Curiosity Thrills This Cat

My world was small growing up. I never really left the three-mile radius of my tiny neighborhood in the San Fernando Valley. Still, I was always a curious kid. My Grandma Sonia would always say to me, "You're so special. You're going to be very successful. Think big. Be big."

When I was young, I could read — but it was very hard for me. I'd look at my report card, see straight D's and F's, and say to myself, "There's no evidence that I'm going to be that special kid my grandmother thinks I'm going to be." I didn't want to break her heart and say, "Hey, Grandma, I don't think that's going to happen." So I continued to dig deeper, ask questions and evolve as a person.

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Smash cut, I graduate from college and realize I didn't learn much except for how to get good grades. I decided to meet with this famed professor at my alma mater. I sent him letters and called his assistant and didn't get a response, so I decided to wait outside his classroom, approach him and ask for 10 minutes of his time. He said OK. I managed to turn the 10-minute coffee with him into one and a half hours. The experience was so far beyond anything I ever could have imagined in terms of learning, emotional and intellectual growth, wisdom, and some real takeaways with what he was doing with neurolinguistics, which was at its most nascent stage at the time. I felt my value as a person becoming bigger just having spent time with this man. And that was the moment I decided to start doing curiosity conversations.

Right around then, I got a job as a law clerk at Warner Bros. and decided that every day I'd meet a new person in the movie or television business. I had this canned speech. It went, "Hi, my name is Brian Grazer. I work at Warner Bros. in business affairs. I'd like to come meet your boss" — I never started out talking to the boss — "and I promise you that I do not want a job."

Everybody said yes. Not necessarily that day, but I learned that if I kept going and pushing and researching — whether it was Mel Brooks or Warren Beatty — they'd eventually relent and give me the 10 minutes that I could turn into an hour. These conversations became a discipline. And I learned so, so much. Then, once I had produced the film Splash, I said, "Now I'm going to meet everybody outside of show business."

Being curious isn't something you get tested on. A movie has to get good reviews, high grosses — it has to beat expectations. The same thing with television and the ratings. But being curious isn't like that. It's not a public thing. It's private, and the test is a private one. You have to be on your toes. Once, I met with Isaac Asimov and his wife. They left after two minutes. He said, "You don't know enough about my work," and he was right. I hadn't done enough research.