Behind The Camera

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Speaker 12 You're standing on the beach when you notice something strange. The horizon doesn't look right.
At first, all you can see is a thin white line. Then the line starts to rise.

Speaker 12 You realize it's not the horizon at all. It's a 30-foot tall wall of water and it's racing straight toward you.
What would you do?

Speaker 12 On the day after Christmas in 2004, a 9.1 magnitude earthquake hit off the coast of Indonesia, triggering a devastating tsunami. It struck Thailand without warning.

Speaker 12 No alarms, no cell phone alerts, no evacuation.

Speaker 12 In this season of Against the Odds, experience one of the deadliest natural disasters in history through the perspectives of those who did everything they could to survive.

Speaker 12 Follow Against the Odds on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can binge all episodes of Against the Odds Tsunami in Thailand early and ad-free right now on Wondery Plus.

Speaker 12 Has this ever happened to you?

Speaker 13 The following is a paid presentation for Donald Trump Way to Wealth Seminars brought to you by the Trump Institute.

Speaker 12 It's two o'clock in the morning, so you turn on the TV, and this is what you see.

Speaker 14 He has authored seven best-selling books on how to make fortunes, profiling his methods of wealth-building achievements.

Speaker 16 I've made a lot of money in real estate.

Speaker 16 Or

Speaker 12 now, you know, you open up YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, whatever, and this still happens to you. And you can't look away.
You're like, oh man, those boats and those cars look so good.

Speaker 12 Yes. I really, I would love one of those.

Speaker 16 I put all of my concepts that have worked so well for me, new and old, into our seminar. And people are loving it.
People are really doing well with it and they're loving it.

Speaker 14 He calls his seminar the Donald Trump Way to Wealth.

Speaker 12 I think we all know by now that this is baloney, but I was wondering, how do these short films, I'm trying to be kind, how do these even get made?

Speaker 18 My name is Scott Wilson. I'm born and raised Texan.

Speaker 18 I have been a freelance cameraman, freelance production professional for over 35 years based in the Dallas-Fort Worth area.

Speaker 12 Scott's bread and butter in the early 2000s, making infomercials for

Speaker 12 MLMs.

Speaker 18 As a cameraman, I've had the good fortune to do a lot of travel and shoot a lot of different, you know, widely varied things.

Speaker 18 Freelance production is kind of funny because I look back and it comes in waves. Sometimes you're doing a whole lot of one subject and then it just goes away and then there's another wave.

Speaker 18 And so MLM was definitely a wave for me uh back i i think about 2000s to about 2008.

Speaker 5 and what are the other waves you've participated in

Speaker 18 um i've shot a lot of shows uh that ended up on hgtv that i just call home shows

Speaker 18 like americ america's most outrageous homes there's a series called you live and what where people converted something into a home uh there was uh uh cool pools america's spookiest homes um so uh that's been a wave um the thing I'm currently deep into right now is a weird subject and it's golf.

Speaker 18 Back in 2004 for three seasons, I shot a golf travel show and got to where I really enjoyed the subject.

Speaker 18 And so continued to do work for like PGA of America and now the Texas Golf Hall of Fame, I produce all the media that goes onto their site. It's an online museum, an online exhibit.

Speaker 18 So that's researching people, doing this, connecting and getting them to tell their career story and doing video and photography and everything.

Speaker 5 I want your job.

Speaker 5 That's a fun career.

Speaker 18 You know, it's my adult son has gone to this business, and I want to tell him you can't raise a family doing this, but it's like, I did.

Speaker 5 And I say,

Speaker 5 that's where all my hair went. You're like, come on, be serious, son.

Speaker 18 I know, yeah. Get her, get a real profession.
So, certainly,

Speaker 18 the help of my wife, and she's currently working in a children's hospital in Dallas. Oh, wow.

Speaker 5 Okay. And yeah, yeah.

Speaker 18 So

Speaker 18 definitely a team effort.

Speaker 5 How did you get involved in making videos for MLM?

Speaker 18 The story is there's a company, or there was a company in an area called Lake Dallas called Video Plus.

Speaker 18 And so as a freelancer, you're always just trying to meet companies that need to hire freelance cameramen. You get referrals.

Speaker 18 I think I was referred through someone who rented camera equipment to this company.

Speaker 5 When you first got started in the MLM world, did you know what MLMs were?

Speaker 18 No, I did not. You know, I was definitely aware of brands like Avon.
I'd always heard about Avon parties and little small lipstick samples and things like that.

Speaker 18 But I, you know, wasn't aware of what an MLM structure is and how it works. So I'm sure my first times hired to shoot is just a typical shoot day.
Here's someone to interview. Here's a list of B-roll.

Speaker 18 You know, day's done.

Speaker 5 So what kind of stuff were you shooting?

Speaker 18 When it came to MLMs, a big part that we would film is called the success story.

Speaker 18 So picture a two-person crew. There'd be a cameraman and then the other person does audio and grip helps you with lighting or reflectors or things.
And then there's a producer. So

Speaker 18 if we're doing a success story locally, we'd show up at someone's house at about 8 a.m. and kind of spend the day with them.

Speaker 12 There's a pet acting like a pet in the background. So if you hear that, that's what it is.

Speaker 18 Oftentimes we would travel to shoot success stories. The interesting thing was, even at that stage for me, I wasn't so focused on what their product was because I'm not handling the content.

Speaker 18 I'm not doing the interview and the context. I'm there to make sure the shot's beautiful, it's in focus, it's lit right.

Speaker 18 You know, focusing just on camera work. So oftentimes I'd travel and really kind of not even know what the product or client is, just knowing that we're shooting a success story today.
Right.

Speaker 5 So you just need it to look pretty and

Speaker 18 yeah, yeah, to look professional, real high-end professional. And the success story is usually start in the morning outside someone's house.

Speaker 18 We want to show a big, beautiful house and they've had all the landscaping done the day before, you know, mode and everything. And then we go inside and we sit down and do a long interview.

Speaker 18 And that's where the producer is really kind of getting their success story, their, you know, their career.

Speaker 18 Our days of filming a success story often involved around the kids are coming home from school at 3.30.

Speaker 18 So we want, you know, clean them up, polish them up, change clothes. We're going to do a family scene.

Speaker 18 That would be funny sometimes when you know the kid doesn't want to do it

Speaker 18 and you're standing in the living room just kind of waiting for the parents and the kids to come to an agreement before we pick up the camera and go.

Speaker 5 Oh my gosh.

Speaker 18 A lot of also what we would do is film a staged,

Speaker 18 I mean, I keep calling it meeting. I'm trying to remember what they would call it, almost like a house party.
You know, when you would have your friends over, you would show them the product.

Speaker 18 Avon is a perfect example. We would need to stage house parties.
And then afterwards, we do b-roll. They'll give us a home tour.
They'll walk us through this amazing kitchen, living room, guest rooms.

Speaker 18 And then oftentimes after that, we end up on their boat or in their Mercedes car.

Speaker 18 One gentleman, this was early when there's this crazy thing where you could have a little earbud in your ear and not have a wire to your phone.

Speaker 18 And this gentleman would go to his golf club and go to the putting green. And so while he's putting all day, he's handling phone calls and motivating his downline and doing his work.

Speaker 18 And we'd film stuff like that too.

Speaker 5 Did they actually own this stuff? Did you believe them?

Speaker 18 You know, certainly you learn down the line that like the Mercedes, they're showing off is a lease.

Speaker 18 You know, they're not, they would never kind of reveal on camera that situations could be tenuous. It just always came across as, you know, two years ago, I was middle management at some company.

Speaker 18 I got turned on to this product. And now look at my house, look at my boat,

Speaker 18 look at my family.

Speaker 18 So it was always presented as pure success. No questions asked.

Speaker 5 I am so jealous that you got to be inside these people's worlds and heads and houses and boats and cars. Any private jets?

Speaker 18 You know, recently after this wave,

Speaker 18 there was one other gentleman that he piloted his own private jet and we flew around the country where he would land and do surprise visits while people were having a meeting or so. And

Speaker 18 a lot of a lot of cult of personality. Yeah.
You know, big personalities, motivational speaking,

Speaker 18 but a lot of as much attention on you got to follow this guy as much as you got to sell this product.

Speaker 5 Give me the goss. I want to hear like the top 10 weirdest things you got to see on the inside.

Speaker 18 Goodness, let me think.

Speaker 18 As far as weird, you know, some, again, some amazing houses.

Speaker 18 Sometimes people showing off their art collection in the house. Oh.

Speaker 18 And I do got to frame, you know, when I say this was about 2000 to 2008, this was really before smartphones and really before shared video.

Speaker 18 We're coming in there with high-end, you know, Betacam, broadcast quality cameras, lighting and audio. And so we're creating for them a really highly polished, finished product.

Speaker 18 Again,

Speaker 18 of success.

Speaker 5 And were those to be put on DVDs and sold to the downline or how were they getting distributed?

Speaker 18 Yeah. And in fact,

Speaker 18 I'll share a quick story.

Speaker 18 In addition to producing videos on site, we would also film

Speaker 18 the large event meetings.

Speaker 18 You know, we're a product. We're going to have a meeting in Dallas.
You bring three of your best prospects. We're going to wow them.
And it's going to be at a huge ballroom in a big hotel.

Speaker 18 And it's going to almost look like an Aerosmith concert. It is lighting and pyro going off and music rocking and just really getting people up out of their seats and cheering.

Speaker 18 And so speakers would get up and talk, motivational speakers who, you know, have success within the company.

Speaker 18 And I remember one gentleman talked about the DVD, the power of the DVD, and you know, they would address your objections. Oh, I can never be as successful as you.
I can't do this.

Speaker 18 And he says, yeah, you might be telling me you're not good at speaking or you're not good at convincing, but guess what? I've got a salesman for you that is on message all the time, 24-7,

Speaker 18 never takes a rest. And

Speaker 18 all you have to do is introduce people to the salesman. And it's a DVD.

Speaker 18 And that was the currency at the time. So a produced DVD that spelled out all of the opportunity, all of the product, all of the machinations.

Speaker 18 And the

Speaker 18 thing he stressed, he says, my success came from I gave out two DVDs every day.

Speaker 18 He said, I was traveling, I was in Omaha or something. It was 11.30 at night.
I'm in my hotel room and I realized only giving out one DVD. I put on my clothes.
I went downstairs. I found a 7-Eleven.

Speaker 18 I found someone before midnight and handed out my second DVD. I'm that devoted to this style of selling, and it'll be successful for you.

Speaker 5 It's like a door-to-door influencer.

Speaker 18 It is. It is.
And of course, the flip side of that that they're not saying on stage is you need to buy these DVDs.

Speaker 5 Right.

Speaker 18 To distribute. We're not giving them to you for free.
Right.

Speaker 5 When I asked that question, I was like, did I just say that? That you'd have to, that they would be selling them. But of course they're going to sell them to the downline.
Oh, yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 18 Yeah, absolutely. Always, there's, as, as you've even covered, there's always materials, there's always training sessions.
There's always stuff you need to put the money into.

Speaker 18 And you're supposed to be the one reaping the success.

Speaker 5 Which companies did you film for?

Speaker 18 You know,

Speaker 18 a lot of what I started with was prepaid legal.

Speaker 18 I don't know if you're familiar with them. They're out of Ada, Oklahoma, which was about a three-hour drive from Dallas.

Speaker 18 Products and companies like Manatech, you know, a lot of them fall into what they call the powders, potions, and lotions.

Speaker 18 so manatech ignite i have mona v

Speaker 18 um artist which i think was a body shaping undergarment yes um isogenics might have been the same isogenics is like is like a diet shape thing oh wow

Speaker 12 did you catch that he was on set filming a commercial for a company that he knows the name of isogenics but he doesn't know what the product is because you know as we always say in in MLM, the product doesn't matter.

Speaker 18 Lima juice, which I just looked up the other day, because out of all of this work and everything I did, I can't call myself victim because I did it myself, but I purchased Lima Juice.

Speaker 18 At some point, I agreed to get out my debit card and probably signed up for about 300-something bucks for a case that would get shipped to my house. in Texas.

Speaker 18 Even by the time I received it and when I was home, I was like, ah, idiot, what have you done? And most of it sat in its case in the pantry and probably turned rancid.

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Speaker 3 Can I make my site softer?

Speaker 4 Can I make my site firmer?

Speaker 5 Can we sleep cooler?

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Speaker 18 Goji Berry was another one that we did a lot for. We even flew to Los Angeles and had a Tibetan monk-looking actor and got costume from Hollywood shop and went to a,

Speaker 18 what, like a Japanese botanical garden and

Speaker 18 filmed him on the little wooden bridge handing over some parchment to whoever is the,

Speaker 18 you know, American founder of a Goji Berry Juice.

Speaker 18 You know, again, just making movies, just the persuasive power of high quality video to tell a story.

Speaker 5 What were they trying to convey with that actor?

Speaker 18 I think in that story, the founder of whatever that MLM was is talking about: I traveled to Mongolia and I learned the secrets of the Goji Berry from the Tibetan monks. And

Speaker 18 they handed me the secrets and now I'm here to share them with you for $39.99 a month or whatever

Speaker 5 their signature.

Speaker 5 Any others that stand out like that?

Speaker 18 I have Herbalife, Avon, Free Life.

Speaker 18 I don't know the company, but there were wearable air filters, like a leash around your neck, and you're wearing this air filter and portable alarms, water filters for your home.

Speaker 18 You know, and those sold very well in Louisiana. I remember traveling to Louisiana where you have a lot of chemical plants and stuff.

Speaker 18 And so they insist, you know, your tap water, we're going to protect you from all the toxins with our product.

Speaker 5 Do any characters stand out besides the monk?

Speaker 18 Let me think here. The gentleman who did the two DVs a day, the monk,

Speaker 18 I had to make a list of aphorisms because certainly to be on camera or to be on stage and to motivate people and to sell them, you need some quick, rapid fire.

Speaker 5 go-to aphorisms.

Speaker 18 And

Speaker 18 they always end with, follow my program, you're going to make money. So I'd start with, you know, Jane, if you don't stand for something, you'll fall for anything.

Speaker 18 Follow my program, you're going to make money. You know, Jane, failure to make a plan is just a plan for failure.

Speaker 18 Follow my program, you're going to make money. I walked into my boss's office on a Monday and said, you're fired.
How many of you want to fire your boss? We're going to do it together, people.

Speaker 18 Monday morning, follow my program, you're going to make money.

Speaker 18 This one, I think I've even heard on your show. I'm like a turtle on top of a fence post.
You don't know how I got there, but you know I had help on the way up. I'm here to help you folks.

Speaker 18 Follow my program.

Speaker 5 Hire your boss or tire your husband.

Speaker 5 That's a big one. Yes.

Speaker 18 I've got a few more. There's one, it's not a vacation, it's a vacation.
You're getting paid while you're sitting on the beach.

Speaker 18 Another one that I couldn't believe, I wish I could remember who said this, but they said, in one year, we took this thing from bricks and mortar to clicks and order. We're online, people.

Speaker 18 We're on the internet worldwide 24-7.

Speaker 18 Follow my program. You're going to make money.

Speaker 18 two more uh i was always sick and tired of feeling sick and tired that's a big one and then i love this one you could be from yale or you could be from jail it doesn't matter follow my program you're gonna make damn lady jesse lee ward god rest her soul who was on our season last season said that to me

Speaker 5 yes really

Speaker 5 Yale or jail. Yeah, it doesn't matter, I guess.
Oh, that's funny. I like that that was just given to her.

Speaker 5 her that she was basically right this was during a live interview like we were just chatting and she wasn't pitching me anything because she knew i was anti-mlm but she just it was she was so practiced at these sayings that it just flew out of her mouth out of context yeah

Speaker 5 it was so weird

Speaker 12 so tell me more about your mema juice experience

Speaker 18 Yeah, I know, again, as a two-man crew and a producer, I know we had traveled out of of the state. I know that the person we're doing a success story about was a woman.

Speaker 18 And,

Speaker 18 you know, who knows why?

Speaker 18 You always go in kind of with your guard up, knowing that, hey, you're going to get sold at some point today. This is, you know, this is what they do, et cetera.

Speaker 5 Say more about that. Just what it feels like to be around pitch men all the time.

Speaker 18 I'll give you a great example is that in doing a success story, after you've done the home tour and the interview, next the producer says, Hey, Scott, get in his Mercedes with him.

Speaker 18 We need some shots of him driving on the phone, hands on the wheel.

Speaker 18 And while you're gone, we're going to set up our next thing, you know, like a mock meeting or something.

Speaker 18 So that's where, as a cameraman, I'm suddenly alone with the MLM successful person in their car. I'm in the first passenger seat trying to wiggle my camera around.

Speaker 18 Yeah, yeah, and get an angle of them. And I always tell my friends, it's like I could count down three, two,

Speaker 5 one.

Speaker 18 Here it comes. Hey, Scott, how heavy is that camera?

Speaker 18 Well, it's, it's, it's, it's heavy. You know, you think you're going to be a cameraman the rest of your life? Well, you know, that's, that's the plan.
I enjoy it.

Speaker 18 You know, supplementing that camera income may be just the perfect thing for you.

Speaker 18 And I'm like, you know, I need to film you driving and not talking out loud. We can't use footage of your mouth.
moving.

Speaker 18 So for the next 20 seconds, just stay quiet and we're going to take some turns and things here.

Speaker 5 And then you can go back to your pitch. But did you feel like you had your guard up? Like, I just wonder, like, the evolution of this.
Did you know at the beginning that you were going to be pitched?

Speaker 5 And did you have any idea that this was a scam?

Speaker 18 I did. I didn't know at the beginning that I was going to be pitched.
Like I said, most times I'm hired as a cameraman. It's, it's just a commodity.
Are you available Tuesday? It's a full day.

Speaker 18 Are you available the next three days? We're going to travel to St. Louis.
Okay. And you often don't know what you're filming.
As I got into the MLMs, of course, I was exposed to the sales side of it.

Speaker 18 Hey, this is amazing.

Speaker 18 People, you know, from all walks of life, if they get involved in this, if they work hard, they make money, we're filming success stories. These people must be successful.

Speaker 18 And I guess more as I went along in it and got exposed to it and started learning

Speaker 18 about it, you do start to realize what a challenge and a struggle it is to break even, let alone make money.

Speaker 18 Most people talk about and know that unless you're the original 10 or five founding the company, you're always, you know, paying it up the pyramid. You're, you know,

Speaker 18 the other thing I learned of, of course, of a lot of people doing training is sometimes they would get honest and say,

Speaker 18 you know, selling the product's fine, but if you're going to have success, you've got to develop downline.

Speaker 18 And that's the real emphasis is you've got to call everyone in your family, got to be in your downline. Cousins, second cousins, downline.

Speaker 18 Everyone you're working with, it's got to be in your downline. And they tout it as like guaranteed residual income.

Speaker 18 And there's kind of never a talk about if they, if they get in your downline, they might leave.

Speaker 18 That's like never a prospect. Just this idea of once you have them in your downline, look at these numbers I'm putting up.
You're going to be making money hand over foot every month automatic.

Speaker 18 You don't even have to work it anymore. Build that downline one time.
You don't have to.

Speaker 5 Isn't there like a work?

Speaker 5 It works if you work it or something like that.

Speaker 18 Yes, yes, or the problem, the program works for you if you work the program, or something like that.

Speaker 5 Yeah, and there's never any talk of the people in your downline not being able to build a replicable downline.

Speaker 5 You're supposed to recruit someone and then they recruit five others, but most of the time they don't right,

Speaker 18 right, right.

Speaker 18 And there, there was, you know, seminars and things I filmed that was kind of train the trainer, uh, where the super successful person is trying to give you the tips on how to motivate and train your downline.

Speaker 18 But it's, you know, it, it kind of turns into a zero-sum game.

Speaker 5 So how quickly did you kind of catch on that something was going weird?

Speaker 18 Like, did you, did it take you a while to

Speaker 5 understand

Speaker 5 that this was scammy?

Speaker 18 I guess pretty quickly.

Speaker 5 Do you remember like the first time you were like, wait a minute,

Speaker 5 I'm making propaganda.

Speaker 18 Yeah, yeah, yeah. That it dawned on me.

Speaker 18 I'm not sure because I, I mean, I have to be honest and say from my end, as a freelancer, I'm filming something, turning over the tapes, and that's all my involvement.

Speaker 18 I'm not doing the editing or the music or the graphics or finishing it up. I really am just there to shoot and turn over the tapes.

Speaker 18 So maybe my exposure and involvement wasn't as deep as people, you know, who ran the companies or produced

Speaker 18 the media. One of the things I learned, and

Speaker 18 I do want to share it with you is off camera there would be conversations you would hear people talking and one of the things that comes up is is the threat of taking your large downline and going to another product and that to me was was the juicy part

Speaker 18 uh was kind of hearing about yeah okay like i'm number five in this company that we founded three years ago i've built a huge downline i've got my success story my house my boat uh but within that company they're going a direction that i don't like well if they don't listen to me and take my advice, I'm going to take my entire downline.

Speaker 18 And of 9 a.m. tomorrow morning, we're selling another product.

Speaker 5 They would be talking about this in what context?

Speaker 18 You know,

Speaker 18 I assume like in any part of corporate America, there's always a bit of

Speaker 18 intrigue about what's going on with jobs and power.

Speaker 18 But I did kind of get exposed to the idea that it doesn't matter the product. I can take this downline that does everything I say.
And by tomorrow morning, say, we're no longer selling this lotion.

Speaker 18 We're selling this energy drink.

Speaker 5 Now that you know how the whole industry works,

Speaker 5 if you're a greedy, soulless person, that's a good idea because you would have to make your downline by the product.

Speaker 5 So moving to a different product is great for your bottom line.

Speaker 18 I would agree. Everybody downline has to start stocking up on the product or even just the demo sales items and stuff.
And yeah, that's huge huge today

Speaker 12 we'll be right back

Speaker 12 you're standing on the beach when you notice something strange the horizon doesn't look right at first all you can see is a thin white line then the line starts to rise you realize it's not the horizon at all it's a 30 foot tall wall of water and it's racing straight toward you what would you do on the day after christmas in 2004 a 9.1 magnitude earthquake hit off the coast of indonesia triggering a devastating tsunami It struck Thailand without warning, no alarms, no cell phone alerts, no evacuation.

Speaker 12 In this season of Against the Odds, experience one of the deadliest natural disasters in history through the perspectives of those who did everything they could to survive.

Speaker 12 Follow Against the Odds on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can binge all episodes of Against the Odds Tsunami in Thailand early and ad-free right now on Wondery Plus.

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Speaker 15 Hey, I'm Paige DeSorbo and I'm always thinking about underwear.

Speaker 22 I'm Hannah Berner and I'm also thinking about underwear, but I prefer full coverage. I like to call them my granny panties.

Speaker 21 Actually, I never think about underwear. That's the magic of Tommy John.

Speaker 22 Same, they're so light and so comfy, and if it's not comfortable, I'm not wearing it.

Speaker 15 And the bras, soft, supportive, and actually breathable.

Speaker 22 Yes, Lord knows the girls need to breathe. Also, I need my PJs to breathe and be buttery soft and stretchy enough for my dramatic tossing and turning at night.

Speaker 22 That's why I live in my Tommy John pajamas.

Speaker 15 Plus, they're so cute because they fit perfectly. Upgrade your drawer with Tommy John.

Speaker 21 Save 30% for a limited time at tommyjohn.com/slash comfort.

Speaker 15 See site for details.

Speaker 5 What was the most fun you had?

Speaker 18 You know,

Speaker 18 let me see. You know,

Speaker 18 being on a boat at sunset on some lake was a lot of fun.

Speaker 18 And it's funny, you know that as the cameraman, the editor only needs like three shots, but you're literally spending two hours to get on the boat and go out to the setting and

Speaker 18 wait for the beautiful light and everything. So that part's kind of fun.

Speaker 18 Not only filming around the U.S., but we have filmed in the Bahamas.

Speaker 18 If I remember right, certainly Hawaii. And then as a golf fan, I even got to travel and film one in St.
Andrews, Scotland.

Speaker 5 Beautiful.

Speaker 5 So

Speaker 5 were there ever moments where you did feel like you were maybe participating in something sketchy?

Speaker 5 I don't know you're a freelancer, so you're trying to do a good job and be the right guy for the job so you get the job next time. Right.

Speaker 5 You were ultimately profiting off of the downline yourself, right?

Speaker 5 I don't know. Did you ever think about that at the time? You've clearly recognized it by now, or you wouldn't be talking to me of all people.

Speaker 18 Right.

Speaker 18 Yeah. I've recognized it by now.
I mean, I can't, I hate to say it. I can't say that I had sleepless nights.

Speaker 18 I've, I've got more of a political footing now.

Speaker 18 And certainly I'm older. I'm successful.
My kids are grown. So I can turn down work.

Speaker 5 Right.

Speaker 18 And

Speaker 18 I do do that now. I ask more questions.
I've got a little more, you know, say in what I want to take and not do. At that time, it was a single income in my house.
My kids were young.

Speaker 18 And yeah, if you're called for a shoot, you know, if you turn it down, someone else is going to take it.

Speaker 5 Right.

Speaker 18 And so, yeah, you turn down a shoot, someone else is going to do that shoot. And the client is going to find out, hey, this guy's great also.

Speaker 5 Capitalism and moralism don't necessarily play well together. But what's nice about it is that you're confirming something we've all long suspected, that it, you know, that

Speaker 5 this is all highly produced. The idea of multi-level marketing being a viable business opportunity is being orchestrated and designed and produced.

Speaker 5 And you were part of that production team to make it look like something that it's not.

Speaker 18 Right, right. Very, very highly polished, very rich.

Speaker 18 You know, the videos got great color, great cinematography. Again, planning to shoot things at a beautiful time of day,

Speaker 18 really capturing that kind of story.

Speaker 18 Something that stood out to me was not only the success stories, but when we were hired to film at the meetings. Oh, yeah.
Again, to set the stage.

Speaker 18 You know, we're going to have a big explosion event of whatever our product is. Bring your five best friends and they're going to become your downline.
We guarantee it.

Speaker 18 And so lots of people show up, big ballroom, big hotel, Dallas, Texas.

Speaker 18 And again, the show is like a rock and roll show. There's pyro, there's lighting, music.

Speaker 18 But one of the things that won us as a camera crew is when people come out, we need to catch them on camera and get quick interviews about what they're going to do, what their next step is.

Speaker 18 And so you're like, hey, you just did this, you know, two-hour event. What are you going to do next? And it's so funny because almost everyone to a T would say, well, I'm excited.

Speaker 5 Oh, it was a rah-rah. I mean, were they?

Speaker 18 Yeah, well, you know, you're fired up, you know, so what's the next step? What's your plan? Well, we're just excited. We're here.
We're excited. That was exciting.
We're excited.

Speaker 18 You know, you're not getting the sound bite that you're looking for because the next person, the next person, we're just going to say, I'm just excited.

Speaker 5 I'm excited. Yes.
Yeah.

Speaker 5 Did people ever say anything negative?

Speaker 18 Not that I was exposed to. Okay.
You're helping them tell their story with the magic of high quality media.

Speaker 5 Did they seem like good people?

Speaker 5 Or could you kind of smell it on them that they were creeps?

Speaker 5 I'm serious. I don't get to be around them very much.
I've been around a few on the show.

Speaker 5 And they,

Speaker 5 if to me, I can smell it a mile away. Like this is a scare.
You know what I mean? They're trying to whip people off and they're greedy and they have a bunch of other deadly sins going on.

Speaker 5 But i you know i i don't could you tell

Speaker 18 or maybe they were good people i don't know yeah yeah maybe in their minds they were good people or when people just know there's a camera around um they're you know they're gonna they're gonna perform even if the camera's turned off or being set up for the next uh thing right

Speaker 5 how long did it take you to figure out that you were gonna get pitched every single time

Speaker 18 Probably a short amount of time because you got pitched every single time. I always had that sinking feeling when it came time for the car shot, when it came time for the Mercedes shot.

Speaker 18 And the Mercedes shot always aggravated me as a cameraman because a Mercedes is a tight, small vehicle. And this is back with beta cams, you know, the camera that goes on your shoulder.

Speaker 18 So to wedge yourself in, you can't put on a seat belt. You're trying to create a shot that isn't right up their nose.
They're taking corners and slamming you all over the place.

Speaker 5 A lunatic is driving the car. Yeah.

Speaker 18 And it's, so I always have, you know, kind of like, here comes the car shot. And then again, like I would tell myself, myself, three, two, one, once they have me alone,

Speaker 18 they would start the conversation, the innocent conversation.

Speaker 5 But still, I mean, like, you can't miss an opportunity, right?

Speaker 18 Oh, exactly. Yeah.
Yeah. If, if you're going to be successful, if I was in that business, I would be selling every single person that I ran into.
I can be a pretty persuasive

Speaker 18 person.

Speaker 5 I can tell.

Speaker 18 There was a time, I have to say, there was a time where my wife kind of threw up her hands and said, you know what?

Speaker 18 If you would just do the talking, I'll handle all the paperwork and administration and stuff if you want to get into one of these.

Speaker 5 Oh,

Speaker 18 because I from osmosis, I knew all the you could be from Yale, you could be from jail, you know, sell ice to an Eskimo. And so I did it for a brief amount of time.

Speaker 5 I thought about it.

Speaker 18 It'd be interesting during their deep interview that people again are so excited about the product, they would make medical claims that the producer would have to stop them and get them to restate that.

Speaker 5 Uh-huh.

Speaker 18 You know,

Speaker 18 I had cancer and then I started using this product and the cancer went away. Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, hold on.
Let's stop. Let's stop here.
We can say that you've had health benefits,

Speaker 18 but we can't have you on camera saying that it cured this.

Speaker 18 You know, cancer may be an extreme thing, but that, you know, you can say, I have more vitality, but, you know, you can't say that now I can bench press 200 or something because of the product.

Speaker 5 Now, were the producers part of your team or were they part of the MLM team?

Speaker 2 Where were they from?

Speaker 18 The producers,

Speaker 18 I could never guess if they were freelance or if they were on staff.

Speaker 5 Right. They must have had some education in the MLM legal side of things if they were able to correct people.
Yeah. Yes, yes.

Speaker 18 Yeah. I know the folks producing, now that I produce, I've learned a new set of, you know, a new skill set.
And so

Speaker 18 back in that case, I know that they were schooled up in knowing what they're working with and what they're trying to get as the end product that they can edit together and use.

Speaker 5 Did any of these error like as an infomercial?

Speaker 18 Not that I'm aware of. You know, the thing about MLM is

Speaker 18 we are exactly like the product you see on the shelf, but we're not sinking our money into television advertising. We're not sinking our money into media is what they tell you.

Speaker 18 We're using word of mouth. Right.

Speaker 18 That is our advertising and passing the savings on to you.

Speaker 5 Word of mouth and these DVDs that I'm going to sell you.

Speaker 18 I'll tell you, one of the great, and I would hear this often, someone motivating you to become a salesperson, to have you on downline. They would say, Jane, did you see a good movie this weekend?

Speaker 5 I actually did.

Speaker 18 Yeah. Well, so what'd you do? Did you tell some friends about it?

Speaker 5 Yeah.

Speaker 18 And And your friends probably want to see that movie now because they trust you. You're a trusted source.
You know good movies. I have good taste.
That's how MLM network marketing works. Okay.

Speaker 18 You know, you're a trusted source. You have just experienced something good and you're sharing it with people.

Speaker 5 Oh, the sharing thing.

Speaker 18 Yes. That's the pitch.
You're not selling. You're not selling.
You're sharing. If you saw a good movie this weekend, you shared that with a close friend or two.

Speaker 5 Yeah, I'm spreading the wealth of Freakier Friday.

Speaker 18 Exactly. Exactly.

Speaker 18 Another cameraman friend of mine who worked in tons of these, we had always wanted to make a documentary.

Speaker 18 Like, man, if we could follow five different people from different walks of life, out of college, retiree, divorced wife, and true documentary and follow them into an MLM,

Speaker 18 I think it'd be amazing TV. It's like, who's done that? You know, nobody.
And we kind of came to the conclusion that there's not an MLM out there that would allow unfettered cameras.

Speaker 5 Yeah,

Speaker 5 and yet, and yet, I don't think it would be as hard as you think.

Speaker 18 Yeah, maybe, maybe so. Maybe so.
So many, so many people, I mean, they believe their own bullshit.

Speaker 18 They believe they're untouchable and their product and their shtick is so good. that, you know, no one's going to break the facade.

Speaker 5 Oh, boy. Oh, God.
I just just started thinking about RFK Jr.

Speaker 5 Yeah, wow.

Speaker 5 Thanks a lot, Scott.

Speaker 12 The Dream is a production of Little Everywhere. You can email us at hello at little everywhere.com and contribute to the program at thedream.supercast.com.

Speaker 15 Hey, I'm Paige DeSorbo, and I'm always thinking about underwear.

Speaker 22 I'm Hannah Berner, and I'm also thinking about underwear, but I prefer full coverage. I like to call them my granny panties.

Speaker 21 Actually, I never think about underwear. That's the magic of Tommy John.

Speaker 22 Same, they're so light and so comfy, and if it's not comfortable, I'm not wearing it.

Speaker 15 And the bras, soft, supportive, and actually breathable.

Speaker 22 Yes, Lord knows the girls need to breathe. Also, I need my PJs to breathe and be buttery soft and stretchy enough for my dramatic tossing and turning at night.

Speaker 22 That's why I live in my Tommy John pajamas.

Speaker 15 Plus, they're so cute because they fit perfectly. Upgrade your drawer with Tommy John.

Speaker 21 Save 30% for a limited time at tommyjohn.com/slash comfort.

Speaker 15 See site for details.

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