Another thread about TV credits

Cafe Society
1

I’ve been watching a long-running TV series and for some reason, I’ve recently started reading the end credits. As usual, there are half a dozen Executive Producers and one Co-Executive Producer, five or six Producers, one Co-Producer, and one ‘Produced By’ credit. I have no problem with the number of producers, and realize that credits are negotiated as part of a person’s contract, but what could possibly be the difference between a Producer credit, a Co-Producer credit, and a Produced By credit? Is there any actual difference or is it all pretty meaningless and just a matter of oneupmanship?

2

There’s a hierarchy of TV writer credits, many of which have “producer” in the name. So listing everyone in the writers room makes it looks like there are a bunch of producers. Movie producers are a totally different animal.

  1. Executive Producer (the showrunner)
  2. Executive Producer (any other non-showrunner EPs)
  3. Co-Executive Producer
  4. Supervising Producer
  5. Producer
  6. Co-Producer
  7. Story Editor
  8. Staff Writer
3

Thanks, hogarth, but then how does someone get a Produced By credit, and how is that different from a Supervising Producer, Producer, or Co-Producer? My guess is that’s it’s no different.

4

Different producers have different roles to play, such as financing, creative input, power on set, etc, but it’s not a one-to-one definition with the descriptive title. An actor who is a producer has say over their character’s portrayal, and may feel some obligation to be a role model on set, but that doesn’t mean they need a special title for that.

It is, as you surmised, about divvying things up during the contract negotiations.

5

As noted, Supervising Producer, Producer and Co-Producer are job titles for TV writers. For example, the IMDb credits for The Good Place include:

Jen Statsky … co-executive producer / co-producer / producer / supervising producer (50 episodes, 2016-2020)

Jen Statsky is a TV writer (Parks & Rec, Broad City, The Good Place, Hacks, etc.) and you can see she started out as a Co-Producer on The Good Place in Season 1 and got a promotion with each following year, ending up as a Co-Executive Producer (“Co-EP”) which is a job title for a senior writer. She’s listed as the primary writer (“Written By” credit) on 7 episodes, but she was part of the writer’s room contributing on all four seasons.

The “Produced By” credit presumably refers to someone involved in the production in a non-writing capacity. Do you have a specific example?

6

curb your enthusiasm…

Director Robert B. Weide
Executive Producer Larry David (show creator and reoccurring role)
Executive Producer Jeff Garlin (reoccurring role)
Executive Producer Gavin Palone (producer only)
Co-Executive Producer Robert B. Weide (director and executive producer)
Produced by Tim Gibbons (producer only)
Co-Producer Erin O’Malley (producer only)
Consulting Producer Alan Zweibel (producer only)

None of these producers has a writing credit for the show listed in IMDB.

7

Actually, Larry David has a writer credit for curb, but none of the other executive producers do.

8

Looks like Mr Gibbons’s other credits for Curb are the standard TV writing type of credits (Producer, Co-EP, Executive Producer). I’m not sure why it changed to “Produced By” for 2004 only.