Scott Manners, a veteran talent agent who co-founded Artists & Representatives, died Friday, Jan. 19. He was 68.
He died at home in Los Angeles, surrounded by his family, after a bout of ALS.
The partners at Artists & Representatives announced Manners’ passing in a statement, writing, “Through the years, we have each been moved by his commitment and mission to brilliantly represent the artists who bring our society closer to love. It was his life’s work to make a difference every day and change lives for the better.”
Manners’ work in Hollywood extends as far back as 1978, when he landed an acting role in “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band.” He co-founded the boutique talent agency Stone Manners with Tim Stone nearly four decades ago. In 2010, after Glenn Salners was promoted to partner, the agency rebranded to Stone Manners Salners. And the company was renamed again in 2019, to Artists & Representatives, as it added more partners and expanded to New York.
At Artists & Representatives, Manners represented actors including Debra Jo Rupp (“That ’70s Show”), Bruce McGill (“Reacher”) and Keith David (“American Fiction”).
Struggling to find words to convey Manners’ influence, the Artists & Representatives partners pointed to a Eugene O’Neill quote that Manners often recited. The quote goes: “The people who succeed and do not push on to a greater failure are the spiritual middle class. The man who pursues the mere attainable should be sentenced to get it — and keep it. Let him rest on his laurels and enthrone him in a Morris chair, in which laurels and hero may wither together. only through the unattainable does man achieve a hope worth living and dying for — and so attain himself.”
The partners added, “Scott never ceased pushing for the next ‘unattainable’ after each victory, while inspiring hope and passion in everyone who knew him.”
