Peter Lassally

"Our focus on first impressions won us many new clients before we’d uttered a word. When Dave and Peter Lassally pulled into CAA’s underground garage that August, one of our five parking “concierges” welcomed them by name. Dave and Peter then walked to the elevator through a gallery of vibrant prints—Johns, Stella, Close, Rauschenberg. I’d chosen those pieces to compel attention and announce our values. When I gave visitors a tour, I’d stop by the prints and talk with actors about composition and mood, with directors about the power of the images, and with execs about being well rounded and having a life outside the business. The art works were secretly my favorite feature of the building because they always made me pause, made me feel something, made me remember the person I kept hoping to become—a man very different from the personage Dave and Peter had come to see."

"Because it’s human nature to resist being sold, I avoided cold-calling prospective clients. Better for them to come to me; better to be wooed than to pitch. I dispatched Jay Moloney on a recon mission to Peter Lassally, Late Night’s executive producer. Jay listened carefully to Peter’s woes, then offered his opinion: “Dave is naked against all the forces lined up behind Jay. He needs help.”"