What do these people do? And what is the difference? What does it mean when Steven Spielberg “executive produced” Tiny Toons?
I love Tiny Toons, btw.
A producer, typically, is the man or woman running the show. THe producer obtains rights to the source material, hires the screenwriter, hires the director, oversees casting, and takes a strong interest in the entire filming process.
Typically, the executive producer has one job only: arranging the financing of the movie.
Sometimes that means the executive producer puts up his own money to get the film made. George Harrison did this for some of the films made by Monty Python and by Python’s alumni, which is why he’s credited as Executive producer on some of those films.
But more often, the executive producer coaxes studios into financing his projects.
Does the producer have any creative control? Say the director he hired decides to make some changes…would the director have to get these approved by the producer? Or are certain directors allowed more leeway?
It depends on the formal and informal working arrangements between the producers and the director. A few powerful directors have “final cut” priviledge, but in most cases the producers trump the director on creative and financial questions (although the executive producers have the final word over producers on financial questions).
I forgot to add that the Motion Picture Academy allows only people credited as “producer” to be eligible for the Best Picture award, not those credited as “executive producer”. This is because, as astorian said, executive producers are mostly involved in financing, not creative decisions.
The title Executive Producer can literally mean anything. And it can also literally mean absolutely nothing.
As in, it is sometimes just ‘given’ to someone who isn’t associated with a production in any real way but may have been a writer, director, producer, star etc. of a previous production which was shut down, or that the current film is a sequel to, or was a similar production at a rival studio that’s threatening to sue, or was attached to a previous version of the current film that was abandoned mid-production that it now bears little to no resemblance to, or is just a big enough name right now that the studio uses them to promote a film by calling them the Exec Prod even though they may have passed on it or just looked at the script or were never really involved with it at all, or, because they’re such a huge star, along with giving them points, and their name listed above the title, they get an Executive Producer credit as well!
The movie business is funny like that…
Slight hijack(?)
What does it mean when it says:
Does that mean that Cecil Adams was producer? Director? Financer? Dogsbody?
You have to look at the rest of the credits to determine that. Usually that is the name of the director, but sometimes it is the name of the producer. It’s less an official title than a vanity thing.
This puzzles me too.
Sometimes it goes on forever:
A Carsnog Presentation
.
.
.
In Association with MaxiWorks
.
.
.
of a Flimkin Film
.
.
.
by Horfing Studios
.
.
.
It usually means a bunch of people put up the financing or are sharing the costs. One might produce, another distribute.
The producer of the film is the boss. He makes all the final decisions, though usually they leave the artistic choices up to the director (who they hired).
Other producers do various organizational tasks for the film. They may manage the actual production (since the producer may have other films, and is also involved heavily in the funding aspect). Others will handle smaller management jobs.
Usually, “A Cecil Adams Film” means that Adams is the director.
On TV, the Executive Producer is the person at the top. Other producers handle the management of the production as a whole, and of particular episodes of that production.
The IMDB has a good glossary of movie terms
Here’s the entry for executive producer
So, if you’ve always wondered what a gaffer, best boy, or key grip are, now you can find out.
They actually give a pretty good history of the term in some cases too.
I loves me some IMDB.