LOS ANGELES - Mark Fleischer is a legacy of the entertainment industry.
His grandfather, Max Fleischer, was a pioneer in animation, starting Fleischer Studios and producing cartoon vixen Betty Boop. His father, Academy Award-winner Richard Fleischer, directed "20,000 Leagues Under the Sea" and other motion pictures.
Fleischer began his career as an entertainer but shifted into the legal field, becoming a lawyer, mediator and arbitrator and working at some of Southern California's largest law firms and Hollywood studios.
After receiving a master's degree from the California Institute of the Arts, he became a classical guitarist and composer.
"Music was my first love, and I just naturally gravitated toward what I loved and pursued that because it was very fulfilling," he said. "And then my focus started changing."
After a music stint lasting 12 years, Fleischer took positions as the president of Global Television Inc. and as the general manager of Los Angeles television station KSCI.
He decided to try his hand at being a lawyer. In 1984, he graduated from the University of Southern California's Gould School of Law. He started practicing as a transactional entertainment lawyer at Manatt, Phelps & Phillips and served as a member of the firm's management committee.
While on the committee, Fleischer oversaw a variety of matters, including which partner received credit for bringing in a client. Work on the committee, he said, also helped him develop mediation skills, which he uses to work through complex business cases.
"One of my great gifts is bringing people together," he said. "It's an ideal skill to utilize ... being a peacemaker."
Flesicher ventured into private mediation while he was practicing with Gorry Meyer & Rudd, which merged with Venable in 2006. He remains of-counsel in Venable's Century City office.
To set the stage for his mediation career, Fleischer took a course at Pepperdine School of Law, which, he said, not only helped him learn techniques but also made him aware he was well-suited to be a mediator.
His first cases, Fleischer said, were personal-injury disputes that he took pro bono from the Los Angeles County Superior Court's alternative dispute resolution office.
"I was introduced to a whole different bar, the plaintiffs' bar," he said.
Fleischer continues to mediate Superior Court cases pro bono while handling private mediation matters. The work helps people who can't afford to hire a lawyer, he said, but it also provides him with a good learning experience.
The pro bono cases also helped him develop his own dispute resolution style, he said.
"I make deals that make sense and work," Fleischer said.
He shopped his mediation skills to several large providers and landed at Alternative Resolution Centers in 2003.
There, Fleischer sits on the panel with fellow mediators Ron S. Rosen and Sol Rosenthal. All have extensive experience in the entertainment industry and serve as a three-arbitrator panel to resolve multiparty and multimillion-dollar complex business and entertainment cases.
Although Fleischer is an expert in entertainment matters, he said he is able to handle other cases because the parties, who are experts in their own case, detail the facts and express their points of view.
"If you are creative, you can come to an agreement without being an expert," he said.
During sessions, he said, he sits, listens and helps the parties come to a conclusion.
"Litigation is a faceless enemy," Fleischer said. "During mediations, parties humanize each other and get the chance to have closure."
Loeb & Loeb partner Michael Anderson has used Fleischer's services twice, once for a dispute between an investor and an independent record label and once for a case between a former consultant and film company regarding a finder's fee.
"[Fleischer] has the correct demeanor and personality for mediation," Anderson said. "He lets people pour out why they are using a mediator and lets them tell their positions."
Since he has been serving as a mediator, Fleischer said, he has learned how people respond to adverse situations.
"Some want to cut a deal right away," he said. "Others need to go through a process."
Fleischer tries to read those who need to explain their demands and why they are justified, and then go through the negotiation process.
"If you make a proposal at the beginning and it isn't accepted, then it might be the right proposal at the wrong time," Fleischer added.
But when Fleischer does make the right proposal, he said, he is rewarded by the relief he sees on the faces of both parties once their dispute is resolved.
"People are paying you to get their nightmare out of their life," he said. "It's a wonderful feeling to announce you have a deal."
Lawyers who have used Fleischer's services say his mild-mannered personality helps bring together parties who take rigid stands in their cases.
"In our particular case, he took a dispute that was fairly emotionally charged and was able to reach a partial resolution that I think the parties were surprised they were able to reach," said Isaiah Weedn, an associate in Sheppard, Mullin, Richter & Hampton's Costa Mesa office.
Weedn's client was involved in a trade-secret misappropriation case having to do with customer contact information.
Like Weedn, Los Angeles-based sole practitioner Steven W. Kerekes used Fleischer for a trade-secret case involving a high-tech company and sales manager. The dispute centered on whether the sales manager was stealing the company's intellectual property.
"[Fleischer] doesn't create a pressured environment," Kerekes said. "He looks for areas of common ground to build upon."
Kerekes also used Fleischer to mediate a case involving a music producer who had a long-term contract that was canceled by his manager.
Fleischer's entertainment background helped him work through the issues of the dispute, Kerekes said.
"He's good with entertainment issues. That's why I went to him," Kerekes added.
During his career, Fleischer has worked at several levels of the entertainment industry.
After spending a decade at Manatt, Phelps & Phillips, Fleischer went in-house to serve as the executive vice president of entertainment business development at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios. For part of his time at MGM, he also was head of the entertainment legal department and served as senior vice president and deputy general counsel.
While negotiating financing, co-production and co-distribution of motion pictures and administering the studio's film and television library, Fleischer took over as head of his grandfather's Fleischer Studios in 1995, holding the title of president.
In addition to his work at MGM, Fleischer managed the licensing, brand extension and marketing of the family-owned business rights for Betty Boop, Ko Ko the Clown and other cartoon characters.
He remembers stories about his grandfather's venture into animation and how Betty Boop came into being. Ko Ko the Clown owned a dog named Bimbo, whose girlfriend was a sexy dog, Fleischer recalled. The character became popular and was eventually transformed to have human characteristics, becoming Betty Boop.
"Betty Boop's hoop earrings are the remnants of the dog ears," Fleischer said.
In the 1970s, his father rejuvenated Betty Boop in the mainstream media and built a merchandising business based on the character.
While continuing to oversee Fleischer Studios, Fleischer worked with several law firms.
After leaving MGM in 1999, he joined Squadron, Ellenoff, Plesent & Sheinfeld, which merged with Hogan & Hartson. In 2003, he moved to Gorry Meyer& Rudd, which merged with Venable in 2006.
"I was looking for a relationship with a firm where I was not focused on building a book of business," he said. "I wanted an of-counsel position where I could help train younger lawyers."
While working at Hogan & Hartson and Gorry Meyer & Rudd, Fleischer took his turn at running Mainframe USA, a subsidiary of Canadian production company Mainframe Entertainment, from 2001 to 2004.
"It was a different experience. I have never been bothered by time sheets, so it was disconcerting to not have structure," Fleischer said of his in-house experiences.
But, he said, working with larger companies, where he was involved with complex deal making, helped him sharpen his mediation skills. And now that he has delved into the mediation world, he said, he has met a variety of lawyers.
"I was impressed by the professionalism of lawyers in this town," Fleischer said. "There is not a lot of posturing or anger, which says a lot about their ethics."
"And it made me like lawyers more," he joked.
The following lawyers have used Fleischer's services: Michael Anderson, Loeb & Loeb, Los Angeles; Yakub Hazzard, Dreier Stein & Kahan, Santa Monica; Jonathan Stern, Dreier Stein & Kahan, Santa Monica; Gary Raskin, Raskin, Peter Rubin & Simon, Los Angeles; Andrew Kim, Dreier Stein & Kahan, Santa Monica; Michael Kahn, Law Offices of Michael Kahn, Los Angeles; Joel Blankstein, Silva, Clasen & Raffalow, Los Angeles; Steven W. Kerekes, Law Offices of Steven W. Kerekes, Los Angeles; Isaiah Z. Weedn, Sheppard, Mullin, Richter & Hampton, Costa Mesa.
|
