— A Boutique Talent & Entertainment Management Firm
The room where your
career gets made.
Founded in 2014 by former WME Vice President Robert “Bobby” Kessler, Big Fish Management pairs hand-selected artists, creators, and producers with senior partners who actually pick up the phone. We don't run a roster. We run careers.
- Founded2014
- Headquarters9200 Sunset Blvd
- Active Clients47
— The Thesis
Roster management ends where career building begins.
Big Fish is a small firm by design. Eleven senior agents and managers, four named partners, one client per deal at the table. No associate pipelines. No hand-offs to a junior after the offer lands. The deal is the work, and the work is done by the people whose names are on the door.
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01
A senior partner sits at every negotiation.
The partner who signs you is the partner who closes you. No associate pipelines, no hand-offs after the pitch.
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02
$480M+ in project value negotiated since 2014.
A decade of deal-making across feature, episodic, recorded music, brand, and live.
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03
230+ talent contracts closed.
Across acting, music, producing, and digital creator verticals — for a roster of 47 active clients.
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04
92% principal-terms acceptance in 14 days.
The offers we bring back are the offers the room accepts. Speed is the product.
By the numbers, since 2014 — a small ledger for a small firm.
Behind six Emmy-winning series and two Grammy-nominated album cycles for current clients.
— Table of Contents
Four practice verticals. One senior partner per client.
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I.
— Read the chapter
Acting
Feature, episodic, limited series, and theatre. We sit with showrunners, casting directors, and studio executives — and we read the room before we read the offer.
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II.
— Read the chapter
Music
Recording artists, songwriters, and producers. Label deals, publishing, sync, and touring economics — negotiated as a single architecture, not four separate conversations.
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III.
— Read the chapter
Producing
First-look deals, overall deals, production service agreements, and backend participation. We build the company around the producer, not the producer around the company.
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IV.
— Read the chapter
Digital Creators
YouTube, podcasting, short-form, and the long tail of brand partnerships. IP ownership, exclusivity trade-offs, and the move from platform-native to multi-platform.
“A boutique firm with a principal-agent pedigree and a roster thin enough to keep every deal in the partner's hands.”
— Engagement Model
How does a Big Fish engagement actually work?
A four-step arc, paced like an editorial. Discovery first, strategy memo second, deal-making third, career architecture last. The strategy call is step one.
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01
Discovery Call
A 45-minute conversation with a Big Fish partner. We listen. We ask the questions your current representation hasn't asked. By the end, you know whether the firm is the right room.
Week 0 -
02
Strategy Memo
A four-to-six page written brief: positioning, comp benchmarks, target buyers, the three to five moves that move the needle in the next eighteen months.
Week 1–2 -
03
Active Deal-Making
Outreach begins. The senior partner on your account is the one dialing. Offers, counter-offers, principal terms, close. Weekly check-ins written like editorial memos.
Month 1–6 -
04
Career Architecture
Once the first wave of deals lands, we widen the lens. Long-form value, IP ownership, equity participation, the second-act business. The senior partner stays on the file for the length of the relationship.
Year 1+
— The Directory
Who actually picks up the phone.
Eleven senior agents and managers in total. Four named partners promote from principal-agent lineage at WME, CAA, and UTA. Every Big Fish client is assigned one of them — by name.
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Robert “Bobby” Kessler
Founding Partner
Former Vice President, WME · 22 years on the agency side before founding Big Fish in 2014.
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Danielle Marchetti
Partner, Acting & Episodic
Former Agent, CAA. Negotiated overall deals on three current Emmy-winning client series.
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Jonathan Okonkwo
Partner, Music & Producing
Former Agent, WME Music. Closed two Grammy-nominated album cycles for current roster clients.
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Sarah Huang
Partner, Digital & Brand
Former Agent, UTA. Built the firm's digital creator practice from a standing start in 2018.
— For Executives & Producers
If you're buying talent, you're buying a partner on the other side of the table.
Big Fish reps are reachable, prepared, and brief in writing. We close principal terms inside fourteen days because the offer lands as a memo, not a phone call. For showrunners, studio executives, label heads, and brand leads, the relationship starts with the right partner — and stays there.
- I. A named senior partner on every active file — no associate gatekeeping.
- II. Written principal terms within fourteen days of an agreed offer.
- III. Cross-vertical coordination when a client moves across film, music, and brand.
- IV. Discretion as default — no press releases, no leaks, no roster trades.
— Step One
The strategy call is where the engagement begins.
Forty-five minutes with a Big Fish partner. No deck, no pitch, no obligation. If the room isn't right for you, we'll tell you — and we'll suggest who is.
Or write the partners directly · [email protected] · +1 (310) 555-0184