Five Questions with Ken Lee

Twenty-four years of friendship and professional collaboration means this interview is one for the books! Michael Melamedoff sits down with Ken Lee, manager and Head of the New York office of Brillstein Entertainment Partners. They dive back into the lessons they learned in the mailroom and how those same lessons apply today when pitching in the room, plus how Lee feels he was born to be a manager.

This interview has been condensed for length and clarity.

MICHAEL MELAMEDOFF: All right. Well, I'm excited today to be talking to one of my greatest colleagues and friends, Ken Lee, who is a manager at Brillstein Entertainment Partners as well as the head of their New York office. Little backstory here – Ken and I actually met 24 years ago. We started a week apart from each other at the same mailroom of a New York talent agency, and what blossomed from that was not just an incredible working relationship that's carried on for two plus decades now, but also a tremendous friendship. So Ken, I'm so thrilled that you're here, and thanks for making the time. 

KEN LEE: Thank you for having me, Mike.

MELAMEDOFF: It's my pleasure. So I'm going to take it back to the beginning here. We both started in the same mailroom, and there's certainly things that I learned in that first job that have carried with me throughout my career. I'm just curious, are there any maxims? Is there anything that you look back on in terms of working your way up through a mailroom, through an agent's assistant desk, all the way up into being an agent and then a manager – and now running your own office – that you still carry with you? Any of those day one, day two lessons that you think are vitally important for anybody working their way up the ladder of our industry?

LEE: I'm going to sound like an old man, but attention to detail is the thing that I carry most. And back in that day, you and I had to memorize everyone's phone number, we had to memorize so much information, because we couldn't just tap an entry into our phones.

MELAMEDOFF: I remember our first boss used to make me write letters to talent, and I would have to bring a printed copy of the letter to his desk, and then I would sit at my desk and wait for him to come back five minutes later with everything redlined under it that he wanted changed. It was this incredible focus on the information and the presentation of information that he thought was vital to maintaining the trust of our clients. And I've never forgotten that – about how important it is to present properly and have your details lined up. 

LEE: And that same boss would stand near our desks and want a phone call made, and we did not have even five seconds to look it up. So that forced us to memorize all those phone numbers…

MELAMEDOFF: Yeah, yeah – I do think about how that attention to detail has carried through everything that I do now, and the importance of, if you want people to take you seriously, you better be deeply serious and thoughtful in your approach at every moment.

LEE: My memory was so good back in the day.

MELAMEDOFF: Well, we are getting older, too. I mean, it might not just be slipping up because of smartphones.

LEE: But I still retain everything. And it's from that internship and that assistant position. 

MELAMEDOFF: Sometimes I'll call you up just to pick your brain or to ask you a question about something, and your recall stuns me. 

Okay I'm curious, because as you've grown your career, you've come to work with an incredible array of talent. Some of the actors you work with now include Rachel Brosnahan, Nicholas Braun, and Chase Infiniti – who maybe some people reading this don't know yet, but they will know soon because she is starring opposite Leo DiCaprio in Paul Thomas Anderson's new movie. In recent years you've also expanded to representing writers and directors. What drove that decision?

LEE: Mostly time. At a certain point when I moved into this management role, I got curious about who's actually writing this and who's directing it. And I became interested in a handful of people. I wouldn't say that I'm in the lit world one hundred percent, but there are certain filmmakers who I love working with.

MELAMEDOFF: Is there something – whether it's an actor, a filmmaker, a writer – that you're looking for? Is there something that sparks your interest? Is there anything that connects the kind of talent that you seek out and whose careers you want to drive?

LEE: Even actors at a young age, you can tell they have a point of view about themselves and their careers and where they want to go. And that's pretty much what drives me.

MELAMEDOFF: There’s a lot of stereotypes about agents and managers in our business. But the agents and managers that I love working with are individuals who are deeply and truly invested in the ambitions of others. And it's a quality that I know you hold in droves, and as a result, you really do fight for your clients. 

You and I aren't just friends, we've worked together as producer and manager; most notably you brought the series concept from Michael Torpey for PAID OFF to my desk. I remember you said, “I've shared this idea with my colleagues. I think it is deeply special, and some of my colleagues don't see it.  And I want to know what you think.” I believe you've always had this deep passion that supersedes maybe what other people are saying in the industry, what the noise is. How do you maintain that? And what do you say to people who are coming up against gatekeepers? Because I think a lot of times we think of agents and managers as gatekeepers themselves. But in terms of fighting for your clients, it's your job to get around other gatekeepers.

LEE: As cliche as it sounds, you have to trust yourself and your client to be passionate about the things that they want to make, and the things that they want to try to make. There's no one hundred percent success rate. Things don't sell, things can sell but ultimately not get greenlit and made. But you just gotta keep pushing on your client's behalf. And, you know, PAID OFF was an idea that I thought was timely, and I just knew you could carry it out. And you did – two seasons!

MELAMEDOFF: It was, and remains, one of my favorite things I've ever worked on. It’s a show from my past that if I could do anything to get it back on the air, because I think it remains as timely as ever, I would. I'll say too that if one thing breaks my heart, it's that so many of the early television shows that I made – like SHADE and PAID OFF – speak to issues that feel as critical right now as they did when we started making them five, six, even seven years ago. So that need to continue to persevere and push our messages is really, really deeply important now–

LEE: Also Rachel Brosnahan loves hearing the word “no.” That actually drives her, and it's incredible to watch her work.

MELAMEDOFF: You and I are working on a new project together right now that we have been pushing up a hill for two years. And I think we're about to make a really big breakthrough, despite the fact that a lot of people along the way said no to us.

LEE: Sometimes timing is key. And unfortunately in this business, some people don't stay at certain positions, at certain places, and new people may see these pieces and materials a little differently.

MELAMEDOFF: Yeah, it's true. The thing that you're speaking to – we're living through a moment right now of great disruption and change in our industry where we're seeing a lot of really painful layoffs and changes across networks that we work with. I do think that that's cultivating an atmosphere of fear in terms of what ideas people are willing to pitch, what ideas people are willing to buy, and what sort of support people might want to lend to the talent that they're working with. But is there something to draw from in this moment of tremendous change, in this economy of ideas existing in digital spaces where we see creators on Tiktok, Instagram and YouTube making what they like and making what they want and proving that there's an audience for it? Is there something that you think traditional networks can be learning from it all?

LEE: They should be learning from it, but I don't think they're as quick to adapt as other people are. I think social media creators – Tiktok and Instagram and YouTube creators – are incredible. They start from zero followers, and for good or bad, they can create a huge, huge platform for themselves. And that's all in the beginning without the help of quote unquote traditional media.

MELAMEDOFF: It's true. There's so many incredible talents that I'm seeing daily on my social feeds that I just want to bring them to a different audience. I want to harness what makes them so special, and I want to find more brave executives that want to go on that journey with me. And you know, for anybody who's reading this or watching this, let's do it! 

With that said, you have always been tremendous about shining a light on and elevating remarkable talent, but you're also generative. I also think of you as an artist and someone who creates and has strong ideas about what they want to be making and what they want to be seeing. And you really do put your money where your mouth is in that regard. I’m curious–

LEE: I don't consider myself a creator or an artist or producer. I work with clients and collaborators–

MELAMEDOFF:Yeah, you're also tremendously self-effacing–

LEE: No, no, I mean it. Here's what my talent is– Hmmm, no I'm done with that question.

[They both laugh]

‍MELAMEDOFF: One last question for you. We started as baby mail room assistants 24 years ago… Is there anything that you know now that you wish 21-year-old Ken Lee knew when starting out?

LEE: Ooh, really good question. Alright, I tell people that I was born to do this. I didn't know an agent or representation existed, and then once I got to our company, it made so much sense. So I am so fortunate and grateful every day that I basically stumbled upon this profession that I've been in for 24 years.

What would I tell young people? I think this goes back to your gatekeeper question. I don't find that there's as many barriers to entry as there used to be. I mean, there still are really tough places to get into and break into, but now I do think people can make their own way and push their own way into it. If you’re passionate about it, it's going to happen.

MELAMEDOFF: That's an exciting thing to lean into. So for anybody out there who's pushing forward, keep going.

LEE: Exactly. Keep going.

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