Etiquette: checking client list of a referral

[ap0110]

I have a highly competent friend who's been in the industry for awhile. One of his friends from film school is now a screenwriting agent and has been in the industry for about 20 years. She's looking for writers in my chosen genre. I trust my friend and his judgment - he only respects extremely capable people. And the good news is that he's willing to introduce me to the agent once I have a script polished and ready to go.

Here's the thing - it's been ingrained in me to check references. Always always always. That means at least reviewing a client list. When I asked my friend about the agent's existing clients, he flew off the handle and implied that I should be grateful just for a personal contact, which I am. But I would also love to know who else the agent is repping.

Is this a breach of etiquette? Am I being naive or is my friend being unreasonable? I was under the impression that seeing an agent's client list was a fundamental part of due diligence.

[icerose]

It seems odd that he wouldn't be willing to tell you who this person is.

I recently got referred myself and the producer who referred me, not even a personal friend, had no trouble telling me the name. I didn't even have to ask. He gave me not only the name of the company but also who he would be contacting.

[ap0110]

Sorry - I wasn't clear. I have the name of the agent, just not anyone she's repped. I've Googled and searched writer forums and can't find anything, though I did finally track down an imdb listing with a few credits. I'm still too new at this to know what other resources are available for finding this info. But my main question is whether or not it's offensive to ask for it in the first place.

[icerose]

I don't think it would be offensive, but I don't know, I've never had to ask.

[DevelopmentExec]

Hi AP,

You can always ask the agent for her client list once you make contact with her, agents have no problem providing this info. But you don't necessarily need to get her list before you submit to her.

If you have the opportunity to submit to her through your friend before you find out who she reps, I'd go ahead and let your friend submit. Her client list is irrelevant if she's not interested in repping you if she is interested you can do whatever vetting you need to before saying yes. Just because someone wants to rep you, doesn't mean you have to sign with them

Dev

[zeprosnepsid]

He may have just took the question personally, like you were being ungrateful, since he offered to introduce you to an agent and your question may have come off like 'how do I know this agent is good enough for me'. Is the agent at a major agency? If they are then I'd just keep quiet and go with it. Take any opportunity you have and then, as someone else says, if the agent wants to rep you you can ask all the pertinent questions.

Sometimes when referring people, I withhold information so as not to embarrass myself. Because people can get very excited about an opportunity and run their mouth off to the wrong people and then you look stupid.

Like say I'm going to introduce a writer friend to an agent friend and then the writer friend tells someone 'this agent is looking at my work' (although they haven't looked at it yet) and then it gets back to the agent who is like who is this person dropping my name? Then they find out they're a friend of mine and then the agent is like why are you telling people I'm looking at this guy's work? And then I look stupid and have to explain that I told him I'd introduce him to the agent, not that the agent would read anything -- either way, I've lost my ability to introduce someone else to the agent after all this. This is really convoluted, but it happens. More often then you'd think. Small town and all.

[ap0110]

Zepro, great explanation. Thanks. Fyi, the agent is very small - 1-person agency, repping "a couple of comedy writers". It's tricky. Obviously I'm very grateful for any introduction. At the same time, it's not *quite* the career path I'd envisioned. I'm just starting to put myself out there, so quite frankly I don't know if my work warrants a chance at one of my dream agencies or not. Bird in the hand, 2 in the bush sort of thing. So yeah, I can see how it would come off as "is she good enough".

But also good advice DE - get the meeting, see where it goes. THEN worry about vetting. Great advice, really.