An Interview with Marissa Román: Hollywood Dealmaker

Marissa Román is a a partner in the Los Angeles office of Akin, Gump Strauss, Hauer & Feld. Ms. Román's practice focuses on media finance and other entertainment transactions. In other words, Ms. Román has built a career representing the financial institutions that back movies and television shows. Sounds pretty cool, right? Well we got to chat with Ms. Román and find out:

1. The worlds of law, finance and film are known for being male-dominated. Your practice combines the those fields. Have those stereotypes been born out in your experience? In the same vein, how do you think your gender impacts your work and career?

The perception that it's glamorous is hilarious. People think its sexy. Really it's corporate finance. Yes, you have to understand aspects of entertainment and the process behind delivering a film. But it's like any other legal job - it's long hours in the office and a not so glamorous lifestyle. I still show up to work with wet hair many mornings just like any other person.

That said, any job has perks, and entertainment lawyers have good perks. I get to go to film festivals, I was just in Sundance. Though again, it's still work; you're there for networking.

The arena is very male-dominated. The two people who have been my mentors and had the biggest impact on my career were men. They were male partners in my firm who gave me opportunities. But I often find the principal people I'm dealing with on the client side are all women, which is really fun. Regardless of your gender it's important you do good work, you're efficient, you have a good bedside manner and you're responsive.  I find my practice is fairly gender blind and what people care most about is, are you a good lawyer?

The only time I have experienced what I perceive to be gender issues:

1. Sometimes when I'm having conference calls with a man, we don't get each others shorthand - we talk in circles. We're not communicating effectively; we're not understanding one another. I'm not sure it's a gender thing, but it does tend to happen more frequently with men.

2. Sometimes there are men who like to bully - this is especially true in the entertainment industry. It's usually on the creative/producer side. That's how they get their job done; they yell at people. It's something you learn to deal with. You don't want to stir up the hornets nest, and when you're junior that might mean sitting and taking it and not taking it personally but possibly reporting it up the ladder. As a more senior attorney you can say, "I think we're no longer being productive. Let's take a break and revisit this."

When I was junior and that happened I thought I would get in trouble if I spoke up.  But there are some people who don't back off until you push back. Knowing the difference comes with age.

Every once in a while it would get to me personally. You're working incredible hours, you're not eating, you're sore and your body aches, and when something happens on top of all that it can be like "that's it." But you cannot take it out on the person on the other end of the phone. 

After the jump, the single most important attribute for any junior associate and some realistic advice about financing law school and paying off loans ...

The World's Most Powerful Women

Forbes magazine released its list of The World's 100 Most Powerful Women last week. The list includes several women with Juris Doctorates, including Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, ranked at #72, and Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, ranked at #28.

Two female attorneys rank among the Top Ten, although both are now in executive roles--one is Chairman of the FDIC, the other is the CEO and President of WellPoint.

Introducing Ms. JD's National Women Law Students' Organization (NWLSO)

This past weekend, Ms. JD celebrated its first birthday by bringing together over 90 law students from 70 law schools in 33 states to create the Ms. JD National Women Law Students' Organization (NWLSO), a group that will bring together and represent the interests of women law students. Delegates elected regional leadership to establish a NWLSO presence at every law school campus in the country and to connect with practitioners and professional leaders in legal markets nationwide.

Sponsored by Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz and made possible by all of the founding sponsors who have supported Ms. JD through a year of quick growth, the summit kicked off with a cocktail reception on Friday night in New York City. At the opening reception, Chief Judge Judith Kaye, of the New York Court of Appeals, inspired the student delegates with reflections on the advancement of women in the legal profession and the challenges female lawyers still face. Lynn Hecht Schafran, the Director of the National Judicial Education Program, offered her perspective on the current professional climate for women in the courtroom. On Saturday, Kate Frucher of Axiom offered advice on how women attorneys could maximize networking potential. The summit ended with a banquet featuring remarks by Dahlia Lithwick, senior editor and legal correspondent for Slate.com, and Barbara Babcock, the first female professor at Stanford Law School, who recounted the history of women in the legal profession and offered advice to young women lawyers. The banquet also recognized the accomplishments of several guests of honor, including Judge Denise Cote, Judge Betty Ellerin, Janice Goodman, Joan Krey, and Cathy Ruckelshaus.

If your school was not represented at the conference, and you would like to join NWLSO, please email the student liaisons at nwlso@ms-jd.org. Video from these speakers and more information about the four regions of NWLSO will be available on the website soon. Congratulations to all the participants!

Profile & interview with Michelle Obama, lawyer and "super juggler" [Clippings]

Yesterday the Wall Street Journal profiled and interviewed Michelle Obama (J.D., Harvard Law School, 1988). Hat tip to John J. Edwards III at the WSJ Juggle Blog, who suggests reading the pieces for the perspective of a "super juggling" two-lawyer family with kids.

Interviews with Fatima Goss Graves and Jill Morrison, Senior Counsel at the National Women's Law Center

The National Women's Law Center has started a weekly series interviewing bloggers at Womenstake, their blog. Most recently they interviewed Fatima Goss Graves, Senior Counsel with NWLC. She works for greater gender equality in education, through litigation, drafting legislative policy, and public education. Highlights...

I come from a long legacy of civil rights activists. My father and aunt were the named plaintiffs in a significant post-Brown Supreme Court ruling that desegregated schools in Knoxville, Tennessee, during the height of the civil rights movement.

...

Q: Over the years, the civil rights movement and the women’s rights movement have coincided and sometimes clashed. As a woman of color, do you ever feel torn between your loyalties as an African-American and as a feminist?

[T]hese are movements that have benefited from and fostered each other. And these movements continue to work in strong coalitions together; I work with many civil rights organizations on a regular basis and our work often overlaps.

That said ... feminists have to ensure that their advocacy takes the needs of all women into account, not just white women.

Previously Womenstake interviewed Jill Morrison, another Senior Counsel at NWLC. She litigates and drafts policy to ensure access to health care. If you are interested in nonprofit, public interest legal careers or looking for a dose of inspiration, the series looks like something to check on Fridays!

Video of Judges Ikuta and Fletcher

Click here to watch video of 9th Circuit judges Ikuta and Fletcher

This post is cross-listed here

Video of Judges Fletcher and Ikuta

Click here to watch video of 9th Circuit judges Ikuta and Fletcher

This post is cross-listed here.

Be Open to Change

By Deborah R. Schwarzer, Of Counsel, GCA Law Partners LLP I’m reluctantly realizing that I’m ancient. But with age comes history, experience and, with luck, perspective. When I attended the University of Chicago Law School in the early 80’s, women made up about 30% of the class. We weren’t pioneers; those in earlier classes served in that role. We weren’t all alike. And we didn’t have to wear those horrible blouses with the gigantic self-bows that women just a few years back had had to wear (I have incriminating pictures of my sister, also a J.D., in one of those). But we still weren’t the same as the guys, especially when it came to employment. I fled West, fearing that my gender would stand in my way (I had clerked in Cincinnati one summer and was appalled by attitudes there, particularly outside the legal community. I didn’t like being called “a lady lawyer.” I did not wish to be regarded as a novelty, like a talking dog).

Profile: Judge Kim Wardlaw

Wardlaw Cut a Fast Track to Center of 9th Circuit
By Amelia Hansen
Daily Journal Staff Writer

February 08, 2007

PASADENA - A turn of turtles inhabits Kim Wardlaw's chambers.

Sparkling and vibrant, the small figurines appear on the judge's bookshelf and desk. They are unlikely visitors in a world filled with legal documents and books.

"They remind me to slow down, to be thoughtful," Wardlaw said. "They remind me that everything doesn't have to be done today."

Impressive Progress Alongside Persistent Problems

In April the New York Committee on Women in the Courts celebrated twenty years of working to implement the recommendations of the New York Task Force on Women in the Courts. New York’s Chief Judge Judith Kaye encapsulated these two decades with a perfect aphorism, “Impressive Progress Alongside Persistent Problems” – an aphorism that captures the work not only of the New York Committee, but of every effort to achieve equality for women in the courts and the legal profession.