Essay Sample - "How to Make It in Hollywood"

The book "How to Make it in Hollywood" by Linda Buzzell is a product of its time; it is one of the greatest novels that was first written in 1996, but the second edition was written in 2013 and published by Harper Collins. The book contains 22 chapters with an appendix at the end. The author of the book Linda Buzzell is a renowned psychotherapist and a career counselor; she is also an expert and knows how to create and develop a career in Hollywood. In her book "How to Make it in Hollywood," Lynda shows how individuals can look at their personality, weaknesses, strengths, skills, and talents in order to target their personal goals and maximize their career success. Linda, as a career counselor, explains all the jobs in Hollywood, how to find them, and how to advance through each stage of the individual's career. Linda Buzzell has served as a production company vice president at Columbia and Lorimar. She also served as a development official for Jacques Cousteau and as an associate producer of documentaries for ABC and PBS. She has helped thousands of people in the entertainment industry with both personal and professional issues as an administrator and director of the entertainment industry career institute. This novel can also evidence this career counseling; currently, she teaches at the American Film Institute and lives in California.

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The novel "How to Make it in Hollywood" includes elements and issues that an individual or the reader needs to know about various professions. Through reading this book, an individual get to know more about managers and management, Agents, lawyers, Godfather calls, and networking in different careers, including business careers (Buzzell, 2013). The reader can also know more about the casting couch, schmoozing, rhino skin, Rolodexes, handling rejection, and constant unemployment. It can thus help the readers to keep on track their dreams when faced by challenges of their careers in real life; thus, the book encourages the reader to give it all up and move back to Cincinnati (Buzzell, 2013). When an individual reads the book and embraces principles or the ideas, one can thus overcome challenges in their daily careers. This paper, therefore, is a detailed report of the novel "How to Make it in Hollywood." It summarizes the novel, provides a brief overview of the information about the author, and highlights the benefits of the book to the readers.

Linda Buzzell is a hyphenate and a studio executive- psychotherapist to be precise, her background in psychology makes this novel a worthwhile read for people considering a career not only in the entertainment industry but also in various careers in the community. For instance, the chapter "Focus: Know Who You Are" tells and help the readers to create personal inventories of their tastes, talents, and skills through a series of psychological questionnaires (Buzzell, 2013). It, therefore, encourages the readers to identify and work towards achieving their goals. In this book, Buzzell is seen to be counseling people on developing their talents and careers, thus can help in creating jobs, thus control of unemployment (Buzzell, 2013).

In the chapter "The right reasons and the wrong reasons for going into show business," Buzzell explains that it is not nearly as necessary to make it in Hollywood as it is to have a pleasant and fulfilling life (Buzzell, 2013). In the book, the author says, "Could you be happy in any other line of work? If so, do it! Please! (Buzzell, 2013)" The author also discusses various forms of discrimination, racism, ageism, and sexism with sensitivity and intelligence. Buzzell, says, "It isn't easy for anyone to get a job in Hollywood, but when the industry gets a cold, members of the non-dominant groups get pneumonia, there's a double standard (Buzzell, 2013)." She alerts against denial and thus advises the individuals from protected groups to observe discrimination and racism realistically. In the book, the author says, "The people I know who deal most effectively with discrimination follow a simple plan: they admit it exists (Buzzell, 2013). They don't pretend it doesn't (Buzzell, 2013). They get appropriately angry about it, but don't blame every problem in their lives on it (Buzzell, 2013)." Discrimination and racism have been a major challenge in our communities; therefore, Buzzell is one of the women that seem to help in the fight against discrimination against women, older people, and people from different races (Buzzell, 2013).

Buzzell's psychological approach follows through in her advice on marketing yourself, networking, selling, and schmoozing (Buzzell, 2013). The novel thus conveys a message and advises to the readers that rather than offering snake oil and deals that promise to magically transform them into the next Michael Eisner or Tom Cruise, they should hard work towards achieving their goals. Therefore the author encourages determination and self-discipline among her readers. She also offers counseling to her readers in the novel; she says, "You can breakthrough if you make the right moves. Nobody said it would be easy (Buzzell, 2013). Don't turn the anger inward, where it can fester. Channel this energy into constructive action, on both an individual and collective level (Buzzell, 2013)." The author of the novel "How to Make it in Hollywood," gives her readers a good liveliness talk, she suggests that individuals should start thinking and acting as an employee of their corporation (Buzzell, 2013): "Your gifts are the major asset of this corporation. It's your job to get out there in the world and give those gifts, sharing them with other people who would benefit from them, this is a job from which you can never be fired (Buzzell, 2013)."

The book "How to Make it in Hollywood" is suitable for individuals at the beginning of their entertainment careers. Some of the chapters are a primer on show business and its culture; it equips the readers with appropriate knowledge and skills that can help one start and run successful businesses. If one watch "Entertainment Tonight" or work in the business or even knows someone who subscribes to people, they may find this a bit simple. Linda Buzzell, therefore present the idea with some irony or humor, it might have been more digestible. "How to Make it in Hollywood" therefore gives the readers primary education on how to develop a successful career. The book includes a show business glossary with a section on Yiddish and another section on writer-speak.

Linda Buzzell, the author of the novel "How to Make it in Hollywood," gives an excellent account of how to make it in Hollywood. Any person reading this book can learn a lot if they choose to follow their dreams into moviemaking and acting. "How to Make it in Hollywood" is; therefore, a great book for anyone not only in the entertainment industry such as the film industry, but the novel is also important and beneficial to every reader who has a goal of developing a successful career (Buzzell, 2013). The book covers in-depth topics such as how to network, how to handle rejection, how to focus and how many attempts one can expect to make before securing a position in the industry. In addition, it offers advice on entertainment resume writing. Currently, hundreds of people visit Los Angeles with a hope working in film or television, obsessed with their ambition of creating dreams. The novel "How to Make It in Hollywood" provides them with a map to success by throwing a little light on their path.

This book is required reading for an exploratory class, for instance, a student taking entertainment technology careers. It proves to teach them a lot more than just that; it gives individual insightful and helpful tips as well as the exercises within the chapters that assist one in finding out what it is that they really want to do and where to get their motivation. I think it is an invaluable book for not only people seeking work in the entrainment field but for people who aren't really sure which way to go about it or which end they had like to begin.

Conclusion

The novel "How to Make it in Hollywood" is actually like having an individual career therapist at hand 24 hours a day; this might be not about headshots or mailrooms or union dues but about the self-marketing skills required to get and maintain working in a highly competitive, volatile field and maintain reasonable skills. Buzzell homes in on the important business abilities necessary, such as positioning yourself, developing a position and business image, tested network skills for the creative sphere, and even more insightful career planning for all areas of the entertainment business, above and below the line. She also helps individuals place the objectives, triumphs, and falls in perspective; an acceptable, attainable way to keep working; and open cautionary tales and motivational skills.

There are plenty of books about the entertainment industry; however, little can be found on how to go from writing to pitching in their professional space. "How to Make it in Hollywood" is therefore an insider's guide to successful career development and thus unlocks pragmatic guidance for constructing an entertainment industry career and other careers delivered by a sought-after industry authority who works with writers, both novice and professional.

Since everything, an individual read fills give them new bits of information, and they never know when it might come in handy. The more knowledge one has, the better equipped they are to tackle any challenge they will ever face. Apart from knowledge, the book "How to Make it in Hollywood" improves the reader's focus, memory, and vocabulary expansion. It also provides individuals with more persuasive analytical thinking skills and also improves their writing skills.

Reference

Buzzell, L. (2013). How to Make it in Hollywood. Harper Collins.

https://www.amazon.com/How-Make-Hollywood-Linda-Buzzell-ebook/dp/B00C0UHK9M