Hi Bonnie,
I wanted to send a small note to let you know how wonderful Under Contract was. It especially rang true with me because I had a landlady that I took to court because she didn’t give the rental deposit back. The court sided with me; I got triple damages because she had done it intentionally. She declared bankruptcy, and to this day I haven’t seen a dime. I would have been so much better off letting it go and putting my energies into something more productive.
It was good to see how you handled it, not handing over any work until you had something in writing. If I would have been smart, I wouldn’t have handed over any more rent once I realized something squirrely was going on (I did know that something squirrely was going on long enough to keep some of my money). At the time, I cared so much about keeping a good relationship that I gave up my negotiating power. Live and learn.
Best,
Lewis Ford
Thanks, Lewis. Always good to hear from you, and boy don’t you love those “live and learn” experiences in life?
Since so much of the time, what you’ll end up with — if you do pursue any action against someone who owes you money — is that wonderfully satisfying feeling of, “I am right, dammit!” I say just go ahead and embrace that feeling without having to go through the effort and time (and expense, possibly) to have the actual proof of that fact, when you still might not benefit financially in the end.
Remember one of my favorite quotes, from Deepak Chopra: “Energy is currency. How do you wish to spend it?” That absolutely applies here.
I totally understand about your wanting to “keep a good relationship” with your landlady. Boy, do I get that! But what I’ve learned about this business (and life, really) is that the way to “keep a good relationship” is to behave professionally. And that means providing work product when under contract. Stopping payments when you see something is “squirrely,” like you said.
Oh, and a fun punchline about the job I had won and lost, in that column a couple of weeks ago: The producers have already hired me again for another gig. Easy come, easy go… easy come again.
Bonnie Gillespie is living her dreams by helping others figure out how to live theirs. Wanna work with Bon? Start here. Thanks!
Originally published by Actors Access at http://more.showfax.com/columns/avoice/archives/001028.html. Please support the many wonderful resources provided by the Breakdown Services family. This posting is the author’s personal archive.