode and said, we're picking him up for the full year.
[00:28:47] Speaker A: So I had to earn my wings. It was because of the negative recommendation that I got.
[00:28:55] Speaker B: All it takes is one bozo, oh, Mama Lucian.
[00:28:59] Speaker A: But hey, yeah, the outer limits was a great show to be on. It was exactly what I needed working in Vancouver.
It's funny, you and I, of course, constant conversation back and forth. And when you would, we had one.
The writers had one assistant between, I think, the five of us. I forget what her name was, but.
[00:29:22] Speaker B: Leah.
[00:29:22] Speaker A: Leah. Well, of course you remember Leah's name. Leah would.
You would call. You'd say, hey, it's the mechanic for Alan.
You say, it's mechanic. Mechanic. And so she came to me after, shortly after, and she said, you have such a close relationship with your mechanic.
[00:29:43] Speaker B: That's happened a lot.
[00:29:44] Speaker A: And so I explained to her what the deal was. Now, at some point, you came up to visit me. I did all the time in Vancouver. And I think you hung out with Leonardo.
[00:29:56] Speaker B: I did. For the weekend, yeah.
[00:29:58] Speaker A: Did you, in fact, sleep with her?
[00:30:00] Speaker B: I did not.
[00:30:03] Speaker A: How did you not pull that off? As I recall, she was very attracted.
[00:30:06] Speaker B: We went out the first night. She was a go go dancer, and we had a blast. And she was shy, so we fooled around a little bit, and then she, like a little girl, ran down the block. It was really endearing. And then I decided to get crack instead. The second night at the park around the corner from whatever hotel I was staying in.
[00:30:25] Speaker A: Yeah, you were at the Sutton.
[00:30:26] Speaker B: So I blew that. And was. I was smoking crack in the bathroom on your set when my client, Neil Fernley was directing Joe Panteleone.
[00:30:37] Speaker A: Oh, yes. And that the first. That's right. You came up. That was the first episode that. That's right.
[00:30:43] Speaker B: That you did, that I wrote and.
[00:30:44] Speaker A: I produced and Neil directed.
You very cleverly began to pick up canadian directors as clients.
[00:30:52] Speaker B: I was making big money just representing directors. I would book them nine months in advance, and they were every month, every three weeks. They were working. They worked more under my leadership than anybody else. And I got them into the DGA, got Neil a Dgate ent pilot, and it was great. And I'm still getting highs, still getting high, still drinking.
No ramifications except not getting hired by CAA.
[00:31:26] Speaker A: Yeah, that's true. The only downside.
[00:31:28] Speaker B: So my whole team hated me because I could do no wrong in Jerry Zachman's eyes, you know, he loved me. I was like the son he always wanted.
[00:31:37] Speaker A: Did you see Jerry as a father figure in any way?
[00:31:41] Speaker B: Absolutely. Yeah. I need a lot of money. And we went to Canada all the time. We went to Mexico. He treated. We always had dinner with clients, eat wherever we want. He always picked up the check. He was very good to me. And he didn't fire me, which is quite amazing because he had every right to can me dozens of times. Dozens.
[00:32:01] Speaker A: Do you think he saw a son in you?
[00:32:05] Speaker B: Absolutely.
[00:32:06] Speaker A: Did he have any sons?
[00:32:07] Speaker B: He did. Craig Zeitman. Remember, he used to answer the phone. The agency. Wow.
[00:32:12] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:32:13] Speaker B: That was Jerry's son. He died, and Jerry recently died within the past five years. But he was very good to me. I have nothing bad to say about him. He could have run things differently, but he didn't. And that's. It was his choice. It was his company. But we had the potential to grow. But Jerry just got in the way. Like when he called you and said, I'm representing you. I'm sure it was the last thing you wanted.
[00:32:34] Speaker A: Jerry was. He told great stories of the old days back with. At MCA Universal under Lou Wasserman. Wasserman, right.
[00:32:48] Speaker B: And George Burns and Bob Hope just.
[00:32:52] Speaker A: And he would regale you with these stories of. Of legendary people that he had been with and worked with and knew, but.
[00:33:00] Speaker B: And, yeah, they made him a multimillionaire.
[00:33:03] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, yeah. But as a.
I don't think he understood me or what I did.
[00:33:11] Speaker B: Right. I still don't.
[00:33:14] Speaker A: Well, I finally do.
[00:33:17] Speaker B: I find that. I think I found the light, Alan.
[00:33:20] Speaker A: Yeah. I discovered the thing that I want to be when I grew up as a podcaster.
[00:33:24] Speaker B: That's right. And that's going on great.
[00:33:27] Speaker A: And we're going to be doing it. We have a podcast together, but we're leaping ahead to the end of the story. All right, so eventually your relationship with Jerry ends and you.
[00:33:39] Speaker B: I started my own company as a manager producer and was doing really well. And then my drug problem escalated, and I went to jail, and I was ordered to go to rehab for a year. That didn't stop me. And picked up another couple cases was still making money. I still have my director business built in. That was paying me six figures a year, and it wasn't a lot of work, and I sold a bunch of scripts, and then I. It just got to be too bad.
[00:34:11] Speaker A: Now, your.
Your relationship with the Beverly Hills police department.
[00:34:16] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:34:17] Speaker A: You all right? Do you want to talk about what you were. What was going on?
[00:34:24] Speaker B: I'm not really allowed to.
[00:34:26] Speaker A: You're not allowed to?
[00:34:27] Speaker B: I'm not allowed to.
[00:34:28] Speaker A: Okay. You were. You were selling.
[00:34:32] Speaker B: I was selling massive amounts of methamphetamine, cocaine, GHB and norcos, and I got raided, and they literally thought I was the cartel. Um, I got. I bail. I bailed out that night. It was 50 grand or whatever, and I had the money, so.
[00:34:51] Speaker A: So. Oh, okay. All right. So the very first time that you did, did you see this coming at all?
[00:34:58] Speaker B: No. And my sister, my group, my landlord, her husband's a private detective. They warned me two weeks before all this went down that I was being watched. I was under surveillance. I'm like, oh, I'm not. They don't want me. I'm. And I was smelling large quantities, but I just thought I was invincible.
[00:35:19] Speaker A: So you. Yeah. So you should have seen it coming. You were given ample warning. If. If. All right, if you had taken their warnings, what would you have done?
[00:35:30] Speaker B: Nothing.
[00:35:33] Speaker A: You would have carried on?
[00:35:35] Speaker B: I just would have done nothing. I didn't believe them. First time offender, never been in trouble. Little did I know when they offered me 15 years in prison as my first offer, I guess the seriousness of how much I had and the various different drugs I had was pretty bad.
[00:35:56] Speaker A: So they were. They really wanted to.
They wanted serious time inside.
[00:36:04] Speaker B: What they wanted was me to roll on the people, and I would never do that. And that's what they were banking on. They sat me down with a legal pad and taking notes. They said, look, we just want to know your resources, because you're going away for a very long time, and you're going to get ass fucked in the shower. You're a good looking young kid. You're 40 years old. You're not going to survive in prison. And I'm like, I'm not going to survive if I do. What are you telling me to do?
Because there were some serious players. They weren't young kids. These were not little youngsters running the streets. These were. These were players.
[00:36:38] Speaker A: And yes, you seriously would have. That would have been the end of you. They would have finished you off, because the last thing any would have won was you talking.
[00:36:47] Speaker B: And I kept. I kept doing it, even though I got arrested two more times and did a year in county jail and then doing another three months that picked up another charge. But it didn't matter. I didn't care about the consequences. Christian Slater didn't care about the consequences, nor did Robert Downey junior, who ended up waking up in his neighbor's child's bedroom in Malibu. Yeah.
[00:37:14] Speaker A: Yeah. Did you, as you were being questioned and they were trying to break you because they wanted you to give people up, did you at any point think about your dad?
[00:37:27] Speaker B: No, I was in deep shit. The only thing I can.
[00:37:34] Speaker A: Your dad was in deep shit. I mean, yeah, but there's a.
[00:37:37] Speaker B: It didn't even occur to me.
[00:37:38] Speaker A: There's a definite. There's such an echo there. Holy cow.
[00:37:41] Speaker B: Right?
[00:37:42] Speaker A: You know, they were. I mean, you're. You're your.
And your dad did not rat anybody out. And he went to trial, and he got the magic result.
[00:37:53] Speaker B: Right now, you would have gotten found guilty because of the amount of drugs I had.
[00:37:58] Speaker A: So what happened instead with you?
[00:38:01] Speaker B: I went to. I went to rehab for a year. And so they let, rather than any.
[00:38:09] Speaker A: Time now, how long now you spent sometime incarcerated?
[00:38:15] Speaker B: Yeah, they gave me a year. I spent six months in county, which is when I called you and then.
[00:38:22] Speaker A: Got released after you. All right, because you said the first time you got arrested, the bail was $50,000, and you posted it.
[00:38:32] Speaker B: The second time I got arrested, which is not too long thereafter, is when I did my six months while we were fighting back and forth with the courts. And then they released me. They released me to Beteshuva, a jewish, sober living house.
And I was there. I was court ordered to do a year there. Then when I was done an additional six months in county, the DA wanted me to go away. It was going to be twelve years joint probation, joint suspension, plus additional time for picking, getting another case that have been another three to five. So it would have been 15 to 18.
I would have just gotten out a couple years ago.
And then. So I basically lived with my best friend, who big money. And I lived really nicely and for free. And I didn't get high. And then I relapsed. I hooked up with a then girlfriend of mine from my drug days, but I didn't do drugs with her. I just drank. And then, lo and behold, becomes my alcoholic part of my journey, which was worse than the drugs.
You saw me, you came to my house and called the paramedics, and they took me to USC, and they ended up giving me 16 metal sutures in my forehead.
[00:39:59] Speaker A: I have seen you at your very worst.
[00:40:01] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. And then I started slowly but surely started getting back into repping writers and directors, and it's that I still do. It's still on the slow side, but got more into producing and doing podcasts with you. So I've got a bunch of stuff set up as far as tv series, and hopefully one of them will get on air and hopefully our podcast will come to fruition and we'll be kind of laughing at this whole saga.
[00:40:28] Speaker A: Now we're going to talk about the podcast priz directs and how we get to it. Is one of the. I think John has been incredibly loyal to you.
[00:40:39] Speaker B: Yes. Yeah. So is you.
[00:40:41] Speaker A: Well, but John gets the prize through self preservation.
I needed to step away from you because I was going through my own shit and I was literally going through my own deepening writer's block and depression. And, oh, no, we could not do anything for each other.
[00:41:03] Speaker B: When I started working with John, I was sober again, working for a small boutique management company for actors and writers. And that's how I met John. So he didn't get to experience a lot of that, but he did get to experience my alcoholism and my getting. Falling and going into a coma and getting black into a seizure a couple times. This is what you got to experience. But he's got a lot of the tail end.
[00:41:31] Speaker A: John, you had told me that you were representing John, and I'd always said to you, I'd love to meet John, because John will talk about John's story momentarily.
Interesting guy. An interesting story, and a good writer to boot. And when I finally met John in person, it was you. We. You were in the. You were Cedars Sinai.
[00:41:56] Speaker B: Yes, correct. That's correct.
[00:41:58] Speaker A: And John and I were there. We were the two people, the two friends who showed up to make some decisions on your behalf because you were absolutely non compass, never mind mentus, anything, man. You were correct. As big a fucking mess as I'd ever seen, another human being who was still blathering and just noise coming out of you.
[00:42:25] Speaker B: And Alan, I remember all that crystal clear.
[00:42:28] Speaker A: Yeah, it was.
So at some point they took you into the back where they were going to do whatever they were going to do, and John and I went for a walk together. And that was when I think we decided at some point we're going to have to work together, however we figured this out. But we were both terribly worried about you. Right, I know. And we talked at length and then John ended up doing what he did, and I did what I did.
But like I said, john was incredibly loyal to you, has stayed loyal to.
[00:43:00] Speaker B: You, and he's one of my best friends, like you are today.
[00:43:07] Speaker A: When finally, I forget what it was, we had started talking on a more regular basis again, and I said to you, I want you to hook me up with John.
[00:43:23] Speaker B: We went to Dupar's, which was closed, and we just sat outside that different storage and talked about that.
[00:43:32] Speaker A: At that point, I'd been podcasting for a while. I was really. I guess I've just been doing the how not to make a movie podcast. This podcast, I think. I think that was before the donor was even on my radar. But I had.
[00:43:49] Speaker B: It was.
[00:43:49] Speaker A: It was, and I just, I thought, I really like podcasting. I'd like to do some different podcasting. I'd like to find something else correct in the podcasting realm. And so that's what I said. I'm looking for something else. And John seemed like he would be.
I just ripe for something. And the moment, from the first moment we started talking, the three of us started talking together about what that would be.
The idea for Prisoner x came right up.
[00:44:17] Speaker B: Well, it took a, took a couple incarnations where it didn't. Our first set of dialogue was not about that. It was good. It was different. And then it morphed into, I'm glad you were.
[00:44:28] Speaker A: My memory sucks.
[00:44:31] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:44:32] Speaker A: What was the process?
[00:44:35] Speaker B: It was great. It was very fluid. But as we started thinking and getting more into what this story really should be, what it could be, it took many phone calls. And I remember our conversation. We were talking about Guantanamo, and I was thinking about myself, and I was thinking about other people I know. And I originally, I had the idea of, like, why don't we focus on the people who are in prison who can't get out? Because I think that's their story. And it morphed into this.
[00:45:06] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, yeah. And that's what prisoner X is. It's about people who are prisoners in the United States, all over the world, but who should not be, who really shouldn't be. Indeed. But the point of the exercise isn't just to tell you their, their sad story. It's to. But what can you do to help make them an ex prisoner.
[00:45:27] Speaker B: Correct.
[00:45:28] Speaker A: So part of what Prisoner X is doing as a podcast is not just informing you, but empowering you to help do something.
[00:45:38] Speaker B: The only people who can help them are us. Indeed, are Joe Smith, citizen Jane Doe.
[00:45:44] Speaker A: Now, John Kiriakou, as we've said, is a very interesting person is a former CIA officer, and John was active, especially during our war on terror. After the. After 911. And as we were hunting for the leaders of al Qaeda, we, you know, we identified a couple of people, and one of them was a guy who we thought was Abu Zubaydah. And we captured him in Pakistan.
[00:46:16] Speaker B: Don captured his ass, and he was.
[00:46:20] Speaker A: Abu Zubaydah was badly wounded, and they got him into surgery, and he survived.
And for the next couple of days before the CIA took full possession of him, John was his handler, and John spent a couple of days with him, and they had as good a relationship as you could have. John Washington was very gentle toward him and developed some trust.
And then John witnessed what happened in the aftermath. The immediate. At first, the CIA used FBI tactics, which actually, in this instance, were good because they're very good at interrogation. The CIA is not. And when he was handled, the. When it was, the interrogation was conversational, and it was about a relationship. He basically told us everything that he had. And we figured out early on that he is not the third in command at al Qaeda. Not an angel, you know, responsible for some terrible things, but he had information.
[00:47:34] Speaker B: But he was a bookkeeper.
[00:47:36] Speaker A: Yeah. He was not that person. We water. Well, after the CIA, after John Yoo and Dick Cheney decided the torture was the american way, of course, we waterboarded that man 83 times, despite knowing the fact that he wasn't going to tell us anything else.
[00:47:59] Speaker B: He didn't know anything else, and that's.
[00:48:02] Speaker A: What he told them. That's what he told them. But we tortured that man. And anyway, Abu Zubaydah's story is the first episode of Prisoner X. John has tremendous inside knowledge. The episode is almost finished. We've got. I think we just got the last couple of minutes to do. I think next week, we're trying to arrange to have a conversation with Abu Zubaydah's current attorney.
[00:48:27] Speaker B: And we've interviewed a couple of very incredible people. High level former retired CIA operatives and former. What NSA is what Glenn was.
[00:48:39] Speaker A: Yes. He was in the intelligence community. I forget exactly which organizations he was with. We also talked to Joe Hickman. Joe Hickman was a guard at Guantanamo Bay who oversaw some incredibly disturbing things.
[00:48:53] Speaker B: Their guards are different than guards we have here in the states. Yeah, they're not guards.
[00:48:58] Speaker A: Yeah, these are not prison guards. These were. These were secret keepers, uh, in the end, because he ratted out the. The fact that we were waterboarding people and we had a torture program. John Kiriakou spent 18 months in federal prison.
[00:49:14] Speaker B: That's right. And so they tried to get him on espionage charges and get him lice. He's not a spy.
[00:49:21] Speaker A: John is actually a rather heroic. John is rather heroic. What he did was. Was vital, essential. It's. We owe John debt because he blew the whistle on. On something that we had no business doing.
[00:49:37] Speaker B: We wouldn't know about the torture program today if it wasn't for John.
[00:49:40] Speaker A: It wasn't for John. So Prisoner X, this podcast that we are all doing together, John and Nick and I said it starts with a story that John knows better than most. He has been a guy that should not have been in prison and was.
So, uh, that's, uh, that's the. That's the future. So there we go. There you go. Nick, we've talked about the past, the present, and the future where we're going.
[00:50:13] Speaker B: Yeah, this is great. I've been wanting to do your show.
[00:50:15] Speaker A: For a while, and here we are. I, uh.
I thank you for. For spending the time, and I'll talk in your case. I'll talk to you shortly.
[00:50:28] Speaker B: I'll see you later.
[00:50:30] Speaker A: See you later. Thank you, everyone, as always.
The how not to make a movie podcast is executive produced by me, Alan Katz, by Gil Adler, and by Jason Stein. Our artwork was done by the amazing Jody Webster and Jason. Jody, along with Mando, are all the hosts of the funeral and informative dads from the Crip podcast, followed up for what my old pal the crypt keeper would have called terror crip content.
[00:51:00] Speaker B: So we moved from New York, right? And I'm with my dad, and I was getting bullied by a guy who lived in my condominium complex. So my dad grabbed two pool cues and goes, let's go get them.
I'm like, this isn't Brooklyn circa 1948.
You can't get away with that now. But he wanted me to beat up the guy with the bottom half of a pool queue.
No wonder I'm so fucked up.
