easy child 2/difficult child 2 had an agent for a few years. Well, she's had two, really. But her first agency was small and exclusive, connected to a well-known Aussie showbiz family. They never did anything inappropriate when it came to sexual abuse, but in their own way they were exploiting the kids in their agency by not paying them. The agency would get paid, but the money (which legally was supposed to flow on to the kids) never turned up. And if you began to get stroppy about it, the serious concern was, your kid wouldn't get any more work. The way this exclusive place was set up, too - with only about 50 clients in total, plus the promise tat we'd never be sent on cattle calls or open auditions, we rarely if ever got the chance to meet other clients of the same agency. So it was almost impossible to compare notes. Plus the agency kept saying, "We've taken care of this for you," or that, which meant that contact with various regulatory bodies as well as direct contact between the performer and the client, was nonexistent. all contact had to be via the agency. So parents of kids said nothing and hoped that the money would eventually show up; their kids enjoyed the chance to perform, and the money was secondary. But it was still exploitation.
We finally had to make a fuss, easy child 2/difficult child 2 was fed up and refusing to go to any more auditions; the agency began to say she was becoming a problem and if she continued to "act up" she wouldn't get any work. A direct threat - so we had nothing left to lose. Besides, they had made the mistake of sending her to a couple of open auditions which gave us the chance to meet other clients, who all had the same story - work, but no payment.
We eventually got the money, but easy child 2/difficult child 2 was 'blacklisted' by most agencies for a few years because she had to take her former agency to court for non-payment. I represented her for a while, getting her the work she most anted anyway - circus work, locally. Plus she did a few acting courses. Her next agent actually headhunted her, he was a person like me, a father who was fed up with his daughter being exploited. She had been with a different agency, so this sort of skulduggery is unfortunately not an isolated case.
The thing is - we felt pressured to put up with stuff we shouldn't have had to put up with. About the time we were making a fuss, there was a story hitting the media of a young boy who had starred in a well-known ad on TV and who hadn't been paid. The current affairs were all over the story, the kid clearly hoped the media attention would get him paid, AND get him a bit more exposure. But we've not seen him on our TVs since. So yes, the pressure to shut up and put up with the problems is intense.
So if you think about it - the sort of people that pageant moms rely on - the promoters, the various hangers-on along the way - it would be so easy for a pedophile to set themselves up in such a position, and get access to these kids. "If you make a fuss, I'll stop providing my services." "They all let me do this." "Don't you want to be a star?"
It is just too easy.
Of course there are checks on people in those positions, but pedophilia is like an iceberg - the ones you know about are just the tip of the iceberg, most pedophiles have never been caught and therefore are not on any register.
The law for us here where easy child 2/difficult child 2 was concerned, stated tat while she was under-age, I had to be with her at all times. But one job she did (a TV soapie) would not allow me on the premises. wouldn't allow any parent on the premises. PLus they didn't provide lunch for her (which should have been either automatic, it's in the rules, or we should have been given advance notice). Luckily for my girl, I had parked the car down the rod from the studio and found a local convenience store. She rang my mobile phone, I grabbed some food, headed up to meet her at the gates.
I could have insisted, but they could then have said, "Then we don't want her working for us today."
It's a dirty business, really. I wasn't too concerned for easy child 2/difficult child 2 that day, however, since I knew she would be in the company of other people including other girls her age (they were playing schoolgirls, extras in various scenes) plus she had by then a lot of self-protection built in. And had her phone with her. She was 15 at the time. But the law is the law, that was one time her (first) agency got angry on our behalf and had harsh words with the TV studio about their not following the rules. At least they earned their commission that day!
easy child 2/difficult child 2 was studying drama at school, so this was invaluable experience for her. But it was what SHE wanted to do. She also kept quiet about it at school as well, it was rather funny. There was one time when she was waiting for me to collect her, she had an audition to go to, and a rather nasty girl in her class, a bully, walked past and said to her, "What are you doing hanging around here? Waiting to be discovered? Forget it, you're a lousy actress, nobody would want you!" (there had been some jealousy about easy child 2/difficult child 2 getting an important role in the school play, and bully girl had missed out).
easy child 2/difficult child 2 said nothing, merely smiled. Because her permission note to leave school had simply said, "easy child 2/difficult child 2 has an appointment." The school did not approve of kids being out of class merely to attend an audition, or even for filming. Bully girl would have dobbed if she had known, but easy child 2/difficult child 2 didn't feel a need to tell anybody. SHE knew; that was all that mattered.
But I do worry about kids being exposed to possible exploitation. I did my best to avoid it, but we still got burned.
Marg
I don't get it. DDD
