max s. gerber(the latest shot)

abigail breslin (star of little miss sunshine), photographed at the four seasons hotel in beverly hills. we waited around for three hours, and were promised a full fifteen minutes with abigail. i looked at the time stamp on my camera’s metadata. the publicists shut us down after six minutes and thirty-six seconds. this was, of course, a full three minutes after they first started demanding we ‘wrap it up’.

as photographers we learn early on to pick our battles. there are some things you can change, there are some things you can have an effect on, and there are definitely some things you cannot. there are a great many obstacles in the way of a good result on any given shoot. part of the job of the photographer, of course, is to overcome those obstacles. high on the list of obstacles are two things: time and cooperation.

on a celebrity shoot time and cooperation are controlled by the publicity industrial complex. the subject’s handlers. the ‘Bad Cop’ to their ‘Good Cop’. the handlers are there to make sure that all the bad news is delivered through them so the celeb can still be a stand up guy and shrug and pretend that it’s out of their hands. time and cooperation are in the hands of the publicists, and publicists are responsible for ruining more stories than they actually help. this is because over the years the role of the publicist has changed dramatically. ever wonder why celebrity and music photography in the 60’s and 70’s is so good? one word: access. no retouching, very often no lights, even. but there was access. there was the general feeling that everyone – the magazine, the photographers, the record companies, the celebs, the studios and yes, even the publicists were all in it together for the same goal: to make something really special that people would want to see. photographers actually got to see a real part of a celeb’s life, and those lives were allowed to be documented, not like today when the predominant celebrity image is essentially a manufactured advertisement.

but oh, how times have changed. now the primary function of the publicist is to block from view specifically the kinds of things that might make a story interesting or special. it seems as though their primary function is not to facilitate a good result, but to remove any shred of inconvenience from their clients. unfortunately most things in life that are worth doing or watching or participating in are also somewhat inconvenient. and take time. and patience. and access. and cooperation. rare commodities at the moment.

are all publicists bad? no, of course not. i’ve met one or two that have actually been helpful. debby hambrick certainly deserves a mention. she helped tremendously with the shoot for the hold steady for the cover of the village voice. sharrin summers at hollywood records made my shoot with DJ z-trip way better than it could’ve been without her. my good friend brian used to be a music publicist here in los angeles, and we would get into good natured arguments. me saying that he was inherently evil because of it, and him defending the profession. why was i friends with a publicist? well, we were friends at age 13, before i was a photographer, and before i knew he would become soulless on purpose. a while later he became the editor of a short-lived magazine in LA and a few weeks after that called me to take it all back. it seems as an editor he ran into the same thing from other publicists that i had always told him about. it hurts to be so right, so much of the time.

i want to like publicists. i really do. i want them to be helpful. the ones that are helpful make life so much easier and absolutely do contribute to getting a better photo, or making a better story for the magazine. but it’s hard to overlook the teeming masses who just show up, order room service (though not for you), text message their friends, and refuse to validate parking all the while demanding that you WRAP IT UP three minutes in to the shoot. it’s hard to overlook all the missed opportunities with really interesting subjects where it could’ve been so much better had the publicity industrial complex simply not been involved.

in the case of abigail breslin, the publicity industrial complex almost killed the story entirely. this was shot for TIME magazine’s 10 questions column. that’s where readers submit their questions. aside from dramatically slicing down the time we had with her to take pictures, the publicist immediately cut out all the interesting questions from the poor reporter’s list. (my favorite: who would win in a fight between you and dakota fanning? i’d like to bet on abigail, but i fear that dakota might be ruthless and scrappy) what we were left with were softball questions along the lines of what’s your favorite flavor of ice cream?

in fact, the publicist-approved questions were so uninteresting that TIME almost axed the story entirely. is that the result the publicist wants? is it so important to avoid controversy that you would chance pissing off and alienating a national magazine? i mean, this is an eleven year old girl. does she need an entourage? her mother was with her, as she should be, but are the PR cops necessary?

it’s very disheartening. mostly it’s disheartening when i get an assignment to photograph someone i admire or am a fan of, only to have the experience soured by their publicists. like i said, everyone, i’m really trying to like all of you. make it a little easier on us. you might be surprised at how the results improve.