Next Gen 2011: Hollywood's Fastest-Rising Stars
Maryasis, 29, has been with UTA since graduating from Pennsylvania's Haverford College in 2004 despite her Russian immigrant parents' disappointment that she was passing up a career in law. ("They thought 'agent' sounded like a fake job," she says.) She had enjoyed a summer internship at Gersh after her junior year, so the Brooklyn-born Maryasis moved to L.A. and worked on the desks of UTA's Jeremy Zimmer and Andrew Cannava. As an agent, she has signed new writing talent such as Lauren Miller & Katie Naylon (the upcoming comedy feature For a Good Time, Call …) and discovered the work of filmmaker Lena Dunham before her no-budget comedy Tiny Furniture brought her major buzz. "It's an example of sometimes you gotta take a chance and trust your gut," she says. Maryasis indulges her love of travel by taking two big trips a year. A recent jaunt to Iceland involved glacier lagoons, black-sand beaches and dining on fermented shark. "I love trying new foods -- the weirder, the better," she says. That eagerness and flexibility also inform Maryasis' approach to clients. "The most important thing is being open to different ways of making films," she says. "I find that the new changes are exciting, and it's made room for a lot of entrepreneurial writers and directors."
