Assuming you're not wearing all the hats for your filmmaking endeavor, your producer, director, and writer are arguably the most important people you need to hire. Within those three disciplines are dozens of supervisors and assistants who must complete their assigned duties while also handling the inevitable overflow associated with each position (see Chapter 11).

The Producer

As the name would suggest, the producer is in charge of the overall production of a film. This individual must be highly capable and possess the ability to juggle many balls during the entire course of production from start to finish. This includes handling matters pertaining to financing, equipment, and the entire crew associated with the film.

Putting the Wheels in Motion

It is widely recognized in the industry that the producer is the busiest person on a film set. In addition to normal daily proceedings, producers are often responsible for finding financing, acquiring and finalizing scripts, hiring and firing crew members, and distributing a film. During a typical shooting day, the producer is usually the first to arrive on-set and the last to depart.

The term “production” is a bit of a misnomer, given that an entire film is considered a production, so there really isn't a production department in the traditional sense. Rather, there is a production team that covers a wide range of disciplines including overseeing all of the other departments (art, editing, sound, photography, etc.) as well as a staff of accountants.

A few recognizable and accomplished producers include:

• Andrew Vajna (Basic Instinct 2, Evita, Nixon, Die Hard, Tombstone, Jacob's Ladder, Air America, Total Recall, the Rambo trilogy)

• Debra Hill (The Fog, The Fisher King, Big Top Pee-Wee, Clue, Escape from New York, Halloween)

• Frank Marshall (The Jurassic Park and Back to the Future trilogies, The Bourne films, The Sixth Sense, Cape Fear, Who Framed Roger Rabbit, The Color Purple, Poltergeist, Raiders of the Lost Ark)

• Gale Ann Hurd (Aeon Flux, the Terminator trilogy, Hulk, Armageddon, Dante's Peak, The Ghost in the Darkness, The Abyss, Aliens)

• Hal B. Wallis (True Grit, Blue Hawaii, Gunfight at the O.K. Corral, My Friend Irma, Casablanca, The Maltese Falcon, Dark Victory, Jezebel)

• Irving Thalberg (A Night at the Opera, Mutiny on the Bounty, Grand Hotel, Tarzan the Ape Man, The Champ, The Merry Widow, The Hunchback of Notre Dame)

• Jerry Bruckheimer (The Pirates of the Caribbean films, National Treasure, King Arthur, Pearl Harbor, Crimson Tide, Con Air, The Rock, Beverly Hills Cop, Flashdance)

• Kathleen Kennedy (Munich, War of the Worlds, Seabiscuit, the Jurassic Park and Back to the Future trilogies, The Sixth Sense, Twister, Schindler's List, E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial)

• Sam Spiegel (The Last Tycoon, Lawrence of Arabia, The Bridge on the River Kwai, On the Waterfront, The African Queen)

• Saul Zaentz (The English Patient, The Unbearable Lightness of Being, Amadeus, One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest)

On an independent or lower-budget film, the producer will have his plate full. A consummate professional will be able to accomplish in a day what mere mortals can only hope to accomplish in a month. To suggest these folks are busy is a massive understatement. Producers range from executives to managers to assistants, each having a slightly different job description depending on the film and most definitely the budget. If you're serving as writer, director, and producer, things can get crazy before you can yell “action.”

UPMs and Line Managers

Unit production managers and line managers serve directional and motivational functions in the film production from different perspectives. The unit production manager is responsible for maintaining production flow on the business side and keeping a close eye on expenses and the budget. The line producer maintains flow on the set, and helps keep the directors, cast, and crew on track and on schedule throughout the shooting day.

Production Assistants

Production assistants, commonly known as PAs, are a permanent fixture on film sets. As their title suggests, they perform all types of necessary chores, ranging from traffic control to courier service to food service. Sometimes paid, sometimes taken on as interns, these hardworking folks are accustomed to odd jobs. Experienced PAs are often delegated more important tasks, and often they're attached to a certain actor, director, or filmmaker. Also referred to as gofers (go for this, go for that), they are generally at the lowest end of the filmmaking totem pole.

Calling the Shots

If you're not serving as director, then hiring one will be one of your most crucial decisions. The director is the creative vision behind a film. It's through their eyes that a script comes to life visually, technically, and musically. Directors work with all of the department heads and especially with the actors, through which the director's vision is ultimately realized.

When hiring a director it's important to keep in mind that she will set the tone of the production, both on screen and with the crew. Directors are renowned for their creativity and the style in which they control a production. They have a lot to think about and organize, both in their head and in the real world. They are artists in the creative and technical sense, and the role they play in a film is paramount to a film's ultimate success — or demise.

Directors come in all shapes and sizes and varying degrees of experience and paychecks. Their duties are wide in range and scope, as they are hired to do everything from script editing to casting to shot selection and composition. If there's one thing to remember when hiring a director, it is this: A bad director can turn a stellar script into a disaster, and a great director can make even the worst script work on the screen.