Hollywood Producer Jeff Gomez: Transforming Your Personal Tragedy into a Career Strategy

Jeff Gomez is one of those people you immediately admire. He is the Chief Executive Officer of Starlight Runner Entertainment, a New York based digital production company that specializes in transmedia storytelling, the development and production of content across multiple media platforms in concert. 

From creating transmedia for Avatar, Men in Black, Halo and many other blockbuster properties, to consulting with some of the biggest movie directors on the planet, Gomez has fast become the go-to guy for creating worlds within worlds. With his successes he could easily be inaccessible, but as I began to speak with him at his Manhattan offices, I realized very quickly that his mission in life is to be the opposite. He seems to be driven by a desire to reach out and give people a hand. 

In the first of our two-part interview, I had the opportunity to speak with Gomez in-person about his humble beginnings, his keys to success, advice to those who want a career like his, as well as his brand new coaching and counseling service. He also gives advice on how to turn a negative situation into a positive one and how to deal with difficult bosses and clients.

Tell us about your background. How did you go from where you were to where you are now in your career?

Jeff Gomez: I started out as a dreamer. I started out as someone who maybe didn't care too much for the real world because the fantasy world was so alluring and so engaging and fulfilled my desires so much more. Reading comic books, watching animation, eventually reading giant novels made me love storytelling so much, that instead of just getting lost in the stories, I started to study how story worked. I was fascinated with what it took to convince the audience that something can be made to feel real. And that skill set helped me to find a job in comic book creation, in video game creation, and then in this notion of telling stories across multiple media. 

What was your first big break? 

Jeff Gomez: Well, there were a few breaks. It's funny when life is unfolding there rarely is that big snap moment. One of my breaks was by independently producing a magazine using desktop publishing in the 1980s, where we examined storytelling from a gaming standpoint. The magazine was called Gateways and we talked about how technology was making storytelling more and more interesting.

Later on, I got a big break at the comic book company I worked for. Valiant Comics was purchased by Acclaim Entertainment, and because I understood gaming, I helped the comic book guys hook up with the video game guys and I wound up producing Turok: Dinosaur Hunter, the Nintendo 64 game, which became very, very successful.

A third break happened after I launched my company, Starlight Runner Entertainment where I was able to develop stories across multiple media. We got called by 20th Century Fox to work on James Cameron’s Avatar, and that changed everything for my company. Since then we’ve worked with movie studios and video game companies on all kinds of blockbuster properties. 

How did you get that first seed money to start the company before working with James Cameron? 

Jeff Gomez: That was in 2000 and we did get some seed money. There was a venture capital company that was interested in my idea for creating storytelling on the internet. It was still a new medium at the time, and we were trying to figure out how storytelling could become nonlinear and more fully interactive; how to use little bits of video back in 2000 to help tell stories. They gave us a little less than a million bucks to try and figure that out. Unfortunately, 9/11 struck and my office was close to the Twin Towers at the time, and so that money dried up, and we had to go in a different direction. That direction turned out to be this kind of transmedia practice, helping brands and entertainment properties to develop across different media. 

A lot of people would have given up at that point. What allowed you to adapt and press on?

Jeff Gomez: You know, that's a great question. You're faced with a crisis. We had to close the company because physically it was not possible to get into the office. Your capital dries up, nobody wants to create transmedia entertainment when something so terrible has happened to the country. Your instinct is to think maybe this wasn't worth it in the first place, maybe we should give up. But what we talk about in our coaching with our clients is that when you're stressed, when something bad happens, you need to fall back on a strong foundational narrative.

What is your story? What was my personal story? Well, my personal story has a lot to do with perseverance and a lot to do with the connection between people and the aspirational qualities of story. So, in the days that followed 9/11, we thought about the fact that war could be imminent, that this country could be dragged into a terrible ongoing conflict. Is it because we're going to have hatred in our hearts? Is it because we are going to be permanently anxious about something else happening here in our city? Maybe we should talk to kids. Maybe we should talk to them about making their connections with one another, embracing one another, loving one another in better ways, understanding why things like this happen so that we can prevent them from happening again.

Because I was once a teacher, we were able to go to the New York Department of Education and get permission to start telling stories in classrooms around the city, and have them tell their stories back to us. Some journalists began to cover the work we were doing, and the story caught the attention of an executive at Mattel who remembered my name from my Turok Dinosaur Hunter days. She called us and said, “Hey, can you help us with this Hot Wheels campaign? We want to create stories around the Hot Wheels brand.” And boom, we were in business, you know. So, it was falling back on that core narrative that eventually got signaled back out into the world. 

You and I talked about your own personal story, your own personal narrative as being one of perseverance like what is your story? For those who are unfamiliar, what is your narrative? 

Jeff Gomez: Well I was first raised on the Lower East Side of New York City, and that world was chaotic. I'm Latino, there is Afro Latino in my family, and I have a partial facial paralysis from birth that got made fun of. So, I got kicked around, bullied some, this combination causes you to have to make some decisions. And my decision, which was passed down to me by my Mom, was that I had to be happy, I had to find my happiness somewhere in this chaos. I realized that I could not find happiness within myself completely on my own. No matter how beautiful Tolkien's Lord of the Rings was, it's a book. I'm still going to be lonely when I close that book. I needed to connect, we need to connect with each other if we're going to transcend the chaos and the violence. And so I decided that that's going to be what I do. That's my response to the chaos and afflictions and bullying that I experienced. Well, guess what? I'm going to figure out a way to connect with you, to join my story world with yours. And that narrative has always served me really well. 

And so you were able to turn what people may perceive as being a negative experience into a positive. So tell me, what kind of positives came out of those early challenges that you're now able to use as a business person or as creator? 

Jeff Gomez: One of the positives that came out of living in adverse situations is the skill set of listening. To be able to disarm a potential conflict and get myself out of situations that could be harmful to me. I needed to be able to read people. And when I was able to tell what it is that you liked, what it is that you want to do, when I was able to learn that nobody listens to you—but maybe I can listen to you—I learned how valuable that that dialogue can be. Listening got me safety. It got me friends. It improved my skills.

As I got older, I realized that all media was going to be two-way, but that no broadcaster really knew how to listen. That was what I brought to the table. Big media companies were just reading the data, the box office numbers, the ratings, but if you actually ask your fans what it is that they're looking for, what it is that they like and don't like about your content, they're going to feel good about being able to tell you. They're going to feel validated by that attention and that creates a bond, that creates fans. And knowing how to create fans and make them feel like participants in their favorite story world has been one of the greatest assets of Starlight Runner. 

Can you tell me about a time in particular where knowing how to disarm somebody turned the situation to a positive one?

Jeff Gomez: My Mom managed to figure out how to get us out of the projects and moved us to Flushing, Queens, which was like to me going out to the countryside. After I got there, I was curious, because I wasn't immediately embraced and the weird thing was, I didn't feel that I looked so different from everybody else there. But my last name seemed to cause some consternation with the Italian kids at school. It was like West Side Story or something. Gomez was not allowed to play with the white boys. And in fact, it was starting to escalate into a bullying kind of situation. I guess I was just really different.

On top of all that I was into imagination and Godzilla and early Japanese anime, these weird things. And there was one guy in the fifth grade, Amado was his name, who was really tough and people said, "Oh, he’s like wild, he's dangerous, you don't want to even go near him." I was curious about him, because I would look in his eyes and I would see something warm somewhere in there. Yes, he was alienated, I could tell. But I started to kind of observe him.

One day, I saw him playing with G.I. Joes in front of his house. In elementary school, I could tell you everything about G.I. Joe. And I started to like kind of mumble about it nearby while he was playing. And he looked up at me and he's like, “What are you talking about?” I started to toss off trivia about the toys and he goes, “Yeah? Here.” And suddenly, I'm with the toughest guy in school playing G.I. Joes with him and his brother Danny. With just a few sentences I convinced them that I understood their story world and so they invited me to join them. Nobody bothered me ever again, because we just kind of stood near each other in the school yard or in the park. And we wound up becoming fantastic friends. And that was just a matter of listening, observing, and then validating someone about whom other people have already made up their minds. 

In the corporate world, we run across a lot of bullies. Have you experienced that and if so, how were you able to disarm them? 

Jeff Gomez: It's so important to understand your own story. And as you get older, to keep reevaluating that narrative, so that you're updating it, upgrading it, and making sure that you aren’t ruled by your past. As your skill sets develop, you become a slightly different person than you used to be. When you're confident in who you are and what your story is, when someone else comes to you and starts speaking loudly, or criticizing what it is that you're doing even though you know it's been pretty good job, you've done well, you can start to listen instead of freaking out. You can separate the noise from what the person is really trying to communicate. You are patiently separating out the facts, so you can act on them without getting too emotional. And so my inquiry, my listening is for the facts. What are the facts? If I'm not making a connection then I've missed something.

You need to think, "So, I have to ask you the right questions to get what I want." And the anger and the loudness or even the criticism doesn’t matter as much. You’re telling yourself, “I know who I am. I know what my story is. So, let's just get the job done.” And my job is to please some of the biggest studio heads, and producers, and directors in Hollywood. Some of them don't have much patience, but I’ve been practicing all my life, and I’m the best at what I do. I'll just wait and ask the right questions, so that I can make the adjustments that are going to work. 

For those of us who are empaths or very sensitive, how do you remain calm in the thick of being yelled at?

Jeff Gomez: There is a way to apply our sensitivity to our advantage, and to the advantage of the people we’re dealing with. What is tangible in three dimensions is real. The stuff that we emit from our mouths is narrative—an interpretation of reality. It takes some exercise to discern the two; the facts from the story, and we need to learn how to interpret of the facts in ways that reduce drama and maximize potential. Interpretations belong to everybody and that's what I have to remind myself about constantly. What you're saying belongs to you. It has little to do with me. You're trying to communicate something with me and no matter how loud you're doing it or if you're far afield of reality, my job is to bring you back. And I can be calm and do that.

I'm not saying it's not stressful, but the faster you're able to detect bullshit and push it aside so that we can get at the heart of the matter, the narrative, the core narrative, the faster the story can be adjusted. So, it doesn't bug me too much to deal with strong personalities, even though I’m super sensitive. Using your sensitivity, using your talent and skills to discern the story worlds of others and speak to what’s really going on in a positive constructive way, that is the correct application of that sensitivity. 

Note: This interview has been edited for clarity