LAWRENCE SCOTT:
MY CELEBRITY AFFAIRS
by Loy Bernal Carlos
Photo by Gruber Photographers
But look beyond the casually conservative clothes and you’ll quickly find his personality in abundance. Larry can be described as dramatic without being outrageous and ridiculous. He is indefatigable at work, and fierce in his acceptance of what and who he is. “My mother is dead. I no longer need anybody’s approval.”
He attributes part of his strength in character to being bullied as a child (it’s hard to imagine this now since he towers over most people). “It’s made me who I am today. Government couldn’t have done that for me,” he deduced. “At age 58, I love what I do. I get to say no, that’s the difference. I can pick and choose what I want to work on.”
He values his choices dearly. “I can say, ‘no, thank you’ to a celebrity or billionaire. It’s not [always] worth telling their stories.” Pressed on the matter, he is reluctant to elaborate. He guards the privacy and secrets of clients–even those that don’t work out–like a sphynx.
To illustrate, he describes an episode of a husband who was berating his wife, criticizing all her ideas for a party. The verbal abuse made Larry uncomfortable. True to his nature of standing up to bullies, he proceeded to point out to him that the man spends much of his time in the city while his wife is relegated to a life in suburbia. To Larry, it did not make any sense that the husband would expect the kind of cosmopolitan party that he is familiar with to be thrown by his wife who leads a rather stepford life. Where would she get that exposure?
One other character trait he especially detests is narcissism. He points out the futility in dealing with a narcissist’s misery. “Working with them is constantly walking on egg shells. You can never make them happy...they don’t know what happiness is!” Although Larry believes this relates to their upbringing, “I’m not there to play therapist.”
Don’t misunderstand. Demanding clients are not the same as narcissistic ones. He is undeterred by the former. “I’m not afraid to deal with difficult clients.” Instead, he thinks of it as a ‘higher being’ that’s handing him a challenge. And when he succeeds, he relishes the sweet satisfaction of a job well done. “It’s my F*ck You moment! You thought I couldn’t do this…You have to have faith in yourself.”
Egotistical ones notwithstanding, his long list of clients from fashion designers to celebrities to politicians do have unbridled faith in Larry Scott. That includes Michael Bolton, Drew Barrymore, the Hadids, John Varvatos (whose wedding he did), Donna Karan, Vera Wang, Bill Clinton, Mitt Romney, etc.
But one client whom he describes as a dear friend that best mirrors Larry’s fiercely unfiltered, no-nonsense attitude is Judge Judy, the beloved judge and TV personality who has won millions of viewers’ hearts with searing statements to plaintiffs and defendants like “Do I have stupid written on my forehead?” and “Sir, don’t pee on my leg and tell me it’s raining!”.
Lawrence Scott with Rosanna Scotto and Lori Stokes, Good Day NY
This event producer has nothing but admiration and high-praise for her. “A lot of celebrities believe what they read about themselves. They don’t know that something can always happen that changes everything. Judge Judy is not like that, maybe because she got it all later in life when it was her time to get it. She walks into a room and says hello to all my staff. She is human. She takes pictures with them, gets it all out of the way. Then everyone goes to work. With her, what you see is what you get.”
Another friend and client whom he is particularly fond of is WNYW’s Good Day New York co-anchor Rosanna Scotto. “She is a [well-known] local news woman.” he continues, “but she is real. She comes with no agenda. She helps so many people.”
To Larry Scott, both exemplify hard work and integrity, which he values, himself. His motto is “Class never trash.” And this necessarily means “putting in the work before.”
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Lawrence Scott with Judge Judy and Judge Jerry Sheindlin