Sue Mengers emerged as a powerful Hollywood agent in the late 1960s and 1970s, a time of enormous challenges and transformation in the film industry, as independent-minded stars and directors took greater control over their projects, a tactic enhanced by the innovative work of agents like Mengers.
Sue Mengers (born September 2, 1932, in Hamburg, Germany; died October 15, 2011, in Los Angeles, California) became famous and successful in a profession that generally remains behind the scenes while aiding the success of others: the Hollywood talent agent. Yet her career’s narrative arc spans the classic chapters of rising from horrible trauma to notoriety; from one of the most profound tragedies of the twentieth century—the Holocaust—to one of the most decadent areas and periods, the 1960s and 1970s scene of Hollywood. In a field that demands negotiating skills both in terms of diplomacy and die-hard demands, Mengers’ savvy and acumen served her well, as did her startling sense of humor. The child of Holocaust survivors who immigrated to the United States at the outbreak of World War II, Mengers worked her way up the secretarial ranks in New York talent agencies before moving to Hollywood and establishing herself as one of the leading and legendary talent agents in the modern film industry. Mengers succeeded to such a strong degree as a talent agent that she became a minor celebrity herself—so much so that in 2013 an entire Broadway show was dedicated to “Hollywood’s most outrageous superagent, ” with Bette Midler starring as Mengers in the one-woman show “I’ll Eat You Last.”[1] In an otherwise male-dominated profession, Mengers became the first woman to achieve the kind of status only a few other agents could claim—icons such as Lew Wasserman, Myron Selznick, Mike Ovitz, and, more recently, Ari Emmanuel. “She gave meaning to the word ‘woman power’, ” Hollywood talent manager Joan Hyler remarked upon Mengers’ death. “And the fact that she was a woman and fearless was quite extraordinary.”[2] Producer Karen Rosenfelt, of “Twilight, ” credits Mengers with breaking the glass ceiling for many women in the industry.[3] Mengers herself, looking back years later, acknowledged her trailblazing role in the field but regrets having emulated what she considered typically male behavior: a rough, aggressive negotiating style. “I rolled in there like a tank. . . but in any revolution you have to do something to get their attention. Women don’t have to act like that these days.”[4]
Mengers emerged as a powerful agent in the late 1960s and 1970s, a time of enormous challenges and transformation in the Hollywood industry, as independent-minded stars and directors took greater control over their projects, a tactic enhanced by the innovative work of agents like Mengers. She acutely recognized these changes in the business practices of Hollywood and capitalized on them through the increased role negotiations played in setting up productions. In this regard, Mengers managed the careers of Barbra Streisand, Gene Hackman, Diana Ross, Ali MacGraw, Faye Dunaway, Cybill Shepherd, Sidney Lumet, Jonathan Demme, Ryan and Tatum O’Neal, Farrah Fawcett, and major new directors like Peter Bogdanovich and William Friedkin, and many others. She retired in the 1980s but continued to play a strong role in the social networks of the industry, hosting infamous dinner parties carefully engineered to stimulating effect by her lapidary guest lists. In the end, for all of the success and power she gained in her career, she regretted the lack of a productive legacy. Since agents don’t produce anything tangible—no screenplays or movie productions, only “deals”—she lamented the sacrifices she made to sustain her career, particularly the lack of a family.
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Mengers rarely provided much information on her early life. It’s not clear why the otherwise garrulous Mengers remained so reticent about her family’s immigrant history or her childhood in general. Hollywood, at least the Hollywood of an earlier era, spilled over with immigrants who often told tall tales about their experiences, accentuating their rise to fame and fortune. Perhaps having created this charismatic character out of herself in Hollywood, Mengers preferred to leave the past behind. What little she did tell came out in a rather cryptic synopsis of a series of escapes, first from Nazi Germany and then from the strictures of a young woman’s life in the Bronx. Her parents George and Ruth Mangars immigrated to the United States from Germany with their only child in 1938, escaping the Nazis and the Holocaust.[5] They spoke no English upon their arrival, and apparently many years later Sue would still lapse into German on occasion.[6] When Mengers was fourteen years old, her father, struggling as an unsuccessful traveling salesman, committed suicide while the family was living in the small town of Utica, New York. Her mother, then a bookkeeper, moved with her daughter to the Bronx.[7] After high school, Mengers surveyed the bleak horizons of her small neighborhood and discovered that “the prospects for a girl in the Bronx were not splendid—marriage, or, with luck, a secretarial job.”[8] Mengers picked the latter route and headed to Manhattan.
Mengers began her career in 1955 working as a secretary at the legendary talent agency Music Corporation in America (MCA). Talent agents had emerged in Hollywood in the 1920s alongside the rise of the major studios. Agents capitalized on the constant influx of talent—primarily actors, writers, and directors—to Hollywood, acting as gatekeepers for the studios (filtering out the most promising clients from the general fray) and negotiators for clients, in exchange for 10 percent of the negotiated salary. By the early 1930s, agents were a fixture in the business, maintaining steady relationships with studio executives in consultation over the availability of clients for productions. With rare exceptions, every actor, writer, and director (and some cinematographers and producers) had agents in the 1930s and 1940s.[9] In the 1950s MCA was the leading firm representing talent, with offices in New York and Hollywood, as well as Chicago, London, Paris, and other major cities. MCA covered film, television, music, and theater. It owned a television production company, Revue, which brought in more revenue on its own than the entire talent agency. But in 1962, after MCA purchased Universal Studios, the Department of Justice forced the company to close its talent agency, as a conflict of interest.[10] The move opened up the playing field for talent agencies in the 1960s. Mengers made her transition to one by joining the office of the smaller but successful Baum-Newborn agency. She earned $135 a week (roughly $973 in 2010 USD) as a secretary.[11]
In 1963, she became a full-fledged agent by setting up shop with Tom Korman, formerly an agent at Baum-Newborn, and two clients, Joan Bennett and Claudia McNeill.[12] Two years later, Mengers joined the theater department of Creative Management Association (CMA) in New York, then headed by two former MCA agents, Freddie Fields and David Begelman. She remained at CMA for almost nine years. Fields and Begelman allowed her to move to Hollywood to pursue deals for film projects. With the backing of this major firm, Mengers established herself as a forceful talent agent.
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She quickly became a bit of a minor celebrity in 1970s Hollywood with articles and pictures of her occurring regularly in the local papers, in
(a first for a talent agent).[13] Short and fairly plump, with wavy blond hair and big, round glasses, Mengers possessed an expansive, boisterous personality that matched her atypical appearance for a talent agent. “Ms. Mengers, ” as one journalist put it, “possesses the beguiling face of a sweet, innocent child and, upon occasion, the mouth of a truckdriver.”[14]
Mengers had a great talent list and the backing of a major talent agency. Those made her stand out. But she also had charisma that made her stand out as well. She was known for a vicious sense of humor. One wisecrack gets repeated over and over in profiles. After the Sharon Tate murders by the Manson gang in 1969, Mengers allegedly reassured a nervous client with the macabre pledge, “Don’t worry, honey. Stars aren’t being murdered. Only featured players.”
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Mengers’ career soared shortly after her two bosses—Freddie Fields and David Begelman—left the agency business to pursue careers in film production. Rumors had been circulating for at least a year that the two top agents had been considering a move into a studio executive position or heading their own production companies. In 1975, Begelman was hired to run Columbia Pictures, which had been on the cusp of bankruptcy after losing $50 million in 1973.[15] Fields began his way out by accepting an offer from Marvin Josephson Associates and his International Famous Agency to buy out Fields’ Creative Management Associates. Josephson paid $6.10 a share for CMA, valued then at only $3.25.[16] The deal and merger between the two companies in 1975 created a firm—renamed International Creative Management (ICM)—that now rivaled the William Morris Agency, the oldest and largest in the business. The new firm would now have 125 agents compared to Morris’s 139. Finally, in June, Fields announced his departure from CMA and the establishment of his own production
Mengers’ career soared shortly after her two bosses—Freddie Fields and David Begelman—left the agency business to pursue careers in film production. Rumors had been circulating for at least a year that the two top agents had been considering a move into a studio executive position or heading their own production companies. In 1975, Begelman was hired to run Columbia Pictures, which had been on the cusp of bankruptcy after losing $50 million in 1973.[15] Fields began his way out by accepting an offer from Marvin Josephson Associates and his International Famous Agency to buy out Fields’ Creative Management Associates. Josephson paid $6.10 a share for CMA, valued then at only $3.25.[16] The deal and merger between the two companies in 1975 created a firm—renamed International Creative Management (ICM)—that now rivaled the William Morris Agency, the oldest and largest in the business. The new firm would now have 125 agents compared to Morris’s 139. Finally, in June, Fields announced his departure from CMA and the establishment of his own production
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