May 24, 2025 • 43 mins
Some people call them flacks. Other people call them liars. But if you're in the public eye and suddenly have an image problem, you'll call them your best friend. Learn all about them in this classic episode.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hi, everyone. We're going to jump back in podcast time
to September fifteenth, twenty fifteen, for this week's selection, How
Publicists Work. We've never had a publicist, you know why,
because nobody cares that much about us. So it's really
not a job that would get a lot of billable hours,
if you know what I mean. But anyway, it's a
(00:21):
pretty fascinating, weird job. And we heard from a few publicists,
I believe when we recorded this, so maybe we'll hear
from some again. How publicists, publicists, publicists work. Welcome to
Stuff You Should Know, a production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2 (00:48):
Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clarks, Charlte
w Chuck Bryant, there's Jerry so Stuff you should know.
Speaker 1 (00:57):
This is it? That sounded like you're introducing the final
episode my voice?
Speaker 2 (01:03):
This is it feels like it's the final episode.
Speaker 1 (01:06):
You won't be able to talk anymore.
Speaker 2 (01:08):
No, I'm getting there.
Speaker 1 (01:10):
That's not true. You don't know that. How's it going?
Speaker 2 (01:17):
It's going pretty well? Man? How about with you?
Speaker 1 (01:19):
I think both of us had a bit of a
dark time researching this article. Why well, because and we're
going to get well, we're going to get flack. That's
a teaser from publicists, because what I learned is that
publicists are professional liars.
Speaker 2 (01:40):
I would say that depends on the circumstance.
Speaker 1 (01:44):
Well, what do you mean, Well, you're saying there are
publicists who don't lie.
Speaker 2 (01:48):
No, I'm saying it depends on whether the publicist is
going to the media or the media is coming to
the publicist, depending on the circumstance.
Speaker 1 (01:59):
What I am saying is, no matter what who you
work for, if you are a publicist, then a percentage
of your job will be lying.
Speaker 2 (02:08):
Right, Okay, depending on the circumstance.
Speaker 1 (02:11):
Yeah, so Billy lie about something good.
Speaker 2 (02:14):
Billy ray Cyrus is like, I am going to donate
a bunch of time and money to a local homeless shelter.
Speaker 1 (02:21):
Yeah, you don't have to lie about that.
Speaker 2 (02:22):
The publicist gets on the horn starts letting everybody know
you guys should come cover this. Billy ray Cyrus goes
and does that, and everything's good. Then on the way home,
Billy ray Cyrus decides to celebrate by drinking a bucket
of tequila and runs his car into a whatever.
Speaker 1 (02:42):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (02:43):
The publicist then starts getting calls and says.
Speaker 1 (02:48):
He didn't drink a bucket of tequila.
Speaker 2 (02:49):
That wasn't even him.
Speaker 1 (02:50):
That's overstated. What really happened was this.
Speaker 2 (02:53):
So the circumstances depend on the whether the publicist is
fibbing or not.
Speaker 1 (03:00):
Oh yeah, I'm not saying that all publicists do is lie.
But I'm saying if you work as a publicist, part
of your job is to cover tracks and to lie. Gotcha,
and you know that. Don't hate the publicist, Hate the system,
is what I say.
Speaker 2 (03:15):
Yeah, they're definitely a part of a larger system.
Speaker 1 (03:18):
Yeah, a larger system which includes all of us who
digest news.
Speaker 2 (03:24):
Yeah, especially say like entertainment news. Yeah, that kind of thing.
There's like a there's a whole. There's two from my understanding,
there's two routes a person can take as a celebrity.
You can either just go off and be a normal person,
and depending on your level, you might have paparazzi following
(03:44):
her that kind of stuff. There's once you get to
a certain level, it doesn't matter what your decision is,
or you can hire a publicist and feed yourself right
into that machine to get as much publicity and as
much press as you possibly can.
Speaker 1 (03:58):
Yeah, well, I think any celebrity is going to have
a publicist, but it's really a matter of your directive
and your goal. I think some of those people like
to be like that, the old adage there's no such
thing as bad publicity.
Speaker 2 (04:10):
Yeah, I ran into that that that's more of a
PR term, where like so, if you're in a PR
you're probably representing a company or an organization or something
like that. A publicist is somebody who typically represents a
single person, an artist and author, a musician, something like that.
That's really the only definition I can find for a publicist,
(04:34):
and the job. The goal of the publicist is to
help maintain and promote the public image of that person
that they represent.
Speaker 1 (04:44):
That's right.
Speaker 2 (04:45):
Bye, having a good relationship with the media.
Speaker 1 (04:49):
Yes, that's where it starts.
Speaker 2 (04:50):
That's the publicist.
Speaker 1 (04:52):
And by the way, that no such thing as bad publicity.
I tried to find the origin of that, and the
closest thing I could find was P. T. Barnum. But
I don't know if that's true. I don't think that's verified.
Speaker 2 (05:03):
Well then say Mark Twain.
Speaker 1 (05:05):
Yeah, PT Varnember Mark Twain.
Speaker 2 (05:06):
Everybody says, oh it was a Mark Twain saying.
Speaker 1 (05:09):
And I don't think that's even true anyway. I think
maybe that.
Speaker 2 (05:13):
Used to be true, that it was a Mark Twain saying.
Speaker 1 (05:15):
No, that no such thing as bad publicity. I think
at one point that may have been sort of true. Yeah,
these days there's clearly bad publicity. Sure, So you I
said the word flak earlier as a teaser. Apparently two
flak or a flack is a term originating from Gene Flak,
(05:36):
early movie publicist Hollywood.
Speaker 2 (05:39):
And that's with the ck that's right flak to take.
Flack is named after a type of German gun in
World War Two, a German anti aircraft gun.
Speaker 1 (05:48):
Two different things, but in this case it is a
pejorative term for publicists. They don't like it.
Speaker 2 (05:56):
A PR flack.
Speaker 1 (05:57):
Yeah, you shouldn't say that to someone that works in PR. No,
or call them a liar. They don't like that either. Yeah, yeah,
I looked it up. Apparently it means that, like, you
can't be trusted, you'll you'll do anything for money. That's
what a flack is to them. That's like they One
article I read said that's like calling a personal injury
attorney an ambulance chaser.
Speaker 2 (06:18):
Yeah, just not a nice term, gotcha.
Speaker 1 (06:20):
So there you have it. So a publicist, like you said,
works for their client to make them to get their
good deeds out and to if they don't have good deeds,
to spin things to make it look like they do.
Speaker 2 (06:36):
Right. You know, here hold this baby lamb. Yeah, oh,
we take your.
Speaker 1 (06:40):
Picture exactly, and then they get photographed later eating euros
down the block.
Speaker 2 (06:45):
The two events were totally not connected.
Speaker 1 (06:48):
No, So what they do is they pitch ideas to
the media and they probably have to be good writers themselves,
because a press release oftentimes is a starting point. But
press releases, as we know, can get lost in the
shuffle and never see the light of day.
Speaker 2 (07:07):
Yeah, it seems like a huge wasted time.
Speaker 1 (07:10):
It can be. But if you have a good publicist,
they will be well connected to the media to ensure
that that publicity blast is not lost.
Speaker 2 (07:21):
Right exactly. So there's direction one, which is from the
publicist to the media, and the publicist is going to
have all these contacts with different entertainment reporters and business
reporters and anybody that could possibly run a story. Yeah,
anybody that could possibly run a story on their client, Right,
(07:43):
that's right. And they'll say, Billy Ray is going to
donate some money.
Speaker 1 (07:49):
Why we pick it on him.
Speaker 2 (07:51):
He just seems like the type who would donate a
bunch of money to a homeless shelter. Okay, and go
down there himself and help out. Great, so Billy Ray's
going to be down there. Plus it rolls off the
tongue Billy Ray. Sure, so why don't you send one
of your cover reporters down and let's get some coverage
for this. And since their friends, since these people have
(08:11):
worked together for decades, now this reporter and your publicist,
the reporter actually might respond and show up, or the
editor or the news producer, whoever the contact is. That's great, Like,
that's you hired a good publicist and now this story
is going to make it out there. That's right, because
they didn't just write up a press release with a
(08:32):
bunch of exclamation points in the headline and facts it
to every media outlet they can find a zero response.
Speaker 1 (08:39):
Yes, so good. A publicist is only as good as
their relationships. I think the other way on that street
that you were talking about is from the journalists back
to the publicist. If they hear heard Billy Ray sires
Drenk a bucket a tequila and ran over a prostitute
with his car. They will then get in touch with
the publicist and then they go buddy, hey, we go
(09:01):
back a long way.
Speaker 2 (09:03):
Would I lie to you?
Speaker 1 (09:04):
What I lie to you? Uh So that's how that goes,
and they want they will be more forthcoming with people
who have It's a scratch your back, you scratch mind
type of scenario.
Speaker 2 (09:16):
Yeah, like that reporter that actually showed up at the
homeless shelter and covered it and made a nice piece
and everything.
Speaker 1 (09:22):
I'll give you the scoop.
Speaker 2 (09:23):
When that guy calls, he's he's going to get the
better treatment from the publicist than somebody who ignored the
pitch before.
Speaker 1 (09:31):
That's right, a lot of backscratching, a lot of backscratching.
Speaker 2 (09:35):
He's in the machine.
Speaker 1 (09:36):
I've seen a lot more women as publicists than men,
and I've always wondered why that's true.
Speaker 2 (09:41):
I don't know that that is true. In researching this,
I saw about an equal amount. I really that as well,
but it seems like there's an equal amount these days.
Speaker 1 (09:49):
It seems like every publicist I've ever known has been
a woman. And I just figured it's because women may
be more level headed and uh were able to like
smooth out a situation. It's some big dumb guy. Yeah,
but I guess the guys who were publicist aren't big
dumb guys like me. I'd be a bad publicist.
Speaker 2 (10:08):
Oh yeah, So what would your response be if somebody
called to find out what stupid thing your your client
did or why they did some stupid thing.
Speaker 1 (10:17):
Let's say, you know what, it's really none of your
business or bothers. Bad publicist?
Speaker 2 (10:23):
Yeah, well that was something I ran across, as you know,
saying something like my client needs their privacy respected right now?
Sure would just immediately shut down a relationship that you've
cultivated over the years that you have to give as
a publicist. You are like, there has to be something
that you give, so you better have something that will
(10:45):
placate the reporter, but will also is probably not the truth,
because that reporter will go off and write the truth
about your client, and your client will have just gotten
horrible publicity because of you. So it's a balancing act.
Speaker 1 (10:58):
Yeah, or they'll just say let me send you over
gift back from Fred Siegel. You like the last one, right,
But publish may also and it depends people that have
a staff of people working for them. Sometimes the lines
are blurred on who does what. But a publicist can
arrange interview requests and set all that stuff up. If
(11:23):
you have like a book tour, or you're a politician,
or your band with a new album coming out, they
might arrange all those interviews, in which case they are
prepping two things. They are prepping the interviewer saying you
can't ask about the bucket of tequila. If you want
this interview, i'll give it to you, but this is
off limits all these things. And then, as we've learned,
(11:46):
when we've had people work with us in publicity, they'll
be prepping you on as the interviewee. If they ask this,
this is how you should probably deal with it.
Speaker 2 (11:56):
Don't answer that, Yeah, don't ridge back to what you
were saying before.
Speaker 1 (12:00):
And my favorite thing ever are videos where celebrities walk
out of interviews because the interviewer has asked something they
weren't supposed to ask.
Speaker 2 (12:08):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (12:09):
Those are great. Yeah, I just sit around watch those
all day.
Speaker 2 (12:13):
Yeah, you can probably find a pretty good super cut
of them.
Speaker 1 (12:16):
Yeah. Probably. So all right, well let's take a break
and when we come back, we will talk a little
bit about the skills you need as a publicist. All right,
(12:44):
we've mentioned lying, and you know, I joke, but for real,
if you want to be a publicist, you better have
a certain comfort level with stretching the truth and lying. Yeah,
because you're gonna have to do that. If you're not
comfortable with that, you shouldn't go into that line of work. Yeah,
is that safe to say?
Speaker 2 (13:02):
I think very.
Speaker 1 (13:03):
You need to be good with people and cultivate those relationships.
You need to be a good writer.
Speaker 2 (13:09):
Well, not only do you have to be a good writer,
you have to be a good journalist. And a lot
of publicists have a background in journalism. Because I kept
running into this in this article and another article you sent.
The number one rule of being a publicist is to
think like a journalist. Even better than that is to
(13:29):
not only think like a journalist, but be able to
write like a journalist too, because as we kind of
demonstrated that, the publicist media relationship is a two way street.
The publicist needs the media to publicize in a flattering
manner their client, but the media needs a publicist because
they've got deadlines and they need to come up with
(13:50):
story ideas, and if something is brought to them, that's great,
that's good, But that media professional has a reputation to protect.
Be like, you know, Billy Ray Cyrus got off of
his couch and mailed a check for five hundred dollars
to a local homeless shelter.
Speaker 1 (14:08):
Yeah, boring.
Speaker 2 (14:09):
Yeah, and it came in a pressure release in a
fax machine. Yeah, that reporter is not going to have
a very good reputation. But if a publicist comes to
this reporter with a great headline, creative pitch a good
story that's tailored to that reporter, and they're beat and
even more than that, tailored to that reporter's audience. Yes,
(14:29):
there's a good likelihood the reporter will say I'm listening, right,
and that's just music to a publicist.
Speaker 1 (14:35):
Hears sure, just to be listened to.
Speaker 2 (14:37):
Yeah, that's when you throw it into fifth gear.
Speaker 1 (14:40):
You can't be afraid of rejection. You've got to be
outgoing and you've got to take your licks because a
lot of your attempts are going to fail just by
nature of the job. So you can't get your feelings
all hurt. Yeah, you guess you could, but you don't
want to show that because then the journalists will be
like geez, Chuck's such a baby.
Speaker 2 (14:58):
You are going to be eating a lot.
Speaker 1 (15:00):
I didn't run the story, and he's complaining.
Speaker 2 (15:02):
Crying when I saw him choking up in the bathroom.
Speaker 1 (15:06):
While they may get a good laugh out of that,
probably won't want to work with you as much. You
got to be very patient, and you have to be
very flexible because if you're working for celebrities, it is
a very tough job.
Speaker 2 (15:19):
That's another thing too, So you are your hours are basically.
Speaker 1 (15:24):
All hours whenever you're needed.
Speaker 2 (15:27):
Right, So, not only does your publicists frequently also have
to do other stuff or people associated with the publicist,
I have to do things like pick up things for
the client system. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (15:43):
Sure.
Speaker 2 (15:45):
In addition to that, like the higher up you go
on the food cham which you'll talk about in a minute.
The more that that client feels a okay with emailing
you at three in the morning saying like I need
to be reassured about my celebrity status or whatever, yeah,
and the publicist needs to respond, you're basically on call
(16:05):
all the time. Also, at three in the morning, your
client may have done something really horrifically stupid. Yes, and
some paparazzi caught it and now words starting to spread
and you're fielding calls from reporters at three in the
morning to get a statement on what your client did.
Speaker 1 (16:22):
Yeah, I mean when Twitter came out, I remember thinking
at the time, like publicists aren't going to be around
anymore because people are doing this themselves.
Speaker 2 (16:30):
Well, they've actually figured out ways to use Twitter.
Speaker 1 (16:32):
Well, ways to use Twitter, but Twitter is also their
biggest security blanket as well. Because of Twitter, more and
more celebrities are saying really stupid things that the publicist
is then going to have to cover their tracks.
Speaker 2 (16:45):
Yeah, that's a good point.
Speaker 1 (16:46):
So they'll take down the tweet and then try and
spend that or just you know, the apology is always
very funny to me.
Speaker 2 (16:55):
Awkward, Well, it's never like.
Speaker 1 (16:57):
Did you hear about Chris Carter, the NFL guy. He's
a former NFL player wide receiver. Yeah, he is in
hot water this week because he spoke. Was hired by
the NFL to come in and speak to the rookies.
They often do that for guys that had been in
trouble to come in and say, don't do what I did.
(17:17):
It's scared straight, Yeah, sort of. And he said in
his talk to the Rookie Symposium said something about, you know,
if you get caught with you know, da da da
da da, just make sure you have a fall guy
on your team, like the guy in the car that's like,
it's my weed, wowly, And he got in big trouble
for that and his apology. His apology was like that
(17:40):
that's not the kind of advice I would ever give
young people. It's like, but that's the advice you exactly
gave young people, Like, how can you say that days later?
It's just so obvious. It's a forced, insincere apology.
Speaker 2 (17:54):
So he either had a bad publicist, yeah, didn't listen
to his publicist, because part of the publicist job is
when you're going to make the statement, the public statement,
the public apology or whatever. Sure, the reasoning behind it,
the rationale, the wording of it, just the logic behind
the apology is probably going to be crafted by your publicists.
(18:18):
At least help they're going to help you with it.
At the very least they're going to want to help
you with it because they're probably scared stupid that you're
going to make it worse.
Speaker 1 (18:29):
Right, And it sounds like there's a lot of crisis
management and that is a part of it. But publicists
also are just trying to cook up opportunities.
Speaker 2 (18:37):
I think that that's way more the day to day.
Speaker 1 (18:40):
Yeah, yeah, for sure, depending on the client, of course.
Speaker 2 (18:43):
Sure.
Speaker 1 (18:43):
But I remember our former boss Connell was in a
band years ago and I read online somewhere that his
band was went to Elton John's. Do you remember the story,
went to Elton John's house and spelled out their band
name and fire on his tennis court.
Speaker 2 (19:03):
No.
Speaker 1 (19:04):
I hadn't heard to try and get on his label
or something.
Speaker 2 (19:06):
That's a great way to do it, I know.
Speaker 1 (19:08):
And I went and asked him. I was like, dude,
I can't believe you guys did that, and he went,
we didn't do that. I was like no, and he
was like no, these are publicists made that up. It's
like nothing true about it. And he's like, no, they
completely fabricated that story. Huh as a publicity stunt that
never happened.
Speaker 2 (19:23):
Huh. Yeah, So why even go to the trouble of
it where you can just release a story that says
that you did that.
Speaker 1 (19:28):
Yeah. Isn't that amazing when something like that could so
easily be fact checked, like by calling Elton John.
Speaker 2 (19:35):
Well, that's the other thing, like I don't have him
to call Elton John. You know, I don't know. So
I'm curious. I wonder how many media stories are just
totally fabricated matter of fact. I'd be you out there
in podcasts. Let us know if you know a media
story that was just totally fabricated that everybody takes his
fact right, we want to hear it. I love stuff
(19:56):
like that.
Speaker 1 (19:56):
I do too, all right. We mentioned earlier that you
end up getting the laundry or dry cleaning as a publicist.
Speaker 2 (20:03):
If you're the publicist intern.
Speaker 1 (20:05):
Yeah, that's probably what's going to happen. Is you might
get asked to go get the laundry, and then you
will say, sure, I'll take care of that for you,
And then you will go down the chain until you
find the underling who was trying to be a publicist
who still does things like that.
Speaker 2 (20:17):
Right. This person may or may not be in college,
but it's probably college age. That's something that I ran across.
If you want a career as a publicist, you do
not need to spend a single penny on higher education. Now,
the entire career of publicists begins as a hands on experience. Yeah,
(20:40):
you need to be in you need to be literate,
you need to probably have a knack for writing in
a journalistic way sure, and crafting good headlines and by
proxy good email subject lines. But you don't if you
have that already before college, you don't need to go
to college.
Speaker 1 (20:58):
No, Like you can go in major in journalism or
communications or PR. But it's not like you get that diploma,
that PR diploma.
Speaker 2 (21:06):
And you're going to get like some entry level job
as a publicist. Now you're still gonna have to work
your way out.
Speaker 1 (21:10):
See it says right here, I have a PR degree,
So where's my job?
Speaker 2 (21:13):
Right?
Speaker 1 (21:14):
My advice is to skip college and go straight into
the workforce as early as you can, if this is
what you want to do.
Speaker 2 (21:22):
You know, I feel and I hope that there is
becoming a bigger understanding that there are certain fields out there.
There are careers out there where you don't have to
go to college, and there are careers out there where
like you should go to a vocational school to learn
that trade. Yes, that college is not necessarily this end
all be all, that you have to spend money after
(21:44):
money after money to get a degree that might even
not be used in your field.
Speaker 1 (21:49):
But I mean that didn't need a degree to do
what I'm doing. No one ever has to see it, right.
Speaker 2 (21:54):
And this is a perfect example of that, Chuck, Like,
to be a publicist, you do not need a degree.
You need hands on experience. You need basically what amounts
to an apprenticeship.
Speaker 1 (22:04):
That's right, Yeah, good way to say it. So go
in and get that job in the mailroom or as
an assistant or as an intern.
Speaker 2 (22:12):
And it would be great if you still live at
your parents' house at this point, because you're going to
get paid like next to nothing, yes, and you're going
to be doing all the grunt work.
Speaker 1 (22:20):
Yes.
Speaker 2 (22:20):
But if you are, if you go in there with
your mindset to I'm going to learn this. I want
to learn this and move up, you're going to be
in the right environment for that.
Speaker 1 (22:30):
Absolutely. Like we said, you might be picking up dry cleaning,
you're going to be returning a lot of phone calls,
drafting a lot of probably not so fun press releases.
Speaker 2 (22:42):
That is graduated from the intern.
Speaker 1 (22:45):
Yeah. Well, I'm talking about being like a junior assistant.
Speaker 2 (22:48):
Right after you get hired on.
Speaker 1 (22:50):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, and press releases that aren't like the
sexy ones. You know, you're not going to be writing
like the press releases for Billy Ray Cyrus. In other words, no,
those are sexy.
Speaker 2 (22:59):
You'll be writing them for his dog.
Speaker 1 (23:03):
Okay, you know sure, Freddy Freddie Cyrus, Freddy Freddy Cyrus.
Speaker 2 (23:09):
Yeah, okay.
Speaker 1 (23:11):
You are going to be handling your publicists that you
work for, their schedule, their contacts. You're going to be
putting together press kits and epk's electronic press kits and
blasting those out. Basically all of the nuts and bolts
of the job you're going to be doing as a
(23:33):
junior staff publicist or an assistant. Not a bad gig.
If that's what you want to do now, and if
you stick to it and you're get at it, you're
going to end up being a publicist. Right.
Speaker 2 (23:44):
Not only are you getting the experience you need on
the job, you're also in a place where you're networking too,
because that is probably tied for first as far as
like thinking like a journalist goes. You need to be
a pretty good networker.
Speaker 1 (23:57):
That's right, And you know what, let's take a break.
We will talk more about networking and some of the
skills you still need.
Speaker 2 (24:24):
Can I make a confession. Yes, I'm possibly the worst
networker on the planet. You didn't have to tell me
that I'm really bad at it.
Speaker 1 (24:36):
Yeah, it's not your bag.
Speaker 2 (24:38):
It isn't Some people are good at networking.
Speaker 1 (24:40):
That's pretty good at it.
Speaker 2 (24:41):
You're good at networking, Yeah, because I enjoy it.
Speaker 1 (24:44):
Yeah, And I don't consider it networking sounds like just
doing something to serve you in the end. I don't
look at it that way. I look at it as
like I enjoy making professional colleague, enjoy meeting and and
getting to know professional colleagues. Yeah, and then later on
if I can hit them up for something, If they
(25:05):
hit me up, that's great. But if not, it's just
something like gotcha, you know.
Speaker 2 (25:10):
So, So the proper response to somebody when they come
and ask you for something, you're like, oh, I saw
this coming. Yeah, that's not the way to respond.
Speaker 1 (25:19):
Probably not.
Speaker 2 (25:21):
I'm trying to put myself out there a little more.
Speaker 1 (25:24):
Oh yeah, yeah, why's that just?
Speaker 2 (25:27):
I think that's a skill that everybody should have. Yeah, right,
instead of being like a misanthropic recluse, you know.
Speaker 1 (25:34):
Put yourself out there. I agree. Well, one of the
skills that I don't think we pinpointed was networking without
seeming like you're networking, which is sort of the key
what I was just talking about.
Speaker 2 (25:45):
And I think maybe that is it too, Like I
feel like networking is a task, whereas if I just
relaxed and enjoyed it and like just you know, communing
with a fellow human being, is that what it's all about.
Speaker 1 (25:58):
That's all it is. That's so scary.
Speaker 2 (26:00):
If I just took it like that, then I'm sure
it would be much more relaxing.
Speaker 1 (26:06):
I read a blog and I sent it to you,
and I want to shout them out because they sonic
bids s and ic b id S. It's a blog
where they did an interview that was pretty insightful.
Speaker 2 (26:23):
Actually they did a double interview, a.
Speaker 1 (26:26):
Dual interview with Julie Lichtenstein of thirty seven Media and
Lily Golightly of Golightly Media. And I think they work
with bands and musical artists mainly. But it was super
insightful and they said just some little tidbits here, like
I was always curious how they get paid, and I
think if you're a publicist for a person and like
(26:49):
you were on retainer, then you just get a salary
or if you're a part of a firm that just
works with that person. But you can also just be
hired for a campaign.
Speaker 2 (26:58):
Right, So, if you're a and you have gone to
the trouble of like going in and hiring a producer
to produce your albums, and like you've made a studio
quality album that you're proud of, you might want to
hit everybody up or gather around another two grand to
hire a publicist for a month to release that album. Correctly,
not a bad idea, no, And like just hiring a
(27:21):
publicist isn't going to automatically make it great. Like you
need to say, can we see some of the other
campaigns you've run, what are your ideas for this campaign?
Who have some of your clients been in the past,
what are what are what's some of the press that
you've gotten? You want? Yeah, you don't want to just
be like throw a darted a phone book. Do your
(27:44):
research because it's two grand and you're an up and
coming band and that's just that's not chump change. But
if you if you look at it as a wise investment,
and you do invest it wisely in a good publicist,
it could make a huge difference.
Speaker 1 (27:57):
For you agreed this. Julie said that they try and
get out for major artists, three or four months ahead
of the release of the album is when they want
to start their job. So it's not like, hey, it
drops next week, let's think of some good ideas, you know,
they want some good lead time. And they said that
they like to work around goals if there if it's
(28:22):
like a tour, like for us going on our tour,
we don't have a publicist, no, but we have promoters
working with venues that sort of do the job of
a publicist as far as trying to sell tickets. But
if you are booking a tour and you have a publicist,
they're going to be the ones that are getting you
(28:42):
on the local radio stations, morning TV, getting you in
the local newspaper or alternative newspaper to get you some press.
Speaker 2 (28:52):
And this is I mean, if you have like, this
is stuff you can do yourself. But one of the
things that you are hiring when you ira a publicist
is their context. Yeah, absolutely, Like you don't have the context,
you're just the band. One of the problems is you
are it's going to be tough for you to think
objectively like, you're not going to understand why every journalist
(29:13):
you talk to doesn't want to automatically do a long
form piece on how great your band is. Right, publicist
is going to be dispassionate enough, yeah, and removed enough
that they can see it objectively through a journalist's size,
and then pitch it in a way that's probably going
to get better more bites.
Speaker 1 (29:32):
Yeah, that's a good way to put it. Because the
artist we've even experienced this as the ones who gets
their feelings hurt, saying like, oh man, you know they
interviewed us last time, why did they do it this time?
And they're always great about massaging the ego a little bit,
saying like it's okay, guys, it's no big deal. Yeah,
because that doesn't do much for us anyway. Lie, we
got this other thing that's better. Lie.
Speaker 2 (29:54):
Right.
Speaker 1 (29:56):
The other thing they're gonna be doing if they work
for you, they are going to be sending you weekly
or bi weekly reports on what's lined up, who passed
on stuff, who bit stuff like that, like they're keeping
you informed. Yeah, you're not just like in a black hole.
And some artists like to be well in touch on
that stuff, and some probably don't care about being bothered.
Speaker 2 (30:17):
Right, you know, they just want to be on Conan Man.
Speaker 1 (30:23):
Conan shot in Atlanta, fifteen minutes from our house where
we live. Yeah, and we couldn't get on Conan. And
it was while our TV show was debuting.
Speaker 2 (30:34):
I know, you know, if you remind me, let's talk
Penny C.
Speaker 1 (30:39):
Sansy Vieri, Yeah, from HuffPo. She is the author and
CEO of Marketing Experts, Inc. And she listed out nine
things that a good publicist does.
Speaker 2 (30:50):
What's number one, Chuck, can you guess think like a journalist?
Speaker 1 (30:53):
That's right, you already said that and you were right.
Speaker 2 (30:56):
It's the number one rule. Number two rule is no
the rules.
Speaker 1 (31:00):
Right, got to play within the game if you start,
and you can bend rules, but if you start breaking them,
people have a long memory.
Speaker 2 (31:08):
Well here, yeah, if you go on and read, just
type the phrase rules of pitching and Publicity into your
favorite search engine and it will bring up apparently one
of the journalists. Things journalists like to do in their
downtime is write lengthy blog posts mocking pr and publicists
(31:29):
don't follow the rules of pitching. So one of the
rules is no phone calls.
Speaker 1 (31:36):
You just don't use the phone all email.
Speaker 2 (31:39):
Yeah, especially if you're cold calling people like I guess
if you have a relationship with somebody, you can pick
up the phone and call them, But you don't send
an email blast and then a day later follow up
on the email by phone. Apparently that's the worst thing
you can do.
Speaker 1 (31:57):
Yeah, you don't want to bug people.
Speaker 2 (31:58):
No, And it's very easy to come off as like
pestering a reporter as your publicist.
Speaker 1 (32:04):
I bet.
Speaker 2 (32:05):
So you need to know the rules, or your publicist
needs to know the rules.
Speaker 1 (32:09):
Here's a good one that I didn't think about reading
outside of your market. I'm sure it's pretty easy to
just think of New York and LA, like, what else
do I need to know about?
Speaker 2 (32:18):
Well, not even that. It's like if you're a.
Speaker 1 (32:20):
Band outside of your industry, yeah, yeah, you.
Speaker 2 (32:23):
Know, and just start to think of like, oh, well,
we actually sing this song about the oil industry, and
oil prices are going through the roofs, so maybe the
Today Show would want to talk to us about our song.
Speaker 1 (32:35):
If it didn't think about that.
Speaker 2 (32:37):
I'd be a great publicist a songwriter. I'm terrible at networking.
Speaker 1 (32:43):
Google alerts. That's kind of a no brainer. I would
think understanding the importance of local media. That's a good
one because while your artist is not going to be
super stoked about appearing on Good Morning Toledo, Hey, if
there's a tie like you're from Toledo, you yeah, then
that's probably a smart thing to do because the local
(33:03):
media loves people that were from there that moved away.
Speaker 2 (33:06):
Right, plus they still live there. Plus missus san Cvieri
makes this point, or miss sansy Vier sorry, makes this
point that you never know where a local contact is
going to end up. Sure might hit the big time.
Speaker 1 (33:22):
It might work for USA today in a couple of months.
Speaker 2 (33:24):
Yeah, it doesn't get bigger than that. And if they
if they hit the big time on their end and
they have you as like a contact, it could help
you out big time.
Speaker 1 (33:33):
That's right. And then earlier you mentioned something about subject
lines for emails. I never really thought about this, but
Penny says, Can I call her Penny? You can't in
a first name basis.
Speaker 2 (33:46):
I call her Miss SANSAVIERI okay.
Speaker 1 (33:48):
Well, she says that crafting a subject line is one
of the most important things that you can do as
a publicist, and that they agonize over this and it
makes total sense with a glow of emails that people receive,
especially journalists, you want to grab their attention otherwise it's
just going to be bye by time.
Speaker 2 (34:09):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (34:10):
So, but you also have to be redrafting, editing, tweaking,
she says. It's just like maddening how much you have
to do that.
Speaker 2 (34:16):
Yeah, that would drive me crazy.
Speaker 1 (34:18):
Yeah, because it's the minutia. So much importance on the minutia.
Speaker 2 (34:22):
Yeah, but it's true, and you have to you have
to put a lot of thought into it. But you
also probably can't come off as having put too much
thought into it else it seems desperate, which you'll turn
somebody off.
Speaker 1 (34:33):
Journalists.
Speaker 2 (34:34):
Publicists want to kill journalists and vice versa.
Speaker 1 (34:37):
Yeah, it sounds like a weird relationship for sure. Yeah,
you know.
Speaker 2 (34:41):
And then also do you look up media leads? No,
So basically there's services out there where journalists say I
need a quote on I'm doing a piece on nuclear
fusion and I don't even know what that is, so yeah, source.
And then this this service that the the journalist calls
(35:01):
puts out like a daily or you know, maybe even
more than once a day newsletter blast to pr people
who pay for the service and then they go through
and say, oh, I've actually got a nuclear physicist on
my payroll, Yeah, and I'm going to connect him.
Speaker 1 (35:17):
We've been connected that way before. Who when we had
different PR firms working for with us. At times they've
gotten in touch and say it said so and so
at SpaceX wants to know if you want to come
on and talk about this or when we did that
stuff on ABC about when the housing crisis hit.
Speaker 2 (35:37):
Yeah, because we're financial experts.
Speaker 1 (35:40):
Yeah, so stuff like that. Yeah, I guess it used
to come across our desk every now and then.
Speaker 2 (35:43):
Well, there's subscription services that connect people through leads. From
what I'm seeing is Twitter is now filling that void
a lot where you can just search Twitter for the
hashtag h A ro O, help a reporter out, Yeah,
the reporters. And then also I guess there's a lot
of PR taste makers out there sure that are just
(36:06):
super connected and will basically tweet a lead And you
don't have to pay a thousand dollars a month for
that subscription service. You just follow certain people on Twitter,
and as a PR person, you might have somebody that's
a client that you connect.
Speaker 1 (36:20):
Yeah, that whole new job of being an aggregator, a
curator like that. Yeah, like people do that and that's
all they do.
Speaker 2 (36:27):
But we also live in an age where people are
famous for being famous.
Speaker 1 (36:33):
Man, I need to take back a little bit my
tirade about liars. I think that what I'm talking about
are people publicists for like big celebrities and stuff like that. Like,
we've had publicists work with us, and about eighty percent
of the clients that they work with are like people
like us, where you don't have to like lie and spend.
Speaker 2 (36:55):
Yeah, we're always on our best behavior.
Speaker 1 (36:56):
Yeah, it's just you know, regular stuff like let me
find a good opportunity for you and connect you. And
so it's I was overstating, and I think that's just
the far edge of the celebrity end of things. Gotcha,
because I just got to thinking about what if they're listening.
I don't want them to think I didn't think they
were doing a good job. He did a great job.
Speaker 2 (37:15):
We'll wait to back off of that one, Chuck.
Speaker 1 (37:17):
I got one more little thing on Jim Moran.
Speaker 2 (37:20):
Moran Jesus said moron m o n I think Moran, Well,
not the way the friends say Moron.
Speaker 1 (37:30):
He is was known as the master of the publicity
stunt back in the day, like he did things. What
his big thing was to take a saying and try
and disprove it, like for a company. So he literally
went to Alaska on behalf of ge to sell a
refrigerator to well, it says an Eskimo, but I guess
an Inuit just what you would say today. He walked
(37:53):
a bowl through a china shop in New York City.
How that go is a stunt? I think they broke
some things. He got on a horse for a politician
and changed directions mid stream on the horse, like rode
it through a river and changed directions. Yeah, like you
can do this. And then in nineteen fifty nine, for
the premiere of The Mouse that Roared, the Great Peter
(38:15):
Sellers movie, he opened an embassy. Remember the movie was
about a small country that declared war in a big country.
Speaker 2 (38:23):
Because they wanted to declare war on the US and
then surrender and then get financial aid from around the
world because their economy.
Speaker 1 (38:30):
But they ended up winning or something. Wasn't that it?
He opened an embassy in Washington for a mythical country.
Speaker 2 (38:35):
Yeah. Nice, speaking of By the way, I finally saw
doctor Strangelove. Oh, really great movie.
Speaker 1 (38:42):
One of the best. It's up there for sure, one
of the best satires.
Speaker 2 (38:47):
Let's say it is a great movie.
Speaker 1 (38:48):
Great movie. And Peter Seller's man.
Speaker 2 (38:51):
Just he did great. But also I mean, like George C.
Scott was amazing.
Speaker 1 (38:56):
He was amazing. And the guy I can't remember his
name that played the colonel or whatever.
Speaker 2 (39:00):
The one who lost his marbles.
Speaker 1 (39:01):
Yeah, yeah, he was. He was so good.
Speaker 2 (39:03):
Everybody was, uh, slim Slim Chills or Slim Pickens, Slim
Pickens Chills. Yeah, there's chili. Chill Wills was another, Like
what country Western actor Chill Wills? I think is his name,
Chill Wills. You'd recognize him if you saw his face, Okay,
Chill Wills, All right, of course. Chill Wills makes an
(39:27):
appearance in the How Publicist episode.
Speaker 1 (39:30):
You got anything else? No, I got nothing else.
Speaker 2 (39:32):
Thank goodness. If you want to know more about publicists,
you can type this word in the search bar at
HowStuffWorks dot com. And I said search parts was time
for listening to mail.
Speaker 1 (39:43):
I did have one more thing, Well, what was it
that movie America's Sweethearts? Did you ever see that? With
John Cusack?
Speaker 2 (39:49):
And I know what you're talking about.
Speaker 1 (39:50):
Billy Crystal has played a publicist, a pain in the
butt Hollywood couple.
Speaker 2 (39:55):
Oh best, best portrayal of a publicist on Seinfeld? The
mom from that seventies show, Remember she played Seinfeld's publicist.
Speaker 1 (40:05):
Oh she was.
Speaker 2 (40:06):
Yeah, she tried to get the airline pilot kicked out
of Jerry's show and he ended up getting right. Right.
I think it's the one where Kramer's at JFK or LaGuardia.
He's making bets on arrivals and he ends up using
the son of Sam Mailbag as collateral.
Speaker 1 (40:22):
Right.
Speaker 2 (40:23):
Great episode. But the mom from that seventies show played
Jerry's publicist.
Speaker 1 (40:27):
Kitty Yeah, who was also in Friends?
Speaker 2 (40:31):
What was she friend?
Speaker 1 (40:32):
She played Phoebe's half brother. Giovanni Ribisi played his girlfriend
or wife. Oh yeah, which is a weird, fucking mismatched couple.
That's odd, and I think they were. They got her
to be a surrogate for them, Okay, when Lisa Kudro
got pregnant in real life. I think that's how they
handled it.
Speaker 2 (40:50):
We have watched a lot of teams.
Speaker 1 (40:54):
All right, I'm gonna call this one. We were actually right,
and this lady was nice at a gender party. How's
that for a subject life? Okay, hey, guys, have a
little story. I was at a small dinner party where
the host was making his own sea salt. The topic
about It's one of those dinner parties. The topic of
(41:15):
kosher salt came up, so I dropped a fact from
Your Salt episode that kocher salt is actually just salt
used for drawing blood out of meat to make it kosher,
not salt blasts by a rabbi, and the fellow guest disagreed,
to which I responded, I'm quite sure about this. The
host then said raise your hand if you're Jewish, and
the guy that disputed me raised his hand felt rather
embarrassed while he explained to me what kosher means and
(41:37):
that salt also goes through the same kosher process that
would ever explain how I backed down and didn't try
to defend the fact that I just told. It's not
that I doubted you, guys, though I jokingly said I'd
write an email to complain, but it's because a peel
is disrespectful to correct someone on their own heritage. Good move. Yeah,
I also didn't want to start any petty debate with
(41:58):
someone at someone else's dinner party also a good move,
So I decided to take in the embarrassment while he
was explaining what koscher is at the same time eating
a spite of pasta with turizo. I hope you find
this amusing. Please keep up the good work. If you
read on the show, please give a shout out to
my friend Amber who introduced me to the show. And
that is from Chloe to say, so.
Speaker 2 (42:19):
Wait a minute, Chuck, were we right and the guy
was wrong?
Speaker 1 (42:22):
We were right? The Jewish guy was wrong because I
looked it up today just to be sure. Yeah, and
apparently kosher salt is kosher because in fact, they said
it should be called koshering salt.
Speaker 2 (42:33):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (42:33):
Yeah, because it's used to make things kosher. It is
not the salt itself that's kosher.
Speaker 2 (42:37):
It would have kept Chloe out of that kind of situation. Chloe,
it sounds like you have a lot of tact and dignity. Yes,
and exratulations on that. It sounds like, yeah, the guy's
a bit of a blow hard. I'm not ruining the
dinner party.
Speaker 1 (42:49):
So that is from Chloe in Sydney, Australia.
Speaker 2 (42:54):
Thank you if you want to get in touch with us.
We want to hear about all of your misadventures out
there based on Stuff you Should Know. You can send
us an email to Stuff Podcast at HowStuffWorks dot com and,
as always, joined us at our home on the web,
Stuff Youshould Know dot com.
Speaker 1 (43:11):
Stuff you Should Know is a production of iHeartRadio. For
more podcasts my heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
Hi, everyone. We're going to jump back in podcast time
to September fifteenth, twenty fifteen, for this week's selection, How
Publicists Work. We've never had a publicist, you know why,
because nobody cares that much about us. So it's really
not a job that would get a lot of billable hours,
if you know what I mean. But anyway, it's a
(00:21):
pretty fascinating, weird job. And we heard from a few publicists,
I believe when we recorded this, so maybe we'll hear
from some again. How publicists, publicists, publicists work. Welcome to
Stuff You Should Know, a production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2 (00:48):
Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clarks, Charlte
w Chuck Bryant, there's Jerry so Stuff you should know.
Speaker 1 (00:57):
This is it? That sounded like you're introducing the final
episode my voice?
Speaker 2 (01:03):
This is it feels like it's the final episode.
Speaker 1 (01:06):
You won't be able to talk anymore.
Speaker 2 (01:08):
No, I'm getting there.
Speaker 1 (01:10):
That's not true. You don't know that. How's it going?
Speaker 2 (01:17):
It's going pretty well? Man? How about with you?
Speaker 1 (01:19):
I think both of us had a bit of a
dark time researching this article. Why well, because and we're
going to get well, we're going to get flack. That's
a teaser from publicists, because what I learned is that
publicists are professional liars.
Speaker 2 (01:40):
I would say that depends on the circumstance.
Speaker 1 (01:44):
Well, what do you mean, Well, you're saying there are
publicists who don't lie.
Speaker 2 (01:48):
No, I'm saying it depends on whether the publicist is
going to the media or the media is coming to
the publicist, depending on the circumstance.
Speaker 1 (01:59):
What I am saying is, no matter what who you
work for, if you are a publicist, then a percentage
of your job will be lying.
Speaker 2 (02:08):
Right, Okay, depending on the circumstance.
Speaker 1 (02:11):
Yeah, so Billy lie about something good.
Speaker 2 (02:14):
Billy ray Cyrus is like, I am going to donate
a bunch of time and money to a local homeless shelter.
Speaker 1 (02:21):
Yeah, you don't have to lie about that.
Speaker 2 (02:22):
The publicist gets on the horn starts letting everybody know
you guys should come cover this. Billy ray Cyrus goes
and does that, and everything's good. Then on the way home,
Billy ray Cyrus decides to celebrate by drinking a bucket
of tequila and runs his car into a whatever.
Speaker 1 (02:42):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (02:43):
The publicist then starts getting calls and says.
Speaker 1 (02:48):
He didn't drink a bucket of tequila.
Speaker 2 (02:49):
That wasn't even him.
Speaker 1 (02:50):
That's overstated. What really happened was this.
Speaker 2 (02:53):
So the circumstances depend on the whether the publicist is
fibbing or not.
Speaker 1 (03:00):
Oh yeah, I'm not saying that all publicists do is lie.
But I'm saying if you work as a publicist, part
of your job is to cover tracks and to lie. Gotcha,
and you know that. Don't hate the publicist, Hate the system,
is what I say.
Speaker 2 (03:15):
Yeah, they're definitely a part of a larger system.
Speaker 1 (03:18):
Yeah, a larger system which includes all of us who
digest news.
Speaker 2 (03:24):
Yeah, especially say like entertainment news. Yeah, that kind of thing.
There's like a there's a whole. There's two from my understanding,
there's two routes a person can take as a celebrity.
You can either just go off and be a normal person,
and depending on your level, you might have paparazzi following
(03:44):
her that kind of stuff. There's once you get to
a certain level, it doesn't matter what your decision is,
or you can hire a publicist and feed yourself right
into that machine to get as much publicity and as
much press as you possibly can.
Speaker 1 (03:58):
Yeah, well, I think any celebrity is going to have
a publicist, but it's really a matter of your directive
and your goal. I think some of those people like
to be like that, the old adage there's no such
thing as bad publicity.
Speaker 2 (04:10):
Yeah, I ran into that that that's more of a
PR term, where like so, if you're in a PR
you're probably representing a company or an organization or something
like that. A publicist is somebody who typically represents a
single person, an artist and author, a musician, something like that.
That's really the only definition I can find for a publicist,
(04:34):
and the job. The goal of the publicist is to
help maintain and promote the public image of that person
that they represent.
Speaker 1 (04:44):
That's right.
Speaker 2 (04:45):
Bye, having a good relationship with the media.
Speaker 1 (04:49):
Yes, that's where it starts.
Speaker 2 (04:50):
That's the publicist.
Speaker 1 (04:52):
And by the way, that no such thing as bad publicity.
I tried to find the origin of that, and the
closest thing I could find was P. T. Barnum. But
I don't know if that's true. I don't think that's verified.
Speaker 2 (05:03):
Well then say Mark Twain.
Speaker 1 (05:05):
Yeah, PT Varnember Mark Twain.
Speaker 2 (05:06):
Everybody says, oh it was a Mark Twain saying.
Speaker 1 (05:09):
And I don't think that's even true anyway. I think
maybe that.
Speaker 2 (05:13):
Used to be true, that it was a Mark Twain saying.
Speaker 1 (05:15):
No, that no such thing as bad publicity. I think
at one point that may have been sort of true. Yeah,
these days there's clearly bad publicity. Sure, So you I
said the word flak earlier as a teaser. Apparently two
flak or a flack is a term originating from Gene Flak,
(05:36):
early movie publicist Hollywood.
Speaker 2 (05:39):
And that's with the ck that's right flak to take.
Flack is named after a type of German gun in
World War Two, a German anti aircraft gun.
Speaker 1 (05:48):
Two different things, but in this case it is a
pejorative term for publicists. They don't like it.
Speaker 2 (05:56):
A PR flack.
Speaker 1 (05:57):
Yeah, you shouldn't say that to someone that works in PR. No,
or call them a liar. They don't like that either. Yeah, yeah,
I looked it up. Apparently it means that, like, you
can't be trusted, you'll you'll do anything for money. That's
what a flack is to them. That's like they One
article I read said that's like calling a personal injury
attorney an ambulance chaser.
Speaker 2 (06:18):
Yeah, just not a nice term, gotcha.
Speaker 1 (06:20):
So there you have it. So a publicist, like you said,
works for their client to make them to get their
good deeds out and to if they don't have good deeds,
to spin things to make it look like they do.
Speaker 2 (06:36):
Right. You know, here hold this baby lamb. Yeah, oh,
we take your.
Speaker 1 (06:40):
Picture exactly, and then they get photographed later eating euros
down the block.
Speaker 2 (06:45):
The two events were totally not connected.
Speaker 1 (06:48):
No, So what they do is they pitch ideas to
the media and they probably have to be good writers themselves,
because a press release oftentimes is a starting point. But
press releases, as we know, can get lost in the
shuffle and never see the light of day.
Speaker 2 (07:07):
Yeah, it seems like a huge wasted time.
Speaker 1 (07:10):
It can be. But if you have a good publicist,
they will be well connected to the media to ensure
that that publicity blast is not lost.
Speaker 2 (07:21):
Right exactly. So there's direction one, which is from the
publicist to the media, and the publicist is going to
have all these contacts with different entertainment reporters and business
reporters and anybody that could possibly run a story. Yeah,
anybody that could possibly run a story on their client, Right,
(07:43):
that's right. And they'll say, Billy Ray is going to
donate some money.
Speaker 1 (07:49):
Why we pick it on him.
Speaker 2 (07:51):
He just seems like the type who would donate a
bunch of money to a homeless shelter. Okay, and go
down there himself and help out. Great, so Billy Ray's
going to be down there. Plus it rolls off the
tongue Billy Ray. Sure, so why don't you send one
of your cover reporters down and let's get some coverage
for this. And since their friends, since these people have
(08:11):
worked together for decades, now this reporter and your publicist,
the reporter actually might respond and show up, or the
editor or the news producer, whoever the contact is. That's great, Like,
that's you hired a good publicist and now this story
is going to make it out there. That's right, because
they didn't just write up a press release with a
(08:32):
bunch of exclamation points in the headline and facts it
to every media outlet they can find a zero response.
Speaker 1 (08:39):
Yes, so good. A publicist is only as good as
their relationships. I think the other way on that street
that you were talking about is from the journalists back
to the publicist. If they hear heard Billy Ray sires
Drenk a bucket a tequila and ran over a prostitute
with his car. They will then get in touch with
the publicist and then they go buddy, hey, we go
(09:01):
back a long way.
Speaker 2 (09:03):
Would I lie to you?
Speaker 1 (09:04):
What I lie to you? Uh So that's how that goes,
and they want they will be more forthcoming with people
who have It's a scratch your back, you scratch mind
type of scenario.
Speaker 2 (09:16):
Yeah, like that reporter that actually showed up at the
homeless shelter and covered it and made a nice piece
and everything.
Speaker 1 (09:22):
I'll give you the scoop.
Speaker 2 (09:23):
When that guy calls, he's he's going to get the
better treatment from the publicist than somebody who ignored the
pitch before.
Speaker 1 (09:31):
That's right, a lot of backscratching, a lot of backscratching.
Speaker 2 (09:35):
He's in the machine.
Speaker 1 (09:36):
I've seen a lot more women as publicists than men,
and I've always wondered why that's true.
Speaker 2 (09:41):
I don't know that that is true. In researching this,
I saw about an equal amount. I really that as well,
but it seems like there's an equal amount these days.
Speaker 1 (09:49):
It seems like every publicist I've ever known has been
a woman. And I just figured it's because women may
be more level headed and uh were able to like
smooth out a situation. It's some big dumb guy. Yeah,
but I guess the guys who were publicist aren't big
dumb guys like me. I'd be a bad publicist.
Speaker 2 (10:08):
Oh yeah, So what would your response be if somebody
called to find out what stupid thing your your client
did or why they did some stupid thing.
Speaker 1 (10:17):
Let's say, you know what, it's really none of your
business or bothers. Bad publicist?
Speaker 2 (10:23):
Yeah, well that was something I ran across, as you know,
saying something like my client needs their privacy respected right now?
Sure would just immediately shut down a relationship that you've
cultivated over the years that you have to give as
a publicist. You are like, there has to be something
that you give, so you better have something that will
(10:45):
placate the reporter, but will also is probably not the truth,
because that reporter will go off and write the truth
about your client, and your client will have just gotten
horrible publicity because of you. So it's a balancing act.
Speaker 1 (10:58):
Yeah, or they'll just say let me send you over
gift back from Fred Siegel. You like the last one, right,
But publish may also and it depends people that have
a staff of people working for them. Sometimes the lines
are blurred on who does what. But a publicist can
arrange interview requests and set all that stuff up. If
(11:23):
you have like a book tour, or you're a politician,
or your band with a new album coming out, they
might arrange all those interviews, in which case they are
prepping two things. They are prepping the interviewer saying you
can't ask about the bucket of tequila. If you want
this interview, i'll give it to you, but this is
off limits all these things. And then, as we've learned,
(11:46):
when we've had people work with us in publicity, they'll
be prepping you on as the interviewee. If they ask this,
this is how you should probably deal with it.
Speaker 2 (11:56):
Don't answer that, Yeah, don't ridge back to what you
were saying before.
Speaker 1 (12:00):
And my favorite thing ever are videos where celebrities walk
out of interviews because the interviewer has asked something they
weren't supposed to ask.
Speaker 2 (12:08):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (12:09):
Those are great. Yeah, I just sit around watch those
all day.
Speaker 2 (12:13):
Yeah, you can probably find a pretty good super cut
of them.
Speaker 1 (12:16):
Yeah. Probably. So all right, well let's take a break
and when we come back, we will talk a little
bit about the skills you need as a publicist. All right,
(12:44):
we've mentioned lying, and you know, I joke, but for real,
if you want to be a publicist, you better have
a certain comfort level with stretching the truth and lying. Yeah,
because you're gonna have to do that. If you're not
comfortable with that, you shouldn't go into that line of work. Yeah,
is that safe to say?
Speaker 2 (13:02):
I think very.
Speaker 1 (13:03):
You need to be good with people and cultivate those relationships.
You need to be a good writer.
Speaker 2 (13:09):
Well, not only do you have to be a good writer,
you have to be a good journalist. And a lot
of publicists have a background in journalism. Because I kept
running into this in this article and another article you sent.
The number one rule of being a publicist is to
think like a journalist. Even better than that is to
(13:29):
not only think like a journalist, but be able to
write like a journalist too, because as we kind of
demonstrated that, the publicist media relationship is a two way street.
The publicist needs the media to publicize in a flattering
manner their client, but the media needs a publicist because
they've got deadlines and they need to come up with
(13:50):
story ideas, and if something is brought to them, that's great,
that's good, But that media professional has a reputation to protect.
Be like, you know, Billy Ray Cyrus got off of
his couch and mailed a check for five hundred dollars
to a local homeless shelter.
Speaker 1 (14:08):
Yeah, boring.
Speaker 2 (14:09):
Yeah, and it came in a pressure release in a
fax machine. Yeah, that reporter is not going to have
a very good reputation. But if a publicist comes to
this reporter with a great headline, creative pitch a good
story that's tailored to that reporter, and they're beat and
even more than that, tailored to that reporter's audience. Yes,
(14:29):
there's a good likelihood the reporter will say I'm listening, right,
and that's just music to a publicist.
Speaker 1 (14:35):
Hears sure, just to be listened to.
Speaker 2 (14:37):
Yeah, that's when you throw it into fifth gear.
Speaker 1 (14:40):
You can't be afraid of rejection. You've got to be
outgoing and you've got to take your licks because a
lot of your attempts are going to fail just by
nature of the job. So you can't get your feelings
all hurt. Yeah, you guess you could, but you don't
want to show that because then the journalists will be
like geez, Chuck's such a baby.
Speaker 2 (14:58):
You are going to be eating a lot.
Speaker 1 (15:00):
I didn't run the story, and he's complaining.
Speaker 2 (15:02):
Crying when I saw him choking up in the bathroom.
Speaker 1 (15:06):
While they may get a good laugh out of that,
probably won't want to work with you as much. You
got to be very patient, and you have to be
very flexible because if you're working for celebrities, it is
a very tough job.
Speaker 2 (15:19):
That's another thing too, So you are your hours are basically.
Speaker 1 (15:24):
All hours whenever you're needed.
Speaker 2 (15:27):
Right, So, not only does your publicists frequently also have
to do other stuff or people associated with the publicist,
I have to do things like pick up things for
the client system. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (15:43):
Sure.
Speaker 2 (15:45):
In addition to that, like the higher up you go
on the food cham which you'll talk about in a minute.
The more that that client feels a okay with emailing
you at three in the morning saying like I need
to be reassured about my celebrity status or whatever, yeah,
and the publicist needs to respond, you're basically on call
(16:05):
all the time. Also, at three in the morning, your
client may have done something really horrifically stupid. Yes, and
some paparazzi caught it and now words starting to spread
and you're fielding calls from reporters at three in the
morning to get a statement on what your client did.
Speaker 1 (16:22):
Yeah, I mean when Twitter came out, I remember thinking
at the time, like publicists aren't going to be around
anymore because people are doing this themselves.
Speaker 2 (16:30):
Well, they've actually figured out ways to use Twitter.
Speaker 1 (16:32):
Well, ways to use Twitter, but Twitter is also their
biggest security blanket as well. Because of Twitter, more and
more celebrities are saying really stupid things that the publicist
is then going to have to cover their tracks.
Speaker 2 (16:45):
Yeah, that's a good point.
Speaker 1 (16:46):
So they'll take down the tweet and then try and
spend that or just you know, the apology is always
very funny to me.
Speaker 2 (16:55):
Awkward, Well, it's never like.
Speaker 1 (16:57):
Did you hear about Chris Carter, the NFL guy. He's
a former NFL player wide receiver. Yeah, he is in
hot water this week because he spoke. Was hired by
the NFL to come in and speak to the rookies.
They often do that for guys that had been in
trouble to come in and say, don't do what I did.
(17:17):
It's scared straight, Yeah, sort of. And he said in
his talk to the Rookie Symposium said something about, you know,
if you get caught with you know, da da da
da da, just make sure you have a fall guy
on your team, like the guy in the car that's like,
it's my weed, wowly, And he got in big trouble
for that and his apology. His apology was like that
(17:40):
that's not the kind of advice I would ever give
young people. It's like, but that's the advice you exactly
gave young people, Like, how can you say that days later?
It's just so obvious. It's a forced, insincere apology.
Speaker 2 (17:54):
So he either had a bad publicist, yeah, didn't listen
to his publicist, because part of the publicist job is
when you're going to make the statement, the public statement,
the public apology or whatever. Sure, the reasoning behind it,
the rationale, the wording of it, just the logic behind
the apology is probably going to be crafted by your publicists.
(18:18):
At least help they're going to help you with it.
At the very least they're going to want to help
you with it because they're probably scared stupid that you're
going to make it worse.
Speaker 1 (18:29):
Right, And it sounds like there's a lot of crisis
management and that is a part of it. But publicists
also are just trying to cook up opportunities.
Speaker 2 (18:37):
I think that that's way more the day to day.
Speaker 1 (18:40):
Yeah, yeah, for sure, depending on the client, of course.
Speaker 2 (18:43):
Sure.
Speaker 1 (18:43):
But I remember our former boss Connell was in a
band years ago and I read online somewhere that his
band was went to Elton John's. Do you remember the story,
went to Elton John's house and spelled out their band
name and fire on his tennis court.
Speaker 2 (19:03):
No.
Speaker 1 (19:04):
I hadn't heard to try and get on his label
or something.
Speaker 2 (19:06):
That's a great way to do it, I know.
Speaker 1 (19:08):
And I went and asked him. I was like, dude,
I can't believe you guys did that, and he went,
we didn't do that. I was like no, and he
was like no, these are publicists made that up. It's
like nothing true about it. And he's like, no, they
completely fabricated that story. Huh as a publicity stunt that
never happened.
Speaker 2 (19:23):
Huh. Yeah, So why even go to the trouble of
it where you can just release a story that says
that you did that.
Speaker 1 (19:28):
Yeah. Isn't that amazing when something like that could so
easily be fact checked, like by calling Elton John.
Speaker 2 (19:35):
Well, that's the other thing, like I don't have him
to call Elton John. You know, I don't know. So
I'm curious. I wonder how many media stories are just
totally fabricated matter of fact. I'd be you out there
in podcasts. Let us know if you know a media
story that was just totally fabricated that everybody takes his
fact right, we want to hear it. I love stuff
(19:56):
like that.
Speaker 1 (19:56):
I do too, all right. We mentioned earlier that you
end up getting the laundry or dry cleaning as a publicist.
Speaker 2 (20:03):
If you're the publicist intern.
Speaker 1 (20:05):
Yeah, that's probably what's going to happen. Is you might
get asked to go get the laundry, and then you
will say, sure, I'll take care of that for you,
And then you will go down the chain until you
find the underling who was trying to be a publicist
who still does things like that.
Speaker 2 (20:17):
Right. This person may or may not be in college,
but it's probably college age. That's something that I ran across.
If you want a career as a publicist, you do
not need to spend a single penny on higher education. Now,
the entire career of publicists begins as a hands on experience. Yeah,
(20:40):
you need to be in you need to be literate,
you need to probably have a knack for writing in
a journalistic way sure, and crafting good headlines and by
proxy good email subject lines. But you don't if you
have that already before college, you don't need to go
to college.
Speaker 1 (20:58):
No, Like you can go in major in journalism or
communications or PR. But it's not like you get that diploma,
that PR diploma.
Speaker 2 (21:06):
And you're going to get like some entry level job
as a publicist. Now you're still gonna have to work
your way out.
Speaker 1 (21:10):
See it says right here, I have a PR degree,
So where's my job?
Speaker 2 (21:13):
Right?
Speaker 1 (21:14):
My advice is to skip college and go straight into
the workforce as early as you can, if this is
what you want to do.
Speaker 2 (21:22):
You know, I feel and I hope that there is
becoming a bigger understanding that there are certain fields out there.
There are careers out there where you don't have to
go to college, and there are careers out there where
like you should go to a vocational school to learn
that trade. Yes, that college is not necessarily this end
all be all, that you have to spend money after
(21:44):
money after money to get a degree that might even
not be used in your field.
Speaker 1 (21:49):
But I mean that didn't need a degree to do
what I'm doing. No one ever has to see it, right.
Speaker 2 (21:54):
And this is a perfect example of that, Chuck, Like,
to be a publicist, you do not need a degree.
You need hands on experience. You need basically what amounts
to an apprenticeship.
Speaker 1 (22:04):
That's right, Yeah, good way to say it. So go
in and get that job in the mailroom or as
an assistant or as an intern.
Speaker 2 (22:12):
And it would be great if you still live at
your parents' house at this point, because you're going to
get paid like next to nothing, yes, and you're going
to be doing all the grunt work.
Speaker 1 (22:20):
Yes.
Speaker 2 (22:20):
But if you are, if you go in there with
your mindset to I'm going to learn this. I want
to learn this and move up, you're going to be
in the right environment for that.
Speaker 1 (22:30):
Absolutely. Like we said, you might be picking up dry cleaning,
you're going to be returning a lot of phone calls,
drafting a lot of probably not so fun press releases.
Speaker 2 (22:42):
That is graduated from the intern.
Speaker 1 (22:45):
Yeah. Well, I'm talking about being like a junior assistant.
Speaker 2 (22:48):
Right after you get hired on.
Speaker 1 (22:50):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, and press releases that aren't like the
sexy ones. You know, you're not going to be writing
like the press releases for Billy Ray Cyrus. In other words, no,
those are sexy.
Speaker 2 (22:59):
You'll be writing them for his dog.
Speaker 1 (23:03):
Okay, you know sure, Freddy Freddie Cyrus, Freddy Freddy Cyrus.
Speaker 2 (23:09):
Yeah, okay.
Speaker 1 (23:11):
You are going to be handling your publicists that you
work for, their schedule, their contacts. You're going to be
putting together press kits and epk's electronic press kits and
blasting those out. Basically all of the nuts and bolts
of the job you're going to be doing as a
(23:33):
junior staff publicist or an assistant. Not a bad gig.
If that's what you want to do now, and if
you stick to it and you're get at it, you're
going to end up being a publicist. Right.
Speaker 2 (23:44):
Not only are you getting the experience you need on
the job, you're also in a place where you're networking too,
because that is probably tied for first as far as
like thinking like a journalist goes. You need to be
a pretty good networker.
Speaker 1 (23:57):
That's right, And you know what, let's take a break.
We will talk more about networking and some of the
skills you still need.
Speaker 2 (24:24):
Can I make a confession. Yes, I'm possibly the worst
networker on the planet. You didn't have to tell me
that I'm really bad at it.
Speaker 1 (24:36):
Yeah, it's not your bag.
Speaker 2 (24:38):
It isn't Some people are good at networking.
Speaker 1 (24:40):
That's pretty good at it.
Speaker 2 (24:41):
You're good at networking, Yeah, because I enjoy it.
Speaker 1 (24:44):
Yeah, And I don't consider it networking sounds like just
doing something to serve you in the end. I don't
look at it that way. I look at it as
like I enjoy making professional colleague, enjoy meeting and and
getting to know professional colleagues. Yeah, and then later on
if I can hit them up for something, If they
(25:05):
hit me up, that's great. But if not, it's just
something like gotcha, you know.
Speaker 2 (25:10):
So, So the proper response to somebody when they come
and ask you for something, you're like, oh, I saw
this coming. Yeah, that's not the way to respond.
Speaker 1 (25:19):
Probably not.
Speaker 2 (25:21):
I'm trying to put myself out there a little more.
Speaker 1 (25:24):
Oh yeah, yeah, why's that just?
Speaker 2 (25:27):
I think that's a skill that everybody should have. Yeah, right,
instead of being like a misanthropic recluse, you know.
Speaker 1 (25:34):
Put yourself out there. I agree. Well, one of the
skills that I don't think we pinpointed was networking without
seeming like you're networking, which is sort of the key
what I was just talking about.
Speaker 2 (25:45):
And I think maybe that is it too, Like I
feel like networking is a task, whereas if I just
relaxed and enjoyed it and like just you know, communing
with a fellow human being, is that what it's all about.
Speaker 1 (25:58):
That's all it is. That's so scary.
Speaker 2 (26:00):
If I just took it like that, then I'm sure
it would be much more relaxing.
Speaker 1 (26:06):
I read a blog and I sent it to you,
and I want to shout them out because they sonic
bids s and ic b id S. It's a blog
where they did an interview that was pretty insightful.
Speaker 2 (26:23):
Actually they did a double interview, a.
Speaker 1 (26:26):
Dual interview with Julie Lichtenstein of thirty seven Media and
Lily Golightly of Golightly Media. And I think they work
with bands and musical artists mainly. But it was super
insightful and they said just some little tidbits here, like
I was always curious how they get paid, and I
think if you're a publicist for a person and like
(26:49):
you were on retainer, then you just get a salary
or if you're a part of a firm that just
works with that person. But you can also just be
hired for a campaign.
Speaker 2 (26:58):
Right, So, if you're a and you have gone to
the trouble of like going in and hiring a producer
to produce your albums, and like you've made a studio
quality album that you're proud of, you might want to
hit everybody up or gather around another two grand to
hire a publicist for a month to release that album. Correctly,
not a bad idea, no, And like just hiring a
(27:21):
publicist isn't going to automatically make it great. Like you
need to say, can we see some of the other
campaigns you've run, what are your ideas for this campaign?
Who have some of your clients been in the past,
what are what are what's some of the press that
you've gotten? You want? Yeah, you don't want to just
be like throw a darted a phone book. Do your
(27:44):
research because it's two grand and you're an up and
coming band and that's just that's not chump change. But
if you if you look at it as a wise investment,
and you do invest it wisely in a good publicist,
it could make a huge difference.
Speaker 1 (27:57):
For you agreed this. Julie said that they try and
get out for major artists, three or four months ahead
of the release of the album is when they want
to start their job. So it's not like, hey, it
drops next week, let's think of some good ideas, you know,
they want some good lead time. And they said that
they like to work around goals if there if it's
(28:22):
like a tour, like for us going on our tour,
we don't have a publicist, no, but we have promoters
working with venues that sort of do the job of
a publicist as far as trying to sell tickets. But
if you are booking a tour and you have a publicist,
they're going to be the ones that are getting you
(28:42):
on the local radio stations, morning TV, getting you in
the local newspaper or alternative newspaper to get you some press.
Speaker 2 (28:52):
And this is I mean, if you have like, this
is stuff you can do yourself. But one of the
things that you are hiring when you ira a publicist
is their context. Yeah, absolutely, Like you don't have the context,
you're just the band. One of the problems is you
are it's going to be tough for you to think
objectively like, you're not going to understand why every journalist
(29:13):
you talk to doesn't want to automatically do a long
form piece on how great your band is. Right, publicist
is going to be dispassionate enough, yeah, and removed enough
that they can see it objectively through a journalist's size,
and then pitch it in a way that's probably going
to get better more bites.
Speaker 1 (29:32):
Yeah, that's a good way to put it. Because the
artist we've even experienced this as the ones who gets
their feelings hurt, saying like, oh man, you know they
interviewed us last time, why did they do it this time?
And they're always great about massaging the ego a little bit,
saying like it's okay, guys, it's no big deal. Yeah,
because that doesn't do much for us anyway. Lie, we
got this other thing that's better. Lie.
Speaker 2 (29:54):
Right.
Speaker 1 (29:56):
The other thing they're gonna be doing if they work
for you, they are going to be sending you weekly
or bi weekly reports on what's lined up, who passed
on stuff, who bit stuff like that, like they're keeping
you informed. Yeah, you're not just like in a black hole.
And some artists like to be well in touch on
that stuff, and some probably don't care about being bothered.
Speaker 2 (30:17):
Right, you know, they just want to be on Conan Man.
Speaker 1 (30:23):
Conan shot in Atlanta, fifteen minutes from our house where
we live. Yeah, and we couldn't get on Conan. And
it was while our TV show was debuting.
Speaker 2 (30:34):
I know, you know, if you remind me, let's talk
Penny C.
Speaker 1 (30:39):
Sansy Vieri, Yeah, from HuffPo. She is the author and
CEO of Marketing Experts, Inc. And she listed out nine
things that a good publicist does.
Speaker 2 (30:50):
What's number one, Chuck, can you guess think like a journalist?
Speaker 1 (30:53):
That's right, you already said that and you were right.
Speaker 2 (30:56):
It's the number one rule. Number two rule is no
the rules.
Speaker 1 (31:00):
Right, got to play within the game if you start,
and you can bend rules, but if you start breaking them,
people have a long memory.
Speaker 2 (31:08):
Well here, yeah, if you go on and read, just
type the phrase rules of pitching and Publicity into your
favorite search engine and it will bring up apparently one
of the journalists. Things journalists like to do in their
downtime is write lengthy blog posts mocking pr and publicists
(31:29):
don't follow the rules of pitching. So one of the
rules is no phone calls.
Speaker 1 (31:36):
You just don't use the phone all email.
Speaker 2 (31:39):
Yeah, especially if you're cold calling people like I guess
if you have a relationship with somebody, you can pick
up the phone and call them, But you don't send
an email blast and then a day later follow up
on the email by phone. Apparently that's the worst thing
you can do.
Speaker 1 (31:57):
Yeah, you don't want to bug people.
Speaker 2 (31:58):
No, And it's very easy to come off as like
pestering a reporter as your publicist.
Speaker 1 (32:04):
I bet.
Speaker 2 (32:05):
So you need to know the rules, or your publicist
needs to know the rules.
Speaker 1 (32:09):
Here's a good one that I didn't think about reading
outside of your market. I'm sure it's pretty easy to
just think of New York and LA, like, what else
do I need to know about?
Speaker 2 (32:18):
Well, not even that. It's like if you're a.
Speaker 1 (32:20):
Band outside of your industry, yeah, yeah, you.
Speaker 2 (32:23):
Know, and just start to think of like, oh, well,
we actually sing this song about the oil industry, and
oil prices are going through the roofs, so maybe the
Today Show would want to talk to us about our song.
Speaker 1 (32:35):
If it didn't think about that.
Speaker 2 (32:37):
I'd be a great publicist a songwriter. I'm terrible at networking.
Speaker 1 (32:43):
Google alerts. That's kind of a no brainer. I would
think understanding the importance of local media. That's a good
one because while your artist is not going to be
super stoked about appearing on Good Morning Toledo, Hey, if
there's a tie like you're from Toledo, you yeah, then
that's probably a smart thing to do because the local
(33:03):
media loves people that were from there that moved away.
Speaker 2 (33:06):
Right, plus they still live there. Plus missus san Cvieri
makes this point, or miss sansy Vier sorry, makes this
point that you never know where a local contact is
going to end up. Sure might hit the big time.
Speaker 1 (33:22):
It might work for USA today in a couple of months.
Speaker 2 (33:24):
Yeah, it doesn't get bigger than that. And if they
if they hit the big time on their end and
they have you as like a contact, it could help
you out big time.
Speaker 1 (33:33):
That's right. And then earlier you mentioned something about subject
lines for emails. I never really thought about this, but
Penny says, Can I call her Penny? You can't in
a first name basis.
Speaker 2 (33:46):
I call her Miss SANSAVIERI okay.
Speaker 1 (33:48):
Well, she says that crafting a subject line is one
of the most important things that you can do as
a publicist, and that they agonize over this and it
makes total sense with a glow of emails that people receive,
especially journalists, you want to grab their attention otherwise it's
just going to be bye by time.
Speaker 2 (34:09):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (34:10):
So, but you also have to be redrafting, editing, tweaking,
she says. It's just like maddening how much you have
to do that.
Speaker 2 (34:16):
Yeah, that would drive me crazy.
Speaker 1 (34:18):
Yeah, because it's the minutia. So much importance on the minutia.
Speaker 2 (34:22):
Yeah, but it's true, and you have to you have
to put a lot of thought into it. But you
also probably can't come off as having put too much
thought into it else it seems desperate, which you'll turn
somebody off.
Speaker 1 (34:33):
Journalists.
Speaker 2 (34:34):
Publicists want to kill journalists and vice versa.
Speaker 1 (34:37):
Yeah, it sounds like a weird relationship for sure. Yeah,
you know.
Speaker 2 (34:41):
And then also do you look up media leads? No,
So basically there's services out there where journalists say I
need a quote on I'm doing a piece on nuclear
fusion and I don't even know what that is, so yeah, source.
And then this this service that the the journalist calls
(35:01):
puts out like a daily or you know, maybe even
more than once a day newsletter blast to pr people
who pay for the service and then they go through
and say, oh, I've actually got a nuclear physicist on
my payroll, Yeah, and I'm going to connect him.
Speaker 1 (35:17):
We've been connected that way before. Who when we had
different PR firms working for with us. At times they've
gotten in touch and say it said so and so
at SpaceX wants to know if you want to come
on and talk about this or when we did that
stuff on ABC about when the housing crisis hit.
Speaker 2 (35:37):
Yeah, because we're financial experts.
Speaker 1 (35:40):
Yeah, so stuff like that. Yeah, I guess it used
to come across our desk every now and then.
Speaker 2 (35:43):
Well, there's subscription services that connect people through leads. From
what I'm seeing is Twitter is now filling that void
a lot where you can just search Twitter for the
hashtag h A ro O, help a reporter out, Yeah,
the reporters. And then also I guess there's a lot
of PR taste makers out there sure that are just
(36:06):
super connected and will basically tweet a lead And you
don't have to pay a thousand dollars a month for
that subscription service. You just follow certain people on Twitter,
and as a PR person, you might have somebody that's
a client that you connect.
Speaker 1 (36:20):
Yeah, that whole new job of being an aggregator, a
curator like that. Yeah, like people do that and that's
all they do.
Speaker 2 (36:27):
But we also live in an age where people are
famous for being famous.
Speaker 1 (36:33):
Man, I need to take back a little bit my
tirade about liars. I think that what I'm talking about
are people publicists for like big celebrities and stuff like that. Like,
we've had publicists work with us, and about eighty percent
of the clients that they work with are like people
like us, where you don't have to like lie and spend.
Speaker 2 (36:55):
Yeah, we're always on our best behavior.
Speaker 1 (36:56):
Yeah, it's just you know, regular stuff like let me
find a good opportunity for you and connect you. And
so it's I was overstating, and I think that's just
the far edge of the celebrity end of things. Gotcha,
because I just got to thinking about what if they're listening.
I don't want them to think I didn't think they
were doing a good job. He did a great job.
Speaker 2 (37:15):
We'll wait to back off of that one, Chuck.
Speaker 1 (37:17):
I got one more little thing on Jim Moran.
Speaker 2 (37:20):
Moran Jesus said moron m o n I think Moran, Well,
not the way the friends say Moron.
Speaker 1 (37:30):
He is was known as the master of the publicity
stunt back in the day, like he did things. What
his big thing was to take a saying and try
and disprove it, like for a company. So he literally
went to Alaska on behalf of ge to sell a
refrigerator to well, it says an Eskimo, but I guess
an Inuit just what you would say today. He walked
(37:53):
a bowl through a china shop in New York City.
How that go is a stunt? I think they broke
some things. He got on a horse for a politician
and changed directions mid stream on the horse, like rode
it through a river and changed directions. Yeah, like you
can do this. And then in nineteen fifty nine, for
the premiere of The Mouse that Roared, the Great Peter
(38:15):
Sellers movie, he opened an embassy. Remember the movie was
about a small country that declared war in a big country.
Speaker 2 (38:23):
Because they wanted to declare war on the US and
then surrender and then get financial aid from around the
world because their economy.
Speaker 1 (38:30):
But they ended up winning or something. Wasn't that it?
He opened an embassy in Washington for a mythical country.
Speaker 2 (38:35):
Yeah. Nice, speaking of By the way, I finally saw
doctor Strangelove. Oh, really great movie.
Speaker 1 (38:42):
One of the best. It's up there for sure, one
of the best satires.
Speaker 2 (38:47):
Let's say it is a great movie.
Speaker 1 (38:48):
Great movie. And Peter Seller's man.
Speaker 2 (38:51):
Just he did great. But also I mean, like George C.
Scott was amazing.
Speaker 1 (38:56):
He was amazing. And the guy I can't remember his
name that played the colonel or whatever.
Speaker 2 (39:00):
The one who lost his marbles.
Speaker 1 (39:01):
Yeah, yeah, he was. He was so good.
Speaker 2 (39:03):
Everybody was, uh, slim Slim Chills or Slim Pickens, Slim
Pickens Chills. Yeah, there's chili. Chill Wills was another, Like
what country Western actor Chill Wills? I think is his name,
Chill Wills. You'd recognize him if you saw his face, Okay,
Chill Wills, All right, of course. Chill Wills makes an
(39:27):
appearance in the How Publicist episode.
Speaker 1 (39:30):
You got anything else? No, I got nothing else.
Speaker 2 (39:32):
Thank goodness. If you want to know more about publicists,
you can type this word in the search bar at
HowStuffWorks dot com. And I said search parts was time
for listening to mail.
Speaker 1 (39:43):
I did have one more thing, Well, what was it
that movie America's Sweethearts? Did you ever see that? With
John Cusack?
Speaker 2 (39:49):
And I know what you're talking about.
Speaker 1 (39:50):
Billy Crystal has played a publicist, a pain in the
butt Hollywood couple.
Speaker 2 (39:55):
Oh best, best portrayal of a publicist on Seinfeld? The
mom from that seventies show, Remember she played Seinfeld's publicist.
Speaker 1 (40:05):
Oh she was.
Speaker 2 (40:06):
Yeah, she tried to get the airline pilot kicked out
of Jerry's show and he ended up getting right. Right.
I think it's the one where Kramer's at JFK or LaGuardia.
He's making bets on arrivals and he ends up using
the son of Sam Mailbag as collateral.
Speaker 1 (40:22):
Right.
Speaker 2 (40:23):
Great episode. But the mom from that seventies show played
Jerry's publicist.
Speaker 1 (40:27):
Kitty Yeah, who was also in Friends?
Speaker 2 (40:31):
What was she friend?
Speaker 1 (40:32):
She played Phoebe's half brother. Giovanni Ribisi played his girlfriend
or wife. Oh yeah, which is a weird, fucking mismatched couple.
That's odd, and I think they were. They got her
to be a surrogate for them, Okay, when Lisa Kudro
got pregnant in real life. I think that's how they
handled it.
Speaker 2 (40:50):
We have watched a lot of teams.
Speaker 1 (40:54):
All right, I'm gonna call this one. We were actually right,
and this lady was nice at a gender party. How's
that for a subject life? Okay, hey, guys, have a
little story. I was at a small dinner party where
the host was making his own sea salt. The topic
about It's one of those dinner parties. The topic of
(41:15):
kosher salt came up, so I dropped a fact from
Your Salt episode that kocher salt is actually just salt
used for drawing blood out of meat to make it kosher,
not salt blasts by a rabbi, and the fellow guest disagreed,
to which I responded, I'm quite sure about this. The
host then said raise your hand if you're Jewish, and
the guy that disputed me raised his hand felt rather
embarrassed while he explained to me what kosher means and
(41:37):
that salt also goes through the same kosher process that
would ever explain how I backed down and didn't try
to defend the fact that I just told. It's not
that I doubted you, guys, though I jokingly said I'd
write an email to complain, but it's because a peel
is disrespectful to correct someone on their own heritage. Good move. Yeah,
I also didn't want to start any petty debate with
(41:58):
someone at someone else's dinner party also a good move,
So I decided to take in the embarrassment while he
was explaining what koscher is at the same time eating
a spite of pasta with turizo. I hope you find
this amusing. Please keep up the good work. If you
read on the show, please give a shout out to
my friend Amber who introduced me to the show. And
that is from Chloe to say, so.
Speaker 2 (42:19):
Wait a minute, Chuck, were we right and the guy
was wrong?
Speaker 1 (42:22):
We were right? The Jewish guy was wrong because I
looked it up today just to be sure. Yeah, and
apparently kosher salt is kosher because in fact, they said
it should be called koshering salt.
Speaker 2 (42:33):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (42:33):
Yeah, because it's used to make things kosher. It is
not the salt itself that's kosher.
Speaker 2 (42:37):
It would have kept Chloe out of that kind of situation. Chloe,
it sounds like you have a lot of tact and dignity. Yes,
and exratulations on that. It sounds like, yeah, the guy's
a bit of a blow hard. I'm not ruining the
dinner party.
Speaker 1 (42:49):
So that is from Chloe in Sydney, Australia.
Speaker 2 (42:54):
Thank you if you want to get in touch with us.
We want to hear about all of your misadventures out
there based on Stuff you Should Know. You can send
us an email to Stuff Podcast at HowStuffWorks dot com and,
as always, joined us at our home on the web,
Stuff Youshould Know dot com.
Speaker 1 (43:11):
Stuff you Should Know is a production of iHeartRadio. For
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