Cast of Characters.

When filmmakers and advertisers need role players who tend toward the extreme, they call Dragon Talent, which has made its mark by casting punkers, bikers, piercing buffs and others outside of the Hollywood mainstream

TALENT agents Robin Harrington and Chaim Magnum believe that people should have alternatives in life and in business. And they've made it their business to offer plenty of alternatives.

Harrington and Magnum run Dragon Talent, which in the past six years has carved a niche in the entertainment industry by providing non-traditional talent you wouldn't see from such high-brow agencies as William Morris or Elite Models: bikers, punkers, cross-dressers, the multi-tattooed, the multi-pierced, the awkward, the "vertically challenged," the pimpled teenage geek with braces.

"We're always looking for someone who's different," said Harrington, 33, a former Los Angeles underground-club producer who founded Dragon Talent in 1995, operating it out of the home in which she was living in Los Feliz. "We're proof that there is a market out there for people who don't fit the traditional mold of what people think a model or actor should look like."

Although Harrington and Magnum decline to discuss revenues, business apparently is good. They now work out of a penthouse office on Wilshire Boulevard in Beverly Hills, representing approximately 250 people.

Dragon Talent clients have included such mainstream corporate giants as Coca-Cola, Pepsi, Kodak, McDonald's, Taco Bell, Pacific Bell, Reebok, Adidas, Nike, AT&T, Tropicana, Verizon, Hallmark Cards, JELL-O, Citibank, Snapple, automakers Volkswagen, Chevrolet, Mercedes-Benz, Mitsubishi and Cadillac and beer labels Budweiser, Miller and Coors.

Dragon also has placed talent in a variety of movie and television shows, including the films "Batman and Robin," "Father's Day," "Crocodile Dundee in L.A.," "Bubble Boy," "Evolution," "Coyote Ugly," "Space Cowboys," a "rockumentary" of singer Britney Spears and the Showtime production "Holiday Heart." Network TV placements include "Roseanne," "Grace Under Fire" and "Baywatch."

Used in music videos

Add to that hundreds of music video bookings. Some recent videos featuring Dragon personnel are by recording artists such as Madonna, Sugar Ray, Smash Mouth, Blink 182, Black Crowes, Crazy Town, Destiny's Child and Jennifer Lopez.

Harrington estimates that at least 50 of the people she and Magnum represent are full-time models and actors.

"Some people can make a pretty good living at it," she said.

One of those people is Judy Jean Kwon, who has worked with Dragon Talent for four years. Kwon has had a successful run in that time, appearing in numerous television commercials and print ads. She currently can be seen in Orchard Supply Hardware, Verizon and Tropicana commercials, as well as in ads playing on hundreds of automated teller machines.

"I went to an ATM and my face popped up," Kwon said. "It was freaky."

Kwon, a Korean-American, believes Dragon is at least partially responsible for making the ad market more accessible to ethnic talent.

"Dragon took a chance on me and others and put us out there in the market," she said. "A lot of agencies wouldn't have even looked at me because I'm totally not the typical model beauty. But the first day. I signed with (Dragon), they booked me on a job.

Tracking the trends

As wide a territory as Dragon covers with the people it represents, it still has to keep abreast of trends, Harrington said.

"What was cutting-edge in 1995 isn't necessarily cutting-edge now," she said. "Tattoos, for one, are a lot more mainstream today than they were then. What people think is freaky but cool changes like other styles do. The awkward look, the "Geek Chic" look, is popular right now, but it will change, too. We want to be risky, but we still have to have an idea of what's coming."

Keeping a finger on the pulse of the counterculture takes a certain amount of investigative work, 31-year-old Magnum said.

"We keep in touch with the street culture," he said. "What we don't see for ourselves, we have kids out on the street -- going to clubs, hanging out, finding out what people are into, what's happening."

Magnum said he and Harrington think they know what the next underground style will be. They aren't talking about it, though.

"It's our secret for now," he said.

Magnum believes Dragon Talent's success has come about as a result of an age-old business principle: Find a need and fill it.

"We thought it would go, that it had a good chance, but we didn't think it would grow this fast," he said. "It's like little rabbits multiplying around here. We're becoming more and more mainstream. Even Hallmark and JELL-O have used our people, and they are about as conservative as you can get. Even they want to be cool and hip.

"I think we just recognized what people were looking for," Magnum said. He added that, in the past, scouts in the entertainment and advertising industries would have to hit the streets themselves to find offbeat people when they wanted them for a show, a film, a music video or an ad, Now Dragon Talent does it for them.

"Usually, agencies send bottles of champagne to casting directors, but it's vice-versa for us. Casting directors send us bottles of champagne. We save them work."

The agency has also gained respect from other, more-established and traditional agencies.

"We get referrals from other agencies," Harrington said. "They say, 'We really can't do anything with this person, but we think he or she has a look that you may want.' We have a very open mind and we say, 'OK,' and take a look. And sometimes, the people we get sent do a lot of work for us."

Kwon said the agency has helped break down a lot of stereotypes.

"(Harrington and Magnum) take people who are offbeat and market them, and because of that, they have helped make people realize there's a whole new group of talented people out there that can do this and do it well."