INHERITED WEALTH:
WHAT BREEDS THE NEW ZOMBIES OF SUCCESS
By Ana Lola Roman
Definition of Success '07: common disease indigenous only to those whose parents conform to two of the below:
1. Brunch with Rod Stewart
2. Get loaded at Kentucky Derbies
3. Know or have done coke with one of the Schnabels1
4. Drink Tab
When I first got to New York, a certain "professional" told me that most of the city is born and bred on inherited wealth. I was told not to worry, because that's not really the case in the art, corporate, music, or fashion jungles. We go to work, eat, sometimes sleep, sometimes have sex, poop if we are lucky, and
never really think of anything else. Of course that's the case with most people who take anti-depressants. A year passed; I learned the tricks of my trade(s), got on some anti-anxieties myself, and realized that
while I'm busy being a "professional," someone's getting a head-start to the finish line. Those at the finish line are usually there by age nineteen, and while they are "interning" you can be sure they already have a job secure for them simply because one of their parents has two paintings hanging at the MoMA. They are somewhat zombie-ish in manner, smug, and happy to have a closet filled with duds that would take five years for everyone else to save up for. Some of these zombies have the faint smell of Eau de Rock Star Parents, or Parfum de Designer Mother.
You can identify these zombies bombarding you at every turn: "Daughter of So-and-So" turns up in Paper as often as the daily junk mail, or "Son of Horrible Rock Star" in The New Yorker on every dingy subway car. In most magazines the name usually reads "Daughter of a Director," "Daughter of a Burnt-Out Artist," "Cousin of a Designer," "Son of Lady Nausea." I could just kill myself for not having parents that could never abstract paint, fuck loads of groupies, and/or marry aristocrats.
Later, I learned the term "freelance. " "Freelance" is just a clever thing to say instead of having to actually admit you're in between jobs. I wouldn't believe otherwise, simply because people say it too
much. I wonder if Sofia Coppola ever freelances, or those guys from the Strokes.
For those of us whohave not been invited into the clubhouse, inherited wealth suddenly appears as a warm little nest egg that follows these zombies around for the rest of their lives, cushy, golden, and blue. In case you haven't noticed, there's more of it to go around than ever before. Nowadays, your hard work, going the extra mile, and having totally anonymous parents with last names that mean zilch will probably not get you to the finish line as fast as these other zombies.
These are the kids that, while everyone waits for their turn in line, cut in front because their daddy is the president of the Golf Club committee. Some of them will stick their tongues out at you, and some of them won't. The ones who don't stick their tongues out at you are the ones who are trapped inside their limousines. The ones who do stick their tongues out at you are the ones who make shitty art mocking the $15.00 we spent at the Whitney Biennial.
But who's to blame whom just because we don't have rich parents? I can't be that bitter, and I'm not. No, really. I overhear conversation after conversation about the ever-going phenomenon of the last name. have; they're just born. Of course it's getting harder and harder for my peers to slough off the excuse that they can't help what families they were born into.
Once a week I usually overhear something along the lines of, "If I were son of so-and-so, I think I could have already had my album picked up by a record company" or, "She just got that position because her mother owns a fashion house." Now, these are just petty excuses to prevent someone from working harder. Or are they? At this stage in the game I'm prone to think they go hand in hand. Why should we have to work harder and bust three nuts just because we don't have flashy last names to lend our
employers, put at the end our films, and display on our newly-minted CDs?
The struggling director reads about a new film from Cassavettes or Coppola and wonders if he could have made it just as fast in the film world as they did. But for every famous Cassavettes there's a Tarantino who busted his ass at the local video store. A frustrated musician reads about the Strokes and how Julian Casablancas gets all the girls. But for every rich New York rocker kid there's a TV on the Radio guy who waited tables and worked as a barista at some shitty café.
Despite all the inherited wealth, shoes, and cars that surround our generation more and more, it's hard to keep everything in perspective. Meaning, it's hard not to bitch and moan about it despite all the hard work, late hours you put in, and money out of your pocket you have invested into your own pursuits. But doesn't it seem that for every "hard-working" anonymous person who makes it there were fifteen before him with last names to lend? Those fifteen were either part of a family business film monopoly or had one mother and two aunts who invested their money at the fashion house.
Beware of these zombies, kids. Know that they're out there either right behind you or hogging the spaces in front of you. The only surefire antidote against them is to keep busting your ass and working your fingers to bone and hopefully one day you'll have some zombies yourself that will steal your last name and work it for all it's worth.
* Spawn of Julian Schnabel, 80s painter and director. He went on to direct Basquiat and Before Night Falls. Rubbed elbows with the 80s Downtown art scene and glitterati.
