Interview: Ken Atchity

When you learn about Ken Atchity’s many accomplishments, you might wonder why he would agree to an interview with an erudite, yet small, web publication like writersmonthly.com. I wondered the same thing. But now I know the chairman and CEO of Atchity Editorial/Entertainment International, a full-service management company for commercial and literary writers, realizes he just might find the next critically acclaimed writer/screenwriter among our readers. Atchity began his higher education at Georgetown where he attended on scholarship. He continued his studies at Yale, where he received his M.Phil. in Theater History and Ph.D. in Comparative Literature. From there he went on to Occidental College where he served as professor and chairman of comparative literature and creative writing. Ken was also a Distinguished Instructor at the UCLA Writers Program for seventeen years. He has received awards and grants from the American Council of Learned Societies, the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Mellon Foundation and was a Fulbright Professor of American Studies at the University of Bologna. Along the way he has written seven books, so he knows exactly what his clients go through. Interview by Jessica Clark

WM: As chairman of Atchity Editorial/Entertainment, Inc. ("AEI"), you
are a producer and a literary manager. Explain to our readers the
difference between a literary manager and a literary agent.

Technically speaking, the primary difference is that managers can produce films and agents can't (or at least until recently, now that a few agents can produce under certain circumstances). So we're basically the ones who get to be with the writer from concept to final marketing of his books andfilms. Otherwise managers do everything agents do plus much, much more.

WM:What are the benefits of literary management?

I'd say the biggest benefits are (a) that we think "outside the box"; (b)
that we're bi-coastal, and love to introduce clients to the gold mines of
the east and the platinum mines of the west coast; (c) that we're there from prioritizing what concept should be developed next to overseeing the
production and marketing of the resulting books and films; and (d) that we're able to help clients choose agents, if they wish, but in most cases profit by having several agencies working to help them rather than being "forgotten" by the one they've signed with.

WM: Do AEI clients require an outside marketing force when they are trying to promote their book?

AEI is heavily involved in marketing, and ALWAYS recommend that clients use the services of a publicist-which we can provide, or refer them to. In today's highly-competitive book marketplace (50,000 new titles in the U.S. alone every year), the new author needs to do everything imaginable and
unimaginable (the latter is where we come in) to get his first book onto a
few bestseller lists-and that's easier than you might think if you have the
right approach.

WM: Tell us about some of AEI's recent successes.

In the past six months, we've seen the release of two major studio features, Tim Allen and Jim Belushi's "Joe Somebody" and Angelina Jolie and Ed Burns'"Life or Something Like It" (both by former client, now partner, John Scott Shepherd). Brendan Frasier is now attached to another of John's scripts,"Prince of Pools." Shirley Palmer's new book Danger Zone (Shirley began, like many of AEI's clients, as a Writer's Lifeline client) has gotten rave reviews from Kirkus and Publishers Weekly. AEI just closed a deal three years in the making and nine months in the negotiating with Paramount Pictures to make a series of "franchise films" about the adventures of Robert L. Ripley, of Believe-It-Or-Not! Fame. AEI is partnered with Alphaville ("The Mummy," "Michael," "Dazed and Confused," etc.), and will produce the Indiana-Jones style movies with them. Within a single month we've signed several Nicholls Fellowship semi-finalist screenwriters, had three book writers have their books picked up by book clubs, and presently have offers coming in on four different book titles simultaneously. We're also making progress on concluding a $100-million film fund that will allow us to participate in financing our clients' films.

WM: How do your clients come to AEI?

About 25% are visitors to our websites, www.aeionline.com and www.thewriterslifeline.com, 25% referrals from our books (A Writer's Time and Writing Treatments That Sell), 25% referrals from agencies, production companies, publishers, attorneys, and studios, and the rest a combination of former students, referrals from present or past clients, directories, and just plain ole "word of mouth."

WM: What is AEI's ideal client?

Our ideal client is someone who's been "out in the market" long enough to
know how rare honest and dedicated management is, and who therefore respects our time and appreciates our assistance in making their dreams come true. At the same time, the ideal client doesn't hand over the dream to us and say"make it happen for me, big boy!" He knows he alone is ultimately responsible, and works with us to make it happen by being patient, understanding, flexible, as well as driven, ambitious, and as hard-working as we are. I put in 16 hour days nearly 7 days a week, and I LOVE clients who do the same because I KNOW I will turn them into millionaires sooner or later if they persist and remain clear of my and everyone else's "Life is too short!" list.

WM: What is AEI's ideal project?

(a) An ideal "fiction" project, like Martin Schenk's new novel "The Tenth
Muse," or John Robert Marlow's Prometheus, or John Montague's A Guy Named Michael Egan, or Stuart Connelly's This Island Made of Bone, is one where we face this dilemma: Shall we expose it to Hollywood first or New York? A project that has equal weight on both coasts, that will make the studios salivate and cause a bidding war among Manhattan publishers. That's why we say we're "story people," not "novel" or "screenplay" people-our goal is to make your story work on both coasts, and to help you perfect both formats, screen and book. (b) In nonfiction, it's a project where the author has a"national platform," or one easily build-able, and has something to tell us that makes our lives better. Recent examples are AEI clients Dr. Gary Buffone's Choking on the Silver Spoon (forthcoming from Regan Books), Mary Taylor's Bedroom Games (forthcoming from Three Rivers/Crown), John Robert Marlow's Prometheus (Tor/St. Martin's), Steve Alten's Domain and Goliath (Tom Doherty Associates), and Shirley Palmer's Danger Zone (forthcoming from Mira).

WM: Do you have any suggestions for our readers about how to create the most harmonious relationship with their agent or manager?

I guess the basic answer to this question is,"I'd suggest thoughtfulness." And retaining responsibility, not just handing it off to us. Remember, that you're the captain of your team even if you're asking us to quarterback-we hope you'll continue giving us constructive ideas, thoughts that occur to you, contacts you wonder if we've thought of, etc. Those kinds of input we love. What we hate is random calling or verbose emails (I print out any email over 4-5 lines to put into my "read later" pile, because I receive so many every idea I'd otherwise be spending the entire day staring at a computer screen instead of making sales), that are basically saying, "What's going on?" If something tangible is going on, I assure you, you'll be the first to know. You can assume that no news is no news, as I say in The Mercury Transition. Our ideal client is someone who gives us the project, is delighted when we decide to represent, is reasonable during contract negotiation and doesn't nearly ruin the relationship by hiring an uninformed attorney to ask for an entire rewrite of our standard agreement as though it had been aimed at his client only (it's always sad to see a client spend more on his attorney on this stage than he would have been willing to spend on editorial work!), someone who then responds to our "next sets of notes" as though it were the first-always willing to do what's needed to perfect that asset, and most of all, someone
who, while we're working the market for him focuses all his energies (except a few daily prayers for our success) on his next asset.

"Start working more," Ray Bradbury advises writers. "It'll get rid of all those moods you're having."

But when you run across an article in the paper that says Barry Levinson is looking for a movie about prostitution, don't hesitate to FAX it to us! When you run across a true story in your neighborhood, don't hesitate to pitch it to me by email-I may call you up and tell you to stop your other work immediately and jump on it with both feet; then we'll tell you exactly how to go about it.

WM: Is AEI currently taking on new clients?

Absolutely! New clients is where we've had our greatest success-booking over $27 million in sales for them in our first six years of business. But it's
also true we're now taking on a number of clients who are mid-career and
looking for a jump to the next plateau either in Hollywood or publishing or,
ideally, both.

WM: How should our readers approach AEI should they choose the literary management route?

It's all spelled out on www.aeionline.com, but basically we like to begin with a simple letter or query telling us what you're working on and what your track record is-and what you're looking for in representation. We can be reached at jp@aeionline.com

WM: You're chairman of another company as well. Tell us about The Writer's Lifeline, Inc.

In over thirty years in the literary world-as a writer, editor, teacher,
consultant, and producer-one of my greatest satisfactions has come from
helping promising writers bring their skills, craft, and expertise in the
business to the level of their talent, vision, and ambition. Helping
hundreds of writers get their novels and nonfiction books published--and
dozens of them make deals with Hollywood studios--led to the founding of TheWriter's Lifeline as a means of formalizing what I've learned and been able to share with others. We started the company because we constantly ran across projects that were "great ideas" but "not ready for prime-time"
because of the execution. We realized that there was no sales-focused group out there helping writers bridge the gap to the professional world-editorial companies tell them, we edit but don't sell. The Writer's Lifeline not only edits, but edits ONLY for sale; and then connects the writers with either AEI or with an agency to make that sale happen. No company that I know of has a track record like ours, and I think it's because we care enough to be tough on the writers who work with us.

Our goal is to facilitate and educate:—To help writers with stories that need to be told find the expertise to get them told--and sold...To mentor writers who haven't yet achieved the level of competitive professionalism, until their technique equals their talent.

The basis of all Writer's Lifeline consulting begins when President Andrea
McKeown and I put together the right team to help you reach your professional goals, whether those goals are primarily artistic or primarily commercial. That team might include writers, editors, development execs; and the mentoring may include concept analysis, character development, market refocus, structural editing, dialogue editing, style editing-the necessary combination that will best steer your work forward to publication and production?

Our purpose is to help a writer's investment in himself or herself pay off. And our financial goal is to make writers ready for representation. The Writer's Lifeline, historically, has been AEI's "farm team"-accounting for roughly 70% of AEI's sales.

WM: Does The Writer's Lifeline take on all projects for development or do you only choose projects that show a lot of promise?

We base our decision on two factors: (a) a project's marketability, which we communicate to the prospective client immediately upon analysis; and (b) the client's needs. Although our primary purpose is to make that "bridge to the professional world" happen, we sometimes find clients just want to learn how to write, and aren't as worried about marketability as we are. Early in our consulting career, when we were determined to work only on books and scripts that we thought would sell, we turned a client away after a few sessions because (a) she was resisting our advice at every turn; and (b) we finally"realized" that, as things were going, her book was far too self-indulgent to ever be published. She was very disappointed, and surprised that we wouldn't work with her further. Two years later, a copy of her published book arrived in the mail. I opened it to discover two things: (a) it was dedicated to me, thanking me for helping her learn to be a "non self-indulgent writer," and (b) she'd taken out all the junk she'd been clinging to. From this experience I learned our fundamental mission, beneath the commercial drive, was simply to educate-following my 17 years in the academic world, I guess you can take the professor out of the classroom, but you can't take the classroom out of the professor. If a client walks away with nothing else, he or she will have learned what makes trade writing different from casual or professional or technical or academic writing.

WM: What do you see as the ingredients of a promising project?

Everyone's proverbial fourth grade teacher said, "Write from your heart" and don't worry about anything else. What a disservice! Unless you're living in Latvia or Sri Lanka where society is so small that you can break in just by being talented. In the massive jungle marketplace of the U.S., the primary market that drives the global market in books as well as films, I've long ago changed that advice to: "Write from your heart about things that matter to all of us." The purpose of competitive commercial marketing is either to instruct or entertain. That's what makes a promising project-that it changes our lives by moving us (if it's a novel or screenplay), or it changes our life by telling us something new (if it's nonfiction).

WM:How does The Writer's Lifeline charge for development?

All our fees are posted on www.thewriterslifeline.com, but they range from low-priced "project analysis" fees to hourly consulting (starting at $100 per hour), to contract consulting-all tailored to the specific needs of the specific writer.

WM: What are the different approaches The Writer's Lifeline would take in dealing with a screen play, a novel, and a non-fiction book?

The basic approach to all three is the same: We analyze, then decide who
would make the best editorial (for books) or development (for scripts) team for this client's work. The kinds of editing we do begin with conceptual, then move on to structural, style, and line editing. At the conceptual level, which obviously comes first, we assess the project's marketability and communicate that to the client. We change Russians to Irish, nuclear weapons to something futuristic, something too specifically religious to something more generally religious,, to give a few examples that have come up-all elements aimed at giving the market something more palatable given its present state. Sometimes we help a client abort a project, in fact, at this level-in favor of something we've heard from him in conversation that makes us more excited. Then we refocus him in that direction-which is another function that literary management performs for its clients-usually because it's more "marketable." In the case of a nonfiction book, of course, we begin with focusing concept as well. We based Governor Jesse Ventura's first book on the ten labors of Hercules, the last of which, cleaning the shit out of the stables of King Augeus, we felt he'd just accomplished by diverting a river of votes to clean up the corruptly bi-partisan Minnesota political system. He loved that refocus, and we went on to make the book a bestseller (I Ain't Got Time to Bleed, a title we selected based on a line he says in "The Predator"). In the case of a novel, the conceptual focusing almost always begins with cutting-making the size of the novel acceptable to the publishers is one of the obvious trade secrets we share with first novelists who don't see what's wrong with their 1200-page manuscript-even though they themselves can't articulate what it's about.

Finding out what it's about is how we begin that first drastic edit (how can you cut without knowing what to cut and what not to cut?). The team, in each of these three cases, might consist of a conceptual editor, who might then continue to do the structural work; then a style editor, or dialogue editor, or character editor; and finally a line editor-or any combination of these that makes sense to perfect a particular client.

We regard our clients as the creators of literary assets. The Writer's Lifeline's function is to guide them through the perfection of those assets.
Selling perfected assets is the function of AEI.

More on Ken Atchity:
http://www.modestyarbor.com/kennethatchity.html

One of Ken's many projects:
http://webdelsol.com/f-solpix.htm

Ken's Home on the Web:
www.aeionline.com

Ken the Lifeguard:
www.thewriterslifeline.com

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