Meet Reginald Matthews

My career interest in entertainment, sports, and media law started back in high school when I was in Battle Creek, Michigan. I had a huge passion for journalism and I had obtained my first internship at the newspaper covering different stories dealing with students and community events. At the time, the artist Ciara was coming to town to do to a concert and eventually, she ended up canceling the show due to low ticket sales. When the show was canceled – instead of doing a story that emphasized how disappointed people were that she was not coming, I focused on what happens when a celebrity cancels a show from a legal prospective.

My interest in entertainment law grew from there. I then moved to Atlanta to attend Morehouse College. That is when I really began to grow and nurture my interest in entertainment, media and sports with different opportunities. My first ever job within the industry was as an assistant in the Office Alumni Relations and Institutions Advancement for Morehouse. I worked under the director and his then – Executive Assistant. During that time I worked and helped manage Morehouse events including Homecoming, Gala, and Commencement. Morehouse, having the large presence that it does in the community, I was exposed to many different celebrities, politicians, athletes, and public figures that helped cultivate my interest in entertainment and learning about the groundwork for managing celebrities while in the care of other entities and how to get them there.

The job at Morehouse eventually catapulted me into a new summer position Legal and Brand Management Assistant for a prominent celebrity judge and television star.  I began to understand different aspects of the television world, managing the brands of different individuals, and how they are perceived in the public eye. I started working there at the perfect time. The Judge and her team were in the midst of doing a rebrand and working on developing a new television show. I was able to get involved in the rebranding and the beginning stages of the television show development. This is where I really gained my first-hand knowledge on how a television show goes from an idea to reality.

While working as their legal and brand assistant, I leveraged my ability to swim and started teaching swim lessons at the Buckhead YMCA where I eventually obtained a client list of politicians, judges, lawyers, real housewives, bankers, managers, rappers, singers, models, publicists, actors/actresses, producers, and directors. There was no better way to gain the respect and trust of these individuals that teaching them and/or their children how to swim. This is a pivotal point in my career where I was able to harness my skills in the water to forge bonds and relationships outside of the water that I still maintain today.

I later transitioned into sports for a period of time where I worked with different athletes across the US with their business affairs including their non-profits. The organization that I worked with also had a focus on educating individuals who are just getting drafted or entering into the league and how to navigate this entirely new industry. There was also a division where we began the transition out of the league and making a lasting impact on the community. Here is where I was able to forge relationships with NFL players and teams and gain first-hand experience managing the business aspect of a player off the field. I was able to touch everything from brand building, how to pick the right team to represent you, financially do’s and don’t’s, social media ethics, player contracts, NFL Compliance, and event planning.

Fast forward to law school where I took a position as a summer law clerk at a small yet powerful entertainment firm in Downtown in Atlanta. During that summer, I worked on different projects for different rappers and entertainers, reality tv stars, business entities, and several pieces of multi-million dollar litigation.

 At this point, I had fully decided on being an entertainment attorney and going the full experience of what being an entertainment attorney.   I was fully engrossed in entertainment law and the late nights, long meetings, constant phone calls, and emails, and contract after contract after contract.

Summer 2018 I had the  unique opportunity to go in-house and worked for an athletic conference where I was the intermediary between the legal, compliance, and business team and their outside legal counsel. I worked on different compliance (business and athletic) issues, media and first amendment rights, media and broadcasting contracts,  and worked with the strategic media and communications team during their media day and press conferences for different sports within conference. I will also mention that I was working for the sports conference in the midst of the Kaepernick kneeling protest which caused me to see first hand where constitutional law and sports intertwined.

While navigating through all of these different jobs, I managed to maintain my relationship with my bosses, supervisors, co-workers and the people that I had met while working for them – this is what fostered my network of entertainment professionals. So much so that I attended the BESLA (Black Entertainment and Sports Lawyers) Conference my last year of law school. While attending the conference, I had the opportunity to network and foster relationships with different entertainment professionals that have become my mentors and friends. These mentors and friends have helped push me to my full potential and helping me secure meetings and interviews in New York and LA at some of the top entertainment firms, production companies, PR Firms, and with some of the worlds top creators. These meetings have turned into job and project opportunities that landed me at the Super Bowl and the Grammys this year. I have been extremely blessed in my entertainment endeavors.

It is never a smooth road – especially in the entertainment industry. One of the biggest challenges, I’ve faced, is making sure that I stay consistent, diligent, and determined. You cannot get discouraged if you don’t get an email back from that executive, partner, counsel, or manager don’t get discouraged. They are running some of the largest media/entertainment companies in the world or they are working with some of the worlds largest creators in the world. It may take several days for them to respond or they have pushed an email off to their assistant and it has slipped through the cracks. Don’t take it personally – the “follow up” email or phone call is key!

Also, understand that not everyone in this industry has your best interest at heart – there are a lot of opportunist and clout chasers who are just in it for themselves. I’ve have had someone my best friends and mentors who I thought were 100% “Team Reginald”  not care about me at all and did a lot of shady and unprofessional things to make them look better or get a step ahead of me. Which is why I think it is very important to understand who you are and have a good grasp on your moral, values, and ethics before you fully dive into the industry. People will coerce and manipulate you into doing or saying things that are completely out of your character and will make you believe that it is “just the nature of the entertainment beast” but in all actuality, it is to diminish or even destroy your brand.

Also, understand within the entertainment, media, and sports industry there is a lot of money. Getting to and attending these events are expensive and are not easily accessible to students. I was sure to always ask event organizers if there was a student rate so that I was able to attend the event and not break the bank.

My current plan is to specialize in the traditional entertainment sphere and business law  (copyright, trademark, contracts, entity formation, 501c3 formation, deal-making, NDA’s, etc.) but I also want to operate in more of the brand management for young creatives. Helping people curate and grow their passions and protect them while they are doing so. I find now that so many people don’t know the importance of protecting their brand as they are beginning to launch themselves and at a blink of an eye, they can have their entire brand and all that they have worked for taken away from them.

I think that one thing that sets me apart from other law students wanting to practice in entertainment is that I have been introduced to many different facet of the entertainment, media, and sports law industry, understand that there is a process, and that it is imperative to trust the process and pay your dues.   A lot of my colleagues think that they are going to graduate law school, pass the bar, and become counsel or general counsel instantly. No one wants to be an assistant, or an analyst, or a coordinator with a law degree but that’s how it starts when you do not have the experience or knowledge to run a legal department. I understood quickly that I am going to have to work my way up from the bottom. Understanding that I have been an assistant twice and I may have to go back to being someone assistant for a third or come in as a legal and business affairs manager or a contract analyst. I have set my expectations realistically and understand that I don’t have the skillset or experience to run Netflix, Viacom, Sony, or Parkwood Entertainment right now but with patience and hard work in a couple of years, I will but it’s not going to happen right out the gate.

Upon graduating law school and taking the Georgia bar – I plan on practicing entertainment law in Atlanta, but also expand and take the California and New York bar to fully gain the entertainment experience and operate in the largest entertainment markets.

What I am looking forward to/planning is going “in-house” or operating within entertainment, media, or sports entity such as Netflix or Viacom. The ultimate goal would be to work at Parkwood Entertainment.

 I also want to take the knowledge and insight that I have obtained through talking to people and different experiences and help others get into the entertainment industry and help them understand that there are other opportunities within the entertainment industry besides being counsel or general counsel (although that typically is the ultimate goal). There is more than one way to get into a company and there is more than one way to get into the legal department and climb the corporate legal ladder.