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The Difference Between Great and Dumbass Producers | Studio Monthly: “A real producer holds the vision of the project. They’re the first person to turn on the lights in the morning, and the last person to turn out the lights at night. They are the leader, the go-to person, the solution-provider, the conflict resolver. They are consistent, passionate, fair and fierce. They know how to pick their battles. They know how to inspire others, even and especially when they are taking hits and bleeding profusely from their own battles to keep the ship afloat. They are everyone’s confidante, keep everyone’s counsel, but beat to their own drum. Their number one client: the Director. Their number one loyalty: the project — which brings us back around to vision.” That was a passionate response. Clearly John has affection for producers. I think with those words, he just defined the position as it should be. But I certainly know “producers” who are nothing like that. Obviously they don’t work at Dreamworks.

Clearly there is a massive rift between the real producers and wannabies. The problem as I see it is that there are more producer pretenders/Dumbass producers out there than I like to see;. Some (mostly younger IMHO) studio execs have clearly been sucked in by “producers” who talk a good game. Consider the number of really bad movies getting made when there is much better material out there being ignored. A lot of really awful TV is being foisted upon us and, to quote Howard Beale, “I’m mad as hell and I’m not going to take it anymore.” Thus you see the motivation for this column.

Originally from unmediated on September 22, 2008, 12:04am