Michael Jim Spilotro press photographer americano e collega di Ron Gallela in visita a Palazzo Sarcinelli a Conegliano, ci regala alcuni sui scatti suggestivi, Grazie!
"Thank you so very much for the tour and the most incredible showing of photos."
© 2023 Credit Michael Spilotro ( Instagram @michaeljs )
Michael Spilotro told us: << My first sighting of Ron Galella happened just after I moved to New York City in the 90’s while I was photographing an event loaded with celebrities posing on the red carpet. He was about 6 feet something tall, well dressed in a suit, looking and appearing much better than the rest of us photographers. He came equipped with a Nikon F3 camera around his neck with a very large “potato masher” Metz flash attached to it. It was kind of intimidating to see him in the flesh as his reputation preceded him. But to actually see him in person doing “his thing” in such close proximity to me was not something I had ever imagined happening. He slid to the front of the red velvet ropes with his camera at his chest while he yelled out the celebrities names while blasting away with his flash. Watching him work was like watching a finely tuned machine in that no move made was wasted, his every action obviously tempered by years of experience. I had heard numerous stories about him in the news chasing celebrities on the streets; but I never thought he’d ever come to something as boring as a celebrity event on a red carpet.
When the event was over I had a chance to introduce myself. I briefly chatted him up but he was too focused and somewhat rushed trying to get to the lab to process his exposed film immediately afterwards. He was all business. During the days of film, this was standard practice for most photographers that worked with agencies and shot celebrities. It was of the upmost importance to have the processed film in the agency offices that night or first thing in the morning. Because if the photographer luckily took any “exclusive” photos the agents could call publications and let photo editors know these images were available for sale. This allowed agents like Ron’s wife Betty, to make sales beating out the competition at times for very lucrative amounts of money based on the scarcity of the image, who was in the photo, or perhaps even a “wardrobe malfunction” where a celebrity showed a little more than should have.
Ron was wanting to extend his reach and do multiple events each night. He hired photographers to shoot events for him because he could only be at one place at a time. This freed up Ron to attend and shoot what he felt were the most important events. He paid these photographers a salary to which he would own the copyright and all rights to every image shot by these photographers. This would help grow the Ron Galella brand footprint, enable his business to cover multiple events in New York and Los Angeles on a daily basis, and build his legendary photo library.
Eventually it got to the point where I was able to interact with Ron about once or twice a month. The most memorable day I had with Ron was the opportunity to work side by side with him at one of the largest movie premieres that I’d ever covered in New York City. Ron and I were both at the Ziegfeld Theater for the world premiere of the movie Cop Land. There was a large contingent of international press there because so many major movie stars would be in attendance. Needless to say Ron was laser focused as he shot each and every celebrity that walked down the red carpet. Ron yelled to get the celebrities attention while shooting his Nikon with the light from his huge flash dwarfing all others. I basically shot my images of these celebrities “feasting at the table Ron set”, as he did all of the hard work to get the attention of these famous A-list actors and actresses as he coaxed them to look our way. And yes; they acknowledged Ron, there is no question that most if not all knew who Ron was.
It was total thrill for me to work right next to someone who was deserved of the title Paparazzo Superstar; because that’s exactly who Ron Galella was. >>
THANK YOU !