Posted by Jeff Harman
Richard "RB" Botto Richard "RB" Botto

Producing a film consists of a million moving parts. To make a production purr like a Swiss watch, everything has to be in sync. Some people believe that meticulous planning is the key to a production's success. Others prefer to lean on less traditional methods. Today's guest blog contributor, Jeff Harman, believes that astrology cycles play a large part in a production's success. Starting his career working for George Carlin who called him "uncommonly honest", Jeff has worked over 40 years in production and studying astrology. Jeff has found that astrology offers great tools to minimize risk and plan for a successful outcome. Understanding these tools before commencing a project maximizes the benefit, he believes.

Radical? Well consider that such greats as Grace Kelly, Joan Fontaine, Glen Ford, Burl Ives, and, it's been rumored, Steven Spielberg have all used astrology as a factor in their creative lives.

Still skeptical? We'll that's quite alright. Jeff still invites you to read his story and ask him questions in the Comments section below.

I thank Jeff for his contribution to the Stage 32 Blog

Enjoy!

RB

J.P. Morgan said, “Millionaires don’t use astrology, billionaires do.” Timing is everything. When everything’s going right…that’s astrological. It’s the same when you can’t get anyone to give you the time of day. We’re living in a karmic matrix. I discovered this as a teenager, watching my mom cast the charts of my girlfriends. She was always right on. I said, “Okay, teach me this stuff.” That was back in the 70s.

Since then I have had many teachers. It was in the early 80s when I discovered the ancient systems of Classical or Traditional astrology from the west, and Vedic Astrology from India. Court astrologers, rabbis, and Brahmins counseled kings, generals, and emperors. I found this knowledge was in use from ancient Egyptian times up through the 1700’s. Then it appears to have gone underground. The best learning experience has been working with clients for nearly 40 years.

I didn’t start out as a full-time, professional astrologer. For almost twenty years I owned a studio between Milwaukee and Chicago. I filmed music videos, industrial and commercial projects, and Mother Teresa of Calcutta in the 1980s. Various state and federal agencies hired me to do audio forensics work, including the Air Traffic Controllers Strike Rockers, church choirs, jingles, industrials, and commercials were recorded in my studio. I also did studio and acoustic design and electronic mods on microphones and equipment. I filed two patents in technology and taught electronics, physics, acoustics and music at a college.

Eventually, I moved to Beverly Hills and worked with the likes of George Carlin and many others. Well, there’s no one like George Carlin. He gave me his old, filing cabinets that I still use in my office. I found $600 in them, and when I returned the money, he was so shocked that all he could say was, “Where the hell did you grow up?” He put $100 in my hand “for being uncommonly honest.”



All along I was doing astrology on the side. I respected it as a science. I was amazed at looking at many people’s charts how accurately astrology indicated high and low points in their careers and personal lives. I learned the hard way about the importance of business astrology many times. For example, I signed a deal with an investment group at an inauspicious time and lost a fortune. I’ve also seen great successes when things were commenced at good astrological times. Belief is not required, because the data speaks for itself.

I met my wife Camille, an actress from New Orleans, at a gas station in Malibu. That was a very good day. I brought my laptop on our first date, so I could enter her data and check our compatibility. We were married on a Wednesday at 10:35 a.m.

Soon, I was doing astrology full time. Clients wanted to get advice and good times to travel, sign contracts, launch entertainment projects, get married, and anything else important they were doing. Celebrities and everyone else wanted to know why they had success but not love, or they wanted insight on innumerable other common problems.

Many radio shows booked me, such as Coast to Coast AM with George Noory. It happened right when my progressed Moon was in the 10th house, a great indicator for career growth. My client roster got even more interesting. I was advising people all over the world, some who worked for rather interesting employers such as the World Bank, the Federal Reserve, and various special ops and private security firms.

I invested in building a film production company. I bought a mobile rig and customized it for production. I’ve been doing various productions over the years.



Now it’s great to be able to blend my two areas of interest. I’m not the first. The great actor Robert Mitchum was a ghostwriter for the famous, Hollywood astrologer Caroll Righter, who advised Ronald and Nancy Reagan during Reagan’s governorship and presidency. His other clients included Grace Kelly and Joan Fontaine. Glen Ford, Burl Ives, and many other celebrities used astrology. I’ve read that Spielberg was blown away by astrology. Sting uses it.



Entertainment projects are high-risk endeavors with many stages of planning. Astrology offers great tools to minimize risk and plan for a successful outcome. Understanding these tools before commencing a project maximizes the benefit. So, let me list the astrologer’s toolkit.

First there is a basic reading. A person can find out through Vedic, Nadi, Classical, and Kabbalistic Astrology what their strengths and weaknesses are and what energetic cycles are current and upcoming. Are you in a cycle that indicates it’s time to bring your gifts to the world or one that indicates you should work behind the scenes and do some groundwork?

Astro-cartography is a way of mapping a person’s geographic energies. Do you wonder if you should move to L.A., New York, New Orleans, or some other exciting place in the world? This technique maps your personal energies around the globe and is based on your birth date, time and place. There will be permanent energies for you in a given place, as well as temporary energies that are an overlay. Actors, producers and directors love these short term, tactical reads on what their energy will be like at a given location during the time they’ll be there for production.


Production is a social business based on great working relationships. Interrogation Astrology, or Prasna, as it is known in Vedic Astrology, is the most direct way to get an answer to a specific question, such as: “Is it my best interest to take this acting job?” “Is it in my best interest to hire so and so for this project?” “Will shooting next month in South America go smoothly?” This is the only type of astrology that does not utilize your birth data or the data of anyone else.

If you want to take it deeper, Vedic Astrology offers the best way of checking compatibility between partners. The astrologer will need the birth time, date, and place of each party to be analyzed. This goes way beyond the sun sign generalizations of which many are familiar. By the way, I can’t stand sun sign astrology. It’s like saying all red cars are fast. Compatibility analysis illustrates who has the power, how the intellects are matched, if there is mutual respect, and if the relationship can be profitable financially.

Kings, emperors and business moguls were heavily dependent on Electional Astrology, the art of choosing an auspicious day and time to schedule something important. This is the most advanced type of astrology.

Reagan used it when he was sworn in as governor of California in the middle of the night. George Washington used it to lay the cornerstone for the U.S. Capital. It can be used to set travel dates, schedule a wedding, open a business, schedule surgery, sign contracts, start production, and release product such as films and books. Clients who are restaurant owners, authors, and actors use this frequently.

Vedic and Nadi Astrology, from India, offer remedial measures for correcting astrological energies. These include mantras, yantras, prayers and gem prescriptions. Traditionally, planetary energies are assigned to certain gemstones. For many years I have obtained and set gems at specific times relative to a person’s energies, and they have reported significant changes in their lives. Gems used for this purpose must be natural, untreated, large, and mounted so they touch the skin.

If I can offer advice if you chose to include astrology into your creative planning, when choosing an astrologer I suggest you find one who uses ancient, Vedic, Nadi, and Traditional Western Astrology, not Modern Astrology. Traditional astrologers will be more familiar with the techniques of Interrogation Astrology, Electional Astrology, Mundane Astrology (the astrology of the world in general), in addition to Natal Astrology, the astrology of your birth and your dashas (time period cycles), transits and progressions.

Astrology will not make your career. You have to have skills, tenacity and do hard work. I examined the difficult astrological aspects impacting Robin Williams at the time of his death. I wish he’d known that the horrible aspects were temporary.

I use the analogy of a pilot reading a weather report before flight. He can fly around a storm, delay his departure, or merely instruct the attendants to delay serving coffee for a while. He still has a plan--to get from Point A to Point B. But he uses the weather report to get there safely.

Astrology helps you keep the drama on the screen. Many people have heard of Law of Attraction, however, there are other karmic laws at play in the universe. Look at life from an aerial shot, and do your best.


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As always, Jeff is available for thoughts and remarks in the Comments section below...

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