The 6 Worst Decisions I've Made as a Producer

As in any business, success in independent film a lot of times is based on trial and error. We have the luxury sometimes of learning as we go. More than a luxury, most times its a necessity. We make most of our mistakes early, and if we are smart about it, we take notes from what works and what doesn't. Your ability to navigate through your trail and error periods will inevitably make you a better director, producer, or actor.

I began my work in film like most do - as an aspiring writer/director. In film school, our professors told us the very first day that what we come in wanting to do could very well change by the time we leave. Directors could transition into screenwriters, gaffers could become directors of photography, sound techs could gain a love for editing. It was all up in the air. They predicted when it was all said and done, very few of us would come out concentrating on the same skill. I was one of the few that came in a writer/director, and left a writer/director.

I spent time on as many sets as I could, learning whatever skills I could. In '05 I directed my first short film that contained recorded dialogue. I learned a ton from my mistakes with it, and a couple years later brought it to my first feature film. As fate would have it, I somehow became more than a writer/director. Like most filmmakers these days, I would be almost forced to include "producer" in my title. This was not a choice in the beginning, it was a necessity.

Now I consistently produce; more than anything else. You have friends' films that you want to help on, other projects that you'd like to be a part of, and before you know it, you're a producer as well. It just so happens, that nowadays I produce way more than I direct. And I have actually embraced this, and now have accepted my primary title, as "producer." I guess in a way, my film school professors were right.

Years later, with a couple of our titles acquired for distribution and released (and a couple more on the way), I'm looking back on what I learned this first go-round.

Here are the 6 worst decisions (mistakes) I have made as a producer so far:



1) Announcing a film too early. What sucks about this mistake is that I have made it more than once. I can't even remember why - maybe it was just your classic case of overconfidence. I had an epiphany that my next feature would be this ensemble cast feature comedy that I wrote called American Woman. It had been selected as a finalist at a very prominent screenwriters' program. I even had it optioned by an established producer. Years later the option would revert back to me, and after being thrilled about it, I immediately began casting actors. Most of them were either friends of mine that I liked working with, or people I was dying to direct next. Expectations grew high, way high, and next thing you know our financing lead fell through. Which unfortunately brings up questions of the project and its start date till this very day. It remains one of my most regretted, most painful mistakes. All it leaves you with is a ton of anxious, yet disappointed actors. From then on, I never announced anything else until either the project was certain, or the financing was already in place.

2) Marketing a film to the wrong audience. This one was another total misstep on our part. We had a title that we mistakenly marketed to more "mainstream" moviegoers. Its one thing to blindly promote a polarizing, risky film in front of an indie film festival audience. Its another to not concentrate on who each and every audience member may be, which groups or clubs they belong to, and just promote on the basis of your company's reputation from a prior film. We did just that, and I watched it happen (not to mention I invited some future investors - Yikes!). I allowed myself to get caught up in a numbers game, concentrating way too much on filling up all the seats in the theater, instead of focusing on who should see it, who would appreciate it, even if that meant risking a significant turn out. It would have served the film, the audience, and mostly our company much better. Hindsight is 20-20? Thats an understatement. This was a mistake so grave, that it affected the turnout of our next premiere. Luckily we still filled all of our seats, but strangely it was with an audience that was almost completely brand new to our movies. It would seem that at least temporarily, most audience members expected to be hit with another very challenging film, when it could have been avoided by first seeking out an audience that is 100% into challenging films.

3) Editing on Avid. Dont take this the wrong way. Avid is a great system, and a wonderful way to edit any movie. The reason this is on this list is because of all our titles, Cookies & Cream was the only film cut on Avid. This made things difficult when updated cuts were necessary, DVDs with special features needed to be authored, and little things like credit additions, color timing, as well as other distribution deliverables needed to be included on short notice. Because Avid editors are increasingly rare these days (especially those willing to edit a feature film on deferred payment), its tougher when changes need to be made. Everyone and their mother seems to have a Mac + Final Cut Pro combination, and this would have made these last minute adjustments run much smoother. Besides, it was tough transitioning between systems - PC to Mac, and back and forth - especially with a weak post production budget. It made it so every post production job of the film had to be PC-based. Our sound designer/composer used PC, our color correction had to use PC, you name it. We got the job done (thanks to our great editor Hector Maldonado), but it was much more difficult to coordinate than all of our other titles combined, which were all cut on Final Cut Pro.

4) Submitting Rough Cuts to Festivals. Filmmakers can be an egotistical bunch. Some of us become convinced that our opuses are so irresistible, so brilliant, that festival programmers can see their genius despite the unfinished color correction, unfinished sound mix, and overall rough assembly of our movies. Such was the mistake of a batch of a few of our early titles. We submitted the bunch to SXSW (and one to Slamdance) in time for the late 2008 deadline. When our inevitable rejection letters came, we ignorantly blamed it first on the festival director changeover that sent Matt Dentler packing. But the truth is, our rough cuts were just that - rough cuts of micro-budgeted DIY films that needed to be completed in order to even have a shot at acceptance. Rough cuts only work when Jennifer Aniston is in the credits. Despite what they tell you, never, ever submit a rough cut to a film festival.

5) Choosing talent over maturity. I was so blinded by a young filmmaker's very evolved, technically sound first feature that I never once questioned whether or not they were serious about it being seen or not. I was already beaming at what our marketing plan would be - "The director made this film when he was a teenager!" I think it would have been great - I knew of a ton of festivals that would eat that backstory up, not to mention that it had genre elements and distributors were already beginning to ask us about it. We were collectively rubbing our PMD mitts together. Until of course one day out of the clear blue, said young director woke up and decided they hated the movie. Everything about it. And it didnt matter what me and my company could do to potentially jump-start their name circulation in the world of indie filmmaking. The director didn't like it anymore, and because they were so young, they saw no upside of being able to claim an early, teenage entrance into the fray of auteur-ism ala' QT and PTA. We wasted time, energy, and money on the effort. Never again. My controversial new motto is, "I'll speak to them when they're over the age of 25."

6) Not starting a blog early enough. It didn't come up in our meetings to start a blog until after we shot Uptown. We had already shot our first feature film, and it was in post. We didn't begin this blog until after we wrapped the second. Had we begun it earlier, we could have at least begun talking about the process. Not so much to begin "building an audience," but to at least begin a journal of how all this came to be. If we had, we'd be able to look back on those first entries with a fond sense of journey, instead of being forced to go strictly from memory. I guess we were just too busy actually making movies.

- Princeton

(Stay tuned, for my list of the "6 Best Decisions").