[PW] Producer

[Askapart]

I'm intrigued by this, Nina, as I've got friends who work in theatre here in the UK, who would distinguish between the 'director', who is the person responsible for the artistic interpretation and staging of the piece, and the 'producer', who is concerned with financial and/or mangerial issues. I think the usage of 'producer' to mean the person responsible for the staging is now outdated. My grandmother used to talk about the 'producer' when she was telling stories of amateur theatricals, and I remember working out that what she meant was what I thought of as the director.
   
  I've looked at a few UK opera company websites, and they all seem to use the word director in the same way: i.e. the person responsible for the staging and interpretation, who works with the conductor/music director. See for example Welsh National Opera at http://www.wno.org.uk/index.cfm and English National Opera at http://www.eno.org/index.php. As far as I can see by comparing this with US opera companies, the usage is therefore the same.
   
  With reference to the original question, there's a list of who does what in television production on the website of the UK's Economic and Social Research Council at http://tinyurl.com/3ae2xd.

  Bridget
  
Nina Gilbert <ninagilbert at yahoo.com> wrote:
  
I was waiting to hear from someone in the U.K. about this. I think it's a British-vs.-American language question. Where British people say someone "produces" an opera, Americans use "direct." I've known that for many years, before I became an opera educator. See http://ninagilbert.googlepages.com/British.html

Hope this helps,

Nina Gilbert
Education and Community Programs Manager, Boston Lyric Opera

------------------------------------------------
Nina Gilbert
ninagilbert at yahoo.com

----- Original Message ----
From: Adrian Smith 
To: list at project-wombat.org
Sent: Tuesday, June 26, 2007 4:21:23 AM
Subject: Re: [PW] Producer


The words "Producer" and "Director" have different meanings in stage,
film and television work. A television "producer" is more akin to the
film "director" in my opinion.

Adrian Smith
UK


-----Original Message-----
From: project-wombat-fm-bounces at lists.project-wombat.org
[mailto:project-wombat-fm-bounces at lists.project-wombat.org] On Behalf Of
Craig Miller
Sent: 26 June 2007 00:16
To: list at project-wombat.org
Subject: Re: [PW] Producer


At 02:07 PM 6/25/2007, Dan Clinton wrote:
>http://www.producersguild.org/pg/about_a/faq.asp
>
>A List of Definitions from the Producers Guild of America -- about as 
>authoritative as you can get.

While the PGA's list is definitely authoritative, it is somewhat more
applicable to the world of feature films than television. There is
definitely overlap and some of the duties apply equally to both arenas.
But they aren't completely descriptive of the tasks of producers in
television (which was part of the original question).

The line producer in television (sometimes signified in the credits by
the phrase "produced by", the "by" being the all-important signifier)
oversees the physical production. Production managers, coordinators,
and unit production managers work with the line producer on the physical
production aspects like scheduling, locations, etc.

The executive producer (who is also usually the creator of the show) is
also called the "show runner" and oversees the show creatively and
sometimes in other ways as well (e.g. business issues).

For the last several decades, TV series episodes have been written
almost exclusively by writers on staff for that series. (Freelance
writers may write anywhere from none to two or three episodes out of a
22-26 episode season with the rest written by staffers.) For a variety
of reasons, most of them economic, script fees are uniform with TV
episodic writers rarely being paid more than the "minimums" set by the
Writers Guild. In order to keep the writers they want at hand, and not
off writing other things, 
the staff
writers will get "producer" titles, with "staff writer", then "story
editor", "associate producer", "co-producer", "producer", "supervising
producer", and "executive producer" being the sequence. The higher the
title, the higher the salary paid. As they move up the chain, these
writer-producers also get production supervisory duties, including
casting, editing, etc. With more experience, either on their current
show or previous shows, comes higher titles and prestige. (In a
contrary way, in television animation, the writers rarely get producer
titles. Story Editors in animation will 
be the show
runners, whereas they're toward the bottom end in live-action
television.)

In feature films, producer titles are sometimes given out to people who
have little or no involvement with actually making the movie. A
producer or associate producer might be the agent or manager of the
star, and the title and pay is part of the cost of getting the star. Or
it might someone who acquired the rights to a book or somesuch, and part
of the deal for the studio to get the rights to make the movie is to pay
that person a fee and to give them a producer title. Etc. Etc. (It's
for this reason that 
the Producers
Guild has made a fuss about the proliferation of producers listed on
films, since frequently some number of them won't actually be working on
the
movie.)

Craig.




~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Craig Miller Wolfmill Entertainment craig at wolfmill.com
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

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