Underestimated

It’s very interesting living my life right now. You see, everybody thinks I’m younger than I am and everybody assumes I’m stupider than I am (they assume that it’s all on the outside and nothing on the inside). When I go to meetings with the producer, for example, they always assume that she’s the one calling the shot. She does, after all, look more experienced and more mature. It’s fun to watch their body language. Initially they focus almost all their attention on her and near-ignore me.

That changes quickly when I take charge. They suddenly are forced to re-evaluate their earlier opinion of me and by that time I’ve got them wrong footed. That, I might add, is a great deal of fun (and a huge advantage when I’m trying to push through my opinion).

An examples: Last night we walked into this producer’s home. I think he was trying to get my producer into bed and was just using the film as a pretext to get her to his home, so he probably wasn’t too happy when I showed up. His tone and body language were arrogant and he gave me the worst chair of the three chairs that were available. I’m sure he thought it was a very subtle power play, but it was far from subtle enough. He was sitting back, like a king on a throne and pretty much focused all his attention on the producer.

Then we both started talking. We weren’t there to sleep with him (either of us) and we were there for business. He realised this pretty quickly and also realised that we were the real deal. We weren’t a couple of students play at making a short, we were serious and we knew what we were talking about. His body language changed completely and suddenly he went from somebody that was acting like he had to be impressed to somebody that was actually trying to impress us. The audition text I’ve worked up helped (so far most people have been very impressed. I’ll put it up in a while.)

Another example: I was outside the production house, waiting for the people to show up (yes, we have a production house). This guy that I’d spoken to on the phone walked out of the lift. He looked at me and I could just see the thoughts crossing his face. ‘Is this the guy? No, he can’t be, he’s too young, he wouldn’t write something like that!’ (most people here think I’m around 23). Then he walked on. When he found the front door locked he turned around and I asked him if he was the guy I was waiting for.

He hid his shock well, but he could have hid it better. I guess he wasn’t expecting to be working under a guy in his twenties, seeing as he’s a big bad CEO. Still, it didn’t take long to impress upon him that I was fully up to the task of managing my role in the project. We got along great.

It’s no problem being underestimated (well, largely no problem) just as long as afterwards you can make sure that people realise that they have the wrong idea of you. That can be hard work sometimes, but ultimately I’m sure that the pros outweigh the cons.