Talent agency is accused of a hostile culture
Women, people of color allege misconduct tolerated at ICM
In late 2017, ICM Partners Chief Executive Chris Silbermann announced an audacious pledge: achieve gender parity in leadership positions and on the board by 2020.
It was part of a larger industrywide effort called “50/50 by 2020,” championed by prominent ICM client Shonda Rhimes and others in the wake of Hollywood’s reckoning over sexual harassment.
“Companies work best when … there is a balance of men and women in positions of leadership and positions all across the company,” Silbermann said during a 2018 policy summit. “We can’t be a company of a bunch of guys who look like me.”
Last year, ICM, which represents such stars as Samuel L. Jackson, Spike Lee, Regina King, Michael Keaton and Wanda Sykes — declared victory, telling Variety that at least half the agents promoted to partner status since 2017 were female. In March, the agency said 15 of its 23 departments are run or co-run by women.
But more than 30 former and current ICM employees said in interviews that the company tolerated a hostile work environment, where women and people of color were subjected to harassment, bullying and other inappropriate conduct. Since 2017, nearly a dozen women
reported allegations of mistreatment by male agents and managers companywide to ICM Partners’ human resources department or senior leaders, according to interviews with the women and those with direct knowledge of the incidents.
“HR does not have any records of such allegations,” ICM said, although a source close to the company acknowledged that it did investigate some of the complaints and took appropriate actions.
“We were molded into thinking that being put down and yelled at was the way to become better, which is completely wrong,” said Jennifer Jendrzejczyk, a 25year-old former ICM assistant who quit the company in January 2020 after less than a year.
Two of the most serious incidents involved women who did not work for ICM. A film finance executive alleged that an agency partner had exposed himself to her inside a car, according to three people with knowledge of the matter who declined to be named. The agent denied that the incident happened. In a separate incident, an actress complained that her male agent made an unwanted advance in a hotel lobby, said two sources briefed on the matter. That agent did not respond to a request for comment.
ICM also faced pushback in 2019 over a video shoot that was intended to promote the company after Black support staffers said they were asked by human resources to pose as agenttrainees, a higher-ranking role that they did not hold, in an effort to make the agency appear more diverse.
In a statement, ICM said it “does not tolerate harassment, bullying or other inappropriate conduct. HR investigates all reports received and addresses each with appropriate disciplinary measures up to and including dismissal.”
Most of the people who spoke to The Times — who include former agents, managers and assistants — declined to speak on the record because they have signed nondisparagement agreements or because they feared retaliation from ICM.
“If you are going to be the squeaky wheel, you are going to be destroyed, and it’s a choice between your career or complaining,” one former female ICM worker said.
Three female ICM board members, Lorrie Bartlett, Jennifer Joel and Janet Carol Norton, said in a statement that any insinuation that the company’s 50/50 by 2020 pledge “was an insincere marketing ploy is utterly irreconcilable with both the facts and our personal experience.”
They added: “Neither we nor our company are perfect; no one is. In a challenging, competitive, and laborintensive industry that demands much of its participants, we feel privileged to enjoy both a safe and encouraging environment, fair and abundant opportunities, and the respect and support of all colleagues of all genders. With them, we continue to be engaged in a concerted effort towards a better and more equitable culture that will have broad, deep and longstanding effects on our peers and our clients.”
Founded in 1975, International Creative Management has become one of the industry’s leading talent agencies. Silbermann joined ICM in 2006 when it acquired Broder Webb Chervin Silbermann Agency, where he was the youngest partner and earned a reputation as a sharp and ambitious agent.
In 2012, the Century City firm rebranded itself as ICM Partners after Silbermann led the charge to make it a partnership, with agents buying out private equity investor Rizvi Traverse Management.
In a business in which outsize personalities loom large, Silbermann is known as a brash leader. He once trained with a professional boxer and has likened his job to that of legendary former Lakers coach Phil Jackson. “Meditating keeps your mind sharp,” Silbermann told W Magazine in 2008. “But go easy on the yogi stuff. … In my business it works much better to say, ‘I’ll punch you!’ ”
Silbermann declined a request to be interviewed for this article.
Those who’ve worked with him say the 53-year-old executive cultivates an insider culture in which certain agents join him in workouts at the gym or fly on a private jet to the Telluride Film Festival and stay at his house in Colorado.
Under Silbermann’s watch, ICM has expanded rapidly. It now has more than 500 employees but remains the smallest of the “big four” agencies that include WME, CAA and UTA.
In the agency world, ICM is seen as scrappy. Despite its relatively small size among the big firms, it represents major TV writers and producers such as “House” creator David Shore, “Grey’s Anatomy” creator Rhimes and “The Handmaid’s Tale” showrunner Bruce Miller.
In 2019, the company took on funding from Crestview Partners and began an expansion drive. Last year, ICM bought London-based Stellar Group — making it a major player in sports representation — acquired livemusic booking agency Primary Talent International and took a minority stake in Swedish firm Albatros Agency.
But as it has grown, ICM has confronted persistent questions over its treatment of women.
The agency faced blowback in May 2017 when former Fox News contributor Tamara Holder told HuffPost that ICM agents discouraged her from reporting to the network that she had been sexually assaulted by a Fox executive in 2015. She further alleged that the agents didn’t respond to her attorneys’ requests to corroborate her claims after she submitted a complaint that resulted in a $2.5-million settlement with Fox News.
ICM told BuzzFeed in 2018 that an independent investigation found no wrongdoing by the agency.
Holder, an attorney who focuses on women’s rights and institutional abuse, remains unhappy about how ICM treated her. “I was forced to move forward by myself all alone,” she told The Times. “All I wanted was help.”
ICM said in a statement that Holder was not a client, that she was not included in an internal investigation because she had not filed an HR complaint, and that she was not interviewed because the company already had the documentary evidence and public materials it needed.
Holder disputed the claims. She said she was never advised by ICM to go to HR. She cited emails with ICM representatives reviewed by The Times, including a September 2016 exchange in which an agent wrote that he was “really excited to be working together.”
ICM’s reputation took another hit later in 2017 when Variety reported that one the agency’s partners, Erik Horine, was forced to resign over allegations that he made unwanted advances to female staffers dating to at least 2009. Horine apologized for his behavior.
A Times investigation has found that Horine wasn’t the only agency partner who was accused of misconduct.
A female film finance executive alleged that agency partner Steve Alexander exposed himself to her inside a car, according to three people with knowledge of the incident who declined to be named.
In spring 2016, the executive met Alexander for business drinks at the Peninsula Beverly Hills and was driving Alexander to his car when he unzipped his pants and started touching himself in his genital area, said one of the people with knowledge of the incident.
The executive later told a female senior leader at ICM about the incident, and Alexander was put on leave, according to the three sources. A source close to the company said it conducted an investigation and took appropriate actions, which they did not specify.
Alexander has denied the allegations.
The female film finance executive declined to comment. The Times does not identify victims of alleged sexual assault without their consent.
Another alleged incident happened in August 2019, when Alexander sent a flirtatious direct message to a former ICM assistant, not his own, who had quit the agency months earlier after clashing with her boss, according to two people with knowledge of the exchange.
Alexander sent a “fire” emoji image to a former employee who shared on Instagram a selfie in which she was wearing clothes that accentuated her cleavage. A screenshot of the image was viewed by The Times.
ICM said in a statement that it doesn’t comment on specific employment matters that involve the privacy of third parties or are confidential. The agency also said that it “takes all allegations received of employee misconduct seriously” and responds with remedial steps such as coaching and training, and disciplinary actions, including sanctions to leave and termination.
The company added that “all of the referenced matters were investigated and involved some combination of actions referenced above.”
Regarding the fire emoji, ICM said it was not aware of the direct message “that third parties might view as inappropriate or otherwise objectionable.”
Alexander joined ICM Partners in 2014 after stints at Resolution talent agency and CAA, where he was best known for representing the late actor Heath Ledger. His current clients include Tatiana Maslany and John Travolta, according to IMDbPro.
One of Alexander’s proteges, Kevin Hussey, was also accused of serious misconduct. In fall 2017, Hussey met up with a group of people including a female actor client at a hotel bar in New York. After the bar closed, he made unwanted advances, attempting to kiss the woman, according to two people who had been briefed on the matter but were not authorized to comment.
ICM subsequently appointed two female agents to take the female actor on as a client, the people said. Hussey later reported the incident to the agency and apologized to the actor, they said.
ICM declined to comment on the incident but noted that the actor remains a client. The agency also said
‘If you are going to be the squeaky wheel, you are going to be destroyed, and it’s a choice between your career or complaining.’ — FORMER FEMALE ICM EMPLOYEE