But we were doing plays and movies which I had nothing to do with other than being a producer, and I don't have that kind of interest or time any more.
Those titles, Executive Producer or actor, are unimportant. I always try to approach my role as an artist. The first thing you want to do, that you attempt to do as an artist, is to have some sort of input into the material that you are working on. That is how my process begins; I say to myself: "I want to do this kind of work or I want to do that kind of work. "
I can tell you one other story about Rent Control. The lead actress in the film, her name was Elizabeth Stack, and it turned out she was Robert Stack's daughter. The only problem with that - and she was lovely - was that she was basically hired because [Gian Luigi Polidoro] thought she was [film producer] Ray Stark's daughter. And he figured that if he ran out of money, her father would kick in some more. I can still remember the day he freaked out when he realized she was actually Robert Stack's daughter. He was just screaming "Untouchables!" over and over.
You have to be producing to be able to be called a producer.
As a producer, you've got to be involved in helping out with solving problems.
What does a tax do? It takes either from the producer or the consumer a more or less sizable portion of the product destined in part to consumption and in part to savings, in order to apply it to less productive or even destructive ends, and more rarely to savings.
If no producer, no movie.
When I started producing it was right at the beginning Channel 4 in England. Nicholas Nickelby which was my first credit as a producer was Contract 001 at Channel 4 - that was the start of independent production in England and the emergence of an independent sector.
I do a lot of co-writing with my producer RedOne, and then a lot on my own. I just like to be creative.
Well, a lot of politics is communicating with people, and obviously comedy has something to do with that. I've been a producer and led people. Also, being a comedian, you're under pressure.
Susie Lynn, the producer of those segments, goes in and lays all the voices over the video.
The first person I met in the business was David Heyman, who was a producer on Daytrippers and who went on to produce the highly-unsuccessful Harry Potter series.
Oh, well, in Los Angeles everybody is an actor, or a producer, or a writer, or a director, or an agent, or. . . So everybody understands the hours.
When I do any stand-up, you're the writer, director, and producer. You're alone.
When you're in a room with a guy who has a vision like that, it's just one of those things where you close your eyes and just see that vision - then you just go with it. The guys that I write with are so incredible, just like my producer Trent Willmon, those guys know how to bring things out of me - especially things that I maybe didn't even know that I had.
Even before I became a recording artist, I did other things in music. I was a teacher, I did studio work, and I was an arranger and a producer.
Everything I make as a producer, I visualize it as a DJ first. And all those beats, I test them as a DJ.
I will never become a director or a movie producer. I was always looking at picture directing because I didn't know what to do! You can't be a movie director without real preparation.
I love being a producer, and I think I essentially still operate as a producer even though I now have control of marketing and the ability to green-light shows - something every producer wants but that they don't get!
With comedies, I like to be a producer, because comedies can get corny and go off track real fast.