Some rapes occur at parties and are perpetrated by a person the victim knows.

In my last year at film school, I was required to obtain an entertainment industry mentor, someone who would shepherd me into Hollywood. One night my parents went to a party and happened to meet a very successful director/actor. Hoping to aid me in my burgeoning career as a screenwriter, my folks brought me up as a topic of discussion. The gentleman offered to meet me for lunch. I met him a few days later in Beverly Hills at the Four Seasons Hotel lounge. He cut an imposing figure in a back corner booth but when I approached him his smile and demeanor were disarming. In our first of many lunches, he issued sound advice:

“As a writer, you need to write. Your friends and others are going to try to distract you, inviting you to go to parties and hang out. You’ll be tempted, but the greatest thing you can do for yourself and for your career is say, ‘No’.”

I took it to heart. After all, he was now my mentor. Why would he lie?

We built up significant rapport. A few lunches later, he came to me with a project. He had a financial commitment from a studio and was in need of a feature script for an idea he wanted to direct. He thought it would be an excellent opportunity for us to collaborate, for me to establish myself in the business and make money writing. I jumped at it. We met a few times to discuss the story and in the pitch meeting with the backers about a week later, we knocked the ball out of the park. He called me at home the next morning to say he had negotiated my writing fee and that I should be getting $25,000 upon successful delivery of the script. There was one caveat – the backers were fast-tracking production and needed the script in four weeks.

Was I going to say no? Of course not! In good faith, I hunkered down and delivered the script, rewriting as I went along, in four weeks. It was a record for me and I was proud of it until I read somewhere that Spike Lee wrote “Do The Right Thing” in three weeks. During this time, I had to capitalize on the heat generated by my association with my mentor and the project. It was time for representation. I called an agent at The Gersh Agency who had read one of my earlier scripts and expressed interest in me. He agreed to take me on as a client.

In hindsight, I should have seen trouble on the horizon when my agent couldn’t nail down an agreement and a check from the backers. But I was green and glad to be in a bit of demand – my agent encouraged me to keep working with my mentor should any other opportunities arise.

After all, he was my mentor. Why would he lie?

While waiting for my check, my mentor asked me to collaborate on an idea for a direct-to-DVD series. He was going to produce and direct and he wanted me to spearhead assembling a team of writers to pen the pilot and subsequent episodes. He was then going shoot the pilot and use it to gain distribution. He assured me, based on his analysis of the market for this type of series, that the payoff would be huge.

Was I going to say no? Of course not! In good faith, I called upon several of my film school contemporaries to join me on the project. Everyone was still looking for his or her big break and I thought I was in a significant position to provide it. We all met my mentor for dinner at a fantastic Chinese restaurant to discuss goals and expectations. The sumptuous meal included a live lobster being brought to the table for our approval before being boiled alive and diced into the main course – oh, the irony!

The writers I assembled on the project, including myself, worked diligently to craft a great pilot script and a story bible for future episodes. My mentor expressed excitement and satisfaction at our hard work and said distribution – as well as compensation – was imminent.

He was a mentor. Why would he lie?

As our relationship continued I was asked to participate in at least three other projects. Most often I’d be asked to sit in a room with my mentor and other “producers” and develop stories then go off and write them based on everyone’s notes. In retrospect, these so-called producers were nothing more than sycophantic associates of my mentor, who brought him ideas but had little story sense; they simply didn’t want to be cut out of any deals that might be made.

I grew increasingly frustrated at the amount of writing I was doing based on the guarantee of money that never materialized. I voiced this frustration to my agent, who coaxed me to keep working. On one particular project for cable television, my mentor asked me for a show treatment. He took the treatment into network, pitched it to them and called me after the meeting.

“Merry Christmas, I just got you five thousand dollars!” he said.

I never got the money. It began to dawn on me that this was his modus operandi. He would get me to develop his ideas on the promise of “money in the bank”, get me to work some more and when I became exasperated, he assured me money was on the way.

He was a mentor. And he was lying.

He called me one day to say that there was a breakthrough on the direct-to-DVD project and could I meet him at his house in the Palisades – a posh beach enclave overlooking the ocean. When I arrived, the usual sycophants were there. He launched into his need for re-doubled efforts on the writing front, requiring scripts as soon as possible. I told him I couldn’t do anymore writing until I was paid for all the other work I had done.

He said, “You’ll get your money as soon as I get it from the distributors”.

“No.” I said.

“What you’re not understanding…” he chided, “is that it’s not about the fucking money.”

“If it’s not about the money, then just pay me,” I said.

Then my mentor did something he had never done in all of the time I had known him. He raised his voice.

“This business turns on relationships. And you’re never going to be shit in this business because you don’t understand that!”

“I do understand that,” I retorted. “And if you value our relationship and want it to continue, then pay me the fucking money you promised me!”

I got up and walked out. I drove away from the Palisades proud of myself that I had stood my ground. I called my agent that night to tell him that my relationship with my mentor was terminated.

“You shouldn’t have done that,” he said. “This business is about relationships.”

I asked him what good a relationship was if it was built on broken promises? He told me something fruitful was eventually going to come out of it if I just hung in there. I don’t know about that, but what I do know is that I was being raped by someone I knew – someone who, to this day, I cannot watch in a movie he has acted in or directed. What I also know is had I not stood up for myself that day, I would have eventually regretted being passive. Thankfully, that is a regret I do not have.

He did, however, teach me a great lesson – as a writer, I need to write. And sometimes the most valuable thing I can do for myself and my career is say “No”.

What would you create if you freed your mind of limitation? If you could hush the little voice on your shoulder, what road would you take?

The stories you set out to tell go as far as your imagination can take you. If you let your imagination soar there is no telling what greatness you can create. A lot of times we are stopped by a little voice in our heads that says “How ridiculous”, or “that’s stupid”. But some of the best stories are told in defiance of the nay saying voice.

What one man likes, another may hate, what one studio passes on can go forth to take the box office by storm. That’s been proven time and again.

Say “Yes” from the very start and see what pours out of you.

Why put limitations on your dreams, your passions, or your creativity? There will be those who will close doors, turn you down, say “No”. They will weigh in on the believability of the premise, the realism of the characters, the strength of the concept. But this I know is true, if you write, act, play music without limitation or censorship, the results will be pure gold.

“To Those who can dream, there is no such place as far away”.

When I was first learning to dance, rather late in life, people said I would never go the distance because I waited to long to start. Within two years of taking two classes a day everyday and learning everything there was to learn about dance and performing, I found myself competing with dancers who had been training since the age of five. Why did I have such success? Because I never thought I couldn’t.

A famous actress was asked what she would do if the “acting thing” didn’t work out, her reply…”I never thought it wouldn’t”

Walt Disney was fired by an editor for “lack of imagination and good ideas”,
Bill Gates’ first business venture Traf-O-Data was a failure,
Oprah Winfrey, before she was Oprah Winfrey, was fired from being a television reporter because she was “unfit for TV”.

Opposition is all around us, so why oppose ourselves.

Creativity is limitless. Let your imagination take your passions to a land far, far away. I can’t wait to see what great things will manifest.