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Article October 30, 2003. |
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Backstage West
Manager Faces Row Over Reproductions
By Laura Weinert |
Over the past three weeks seven actors have contacted Back Stage West with complaints involving manager/producer Reycie Santayana of MBS Enterprises. The actors claim they gave checks of $75 to $200 to their new manager because, they said, she promised to get them a deal on headshot reproductions. Most of the actors said they handed over their money in August—one as far back as June—and said they have yet to receive their reproductions. Several claimed they are unable to even get Santayana to call them back. One unsatisfied actor will be taking Santayana to court for a hearing on Nov. 5.
The actors said they found out about Santayana through her postings on two popular web bulletin boards, www.CraigsList.org and www.easycasting.com.
"They put an ad on easycasting.com," said one actor, who prefers to go by the initials C.L. "They were looking for actors to become a stable of their production company to do commercials and films. So I had e-mailed her my link to my website." C.L. said Santayana called her a few weeks later. "She said, 'Can you meet today?' and it was, like, a Saturday morning, really early, like, 9 a.m."
C.L. recalled how the meeting went. "First off, it was in a really beat-up apartment complex, in a trashy kind of neighborhood.… There were people moving in at the time at the complex, so I just walked in and found her apartment. And I knocked on the door and they were, like, 'How did you get in? We're supposed to buzz you into the complex.' That was a red flag later on. They were not happy that I had gotten in."
C.L. said Santayana asked her at the meeting to get one of her photos blown up to an 8x10 so she could make copies of it. She obliged and returned with the photo. That's when Santayana asked for the check, she said.
"[Santayana] said, 'I get these huge discounts, so if you want to cut me check for $150—$75 for 100 of each photo—I'll get you a discount. Just give me the originals and you'll get the duplications.' I did that and didn't hear from her for two weeks." C.L. said she waited and waited.
"Four weeks go by, and I figure I better call and find out what's going on," she said. "I decided to call her and didn't get a hold of her. I left a message. Never heard back. I went down to her apartment complex, called her apartment number, and it had a computerized voice saying, 'We're not available.'" C.L. has yet to receive her reproductions, she said.
A similar situation happened with actor Paul Pruett, who found out about Santayana through Craigslist and met with Santayana in June. "She didn't ask for any money up front," explained Pruett. "About a week, week and a half later… she asked if I could get my zed cards done as a headshot. She said, 'I'll tell you what, I'm doing a batch of headshots for a whole bunch of actors… write me a check for $75.'"
Said Pruett, "A couple of weeks go by, I hadn't heard from her, hadn't heard about the headshots…. I couldn't get a hold of her, left her a message. Nothing. A little while longer went by. I wrote her an e-mail. She wrote me back. 'I'm on vacation. When I get back, we'll get your headshots and we'll get going.' I'm like, 'That's a little odd because it's the beginning of pilot season.' Another week or so goes by. More phone calls. Nothing."
Five other sources described a similar situation.
Actor Bernard Ragin recalled, "I gave her $75 for one look, I guess it was like 200 pictures. I never heard from her. A couple of weeks went by. She said the printer broke down and it would be a couple of days." He's still waiting for those reproductions, he said.
Another source who preferred to remain anonymous described the same thing. "I gave her $75," said the source. "I didn't get anything. I've called several times. I finally talked to her, and she was, like, 'Oh, the printer broke down.' I gave it to her August 5, and right now it's October 8."
Another anonymous source said she and her sister gave Santayana a total of $400 and have yet to receive headshots. "I sued her and I've just recently served her. I have a court date on Nov. 5. I am basically new to the business. I feel like such a stupid idiot, honestly."
BSW contacted Santayana to ask for her side of the story. Santayana said she preferred to offer her response in the form of a letter. "I am very sure their headshots had been sent to them by UPS by now," wrote Santayana in response to the claims against her. "If they have not received them they should let me know so I can put a tracer on them."
In her letter, Santayana also denied the allegations of the actor who is taking her to court. Santayana claims that she returned 50 headshots and a refund to her client on Sept. 11.
In a separate phone conversation, Santayana did, however, say she had been experiencing some delivery problems with her reproduction company, Custom Print. "Unfortunately I got a reproduction center that promised too much," said Santayana. "They said they would have the headshots ready in five days. It has been taking three to five weeks.…The owner is a good friend of mine. I just don't know why it takes him so long to reproduce it. I told him I am getting into trouble because of that, and he is trying his best to change the delivery time."
BSW contacted Custom Print manager Felipe Gonzalez. He estimated that Santayana had brought him approximately 100 orders for headshot reproductions in the past few months. On a side note, he also said that he charges $55 for 150 reproductions—not the $75 that actors say Santayana is charging them.
"When they bring you 100 orders, it takes a month or a month and a half to get all the orders done," explained Gonzalez. "I've delivered almost 85 percent of the orders already," he said.
When asked why headshots were not getting completed, Gonzalez said, "We deliver the pictures when we get paid…. If you don't get paid, you don't deliver the pictures."
Had Santayana paid him for all of her orders? "Not really," said Gonzalez.
Santayana explained this by saying she has a "business agreement" with the company that allows her to pay only half when photos are ordered, half when they are picked up. She said plans to offer up further explanations of the reproduction issues at the upcoming hearing. "If I don't make it on the 5th I will postpone it and submit my papers before the hearing so they will know the justifications and the evidence I have against their claims," said Santayana.
This Article is Courtesy of Backstage West.
www.backstage.com |
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