Produced By August | September 2021

PRODUCEDBY THE OFFICIAL MAGAZINE OF THE PRODUCERS GUILD OF AMERICA // AUGUST | SEPTEMBER 2021

A DAY IN THE LIFE OF AN ANIMATION PRODUCER

P. 22 JUMPING FROM LIVE ACTION INTO VIRTUAL PRODUCTION

P. 38 ADAPTING TO HOLLYWOOD’S NEW NORMAL FOR FILM

P. 52

PRODUCING

‘INSECURE’ The team that ushered in the hit hbo comedy reflects on its upcoming final season and how they built a system to discover and develop bipoc talent behind the scenes.

10.875”

24 EMMY NO ®

I N C L U D I N G

O U T S T A N D I N G

“ TV PROGRAM OF THE YEAR .”

AFI HONOREE

WINNER PGA AWARD BEST DRAMA SERIES

CRITICS CHOICE

GOLDEN GLOBE ®

BEST DRAMA SERIES

BEST DRAMA SERIES

WGA AWARD

SAG AWARD

BEST DRAMA SERIES

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OUTSTANDING ENSEMBLE IN A DRAMA SERIES

M I N AT I O N S D R A M A

S E R I E S

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PRODUCING ‘INSECURE’ PHOTOGRAPHED BY ABDI IBRAHIM

FEATURES 26 THE COVER: INSECURE As the groundbreaking HBO comedy concludes, the producing team discusses how they created an ecosystem on set to discover and nurture diverse new talent.

38 INTO THE VIRTUAL WORLD Producers share tips on how to transition from live action to virtual production.

46 PRODUCING INDIES Producer Shrihari Sathe discusses the myriad ways to finance a movie outside of the studio system.

52 BACK TO WORK With Hollywood slowly reopening to a new normal, producers weigh in on how they adapted to theatrical disruption and the biggest upcoming challenges.

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LAST WEEK TONIGHT WITH JOHN OLIVER Outstanding Variety Talk Series

LOVECRAFT COUNTRY Outstanding Drama Series

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OSLO Outstanding Television Movie

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CONGRATULATIONS TO OUR EMMY NOMINEES ®

WATCH NOW AT HBOFYC.COM

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UPCOMING FILMS Cast and crew on the set of Clifford the Big Red Dog

DEPARTMENTS 12 FROM THE TREASURER

22 A DAY IN THE LIFE

60 MARKING TIME

Applauding the resilience of PGA members.

DreamWorks Animation production manager Marisa Castro shares her daily routine.

Producers of upcoming films who earned the p.g.a mark share their experiences.

56 NEW MEMBERS

63 MEMBER BENEFITS

Get to know some of the newest members in our community.

The many rewards of belonging to the Guild

58 PRODUCERS MARK FAQ

64 IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF GIANTS

The p.g.a. mark now extends to TV and streaming movies.

Irwin Winkler shares an anecdote of his famous friends from the set of Guilty by Suspicion.

15 TOOL KIT Nicole Garcia’s five essentials for postproduction.

19 HOT BUTTON How a court judgment in a bankruptcy case can help producers protect themselves in work-for-hire contracts.

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ANYTIME. ANYWHERE.

BOARD OFFICERS PRESIDENTS Gail Berman

Lucy Fisher

VICE PRESIDENTS, MOTION PICTURES Lauren Shuler Donner Jon Kilik

PRODU CEDBY 2020 June | July

Y PRODUCEDB

VICE PRESIDENTS, TELEVISION Mike Farah Gene Stein

LY RICA // JUNE | JU S GUILD OF AME PRODUCER AGAZINE OF THE THE OFFICIAL M

TREASURER Megan Mascena Gaspar SECRETARIES OF RECORD Mark Gordon Hawk Koch

UPPING THE EL ON CREATIVITY LEV TOUR TROLLS WORLD

P ACE THE GOOD PL D KARMA LEADS TO GOO

VICE PRESIDENT, AP COUNCIL Melissa Friedman

P ES QUIBI LAUNCH IN NEW PLATFORM Y A NEW REALIT

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PRO DUC

e Morga n Nevill

PRODU CEDBY

EDBY Apri l | May 2021

THE OF FICIAL MA GAZINE O F THE PRO DUCER S GUILD O F AMERIC A // APRIL | MAY

numbe r 2 volum e XVI

M O RG A N

NEVILLE

VICE PRESIDENT, NEW MEDIA COUNCIL Jenni Ogden VICE PRESIDENT, PGA EAST REGION Donna Gigliotti PRESIDENTS EMERITI Gary Lucchesi Lori McCreary NATIONAL BOARD OF DIRECTORS Stephanie Allain Bray Paulette Lifton Christina Lee Storm Michael Ambers Dan Lin Mimi Valdés James P. Axiotis James Lopez Angela Victor Nina Yang Bongiovi Ravi Nandan Ian Wagner Yolanda T. Cochran Betsy Ockerlund Nolte Lorin Williams Donald De Line Bruna Papandrea Magdalena Wolf Gary Goetzman Charles Roven Charles P. Howard Peter Saraf Iris Ichishita Jillian Stein

THE -Y EA OF THE Q R JOURNEY UEEN’S G AMBIT

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Jam es

do thing I can into aries are the positive HOW F “Document ing ing ELANC andRE put someth E underst PROD to try and UC e sense of ER g in som livin ld, we areTHEIR OW S SHAPE the wor N DEST ty. I feel like INY and curiosi incurious times.” P y increasingl Lope z

THE BILL NY END OF T E CASE HE PROFIT W NET ATERFA LL?

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vol ume XVII num ber 2

JAMES

LO PE Z “Divers diversit ity of thou ght, y it’s be of conten and ov en proven t— over er. It wo rks. good investm It’s a ent.”

REPRESENTATIVES, PGA NORTHWEST REGION Richard Quan John Walker REPRESENTATIVE, PGA CAPITAL REGION Katy Jones Garrity REPRESENTATIVE, PGA ATLANTA CHAPTER Jeremiah Bennett ASSOCIATE NATIONAL EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR Michelle Byrd NATIONAL EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR Susan Sprung

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PARTNER & BRAND PUBLISHER Emily S. Baker EDITOR Piya Sinha-Roy CREATIVE DIRECTOR Ajay Peckham

COPY EDITOR Bob Howells

PHOTOGRAPHER Abdi Ibrahim

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Advertising Info: Ken Rose ken@moontidemedia.com or 818-312-6880

Vol. XVII No. 4 Produced By is published by the Producers Guild of America 11150 W. Olympic Blvd.

Suite 980 Los Angeles, CA 90064 310-358-9020 Tel. 310-358-9520 Fax

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1501 Broadway Suite 1710 New York, NY 10036 646-766-0770 Tel.

12 EMMY® NOMINATIONS INCLUDING

O U T S TA N D I N G D R A M A S E R I E S

★★★★

”

“

C H I C AG O S U N -T I M E S

“PERFECTION.” DECIDER

“A REFRESHINGLY MODERN TAKE ON REGENCY ROMANCE.

IT MIXES AGE-OLD TROPES AND DISTINCT SHONDALAND SENSIBILITIES TOGETHER TO MAKE A FORMIDABLE LOVE MATCH.” VARIETY

F RO M S H O NDALAN D

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FROM THE TREASURER

EXCEEDING EXPECTATIONS

R

eflecting on the Guild’s 2020–21 fiscal year, I’m struck by just how resilient our organization is. The entire year could have been eclipsed by the pandemic. Instead, we rallied into action, pivoting to strengthen our national and international presence while becoming a strong online resource and leader in the entertainment community.

Predictions based on anticipated loss of dues and applications, sponsorship, and awards revenue made the 2020–21 budget very lean. I am happy to report that dues and new member applications greatly exceeded our expectations. Members not only continued to pay their dues but raised money for two funds in order to help their fellow members. The Members Relief Fund (operated through the Actors Fund) provided one-time assistance, and the Member to Member Fund allowed for a 30% dues reduction for those who applied.

Perhaps the biggest story of the year

for our continued financial viability was the Guild’s identifying and expanding online screeners, which brought in a whopping net revenue of $1,600,000.

Preliminary year-end review of actuals shows our expenses were in line with budget estimates except for legal fees. The consolidated net income of the Guild and the Guild’s Foundation is $1,591,771.

The Board of Directors approved the Finance Committee’s 2021–22 budget in July. The budget reflects the Guild’s desire to resume in-person networking opportunities and educational events.

While the Guild is still navigating exactly when that will be, committee meetings, webinars, screenings, roundtables and networking events continue online.

These pie charts will give you a better idea of how the Guild gets and spends its money.

As always, if you have any questions, please feel free to contact me.

2020-2021 REVENUE

PRODUCED BY CONFERENCES (LA & NY) PRODUCERS GUILD AWARDS MEMBER DUES AND FEES MEMBERSHIP APP & INITIATION FEES O-1/O-2 PROFESSIONAL FEES PUBLICATIONS SPONSORSHIP MISC INCOME

2020-2021 EXPENSES

PRODUCED BY CONFERENCES (LA & NY) PRODUCERS GUILD AWARDS STAFF & SELECT CONSULTANT COMPENSATION RENT, OFFICE & GENERAL ADMIN MEMBER COMMITTEE BUDGETS

Megan Mascena Gaspar

PUBLICATIONS Please note: Proportions provided above are based on year-end actuals, and not final tax returns

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EMMY AWARD NOMINEE ®

OUTSTANDING DOCUMENTARY OR NONFICTION SPECIAL OUTSTANDING DIRECTING FOR A DOCUMENTARY/NONFICTION PROGRAM

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EXHILARATING” THIS DOCUMENTARY IS AMERICAN POLITICS DISTILLED.”

“

BOB MONDELLO

“

ELECTRIFYING”

OUTSTANDING INCLUDING

DRAMA SERIES

TOOL K I T

MAKING IT WORK NICOLE GARCIA’S DAILY ESSENTIALS RANGE FROM ANALOG NOTEBOOKS TO COLLABORATION SOFTWARE

O

ver the past decade working in postproduction, Nicole Garcia, a native of San Antonio, Texas, has picked up many tips and tricks to create on-screen magic. After learning how to use Final Cut Pro and Avid in college, Garcia moved to Los Angeles and has worked on an array of shows, from Party Down to Vanderpump Rules, and most recently HBO Max’s reality series The Big Shot with Bethenny. Garcia takes Produced By through her daily work essentials.

LOGIC KEYBOARD WITH AVID LAYOUT Many of the shows that Garcia works on are edited on Avid, and her company gives employees Logic keyboards with Avid settings.

“I’m just more of a visual person so it’s easier to have the Avid keyboard layout so that I know what my settings are,” she explains. It became such an essential item for Garcia that she made sure to incorporate it into her home office as the company shifted to remote working last year.

“A Logic keyboard, to me, is more tactile and reminds me of a laptop keyboard. It’s not like one of the clunky old-school keyboards.

It’s very clean and easy.”

MAC OS NOTES APP AND LEUCHTTURM1917 A5 SQUARED NOTEBOOK Before Garcia switched to the Mac OS Notes app, she used to have a bunch of sticky notes, “which obviously became a cluttered nightmare.” Now she can keep track of all the stack dates, breakdowns of editor and story team assignments, and specific specs she needs to be able to access quickly on the digital app that also syncs with her smartphone. Garcia still likes to switch between digital and analog note-taking, often using a Leuchtturm1917 A5 notebook when working remotely. “I have

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TOOL K I T

different color notebooks for different shows, and that’s where I keep the same kind of notes. It’s my go-to for online sessions to keep track of all the changes we’ve made to different episodes.”

FUNKO POP! FIGURINES Along with succulents, Garcia likes to arm her desk with an army of Funkos, each with a special meaning. “Growing up, my sister was very into horror films, which she kind of terrorized me with,” she says, laughing. So now I have a Michael Myers Funko Pop.” Other figurines include Professor Snape from Harry Potter, Leeloo from The Fifth Element, and rapper Biggie Smalls, also representing Garcia and her sister’s love of hip hop. “It’s just something fun to look at. When you’re in an office all the time, it can sometimes get boring, so it adds a little personality to my desk.”

BETTER FINDER RENAME PROGRAM About a decade ago, Garcia was working for a company that did the postproduction on TruTV’s South Beach Tow series, when she came across a game-changing piece of software. Better Finder Rename allows Garcia to rename batches of files easily. Currently, Garcia is using the program to easily edit batches of cast photos and cast iPhone videos, with options to add or replace text, add metadata, and add dates and identities of cast members. “It’s just the easiest thing when I have to rename files as a way to stay organized. Any little shortcut you can find is a time-saver,” she says.

EVERCAST AND CLEARVIEW Garcia was introduced to streaming platform Evercast by the director of post at Evolution Media. Evercast is software that is downloaded onto an editor system or story system that remotely re-creates the experience of sitting in an edit bay.

“You’re able to set it up to where it

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mirrors your computer, so you can select the view to only be the source record monitor and Avid. So when an editor is playing back during a screening with producers or their story teams, it’ll just play that back,” Garcia explains. Another option that she uses is ClearView, which is similar to Evercast but better for online sessions. “It plays

in real time. We were streaming UHD deliveries, and it was such a gamechanger,” Garcia says. Even as things slowly resume back in offices, she says remote editing has made life easier when staff are in different locations and countries. “If we can’t physically be in an edit bay, it’s the best way to review stuff.

It’s pretty flawless.”

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EMMY AWARD NOMINATIONS ®

INCLUDING

OU T S TA NDING C OME DY S E RIE S OUTSTANDING LEAD ACTOR – Michael Douglas

“A TERRIFIC SHOW.

It plays like a beautiful film from start to finish.”

DEADLINE

“Michael Douglas is remarkable.

It’s the perfect role for him.”

BOSTON GLOBE

THE FINAL SEASON

FYC.NETFLIX.COM

4

EMMY AWARD NOMINATIONS ®

INCLUDING

OUTSTANDING COMEDY SERIES

“THE PERFECT BLEND OF DRAMA, COMEDY, AND STAND-UP-AND-CHEER MOMENTS.” IGN

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H O T B U T TO N

A Modest Silver Lining Appeals court judgment in bankruptcy case doesn’t favor talent, but provides road map to protect parties in work-forhire contracts

written By Michael I. Gottfried

I

n the case of SPYGLASS MEDIA GROUP, LLC, f/k/a Lantern Entertainment LLC v. BRUCE COHEN PRODUCTIONS; BRUCE COHEN, Nos. 20-1750 and 20-1751 (May 21, 2021), the U.S. Third Circuit Court of Appeals held that a work-for-hire contract between a producer and a bankrupt movie studio—in this case, the Weinstein Company—could be sold in the bankruptcy case without the need to pay contingent compensation owed to the producer at the time of the sale.

The court’s decision is of particular importance to producers and other talent parties who potentially can avoid this result by contracting around it in their work-for-hire agreements. While the Third Circuit ruling was adverse to the talent parties, the decision provides a road map for producers and other talent parties who want to ensure that a bankrupt studio cannot sell work-forhire agreements absent payment of past-due compensation to producers and other talent who are parties to those agreements.

During the bankruptcy case, the Weinstein Company sold substantially all of its assets to Spyglass Media Group, including the intellectual property and work for-hire agreements associated with the film Silver Linings Playbook. The talent involved in the making of Silver Linings Playbook argued that as a result of the sale, they were entitled to payment in full of their past-due contingent compensation, while the Weinstein Company and Spyglass maintained that the past-due contingent compensation should be treated as an unsecured claim in the

bankruptcy case, worth pennies on the dollar.

Under bankruptcy law, entitlement to payment in full of pastdue amounts turned on the issue of whether there remained material obligations on each side of the contract at the time the Weinstein Company filed its bankruptcy case. The court agreed that the requirement to pay contingent compensation was a material obligation and thus the Weinstein Company had remaining material obligations under the contract. However, the court held that the main purpose of the production contract was to produce the movie, and thus concluded that the remaining obligations on the part of the producer were “ancillary.”

Based on the Weinstein decision, producers who want to guard against the potential of a bankrupt studio transferring their contracts without the need to pay them compensation that accrued prior to a bankruptcy sale should include in their workfor-hire agreements: (a) all ongoing obligations of the producer, including those obligations that continue to exist subsequent to the completion of the film in question; (b) a provision stating that all ongoing obligations pursuant to the work-for-hire agreement are material; and (c) a remedies section providing that the breach of any ongoing obligation by the producer will allow the studio to withhold compensation until the breach is either cured or waived. While bankruptcy law in this area continues to evolve, the inclusion of these provisions in work-for-hire agreements substantially increases the likelihood of payment in

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H O T B U T TO N

the event of a studio bankruptcy.

The contract in question provided that contingent compensation would cease to be paid upon any default by the producer. The inclusion of that provision would lead to the conclusion that all remaining obligations on the part of the producer, even the so-called “ancillary” obligations, should be deemed material. The Third Circuit agreed that a contract could by its own terms make provisions material; however, the court found that the contractual language did not clearly indicate that the parties intended such a result. The court noted that the provision at issue was not in the remedies section of the contract. Rather, it read the language as a condition precedent that had to be fulfilled prior to payment. As such, the Third Circuit affirmed the ruling of the Bankruptcy Court and held that

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any unpaid compensation at the time of sale would be nothing more than an unsecured claim in the Weinstein bankruptcy case.

In closing, the Third Circuit notes: “To be clear, we recognize that parties can contract around a state’s default contract rule regarding substantial performance, and by doing so they can also override the Bankruptcy Code’s intended protections for the debtor. However, that result can only be accomplished clearly and unambiguously in the text of the agreement.”

Michael Gottfried is a partner at the firm of Elkins Kalt Weintraub Reuben Gartside LLP, and represented the interests of a large group of actors, directors, and producers, including the producers of the film Silver Linings Playbook, in the Weinstein Company bankruptcy case.

E M M Y®

A W A R D

N O M I N E E

OUTSTANDING COMEDY SERIES

A DAY IN THE LIFE

A DAY IN THE LIFE Production Manager Marisa Castro Takes Produced By Along On Her Daily Routine

From the moment she’s aroused by her feline alarm clock at 6 a.m., Marisa Castro is on the go, juggling meetings and responsibilities as a production manager at DreamWorks Animation.

The 12-year veteran of the industry has carved a career in animation, starting out at the Walt Disney Animation Studios, where she worked in production on blockbusters such as Frozen and Moana. Currently, she handles series animation at DreamWorks, working on Jurassic World Camp Cretaceous. Castro gives us a glimpse into her busy workday and how she likes to wind down in the evenings.

6 a.m.

Wake up and feed my cat, Pretzel—no sleeping in with this hungry feline—followed by working out with Peloton.

My workouts consist of cross training in cardio cycling, weight training and stretching. I joined the Peloton community in March 2020, and it’s helped my physical and mental health tremendously.

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E M M Y® AWA R D NOM I N AT IO NS INCLUDING

OU T S TA N DI NG DR A M A SER IE S

A M ER IC A N

FIL M INSTIT U TE

W INNER

TOP 10 TELEVISION PR O GR A M S OF T H E Y E A R

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E M M Y® A W A R D N O M I N A T I O N S OUTSTANDING LIMITED OR ANTHOLOGY SERIES INCLUDING

A DAY IN THE LIFE

8:30 a.m.

Eat breakfast and go over emails that came in overnight to prep for the day ahead. It’s a short commute from my kitchen to the home office.

It’s been inspiring to see the crew work so well together during the challenges of working from home.

9 a.m.

Start off the day by meeting with the production team, making a plan for the day and setting our weekly goals. Then we move into dailies and review the work up for approvals.

12:30 p.m.

Lunch break. I’ve attended a lot of virtual lunch events organized by our employee resource groups.

I’m thankful they exist and have furthered a lot of important conversations, from social justice issues to heritage month celebrations.

2 p.m.

Go over finances, staffing and show schedule to ensure we are hitting all of our milestones.

4 p.m.

Meet with show and studio leadership. Discuss any roadblocks, come up with solutions and communicate changes across the teams.

6 p.m.

Wrap up the day. Spend some time playing with Pretzel, catch up with friends, and enjoy a glass of wine.

10 p.m.

Start winding down and get ready for bed. Taking the time to meditate and reflect on the day helps put me in a good state of mind, and I fall asleep faster.

“It’s been inspiring to see the crew work so well together during the challenges of working from home.”

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Amy Aniobi, Prentice Penny and Melina Matsoukas at Darby Park in Inglewood, South Los Angeles

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From ‘Insecure’ Beginnings To Secure Futures Three principals reflect on the groundbreaking show that became an incubator for an extraordinary array of talent.

Written By Piya Sinha-Roy | Photographed by Abdi Ibrahim

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THE COVER: FROM ‘INSECURE’ BEGINNINGS TO SECURE FUTURES

When the cast and crew of Insecure started posting their fifth and final season wrap photos and messages on social media earlier this year, they were unabashedly emotional about an important chapter in their lives coming to an end. What they didn’t anticipate, however, was the outpouring of emotions from millions of their fans.

“I didn’t realize how thirsty we were to see ourselves, and then I knew we’re really feeding this need,” says director-producer Melina Matsoukas. “That was an overwhelming emotion, and seeing how much more that necessity has been fed after us has been so satisfying. That was what was so emotional when our show was ending, that we were really able to create space.”

“It’s so crazy to know now that we are a part of a cultural moment and to see culture accepting and embracing us and celebrating with us and mourning with us as we’re ending, in real time,” adds writer-producer Amy Aniobi.

The response speaks to the vast impact that Insecure has had since it premiered on HBO in 2016, when it broke new ground with the stylized vision and storytelling on screen and launched the careers of young Black creatives behind the scenes.

The series follows Issa Rae’s Issa Dee, a Black woman in her late 20s drifting through life as she tries to find her place within her community, charting her friendships and relationships along the way. Upon its debut, it immediately stood out as one of the few shows centered on the lives of Black millennial women, and most importantly, it was being told almost entirely by Black talent.

Behind the scenes, Rae and showrunner Prentice Penny were already building an ecosystem that would nurture BIPOC creators, especially women.

“I like to say that Insecure is a bit of a teaching hospital,” Aniobi explains. “So many

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EMMY AWARD NOMINEE ®

O U T S TA NDI NG C OM EDY SE R I E S

OUTSTANDING PRODUCTION DESIGN FOR A N A R R AT I V E P R O G R A M ( HALF-HOUR)

“A SPARKLY SENSATION FROM START TO FINISH.” GLAMOUR

“CHARMING. THIS SERIES HAS SUCH A JOIE DE VIVRE.” PASTE

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THE COVER: FROM ‘INSECURE’ BEGINNINGS TO SECURE FUTURES

of us were doing things for the first time. It was Melina’s first time directing a television series, it was Prentice’s first time being a showrunner, and it was my first time being a producer, writer, and on-set producer since I had been a staff writer, and Issa’s first time starring in a show at that budget level.”

Ahead of the final season’s airing in fall, Produced By spoke with three of its key producers on how they shaped the show on screen and created a system on set to discover, nurture and champion new talent in Hollywood.

Prentice Penny The Risk Taker When Penny and Rae first talked about the premise of Insecure—the story of two Black women who live in a very specific part of Los Angeles—the show felt intimate.

“I think HBO thought in some ways that the show would be filmed or made like Silicon Valley, like we’d be on set and have that energy,” Penny says. “The way Issa and I saw this show was that we wanted to give Inglewood scope. How do you make Baldwin Hills and View Park and Crenshaw feel bigger than what they are?”

As Penny and Rae were both born and brought up in Los Angeles, they wanted to set the show in South Central neighborhoods that were rarely showcased on screen in a positive light. The only problem was that South LA didn’t quite have the infrastructure to shoot a large-scale production, so they brought on location scout Alison Taylor to find local stores to feature, and new restaurants that could be showcased in the context of the stylish and upwardly mobile lives of the show’s four women.

“Those areas that we were filming in have shaped who we are as people. We have so much love for those neighborhoods because we’re from there,” Penny says.

“So that meant we had to go film in these areas. It meant we had to not re-create a network version of these places, but make them be real. But that becomes difficult to produce.”

Penny, 46, had been working since the early 2000s, writing on comedies such as Scrubs, Happy Endings (on which he first met Aniobi, who was an assistant) and Brooklyn Nine-Nine, but Insecure marked the first time he was hired as a showrunner on a series of this scale.

With Rae also new to the experience, Penny said they went through a few trials and errors during the first season to land on the tone and style of the show.

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PHOTOGRAPH COURTESY ANNE MARIE FOX

Melina Matsoukas (left) and Prentice Penny (middle) set up a scene with the show’s co-creator and star, Issa Rae (right).

“In the beginning, a lot of it was figuring out what are the stories that we feel are important,” he says. “We initially had all the episodes that are in the front of the first season at the end of the season and HBO was like, ‘No, move all that sexy stuff up, with Daniel and Lawrence and Tasha, move all of that up to the beginning.”

In 2015, HBO’s roster was stacked with shows that featured high-profile talent—Martin Scorsese and Mick Jagger’s co-creation The Vinyl, Game of Thrones, Silicon Valley, Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson on Ballers and ultimate HBO star Sarah Jessica Parker returning with Divorced. In comparison, Insecure didn’t feature any stars.

“We were just three nobodies, making our own little beats and that all proves that we were having fun being as creative as we could be. If it excites us, it’ll excite the audience—that was always our barometer,” Penny says.

Still, as showrunner, Penny felt the pressure to not make any missteps. In the first season, he says they were “over budget all the time” as they figured out how to tell the story as a location-based show rather than on sound stages, and realizing how much time was needed to set shots

up with perfectly saturated, glow-filled lighting. The North Star that drove him and the rest of the team was to make sure Rae was “always able to tell the story that she wants to tell,” and to be fully in service of that.

One of the first things Penny and Rae did was build out a writers room with many millennial women of color, including Aniobi, in order to make sure that the four women at the center of the show—Issa, Molly, Kelli and Tiffany—were well represented. But both Penny and Rae were also careful to not “whitewash” this show, and to break free of the stereotypes that Black characters are often shouldered with on screen.

“We were protective of the Issa-Molly friendship because we always felt that’s the love story—like the guys can come and go, but Issa and Molly are the real love story we’re watching. So they were friends. We didn’t want them to be frenemies,” he explains. “We felt it would be hard to root for Issa and Molly as Black women if they were going at it.”

As the seasons went on, Penny said, he and Rae found a good rhythm for shooting, planning out the days and locations needed, staying within budgets, and

allocating resources to pull off the bigger set pieces such as the Coachella episodes in season 3 (filmed between fields in Calabasas and a Ferris wheel in Kentucky), the Mexico trip that Molly takes, and the block party that Issa orchestrates in season 4.

Throughout this time, Penny and Rae established an ecosystem on set that would nurture new talent through the ropes, be it writers, actors, producers, directors or any other key role on set. A similar ecosystem was also being established at Ava DuVernay’s Queen Sugar series and Lena Waithe’s roster of shows, fostering a thriving playground for BIPOC talent.

“Hollywood gets into this thing of recycled talent, like, ‘That’s the guy we’re going to use and we’re going to use him every time,’” Penny says. “They’ll always want to find new white voices, but for people of color, there’s just no interest, right?

Because it’s like, you just don’t matter; because what they’ll tell you is that you don’t travel internationally, which is bullshit.”

Penny himself recognizes that he was able to come up via showrunner Mara Brock Akil on his first job on the 2000 series Girlfriends, working with such writers as Regina Hicks, Karin Gist, Kenya

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THE COVER: FROM ‘INSECURE’ BEGINNINGS TO SECURE FUTURES

Barris and even Waithe, who was an assistant.

“All of those people are shaping Hollywood in very specific ways, and I wanted to do the same thing, I wanted to leave a lineage that’s like, I’m paying it forward,” he says.

“If we’re not giving each other a shot, if we’re not helping, then who will?”

Penny says they put the word out to agents and managers in Hollywood that they were seeking young creators of color to work on the show, and even held the “HBO Insecure On Set Contest” to recruit young people to be production assistants on set. The success stories are numerous.

Penny’s former assistant Syreeta Singleton is now running Rae’s new HBO Max series Rap Sh*t; another assistant, Nicole Bilbrew, now writes on The Upshaws; and Kindsey Young, one of the contest winners, rose up from production assistant to writer’s assistant and then wrote on A Black Lady Sketch Show.

“In our business, I think typically when you’re a person of color, you either have to make it on your own or you need some white producer to validate you; you can’t link up with your own,” Penny says. “Now we’re in a very sweet spot where we can link up with our own and we’re actively wanting to link up with our own—without needing another outside white person to say they are OK.”

Melina Matsoukas The Visionary After a decade making some of the most notable music videos of the 2000s for some of the most iconic artists—Beyonce, Lady Gaga, Rihanna and Katy Perry, to name just a few—Melina Matsoukas, 40, was itching to find a narrative project to direct. The problem she faced was breaking out of the music box.

“Music videos, as a form of film media, are completely discredited. Unless you’re a David Fincher or a Mark Romanek, if you’re a person of color in the music video space, narrative looks very different and that world isn’t open to you,” she says.

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Matsoukas eschewed offers to do music-related narrative. Then the pilot of Insecure came her way and she quickly found a fan and kindred spirit in Rae. “I didn’t ever plan to go into comedy,” she says. “But it spoke to me. I related to Issa as a person, Issa as a character, and I understood what it was to be a Black woman having to code switch and navigate through all these different worlds.”

To shoot the pilot, Matsoukas and her assistant at the time, Deniese Davis (another Awkward Black Girl alum) hopped in a car and drove around South LA to look for locations in communities that weren’t used to being showcased on screen.

“We were going into places and landscapes and neighborhoods that aren’t usually shot. To incorporate the community we were illuminating, it was important that we were actually there and that it was authentic, that we weren’t trying to cheat Inglewood and Pasadena, which some people had suggested at a time,” she says.

Comedies tend to be shot in bright-

ness, to accentuate the humor. But given Matsoukas’ background in music videos, she was used to visual storytelling, weaving direction with cinematography, production design and costume design to tell a narrative. With the Insecure pilot, Matsoukas helped to cement the rich, stylized look of the show, not shying away from making scenes look dark, spotlighting dark-skin Black actors through color lighting. For example, Issa’s world is much warmer and soulful than Molly’s world, which is more cold and composed.

“We did it in our voice, in our way and in our language. It was always a battle about how dark things can look, and I’m like, it can be dark and still be funny,” she says. “We were changing the way and the boundaries put upon comedy. We were portraying these beautiful Black women and their friendships and their relationships—and Black men—and it was important that we did it our way. We got there, and I think that was the emotional.”

Most of the directors on Insecure are people of color, including such women

as Regina King and Stella Meghie.

Matsoukas names cinematographer Ava Berkofsky, who made her narrative series debut with Insecure and has directed a couple of episodes, with helping her formulate the show’s visual language.

Another mentee, Lacey Duke, was able to direct a TV episode for the first time, under Matsoukas’ guidance.

“We’ve given so many people chances who have gone on to have really incredible careers, and that’s including myself,” she says. Indeed, Matsoukas has become a go-to director in television and made her feature film debut with 2019’s Queen & Slim, written and produced by Waithe.

Matsoukas says Insecure offered a supportive environment for people to raise their hand if they were interested in trying out a new skill, and the show would help them learn, notably those coming from other mediums or looking to get their first shot in television.

Through the seasons, Matsoukas would have someone shadowing her on each episode—including Kerry Washington

PHOTOGRAPH COURTESY JOHN P. FLEENOR

Melina Matsoukas (left), looks over Issa Rae’s shoulder as they work on Insecure.

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in season 2—with the objective that the shadow would have a chance to direct. Washington ended up directing an episode in the fourth season and has another one in the final season.

The show has also been an immense learning experience for Matsoukas as she transitioned from the world of music videos and wore many hats, including bearing the responsibilities of a producer.

“My strongest skill as a producer I think is empowering and advocating and using my experience and then also allowing them space, because I am a director and I have so much respect for other directors,” she says. “Before this, I never worked with other directors, so it was really exciting for me to get to work with other creatives and see how they could take what I brought and reinterpret it and put themselves into the show.”

Amy Aniobi The Wordsmith If there’s one example to illustrate the inclusive and nurturing environment that Insecure fostered to allow newcomers to thrive, it’s writer-producer Amy Aniobi.

A native of Texas and a graduate of Stanford (Rae’s alma mater) and UCLA, 36-year-old Aniobi’s journey to Insecure began when she was hired as a staff writer on Rae’s 2011 web series The Misadventures of Awkward Black Girl. From there, Aniobi was an assistant to the showrunner of Happy Endings, during which she met Prentice Penny, a producer on the sitcom, before moving onto stints at The Michael J. Fox Show, Silicon Valley and a few unproduced pilots.

Throughout this time, Aniobi said she always kept an eye on Insecure as Rae set the show up at HBO, hiring Penny as her showrunner and casting actor and comedian Yvonne Orji—who, like Aniobi, is Nigerian—to play Issa Dee’s best friend, Molly. It was when Rae brought on Matsoukas—whom Aniobi had become a big fan of during her internship at a music video production company—that the young writer knew she had to go for it.

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“I emailed Issa and said, ‘I know you have a lot of mouths to feed, but I would just kick myself forever if I didn’t make it clear how badly I want to work with you on this show.’ She sent me something like, ‘Thank you so much, I’ll find you when the time is right.’ I emailed back and said, ‘Let me be clear—I’m standing in an open field and I’m not wearing camouflage. You have found me; say the word. No matter what I’m doing, I will leave and come and work for you.’”

The gamble paid off. Rae brought Aniobi on as a writer and producer in season 1 and the rest, as they say, is history. “I felt safe to fail and to suggest things that didn’t work when I worked with her before, and I wanted that experience again,” Aniobi says.

Some of the show’s biggest risks take place in the writers room, where the team crafts plots and dialogue that are anchored in the authenticity of Black millennial women. From the perils of oral sex to the breakdown in Issa and Molly’s friendship, the show doesn’t shy away from explicit scenarios or discomfort.

Aniobi says they were also able to steer away from “let me explain race to you” conversations because within the world that they created, their characters were mainly interacting with people of color.

“We didn’t want conversations that other shows could do,” Aniobi explains. “If this conversation can exist on Blackish or Queen Sugar or any other show that was contemporary at the time, we shouldn’t be doing it. We need to have a spin on it that makes it unique for our show.”

Of course, the show still subtly wove in examples of systemic discrimination or racial prejudice within the lives of the characters that were drawn from the writers’ own experiences. But not having to spell everything out was a refreshing change.

“Issa was like, ‘I watched Larry David and Curb Your Enthusiasm, and there was a whole episode about the Palestinian conflict related to chicken. He didn’t explain what it meant. He just assumed you knew, so I’m going to assume people know,’” Aniobi says. “We don’t have to overexplain ourselves. If (audiences) want to, they can look it up.”

From the very beginning of her career, Aniobi demonstrated a desire to not just be in writers rooms, but also to pick up any extra responsibilities. While assisting Happy Endings showrunner Jonathan Groff, Aniobi observed the flow of conversation on budgets and scripts behind the scenes and made sure she was present on set—something staff writers tend not to do. But it was a chance encounter with an episode director that sparked the trajectory of Aniobi’s career.

“Andrew Fleming got hired to be an episode director, and I decided I was going to take him out for drinks because I just need to get to know him,” she remembers.

“Honestly, I don’t know what made me decide to do it except that he came from New York and he’s all alone, but it’s the best thing I ever did.”

Aniobi and another EP socialized with Fleming after work and “established a rapport before the week of shooting.”

When they were back on set and Fleming needed something, he looked to Aniobi for help. After the week was up, the network was so happy with the episode that they moved it up in the season and gave Aniobi another episode to run.

It’d be another two years before Aniobi was back on set, but this time she was able to approach Insecure with confidence.

She says she was given many chances to take on more responsibility, including times when Penny asked her to take over for him in writers meetings. “I guess he picked me because I have a strong opinion, but I also realized that he picked me because I’m a good leader and I’m good at being able to bring things out of people,” she explains.

Since then, Aniobi has earned award recognition for her writing, from Emmy nominations to NAACP Image Awards. In season 5, not only did she write and produce, she also stepped behind the camera to direct the seventh episode.

Aniobi says the one thing she’s honed from producing the series and becoming the go-to person on set is an ability to “pull the super special. Someone can have an idea that is nebulous, and I will home

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in on that gold ore,” she explains. “I also give very decisive and quick feedback.”

The Final Farewell The fifth and final season of Insecure had to be filmed in the midst of the COVID pandemic, forcing Penny, Matsoukas, Aniobi and the rest of the team to adapt to a strict new normal. As they concluded the story, the team said they made sure the focus on screen was on the central friendship between two women.

“We really keyed into the fact that this show is a love story about friends. It’s about Issa and Molly,” Aniobi says. “Going into this final season, we didn’t want it to feel bogged down with the men’s stuff. Even though they’re both going to have heartbreaks and yearnings and love, and there’s always going to be sex in the show, this is a story about these women.”

“I don’t like to repeat myself. I’m very conscious about not getting boxed into anything,” she says. “As an artist, I like to challenge myself to go into spaces that I’m not comfortable in, as I feel like that’s when I create my best work.”

She is also launching a new company for commercials, music videos and photography to help empower new artists and “essentially create my own pipeline” of talent.

Lastly, Aniobi secured an overall deal with HBO in 2019 and is now launching her own production company, Super Special, to start developing her own material, although she doesn’t rule out a reunion Writer-producer Amy with Rae in the future.

Aniobi sits behind the “I really want to focus on scenes during filming. getting back to my own voice. I She directed an episode love writing for Issa, and I also in the final season. love exploring what I have to say on my own,” Aniobi says.

“I know we will work together Off screen, the talents that have again, because we work very well together flourished over the past five years are and I’m really excited for that prospect. But now setting up their next steps, each with I think I need something a little different, a the intention of continuing to build the little bit of a break from Insecure.” ecosystem for BIPOC creators in Hollywood.

She’s also hoping to discover and Penny just announced his move from nurture the next wave of creators and HBO, where he’s been producing new underrepresented voices. “I think what I’ve content, to a new multi-year overall deal learned on Insecure is that what I’m best with Disney General Entertainment’s at is finding what’s super special in every Onyx Collective. He’s also planning to idea and every voice and every project. launch a comic book company to be an That’s what I do, and I’m excited to keep incubator for independent Black comics— doing it for emerging writers.” to identify talent and cultivate new IP—as well as online mentorship programs to inspire aspiring creatives.

Matsoukas launched film and TV production company De La Revolución Films, through which she is working on Annapurna Television and Apple TV+’s upcoming dark fantasy series The Changeling, marking a new style and tone for her to play with.

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A growing demand for content has led to soaring demand for more producers in VFX and animation. Here, producers who have made the transition from live action weigh in on how to utilize existing skills and build new ones in a constantly evolving industry.

I

Written by Graham Edwards

t’s no secret that Hollywood had already been shifting even before it was upended by a global pandemic. For film producers worldwide, nowhere are the changes more evident than in the realm of visual effects, animation and virtual production, an arm of the industry that is fast growing and providing opportunities for live-action producers to switch.

Over decades, the visual effects industry has evolved beyond tentpole action franchises, as effectsrelated techniques and virtual production methodologies have been changing workflows across the board. Simultaneously, animated films both long and short are enjoying a renaissance, as creators fulfil the rising demand for content from streaming services. Smaller animation studios now compete with the industry stalwarts, and a growing number of animation providers are partnering with producers to develop projects that could not have been made in any other medium.

Most recently these trends have converged to bring a silver lining to the COVID-19 cloud over the Hollywood industry. When location shooting became impossible, actors uploaded performances shot against homespun green screens, and LED walls allowed productions to shoot on stages under COVIDsafe conditions. Meanwhile, the visual effects and animation industry adapted readily to remote working, with legions of artists and production staff continuing to deliver content through lockdown.

But this was never just about helping the entertainment industry through the pandemic. There has never been a better time for live-action producers to dip their toes into the waiting waters of what some might describe as the future of filmmaking. For those ready to take the plunge, what is the best way to make the transition, and what opportunities await them in this brave new world?

“I am a huge proponent of below-the-line producers moving into visual effects and animation producing,” says Brooke Breton, visual effects producer and co-producer of Avatar. Breton has previously worked below and above the line in both live action and animation. “Having knowledge in all three production paradigms opens doors to many new opportunities and experiences, which in turn keeps the work varied and stimulating. It helps you make more-informed choices, allowing you to determine the best methodologies that would benefit your project aesthetically, and in terms of time and resources.”

“There’s so much work out there,” adds Jinko Gotoh, producer of animated features including Finding Nemo and Netflix’s Klaus, who started her career in commercials. “There’s no reason why live-action people can’t come into this industry—in fact, most of us at some point started in live action. And it’s important that below-the-line producers embrace the new technologies like virtual production and LED screens. You may not want to move into visual effects and animation, but today, you have to live with it just doing live action.”

ONCE A PRODUCER, ALWAYS A PRODUCER For producers interested in switching tracks, the good news is that the fundamental things still apply. “Producers are used to looking at a script and understanding the various components that need to be satisfied to deliver a final project,” Breton explains. “Moving into animation and visual effects, you are using the same analytical skills, but altering them to accept new practices, pipelines and methodologies. It’s not difficult if you remain open to learning, because all of your existing skills are transferrable.”

A first-time producer on an animated feature will nevertheless encounter some key differences in workflow. The most fundamental of these is the pivotal role played by editorial. “Animation production is a linear, iterative process in which everything centers around editorial,” Gotoh says.

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“Animation production is a linear, iterative process in which everything centers around editorial.

I think conceptually that’s the biggest difference between animation and live action, where you prep for months, then shoot, and then editorial becomes a post process.”

Jinko Gotoh

“I think conceptually that’s the biggest difference between animation and live action, where you prep for months, then shoot, and then editorial becomes a post process. Once you get your head wrapped around that, then everything else is the same. You’re taking a script, doing breakdowns, budgeting against labor, and monitoring the usage of that labor.”

The editorial team will typically assemble the first cut of an animated film very early, using storyboards. “In feature animation, the storyboard is a phase of your story development,” says David Prescott, senior vice president of creative animation production at global visual effects and animation company DNEG, who began his career in live-action VFX. “You’ve got your script, but you’re using the boarding process to really work on story. Is this the best way to tell a joke? Is this the best way to move this character development forward? You throw the whole film up in storyboard, and evaluate it, and then go back into it again and again.” Subsequent cuts of the films introduce simple blocking animation.

As the iterative process continues, this is gradually superseded by increasingly polished renders.

Concurrent with storyboarding, and before animation can commence in earnest, every aspect of the film must be designed.

“Nothing is in camera,” observes Prescott.

“If a character walks past a postbox, you have to design that postbox to fit your world. You have to design the entire world, and build it from scratch.”

Designing whole worlds makes for a large art department whose involvement, like that of editorial, continues through production and into post. For the production team managing this process, however, the challenges are consistent with those on a live-action production— even down to scouting locations. “I always ask the question: ‘What piece of detail can we put in here that will make people believe this place exists somewhere?’” says Prescott. “Visiting places allows you to do that. The team may be a little different than what you’d take on a live-action scout—the

production designer and a bunch of artists, say, rather than an assistant director crew— but the goal is the same.”

MARATHON, NOT A SPRINT On a live-action set, the production dances to a daily beat: How many script pages today? How many setups? Hurry, we strike tonight! When it comes to the animation, one of the first differences a live-action producer will notice is the unique rhythm of the animator’s calendar.

The animation workflow has its own 24-hour pulse, with shots presented and notes given at dailies. However, this daily turnaround is usually underpinned by a weekly quota system. “You start on a Monday and you have to get so many shots by the end of the week,” says Gotoh.

For producers, this means attending dailies and doing regular walkarounds, physically or virtually, to ensure the director is giving enough feedback, and the animators are following the notes. “A day on the set becomes a week in animation.”

Timescales stretch at the macro level, too. Many producers equate the experience of making an animated feature to running a marathon. “Typically we’re in preproduction for about 12 months,” Gotoh says. “Then we go into shot production, which is 12 to 18 months, and we still have post on top of that. It’s hard to make a quality animated feature film in less than 30 months.” Keeping teams united and motivated over such long periods is of paramount importance. “You can be brilliant and talented, but if you’re not a nice person you’re going to alienate your team eventually. Maybe you can get away with not being nice for six months, but not for three years.”

In order to successfully manage an animation team, which might be anywhere from 40 to 120 people, a producer must embrace the fact that animators are actors. For many producers, this represents a welcome opportunity to interact directly with performers. “When you’re on set, the actors are really left to the director and the assistant directors.

Working with animators is definitely

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something that a production person needs to be able to do,” Gotoh adds.

Farther down the animation pipeline, the performance-driven task of animation segues into more technical creative disciplines such as lighting, rendering and compositing. Managing these requires producers to track multiple assets and versions of shots right through production.

Daunting as these disciplines might seem to a newcomer, they are merely parts of a process that is there to be managed.

“Remember, you aren’t required to perform these artistic or technological tasks,” says Breton. “You are simply required to have

an overall understanding of these methods and the time it takes to reasonably perform them. Gaining familiarity with software such as Shotgun will help, but, at some point, you just have to jump in. Take it slow, read trade magazines and books, watch behind-the-scenes pieces, tune in to webinars, talk to friends who have experience in these realms. If you can get on set or into a facility to see this work in person, even better.”

“I always ask the

VFX: BLURRED BOUNDARIES Turning their attention to visual effects, a producer will find much common

question: ‘What piece of detail can we put in here that will

Brooke Breton stands on a virtual production set at Nant Studios in March 2021 while shooting a show for AMPAS Science and Technology Council.

make people believe this place exists somewhere?’”

David Prescott

“Moving into animation and visual effects, you are using the same analytical skills, but altering them to accept

COURTESY EPIC GAMES AND NANT STUDIOS

new practices, pipelines

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and methodologies.

It’s not difficult if you remain open to learning, because all of your existing skills are transferrable.”

Brooke Breton

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COURTESY MARK FELLMAN

James Cameron at the High Camp Bio Lab set built for the sequels to his 2009 hit Avatar, which pioneered virtual production techniques and became the highestgrossing film of all time.

“With proper prep of the systems and assets, the workflow on the set is smooth, creative and flexible, with most of the key decisions being pulled forward from the post pipeline into the prep and shooting.”

James Cameron

ground with animation, but with one big difference: Visual-effects production is, by its nature, entwined with the liveaction production process. As for the precise relationship between the two, new technologies are blurring boundaries, advancing many visual processes toward the front of the schedule and making a lie of the old adage that visual effects is all about ‘fixing it in post.’

“Pipelines are changing rapidly,” says James Cameron, Oscar-winning filmmaker of blockbusters such as Titanic and the groundbreaking Avatar.

“Producers need to stay up to date and get hands-on experience with the new tools. CG environments and characters can be integrated right on the live-action set using real-time composite systems— this makes the live shoot the middle step of the visual-effects process, whereas it used to be the beginning. Those environments and characters need to be created in advance, ready for the director

to work with, and for the live-action cast to react to in real time. This is beyond previs—it’s the actual creation of the CG world, set extensions, character design and near-final animation.”

At the heart of the visual-effects process is the production-side team, which not only maintains the overview in preproduction and during principal photography, but also manages the various vendor companies hired to develop and deliver the finished shots.

The visual-effects producer will likely have their own in-house team of artists to manage as well. Each vendor has its own producer, whose job is to manage the shots through the company’s pipeline.

A typical visual-effects pipeline starts with design, as art department concepts are translated into digital assets. On some effects-heavy films, the vendor team may actually take the lead on certain design tasks, though still under the supervision of the project’s production designer.

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Asset creation is the digital equivalent of prop building, and layout equates to set construction. Beyond these lie animation, lighting, rendering and more.

The concepts behind visual effects will be familiar to any live-action producer.

“There are parallels to most parts of physical production,” says Philipp Wolf, executive-in-charge of corporate strategy at DNEG, and visual-effects producer on films including Ghost in the Shell and Godzilla: King of the Monsters. “The biggest difference is that it’s not physical anymore; it’s virtual. It’s not a carpenter building a set; it’s an artist building that set digitally. For a producer, there’s a difference between having people running around on set all day fixing stuff to having people sitting in front of a computer fixing stuff. But really, it’s just a different energy.”

THE FUTURE LOOKS VIRTUAL The collision of changing times and new technologies has brought with it an explosion in employment opportunities.

The work is out there, in a continentspanning industry that is ready to open its doors to all. “I’ve been encouraging representation and diversity for many years as part of Women in Animation,” Gotoh reflects. “Now streaming has allowed us to diversify storytelling as well, because there is so much demand for content. And ours is a global industry, which brings so much representation from people working virtually all around the world. This is truly a golden era for animation and visual effects.”

For newcomers, the first hurdle is often grasping the terminology. “Whenever I get someone joining the industry, I tell them to take the Visual Effects Society handbook and just read the introductory paragraph to each chapter,” Wolf says. “They’ll get through the book in a week or two and end up with a basic understanding of what they need to know.” With the language learned, focus can return to the producer’s familiar core skills. “It’s the same in visual

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effects as it is on set. You’re making sure everything is where it needs to be, and enabling people to do what they need to do, all within the budget, quality and time you have. You’re laying the tracks in front of the moving train, without getting overtaken by the train.”

Career progression within visual-effects production follows a similar pattern to live-action, with entry-level runners advancing through production assistant and coordinator roles, to production management and upward. In welcoming live-action production staff, many visualeffects vendors will expect a new hire to step down a level. “If you’re an on-set production manager or coordinator with no visual-effects experience, you’ll likely go in as a production assistant,” says Wolf. “But you’re not going to be stuck there for a year. As soon as you learn the lingo, and if you have the qualities, you’ll move up the ladder.”

As the barriers continue to break down between live action, animation and visual effects, the creative opportunities for filmmakers will only increase. Nowhere is this more evident than on a virtual production set. “If everything is teed up correctly,” Cameron asserts, “it makes the work incredibly exciting and gives a great deal of creative flexibility to the director of photography and the director on the set, in addition to yielding stunning results.

With proper prep of the systems and assets, the workflow on the set is smooth, creative and flexible, with most of the key decisions being pulled forward from the post pipeline into the prep and shooting.”

For producers of animated features, virtual technologies are allowing department heads to work together remotely, aligning the animation pipeline more closely to its live-action counterpart.

“The director can get into a virtual space with the digital cinematographer, the production designer, the animators,” says Gotoh. “We are collaborating more like live action. That’s super exciting for me as a producer.”

“You’re making sure everything is where it needs to be, and enabling people to do what they need to do, all within the budget, quality and time you have. You’re laying the tracks in front of the moving train, without getting overtaken by the train.”

Philip Wolf

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s e c r e ts o f a n

Independent producer Shrihari Sathe sheds light on the considerable monetary resources available to filmmakers outside of traditional financing models.

hile many producers spend years figuring out how to play the Hollywood game, independent producer Shrihari Sathe has thrived outside of the studio system. A native of India, Sathe leverages a network of global economic resources to help both American and international filmmakers from marginalized backgrounds bring their stories to the screen, and he’s learned quite a few tricks of the trade along the way.

An Independent Spirit Award-winning producer (and PGA member) who was among this year’s class of invitees to join the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences, Sathe worked stateside to introduce audiences to the radically empathetic cinema of writer-director Eliza Hittman with It Felt Like Love and Beach Rats. More recently, he collaborated with directing duo Paul Felten and Joe DeNardo on their lauded debut feature, thriller Slow Machine.

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SECRETS OF AN INDIE-FUNDING MASTER

But this past decade, Sathe’s most dynamic feats as a producer have involved working on international co-productions, from a Pakistani-U.S.-Norwegian-Indian co-production (Dukhtar, Pakistan’s official submission to the 87th Academy Awards) to a Tibetan-U.S.-Indian co-production with UK equity investments (The Sweet Requiem). A creative force whose films have played festivals all over the world, Sathe specializes in pooling multiple financial resources into successful international co-productions, combining government grants, tax incentives, and other funding sources from co-producers’ individual territories with infusions of private equity.

Raised in India, Sathe came to the United States to study at the University of Michigan, majoring in film, video studies, global media and culture. Taking classes on international cinema, he became fascinated by the ways film industries in Latin American countries were influencing West African cinema, and vice versa. “It was really interesting to see the intersectionality of how people communicated through the medium of cinema,” he recalls.

Earning his MFA at Columbia, Sathe studied directing and producing. As his interest in independent film grew, so did his appreciation for the bounty of resources accessible to indie producers— especially those willing to restructure film financing models to accommodate a more globalized perspective.

AS AN INDEPENDENT PRODUCER, HOW DO YOU APPROACH FUNDING YOUR PROJECTS? In a lot of ways, I approach it like a tech startup. How do I get people riled up, and how do I get people interested in bringing this filmmaker’s vision to life? A lot of my films have been first features by writerdirectors. It’s not only investing in a film, but it’s also investing in the career of an emerging artist, in the talent of someone

who needs that platform. I’ve produced a lot of first features, and it’s something I’m immensely proud of.

WHAT’S AN EXAMPLE OF A PROJECT YOU’VE PRODUCED THAT WASN’T NECESSARILY LUCRATIVE FROM A FINANCIAL POINT OF VIEW BUT BROUGHT THOSE INVOLVED SOME OTHER SATISFACTION? Pretty much every film I’ve done has seen some kind of lucrative value for pretty much everyone involved. For the director, the film has either been critically successful, and they were able to get a grant from a foundation or government to work on their next film, or they got hired by a company to direct commercials.

From an investor’s point of view, they came on board because the film was going to help drive some kind of social change and lead to conversations, and that’s the satisfaction that they got. Luckily, in a few cases it has been that satisfaction, along with financial recoupment, which has been amazing. For me, if I can help investors recoup their money and then some—and still make social change possible—I’m tremendously happy. If you look at my body of work, nearly half of the films I’ve done are American, and about half of them are international. But a lot of them have some kind of underlying social issue concept where it’s not really driving the message or hitting it on the head, but it’s underlying.

TELL ME ABOUT A PARTICULARLY CHALLENGING PROJECT THAT YOU’VE PRODUCED. I have a film called Screwdriver (Mafak) that I produced that is entirely in Arabic that was shot entirely in the West Bank.

I started putting that project together at the end of 2010. It was very hard to raise money in the U.S. because the film

was not in English. It was a first-time filmmaker who is from the West Bank but was educated in the U.S. and Canada.

I took that project through the Sundance Creative Producing Fellowship and that opened a fair amount of doors, for that project and just in general for my career, because I met a lot of people in the industry that I wouldn’t have normally met. As we were financing that project together, we realized it would be hard to raise the funds for a non-Englishlanguage film in the U.S., and I did face a fair amount of resistance here saying, “Oh, we don’t know how this market works. We like the story. We like the vision, but we don’t see any recoupability, so we’re not interested.”

I’ve known the filmmaker, Bassam Jarbawi, since 2005, so I really wanted to make the film. I believed in the subject matter and the story. The film was about a 17-year-old Palestinian boy who gets incarcerated for a crime he did not commit. He ends up going to jail for 15 years, then being released. It was about his reassimilation back into society that has really moved on, while he’s still stuck in the mind of a high school boy. How is he going to readjust?

While the story was extremely specific to the Israel-Palestine conflict, it was very universal, because incarceration is happening everywhere. The idea of a prisoner’s reassimilation was very universal. I knew this film could travel.

AS FINANCING SCREWDRIVER WITH JUST U.S. EQUITY WOULDN’T HAVE BEEN POSSIBLE, WHAT WAS YOUR NEXT MOVE? At one point, the film was structured as a very complicated co-production between the U.S., Palestine, Qatar, Kuwait, Germany, France, and Norway. That’s a lot of countries for a very small, sub-milliondollar indie film, and we tried to set it up through a European co-production model for a number of years. At the same time, I

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SECRETS OF AN INDIE-FUNDING MASTER

“FOR ME, IF I CAN HELP INVESTORS RECOUP THEIR MONEY AND THEN SOME— AND STILL MAKE SOCIAL CHANGE POSSIBLE—I’M TREMENDOUSLY HAPPY.” was trying to raise money in the U.S., and actually had one financier who came to me and asked, “Can you make this film in Spanish and change it to Mexico?” And I’m like, “No, that is not the intention of the story and not the intention of the writerdirector. It was always perceived as an Arabic-language film. I had to walk away from that investment because the financier wanted something totally different. But it only strengthened my resolve. Ultimately, we ended up structuring the film as an equity project between the U.S., Kuwait, Palestine and India, and then we got a big grant from the Doha Film Institute for production, some small grants from the Sundance Institute, and a postproduction grant from SF Film to help finish it. The movie premiered at the Venice Days (Giornate degli Autori) in 2018, followed by the Toronto International Film Festival as the closing-night film in their Discoveries section. It has continued to have a very successful festival and nontheatrical run.

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I’m actually looking for distribution for that film in the U.S. right now.

WHAT’S THE MOST ESSENTIAL SKILL THAT YOU NEED TO WORK ON INTERNATIONAL CO-PRODUCTIONS? It’s important to understand how different funding systems operate and are modeled, and to understand the requirements of the different funds involved.

The U.S.-based producer can bring private equity to the table; here, we don’t have government support other than tax credits from different states. There’s no up-front soft financing like European and Latin American countries have. Equity is hard to come by in other countries because of the public funding systems they have in place. Equity can help close the gaps some of these European and South American productions have, for example.

As a producer, you need to have conversations with international producing partners to find a commonality that will work for both the equity investors as well as the needs of the project. All the public funds have different requirements, and some of them even conflict with each other. You have to negotiate with all the different entities to make sure the equity is comfortable being on the project.

IS THERE A RECENT PROJECT WHERE PRIVATE EQUITY BECAME RELEVANT? I’m currently in postproduction on The Cow That Sang a Song About the Future, which is a French-German-Chilean co-production with some U.S. private equity. I would say the U.S. equity no doubt made the project possible, because all these different countries had put together different soft financing from

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SECRETS OF AN INDIE-FUNDING MASTER

the governments and foundations, but there was still a gap. I was able to bring some equity investors on board in order to close the financing, which essentially greenlit the film. But in order to make this happen, the conversation started with all the different stakeholders over six months ago. We had to drill down into what every producer and production company in each of those countries needed and match that with the U.S. equity and run through permutations and combinations of how the deal would work.

Shrihari Sathe on the set of Screwdriver in Palestine

HOW DOES “SOFT FUNDING” FACTOR INTO YOUR COPRODUCTIONS? In the European context, that term is usually used to describe government funding bodies. For instance, in France there is the CNC, which gives us the Aide aux cinémas du monde (ACM), which is a French government fund that gives somewhere between 75,000 euros and 150,000 euros for first and second features. They have one section for that, and then another section for more established filmmakers. There’s a lot of these funds that exist in different countries. For The Cow That Sang a Song About the Future, we had a few different funds out of France, we had the World Cinema Fund (WCF) out of Germany, and we had a big fund out of Chile.

Those government funding bodies are how films get made in those countries.

Understanding how that gets converted into a local producer’s equity in the film is how the European producers or the Latin American producers generally operate, and structurally, understanding that does take awhile. It’s something that I’ve been really training myself with during my time on the festival circuit. Understanding that has helped me educate investors and equity financiers about structure, and once I can showcase how a project would get structured, that’s up to them if they’re interested in investing.

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HOW LONG DOES IT TAKE FOR A PROJECT TO COMPLETE THIS KIND OF FUNDING CIRCUIT? It takes awhile. For instance, if you apply to Aide aux cinémas du monde in France—let’s say you apply in March— you move through the different stages, and you don’t really get the money until December. That is if everything goes according to plan. The timelines for the European funding structure or international co-production structure are fairly elongated, but that’s not to say that just equity investment can happen overnight; even that can take

awhile. There’s a film I just finished shooting where we were trying to raise the money for nearly a year and a half, and then the pandemic happened, the stock market crashed, and some of the investors we had on board decided to take a step back. But as a producer, I can’t be like, “Oh, I should also stop trying to raise money, because no one wants to invest in the film.” So we had to go back to the drawing board and look at a slightly different structure to be able to make the film. With the European or the co-production financing model, it does take awhile—a minimum of six months, probably closer to a year and a half or two years, for some projects.

SECRETS OF AN INDIE-FUNDING MASTER

“WITH EQUITY, YOU’RE NOT REALLY TIED DOWN TO A PARTICULAR PERSON’S MISSION OR A PARTICULAR GOVERNMENT BODY’S MISSION STATEMENT. IT’S PRETTY OPEN-ENDED.” the state tax credit system is great.

It allows a lot of films to be made.

What’s needed very much in the U.S. is funding for development. Right now, only a few nonprofits are providing screenwriting grants, packaging grants, and development grants, whereas in Europe the government bodies and state institutions provide that funding.

That’s needed to help filmmakers from marginalized communities who might not have access to resources, might not be independently wealthy, or might not have the equity reach in order to be able to tell their stories.

DO YOU WISH THERE WERE MORE GOVERNMENT FUNDING IN THE U.S. FOR INDEPENDENT FILM, OR DO YOU PREFER USING PRIVATE EQUITY? Both are quite essential. Just having one system of putting an independent film together might not be the best way to go about it because then there are gatekeepers. With equity, you’re not really tied down to a particular person’s mission or a particular government body’s mission statement. It’s pretty open-ended. I think a combination of the two is quite crucial. In the U.S.,

YOUR FILMS OFTEN EXPLORE THE INTERSECTIONALITY OF THE AMERICAN IMMIGRANT EXPERIENCE. DO YOU FEEL LIKE THERE’S BEEN A RISE IN THESE STORIES REACHING AUDIENCES RECENTLY? One film I’m putting together, called Backseat, is about a Romanian immigrant and mother of two who must work through the American system to get custody of her children back; it’s the first fiction film written by Lana Wilson, who made the Taylor Swift documentary Miss Americana. The film is looking at what it means to be an American, but also what it means to be from a different culture and be a first-generation immigrant to the U.S. It explores how someone who is coming from a different culture needs to navigate

and understand American culture as an adult. It’s looking at the intersectionality of being non-American and American at the same time. The other film that I’m currently raising financing for is a film called Fight with the writer-director Musa Syeed. We’re looking at the Arab American community in the Michigan-Ohio area, and looking at what that experience means in terms of the perception of Islam in the global media. I’m happy to see that financing is opening up to these stories, but I think a lot more needs to be done for there to be an accurate representation of what America is.

The audience was always there for stories about the immigrant experience or stories made by immigrants. Now the powers that be are more willing to make those movies, so there is content for this audience to consume. That’s why I like films like The Farewell, Minari, and Farewell Amor. They’re able to get that critical acclaim, but also get that satisfaction from an audience perspective, as audiences consume stories by people or about people who look like them and have similar experiences. The part of the industry that’s changing is really great, but a lot more is needed. One or two films are not going to cut it. The drive to make and finance more films made by minority filmmakers should continue and is definitely the need of the hour. These are the kind of films I’m interested in making, that I am making, and that despite all odds I will continue to make.

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Back to

Work Hollywood finds ways to adapt to a new normal.

Written By Piya Sinha-Roy

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When movie theaters shuttered across the nation in March 2020 and movies in production were abruptly halted, Hollywood was forced to contend with a domino effect: Audiences were stuck at home, studios were forced to rejigger their theatrical slate, streaming platforms became the dominant source of entertainment, and producers had to figure out how to salvage their projects.

The return of movie theaters and new fare on the big screen has rejuvenated the industry, injecting much-needed hope for producers who are still navigating an uncertain future. July’s U.S. box office saw success with Disney-Marvel’s Black Widow and Warner Bros’ Space Jam: A New Legacy—both released same day in theaters and on streaming—and Universal’s Old, released exclusively in theaters.

But there’s still a long way to go, and multiple obstacles to take into account, as the film industry slowly resumes operations and producers figure out what to do with the films on their development slate.

THE PLUNGE INTO DARKNESS Back in March 2020, Hiram Garcia, president of production at Dwayne Johnson’s Seven Bucks Productions, was in Atlanta filming Netflix action movie Red Notice and was scheduled to move on to Italy for the next leg of shooting.

“Within 72 hours, everything accelerated so fast,” Garcia says.

With COVID cases rising in Italy, production on the film was paused as Garcia and his team rethought their locations. “As producers, we’re supposed to plan for everything. And we’re pretty good at it,” he explains. “But it’s hard to plan for a global pandemic.”

Red Notice was one of the

first films to resume production in September 2020 under strict COVID safety guidelines, after Garcia and the Netflix team spent months working with the CDC to get the movie back up and running, following a bubble model similar to the NBA’s. Garcia said they moved all the location work to stages and incorporated more LED screens, and were able to keep a crew employed to keep production running. “We were successful in keeping our crew and cast safe, finishing the movie, and when we watched the movie, we were like, thank god the movie turned out well.”

Over at Imagine Documentaries, shutdowns in production happened so quickly that some crews were in the middle of conducting subject interviews.

But they were able to adapt quickly.

Crews were sent home the same day and footage was backed up on hard drives to be made available for remote work.

Many of Imagine’s projects were already in postproduction, so the work shifted to remote operations. In addition, there was a growing demand for archival-driven documentaries, to which the company responded by developing editorial projects that could be produced during COVID with minimal need for physical production. “Having to very quickly pivot and come up with solutions on the fly is inherent in this style of filmmaking,” says Justin Wilkes, president of Imagine Documentaries.

And then there are producers who have been able to adapt their entire slate swiftly to the new normal. Matt Kaplan, CEO of ACE Entertainment, a production house that focuses mainly on youngadult movies such as the To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before trilogy for Netflix, made three films in the past year and quadrupled their development slate.

As producers, we’re supposed to plan for everything and we’re pretty good at it. But it’s hard to plan for a global pandemic.

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“I knew that studios would have a harder time getting back to work on the large-scale productions,” Kaplan explains.

The company was able to make movies with smaller crews and storylines that involved fewer visual effects, as well as controlling their own finances. “Our company has always been built to be very nimble. We approach everything very differently from most traditional producers because we have our own financing,” he adds.

One of the biggest financial impacts for production has been budgeting for COVID safety measures. Kaplan says that while they’ve been able to shoot films in the past year and put crews back to work, COVID protocols add about a million dollars to the budget on each film.

In the case of Red Notice, Garcia said Netflix stepped up to foot the cost, working closely with the CDC to implement thorough guidelines on set.

“We did have to take into account how filming with these new procedures squeezes your budget a little bit more, and we have to be a bit more efficient in terms of circumstances. Some set pieces may be a little tighter,” he says.

That squeeze was felt when Seven Bucks went into production on Warner Bros’ DC film Black Adam, in which Dwayne Johnson plays the titular antihero. With COVID protocols in place, Garcia says some changes did need to be made to the story. “We probably made a couple scenes a little bit tighter and shaved off just a couple of moments. There were definitely sacrifices made if you want to keep the crew safe and if you want to keep the production running,” he says.

BIG SCREEN, SMALL SCREEN As some producers juggled the complications of shooting during COVID, others juggled distribution options for their films.

Long before theaters shut down, streaming platforms were already upending theatrical distribution for indie and mid-range films, but there was no doubt that studios would hold tentpoles

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exclusively for the big screen. In March 2020, producers were forced to make tough decisions: Was it worth holding the film for the big screen, or releasing the film on streaming platforms for hungry audiences at home?

Over the past year, new streamers such as HBO Max and Disney+ have allowed studios to explore a variety of on-demand release models for big-budget films and erase the traditional theatrical window.

Disney has charged premiums for new releases such as Black Widow, while HBO Max has debuted anticipated films such as Wonder Woman 1984 and In the Heights without a premium charge.

as many people as we possibly could, and Netflix has the ability to do that,” says Aditya Sood, president of Lord Miller. “The success of the movie is really borne out in that they were the right place for the movie to launch from.”

Sony also made the decision to release American Pickle, from Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg’s Point Grey Pictures, through HBO Max, making it the streamer’s first film. “There have been so many movies that were to be released theatrically that decided to just

I think we’re always trying to find ways to connect with the audience. Whether that feels like theatrical is the answer or not, we’re open to it.

For Disney and Seven Bucks Productions’ latest movie, Jungle Cruise, starring Johnson and Emily Blunt, Garcia said the choice to release it in theaters and on Disney+ on the same day (for a premium on streaming) was to “allow as many people to see it as possible, and also to give people the choice on how they want to see it.”

“I think we were already starting to see a clear delineation in theatrical attendance in terms of certain kinds of projects,” says Garcia. “It was starting to become this split (between) the really big tentpole, theater-event films pulling in a lot of people, and some of those smaller films that you can typically still have watched at home—people were not quite going out as much toward those. The pandemic accelerated that.”

In the case of the family-friendly animated film The Mitchells vs The Machines, produced by Lord Miller and initially to have been distributed theatrically by Sony, Netflix ended up becoming the right home. “It was important for us to share the movie with

hold and wait until theaters open,” says Alex McAtee, executive vice president of film and television at Point Grey. “But American Pickle was super specific tonally and really important to us as a company.

We wanted to get it out there, and we were OK with having it be something that people could enjoy at home.”

McAtee says that the success of American Pickle has impacted the way that Point Grey is thinking about its slate of films and series, assessing the best distribution model for each project. The company is currently in production on the limited series Pam & Tommy for Hulu, a project that was initially conceived as a film but ended up being developed for TV. “How are people watching things now?

If the answer is at home, then how can we be at home with them?” McAtee says.

“I think we’re always trying to find ways to connect with the audience. Whether that feels like theatrical is the answer or not, we’re open to it and our partners at Lionsgate, where we have our deal, are super nimble and are able to similarly pivot, depending on what feels right.”

BACK TO WORK

LIGHT AT THE END OF THE TUNNEL? As Hollywood gets back to work, producers are already preparing to mitigate the risks of the upcoming year. The expected bump in theatrical attendance after vaccines started rolling out across the nation has been countered with the threat of new variants of the COVID virus, which also threatens to slow down production.

For Justin Wilkes at Imagine Documentaries, the shutdowns pushed them to get creative with storytelling

Alex McAtee on set of Point Grey Pictures and Annapurna’s Pam & Tommy series for Hulu

methods, leaning on archival footage and conducting interviews remotely.

But in terms of demand and distribution, documentaries were experiencing a major decline in theatrical attendance anyway.

The streamers gave them a platform to thrive within.

“The revolution had already happened in the nonfiction world, but not in the traditional Hollywood studio movie world because of all the money and players involved. Everyone has resisted that,” says Wilkes. “But the same thesis is true, and at the end of it, technology

is going to prevail. As a filmmaker or producer, you have an opportunity upstream to decide what is the best path for a particular project.”

Some silver linings have also come from navigating the past year. Matt Kaplan says ACE Entertainment is accelerating development of its international slate, namely local-language and bilingual productions, and casting local actors. Given that transporting cast and crew abroad is likely to be difficult in the near future with COVID, investing in local-language productions might also be the best way to work around travel complications. “We live in such a globally connected world,” Kaplan adds. “Between Instagram and Twitter and all the social media platforms, young people today, more than ever, are connected, and they want to hear stories about a Korean American going overseas to boarding school and stuff like that.”

And then there’s the convenience of having established a system that allows companies to work remotely.

“I think there’s a new level of efficiency that our company has experienced,” says Garcia. “We have much more access to each other. We’ve really ramped up our development process and we have a couple projects. We’ll continue to shoot Young Rock at the end of this year, and we have a big Christmas movie with Amazon next year.”

With the industry once again undergoing a seismic shift, Wilkes predicts more change on the horizon.

“While there’s a proliferation of platforms right now, if you look back in history as our guide, there will be consolidation,” he explains. “Some of these platforms that exist today are not going to exist six to 12 months from now, as companies are being swallowed up.”

So will that slow down the buying spree, and if so, what projects will make the cut? “How do we develop stuff today that we’re going to have to take out six to 12 months from now that’s going to satisfy that need down the road?” he questions.

“That’ll be interesting to see.”

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P G A AT YO U R SERVICE

NEW MEMBERS A spotlight on some of the newest members of the Producers Guild and what makes them tick

What’s the best piece of advice you’ve ever received about producing?

Producers have three main pressures: time, quantity and quality.

John R. Blythe Blythe’s penchant for horror began as a child, when he rented Grizzly and Halloween on VHS tapes. Later, when he learned that both films had been top-grossing indies, he plotted his own path into independent producing.

Amy Seidenwurm

What’s on your producing bucket list?

I really want to work with Ava DuVernay. I admire her so much because she never, ever compromises her integrity or her artistic vision.

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Producing a virtual reality film on the Los Angeles Philharmonic and seeing it travel to communities that didn’t have much access to the arts is what led Seidenwurm to leave her job with the orchestra and move into producing more VR content with social impact. She’s now the executive producer at Oculus’ VR for Good program, where she has ushered more than 20 projects that travel across film festivals.

P G A AT YO U R SERVICE

Dayana Ariza-Gonzalez For Dominican American producer Ariza-Gonzalez, telling stories from her community and from underrepresented voices is what drives her work.

She witnesses the power of storytelling when strangers and loved ones alike share their joy with her in seeing themselves represented on screen.

What’s the best piece of advice you’ve ever received about producing?

It is important to remember that major life events that cannot be rescheduled—like the birth of a child or caring for a family member in their time of need—must be prioritized over the needs of a project deadline. When producers mitigate risks to accommodate the needs of their team, everyone wins.

Who or what inspired you to go into producing?

Having empathy for others is my superpower as a producer. There is something so magical in being part of someone’s life story in this way. Whether in preproduction, production or postproduction, highlighting people’s experiences and facilitating this form of selfexpression without reservations feels like I’ve hit the jackpot every day. I wouldn’t trade this work for anything else. I’ve found my calling.

Jenn Halweil As an electrical engineer with dreams of saving the planet from climate change, Halweil realized she was often the only woman in rooms with people from government, utilities and start-ups. Understanding that major innovation can only come through diverse teams, she launched production studio and innovation lab #GoBeyond to drive inclusive and sustainable ideas.

Aaron Pulkka Pulkka began his career as an interactive software engineer and designer at Walt Disney Imagineering, where he was drawn to the workflow process between departments and highlighted ways to improve collaboration. But it was his boss, Sony Imagineering veteran David Spencer, who encouraged him to explore producing.

What’s on your producing bucket list?

A feature about Sally Ride, most famous for being the first female American astronaut, but she was so much more than that. She is one of the reasons we know about climate change, because she advocated using the satellite architecture she helped place in space to study our own planet. She was also an advocate for Mars exploration. I feel a strong affinity for her with our similar backgrounds spanning both science and storytelling.

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You asked for the Producers Mark in Television and we got it!

Now it’s up to YOU to get production companies, networks and distribution platforms to submit Televised and Streamed Motion Pictures to the PGA for certification!

IS THE PRODUCERS MARK AVAILABLE FOR ALL TYPES OF MOVIES? No. Historically, only theatrical motion pictures, documentary motion pictures and animated motion pictures were eligible to be submitted for Producers Mark consideration. But we are happy to report that the Producers Guild recently expanded its determination process to include televised/streamed motion pictures.

WHEN I SEE “p.g.a.” AFTER A PRODUCER’S NAME IN A MOTION PICTURE’S CREDITS, WHAT DOES IT MEAN? Regardless of the distribution platform, it means that according to the rules of the Producers Guild’s certification process, that producer performed a major portion of the producing functions on that specific motion picture.

WHY DO SOME MOTION PICTURES CARRY THE PRODUCERS MARK, BUT NOT OTHERS? The Producers Mark is voluntary, and the PGA cannot force any copyright owner to submit for certification. All of the major studios—Universal, Disney, Warner Bros.,

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the Producers Mark

ON YOUR MARK

Sony, Paramount and Fox—and nearly all theatrical distributors of independent motion pictures, welcome the PM process.

ARE ALL PRODUCERS ON A MOTION PICTURE ELIGIBLE TO BE CONSIDERED FOR THE PRODUCERS MARK? No. On theatrical motion pictures, documentary motion pictures and animated motion pictures only those individuals receiving “Producer” or “Produced By” credit may be considered for use of the Producers Mark. On televised/streamed motion pictures, only those individuals receiving “Executive Producer,” “Producer” or “Produced By” credit, whichever is the primary producing credit as supported by the submitted credits, may be considered for use of the Producers Mark.

IF A PRODUCER DOESN’T RECEIVE THE p.g.a. MARK FROM THE PRODUCERS GUILD, WHAT HAPPENS TO THEIR PRODUCING CREDIT? Nothing. The Producers Mark doesn’t control or affect the “Executive Producer,” “Produced By” or “Producer” credit in any way, nor does it invalidate that credit by its absence.

WHAT IMPACT DOES THE PRODUCERS MARK HAVE ON AWARDS? Determinations for the Producers Mark and for producer award eligibility are determined at the same time and via the same process. In addition to AMPAS, HFPA and BAFTA, all rely on the PGA

process to guide their decision making.

However the final selection of nominees is always at the discretion of the organization giving the award. And, while the Producers Mark also is recognized by the WGA, DGA and SAG-AFTRA, the PGA has agreed not to license the Producers Mark for use with any combined credit (e.g., “Directed and Produced By …”).

SO WHAT’S THE PROCESS FOR LICENSING THE PRODUCERS MARK? 1. The process is initiated by the copyright owner of the motion picture.

2. After the post-production process has commenced, but four to six weeks before credits are locked, the owner submits a motion picture for consideration via ProducersGuildAwards.com.

3. Within two to three weeks, the PGA sends out eligibility forms to every producer credited as “Executive Producer,” “Produced By” or “Producer” on the motion picture, depending on the type of production and the submitted credits, and sends confidential verification forms to a wide variety of third parties associated with the production of the motion picture: the director(s), writer(s), department heads, company executives and key crew members.

4. Once forms have been returned, the PGA convenes a panel of arbiters, each of them active and experienced producers with numerous (and recent) credits, typically in the genre or category of the motion picture under consideration. (I.e., if the motion

P G A AT YO U R SERVICE Because the Producers Mark is brand new for televised and streamed motion pictures, it is incumbent on you to request that the production companies, networks and distribution platforms submit the movies you produce for them to the Guild for processing the Producers Mark. If you are currently producing a televised or streamed movie and are contractually due the primary producing credit, please contact tvpm@producersguild.org for info and assistance on licensing the Producers Mark.

picture is a major studio tentpole, we try to utilize arbiters with considerable experience in making those big-budget studio pictures. If the motion picture is a smaller indie movie, we rely on producers familiar with that type of production. If the motion picture is produced for distribution via television or streaming platform, we use arbiters with that particular type of production experience, etc.) An initial arbitration panel typically has three arbiters.

The arbiters review all materials returned to the PGA by the producers and third parties, with all names of individuals credited on the motion picture redacted, so that arbiters can arrive at a judgment based on the testimony provided rather than the name recognition and perceived reputation of the producers.

5. Following the determination, the PGA staff informs the producers of the decision. Producers who object to the decision have five days to notify the Guild of an intent to appeal. After giving producers the opportunity to add to or clarify their testimony, the PGA will convene a new panel of arbiters. All appellate panels consist of three producers. If the initial decision was unanimous, the appellate panel will consist of one producer from the original panel and two new producers; if the initial decision was not unanimous, the appellate panel will consist of three new producers. The decision of the appellate panel is final.

SO WHEN ARBITERS ARE LOOKING AT THESE FORMS, WHAT ARE THEY SEEING? The eligibility form filled out by producers asks them to indicate their level of responsibility for a variety of produc-

ing functions spanning development, pre-production, physical production and post-production. The form also includes a free-response section for the producer to elaborate more fully on the specifics of the production and their role on the motion picture. The verification forms filled out by third parties typically ask the respondent questions related to the nature of their collaboration with the credited producers.

For instance, the verification form for editors asks the editor to designate which producer(s) consulted with the editor regarding dailies, gave notes on cuts or participated in screenings.

that bias is affecting their judgment.

WHO SELECTS WHICH ARBITERS VET THE CREDITS OF WHICH MOTION PICTURES? That determination is made by the PGA’s Corporate Counsel in consultation with the General Counsel.

ONCE A PRODUCER’S CREDIT IS CERTIFIED WITH THE PRODUCERS MARK, IS THAT CERTIFICATION APPLIED PERMANENTLY TO ALL OF THE PRODUCER’S MOTION PICTURES?

WHAT IF THE PGA SELECTS AN ARBITER WHO (UNBEKNOWNST TO THEM) IS BIASED AGAINST A GIVEN PRODUCER OR MOTION PICTURE?

No. A Producers Mark appended to a producing credit applies to that motion picture only. It represents the nature of the work performed on that motion picture alone and does not carry over to future productions.

The Guild takes proactive measures to prevent that from happening. Prior to convening the panel, the PGA provides all producers with a list of potential arbiters.

Producers are free to strike any arbiter for any reason. Such arbiters will not be empaneled for that particular motion picture. Furthermore, all arbiters are asked to affirmatively state that they have no interests in the motion pictures to be arbitrated that might result in a biased judgment. Even if all of those hurdles are cleared, an arbiter will be removed from the process if they or the PGA administrator (PGA’s Corporate Counsel or the National Executive Director/COO) feels

WHY CAN’T THE PGA BE MORE TRANSPARENT ABOUT THE PROCESS? We maintain the strictest confidentiality around the identities of the producers, third parties and arbiters involved because such confidence is the only way we can hope to get accurate and truthful information. Many producers are powerful figures in this industry and this might put pressure on third parties and arbiters to achieve a desired decision. Keeping those identities confidential is the only way to maintain the integrity of the process.

DOES THE “p.g.a.” AFTER THE PRODUCER’S NAME MEAN THAT THE PRODUCER IS A MEMBER OF THE PRODUCERS GUILD? No. A producer does not need to be a member of the PGA to receive the “p.g.a.” designation after their name. In many cases, the sets of initials you see in motion picture credits (such as A.S.C. and A.C.E.) indicate membership in an organization.

The Producers Mark is different. It’s a certification mark; its purpose is to designate that the producer has met an officially recognized standard of performance on that motion picture.

For all the details about the Producers Mark, please go to producersguild.org.

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P G A AT YO U R SERVICE

MARKING TIME Producers on four new films share their experiences of making the projects that earned them the Producers Mark certification.

Certification via the Producers Mark indicates that a producer performed a major portion of the producing functions on the motion picture. The full list of Producers Mark certifications can be viewed at producersguild.org.

Clifford the Big Red Dog – Jordan Kerner, p.g.a.

A little girl and her uncle go on a Manhattan adventure with a big red dog with a heart of gold. Out in theaters on September 17.

WHAT WAS THE BIGGEST CHALLENGE YOU ENCOUNTERED, AND HOW WERE YOU ABLE TO OVERCOME IT? The challenge was that Clifford was red!

Having learned on The Smurfs that the two hardest colors to hold their shade in digital media were blue and, red, we spent the better part of two years getting the color to hold on cinema screens across the globe as well as on smartphones or iPads. That was the creation of a painstaking myriad of algorithms. We issued a first-look image of Clifford on the internet that did not hold. All of my digits are crossed, hoping that we have solved the color conundrum, and that he is a beautiful color of Clifford red for everyone. He is very much red and very much a photo-real puppy. As in the series of books, Clifford does not speak as he did in the cartoons. We always chose to be as faithful as possible to Clifford author Norman Bridwell.

HOW DOES THIS STORY RESONATE IN THE PRESENT DAY? We are living in a time of great division and uncertainty. I have always admired and worked hard to produce films that elevate and do not denigrate. Films that recognize both complex sides of beliefs, but ultimately give the diverse audience

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the ability to laugh and cry at the same things. I believe that it is incumbent upon filmmakers to make films that allow us to honestly embrace the idea that we are much more similar in our embrace of family and love than we are different. At the end of this film, I hope that we will all love and understand each other just a “little bigger.”

6:45 – Craig Singer, p.g.a.

A dream vacation turns into a timeloop psychological thriller. Out in theaters on August 6.

WHAT DID YOU FIND MOST COMPELLING ABOUT THIS STORY? When I thought about 6:45, there wasn’t an abundance of time-loop stories. Lately it’s almost become a cottage industry!

6:45 really was about crafting a story that didn’t give away too much while at the same time avoiding the trap of being overly repetitious.

WHAT WAS THE BIGGEST CHALLENGE YOU ENCOUNTERED, AND HOW WERE YOU ABLE TO OVERCOME IT? I had been a creative VP at Disney and was spoiled by the tremendous resources that Disney provided. 6:45 was getting back to my indie roots with films like Animal Room and Dark Ride and working with a remarkably young team of talented individuals who shared a vision of making a powerful film with a limited, almost micro,

Clockwise from top left: Craig Singer on the set of time-loop thriller 6:45; Kelly Carmichael with director Michael Showalter on the set of The Eyes of Tammy Faye; Joseph Patel sitting with Al Sharpton for documentary Summer of Soul; Jordan Kerner with actor Jack Whitehall while filming Clifford the Big Red Dog.

P G A AT YO U R SERVICE

locations, casting the film with folks I’ve worked with in the past along with some fresh faces, production designing the film, pulling in favor after favor.

The Eyes of Tammy Faye – Kelly Carmichael, p.g.a.

How televangelists Tammy Faye Bakker and Jim Bakker rose to power in the 1970s. Out in theaters on September 17.

WHAT DID YOU FIND MOST COMPELLING ABOUT THIS STORY? It was incredibly compelling to consider this exact moment in history. Jim and Tammy were revolutionary—at the forefront of creating a new medium in broadcasting, sharing their lives daily with their followers and spreading their message. It was so exciting to look at a story that we all think we know or remember—the mascara, the tabloids, the scandal—but to examine what really happened and view it through today’s lens.

WHAT SURPRISED YOU THE MOST DURING THE COURSE OF PRODUCING THIS?

budget. Naturally pulling the funding together is always its own journey, and then having to both produce as well as direct. It was, in many ways, liberating to create the sort of film I envisioned without anyone over my shoulder—but also at times very challenging. Making films on any level is a test and I had to overcome our lack of resources with creative alternatives—finding my own

It’s not surprising, but rather inspiring, that when you bring a great group of people together, they rise to meet a challenge. We wrapped production in December 2019. A few months later in March, when Michael (Showalter) was sharing his director’s cut, the world shut down. Much of our postproduction happened remotely, but it was incredibly exciting because everyone— editorial, music, our mixers, etc.—stepped up, addressed the challenges and did an amazing job. If anything was surprising, that would be what we can do with technology. But I will be very happy to be back in a edit suite and a mix stage on our next production.

WHAT WAS ONE THING THAT YOU LEARNED THAT YOU’LL CONTINUE TO IMPLEMENT IN

YOUR FUTURE WORK? A passion for telling the story is always the most important piece of the puzzle.

Working with a director, actors and HODs who are committed and inspired to dig in is always the greatest experience.

Summer of Soul – Joseph Patel, p.g.a.

Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson examines the 1969 Harlem Cultural Festival. Out now on Hulu.

WHAT DID YOU FIND MOST COMPELLING ABOUT THIS STORY? When I was first introduced to it, I didn’t believe it happened. I’m a music nerd and I know Ahmir is a music nerd too, and the fact that we hadn’t heard about it was really mind-boggling. For me as a producer, the opportunity to rescue or find this footage and tell the story that we wanted to tell was a chance to put this festival back on the timeline, and a chance to show something that I personally innately believe in, which is that Black history is American history. For many decades, that hasn’t been the case, and I thought if we did our job right, and we told the story the right way, you would never be able to talk about the summer of 1969 again without mentioning this festival. Those opportunities to put things back on the timeline in a profound way, that was very compelling to me.

WHAT WAS ONE THING YOU LEARNED THAT YOU’LL CONTINUE TO IMPLEMENT IN YOUR FUTURE WORK? The thing that this process confirmed for me is that in order to produce or direct or tell stories the right way, you have to have a lot of conviction in the material, in the way you want to tell the story. You can’t just leave it to chance. You have to have a team around you that you trust. And all of you have to have the conviction to pull in the same direction. When you do, you end up with something special.

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RE A C E K NE WE TA EOCW AR R K TAU EO OF N W W O R OF OU

MPTF provides a safety net of social and charitable services including temporary financial assistance, counseling to navigate MPTF provides a safety net to of community social and charitable difficult times and referrals resources.services including temporary financial assistance, counseling to navigate difficult times and referrals to community resources.

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MEMBER BENEFITS ■ Access to exclusive programs such as PGA Mentoring (including one-on-one, TV Basecamp and Film Basecamp) and webinars featuring the most experienced producers in the entertainment industry ■ Admission to special PGA pre-release screenings and Q&A events (in person, predominantly in LA and NY, and accessible to all when virtual) ■ Voting privileges in the prestigious Producers Guild Awards, and access to physical and digital screeners during awards season ■ Exclusive discounts on industry services and events

■ Grow your network and find creative collaborators with the PGA’s Member Directory, accessible only to PGA Members.

■ Full access to PGA website, including events, calendar, social networking tools, and extensive members-only video library ■ Automatic receipt of Job Bulletins that match your skill and background through Hire PGA, a concierge service for employers ■ Free access to many PGA events and discounts on programs, such as the Produced By conferences ■ Complimentary subscription to Produced By

PRODUCEDBY June | July 2021

PRODUCEDBY THE OFFICIAL MAGAZINE OF THE PRODUCERS GUILD OF AMERICA // JUNE | JULY

THE WORKING PRODUCER’S ESSENTIAL TOOLKIT

P BLINDSPOTTING TURNS A NEW CHAPTER FOR STARZ

P THE MYRIAD WAYS TO BRING BOOKS TO SCREEN

P

Jesse collins volume XVII number 3

JESSE

COLLINS

As the world shut down last year, the veteran live TV producer moved quickly to adapt and reimagine awards shows so that COVID would not stop the entertainment.

SEE THE DIGITAL EDITION PRODUCERSGUILD.ORG LET’S GET SOCIAL

Advertising Info: Ken Rose at ken@moontidemedia.com or 818-312-6880

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IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF GIANTS

Guilty by Suspicion Written By Piya Sinha-Roy

On the 30th anniversary of his blacklist drama Guilty By Suspicion , producer Irwin Winkler reflects on writing it and casting two famous friends.

E

ven though it was his first time writing and directing a film, Irwin Winkler felt comfortable taking the reins on Guilty

by Suspicion. Winkler, who began his career in 1967, had already produced more than 30 films over two decades including Rocky and True Confessions, always being on set every day to watch his movies come together.

“I wrote the script, and because Marty Scorsese and I are friends, I sent it to him to just take a look at and he encouraged me to direct it,” Winkler says. “He also gave it to Bob De Niro and said, ‘Irwin should direct this and you should star in it,’ and De Niro liked it as well.

“So this photo is of me directing two icons—Martin Scorsese and Bob De Niro. We were talking about how the scene was going to be played. Scorsese was playing a director that was going to leave the country because he was blacklisted, and De Niro was questioning him about leaving.”

Scorsese was so committed as an actor that he even shaved off his years-old beard for the role, after Winkler told him it was unlikely that a 1950s director would have sported a beard.

Scorsese, De Niro and Winkler have come together multiple times, beginning with 1977’s New York, New York, then 1980’s Raging Bull, 1990’s Goodfellas and most recently on 2019’s The Irishman.

“We’re all very comfortable and supportive together,” Winkler says. “Frankly, when we talk in shorthand, it’s based on 40 years of commitment and friendship.”

Read more of Winkler’s stories from his prolific career in his book, A Life in Movies: Stories from 50 years in Hollywood.

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