Kirkpatrick Artist Management:

In the Press–

Worcester Business Journal
October 3, 2005
Volume 16 Number 17
Worcester firm brings West Coast Success to local talent
BY KIM CIOTTONE
Massachusetts native and entertainment and corporate attorney Doug Kirkpatrick saw the need for solid entertainment representation in the state and took advantage of it, transplanting his Southern Californian talent management firm and legal practice to a Main Street address in Worcester.

Kirkpatrick Artist Management Ltd. (KAM) is banking on its extensive experience and high-end connections. At least two local clients say they think the company will have no problem transplanting its success, because of an abundance of small, young movie companies with big ideas but no business experience and no sense of the type of legal help they need.

Kirkpatrick is co-founder, president and general counsel of the firm, licensed by the state to represent and manage talent, including actors, writers, directors, producers, musicians, and artists in all fields. He made the move to Beverly Hills with wife Melinda, vice president of talent and public relations for KAM in 1998, initially to assist his brother, Hollywood film producer David Kirkpatrick, a former president of Paramount Pictures, Walt Disney Pictures and Touchstone Pictures.

At the time, David Kirkpatrick, KAM CEO and chair, was trying to close a loan transaction on a movie he was doing with Shirley McLaine and Kathy Bates. “There were 10 lawyers working on it from different firms,” Doug says. “No one could get on the same page.” Resolving that matter, he explains, was just the beginning of the couple’s seven-year stay in the state.

Kirkpatrick’s legal services, he says, complement the firm’s capabilities and offer added protection for its clients – most notably in the arena of how to handle funds for clients’ benefit. Attorneys must follow certain guidelines in taking client money in and processing it through a client trust account. An attorney in a talent agency would not only book talent, but would be obligated to ensure that the funds are processed in an ethical way.

Currently, Kirkpatrick is representing Sean Cobel and Chris Wyatte, the southern CA-based producers of the feature film “Napoleon Dynamite” in connection with their development, production and distribution deals with MTV and with Paramount Classics, which is presently shooting in Canada. It’s an example of how a Massachusetts-based firm can negotiate a $4.5-million deal with a California client, he says.

While KAM plans on maintaining its Worcester headquarters, Kirkpatrick says, it has plans to expand to Boston, and eventually, to LA and New York, both centers of the entertainment industry. He says he recently completed a $500,000 DVD distribution arrangement for two DVD projects featuring NBS star Baron Davis. He has also completed a children’s project with Gwenyth Paltrow as narrator, based on a children’s book to be published by Random House/UK, as well as legal work for a soon-to-be-released production project with Los Angeles-based Paramount, involving the exercise regimen “Boneco Capoeira.”

KAM, he explains, doesn’t operate like some questionable talent-scount agencies, such as the former Options Talent, purchased by Orlando, FL-based TransContinental Talent Inc. in 2002, which have come under scrutiny for allegedly misleading clients and charging fees as high as $500-$1,000 for services such as posting photos on talent websites and requiring the use of its own photographers for those shots at an additional cost.

KAM, on the other hand, is licensed by the state as a talent agency for actors and musicians. “We don’t charge any fees, basically, and we are non-exclusive, except if we actually manage a client’s career,” Kirkpatrick says. The firm takes a percentage of revenue from jobs or bookings.

The company hosted a Sept. 17 open call for actors at Worcester’s Foothills Theatre and conducted an open casting call for two upcoming media projects, one of them an independent feature film project, tentatively titled “Project Confidential,” to be shot in Massachusetts and Connecticut in mid-October. The second project is a TV pilot about the model and fashion industry, which will shoot in Worcester this fall.

Kirkpatrick’s legal practice currently also represents home-grown independent filmmakers Georgia Menides and Doug Lloyd president of emerging film company Raymond, NH-based Uncovered Productions (www.uncoveredproductions.com), which just wrapped its filming of “Still Green” in Naples Marco Island, FL featuring American Idol’s Vonzell Solomon.

Menides and Lloyd give Kirkpatrick a thumbs up and say his legal practice and talent firm, at least for the time being, will have little competition in its class. Lloyd says Kirkpatrick shows a good combination of business and creativity. “He’s in perfect alignment with what we want to do with our business,” Lloyd says.

Menides adds that her company had a lawyer prior to connecting with Kirkpatrick, but that attorney didn’t really know anything about entertainment. “We knew we wanted to make this movie; we knew that we had to raise money – we had none,” she says. “But we didn’t know how to do it; we’ve never done that before.”

Kirkpatrick, she says, helped the team develop a business plan and court investors. His connections and experience in the field, she says, made all the difference. “He definitely knew the language and how to do it, and obviously was a big fan of the film scene,” Menides adds. “He genuinely cares about us as clients and about the film, he wants it to succeed, and wants to help us… I think if we had a lawyer in LA, we wouldn’t get that kind of attention.”

Kim Ciottone can be reached at: kciottone@wbjournal.com.