My agent used to respond to cheapskate clients with the line you'd like to *screw the wife as well?,
*self imposed censorship, with those of a more sensitive disposition in mind. His language was of course a tad less reserved.
The trouble is, Keith, many would reply yes, seems like a good offer; I
would like to screw the wife as well!
I was asked to quote for a knitwear catalogue some years after I left the UK.
The guy who rang me up was a designer I'd known before I left, and he asked me to quote for the shoot etc. and the understanding was that we would find a local hotel or apartment for the models, and that he'd stay with us.
A couple of days after agreeing that, I got a fax from him telling me that he was no longer on the travel list, and that the knitwear company's designer was coming in his place. I said sorry, no way I am having a stranger come live with us for a week or so. At the same time, I received a copy of an existing brochure for another company, which the supposed client company wanted me to match. This production would have cost twenty times the budget, at least, of the deal I had negotiated.
I faxed my designer friend back and said forget it, no deal. I won't do the shoot; there isn't the budget to do what your client wants. I sent a copy to his client outlining the fact that there was no way that a small shoot could match the production values of one with many models, a team of hair, makeup artists etc. and that anyway, my own techniques/style were diametrically opposed to the sort they had sent as sample of their understanding of "perfection". The initial response was how much more money do you need? I replied that it was now nothing to do with money, but of an impossible relationship, and that as far as I was concerned it didn't fly.
It might have been interesting to see what they eventually came up with.
Some jobs are doomed before they begin; learning that is a valuable lesson.