From Idea into Production: The Producer

“The producer’s role can be defined like this: they’re the person who turns the lights on, staying until everybody else has left the room. Then finally, when everyone else is gone, the producer is the one to turn the lights off. The producer is the person(s) responsible for the making of the film from start to finish,” explains Janet Grillo.
“Typically, that involves conceptualizing the movie in some way, either engaging the services of a writer, a director. Sometimes it may involve optioning underlying intellectual property and hiring a writer to adapt it. It may mean finding a project and becoming partners with somebody else, joining another existing production team, or perhaps a writer/director who has already initiated the project.
It’s being part of a collaborative mind that supports the vision of the project—what it’s going to be. It’s figuring out how the team will assemble and then supporting the filmmaker in executing that vision. It’s bringing on required team members.
“As a producer, I would be there from the very start, helping to ideate what the team is envisioning,” says Grillo. “We determine immediately who wants to see this story. Who’s the audience? Is there an audience for this film? This helps us determine the market value, right? Because what gives a project market value is an audience.”
Determining your film’s value
How can you determine what the audience is?
Well, what kind of story is it? What’s the genre? What is the type of audience that typically wants to see this kind of film?
How is it enough like other movies that you can kind of sense its appeal, but different enough that it will draw an audience? We figure the film’s estimated production cost. So, then the question becomes, ‘is it too much? Will it cost more than the perceived market value?’
Market value for a movie is often contingent upon star attachments. So, the next question we try to answer is: ‘how can we get stars attached to a film that will give it this perceived market value and attract funders?’
“The producer is actively part of that ideation, that strategizing. Once market value is determined, we’ll try and identify potential funders. We’ll also look for producing partners, financiers, and distributors,” Grillo explains.
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