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When the TBA producers were (not) announced, my text and email chains blew up.
Dozens of producer friends wrote to one another, flabbergasted that such a thing could happen.
Bowen Yang and Rachel Sennott present the Best Picture Oscar nominees on Thursday in Beverly HillsAl Seib/The Academy via Getty Images
A collective viral uproar occurred.
Ive been trying to imagine what the public must think seeing something like this.
Do some movies (the other five) have producers, and some do not?
Well, we all know whats happening.
The Academy and the PGA are trying to sort eligible names.
Those who are awarded the mark are the ones designated to collect statues should the film win Best Picture.
I could go on about whats right or wrong with these decision-making mechanisms, but thats not the point.
I wasnt involved in any of them, and even I can tell you who produced each one.
Thats because producing is a job.
The PGA recently launched a campaign saying exactly that.
A car has never been driven without a motor either.
When the word Producer was connected to the job description, people understood producers were vision keepers.
Nothing has changed in the job description, but everything has changed in terms of respecting it.
Someone very specific has done all of this on each one of the five TBA films announced yesterday morning.
God knows its a thankless job so much so that calling it such has become an accepted Hollywood-ism.
More importantly, why are real producers being subjected to this contest?
I would rather enter into the Squid Games!
How did we get here?
Its not about the Academy or the PGA.
In fact, the p.g.a.
mark system was introduced years ago to tame credit proliferation.
The reality is this systemic problem has always been rooted far upstream of their deliberations.
This is where the problems take hold and Producer credits are proliferated.
Who do I sort things with?
Who will be managing the movie?
This is where the course correction needs to occur.
Yes, filmmaking is a collaborative process.
That person should be the only one with the job title that describes their services.
Could there be two?
Are there sometimes three?
Are there ever more?
Has a writer, director or actor ever been the service-rendering producer in addition to their primary role?
Over the last year, two hundred producer producers got together and renamed ourselves Career Producers.
We define ourselves on the basis of the job functions we do.
We just want to be what we are: producers.
But weve lost the word to more than a quarter century of degradation events.
They are fighting for their recognition right now while we wait to hear who wins.
We are way too sophisticated to stand by while such a gladiatorial process is carried out.
Let Producers be Producers.
