Cathy Schulman Guest Column: Lack Of Names In Thursday’s Best Picture Oscar Noms Is Symptom Of Much Larger Problem

Ed,. Note: Last night Deadline noted how half of the ten Best Picture nominees announced Thursday did not name the producers who’ll be vying for the last Oscar of the night. We were told that the makers of the films Emilia Perez, Nickel Boys, I’m Still Here, The Substance and The Brutalist did not submit to the Producers Guild of America’s credit vetting system in time enough to be included in the globally televised shout out. Cathy Schulman, a film and television producer and a founding member of Producers United, has been through the credit battle gauntlet and wound up holding the Best Picture Oscar for Crash. She believes that the failure to mark the producers who actually make the movies in a more timely fashion marginalizes the whole breed.

Oscar nominations morning is always an exciting one in Hollywood, and it certainly was for me in 2006 when I was nominated for producing Crash. It’s hard to believe anyone who’s chosen to work in the movie business hasn’t fantasized making an acceptance speech on the glorious stage during an Academy Awards ceremony.

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After the flurry of nominations announcements, next comes the inevitable lists of nomination snubs and surprises. This year, there is another postscript discussion to query. Five of the ten best picture nominees were announced without the names of the people who produced the films. Did five of the films eligible for the top film prize in the world produce themselves? Of course not.

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. A collective viral uproar occurred.

I’ve been trying to imagine what the public must think seeing something like this. Perhaps they ask if film producing is something that happens after the fact, so it can get decided between nominations morning and the broadcast a few weeks later? Do some movies (the other five) have producers, and some do not?

Well, we all know what’s happening. The Academy and the PGA are trying to sort “eligible” names. Due to an arrangement between the Academy and the PGA, in order to qualify for a Best Picture Oscar, producers on a nominated film must be vetted by the PGA so that some of the producers are awarded “p.g.a. marks.” Those who are awarded the mark are the ones designated to collect statues should the film win Best Picture. Some film producers never apply for these marks before their films are distributed, so deliberations can extend beyond nominations morning. When the nominees are finally determined, announcements will be made belatedly, and hearts will be elated or broken. I could go on about what’s right or wrong with these decision-making mechanisms, but that’s not the point. Here’s why: There isn’t a single person involved in those five films – whether they be cast, crew, financiers or distributors, who doesn’t know who produced each film. I wasn’t involved in any of them, and even I can tell you who produced each one.

That’s because producing is a job. The PGA recently launched a campaign saying exactly that. What hasn’t been parsed is how we’ve gotten to a place where the job has become completely disconnected from the word “Producer” itself.

I look back to 2000, when producer credit bartering had already become a tool for studios, networks and agencies to use as “free money” in negotiations. Because producers weren’t / aren’t unionized, no one – then or now – could be stopped from handing out producer credits as chits to close a deal. And back then, it was still something prestigious to be considered a Producer, because remnants of the job description (and it’s a very hard job) were still floating around in the smoggy skies of Hollywood. People understood the simple fact that no movie has even been made without a producer, because producers are the motor of every movie. 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.

Producers identify and develop material, they nurture it, fine tune it, package it, find the money to make it, find the crew to execute it and the cast to act in it; they act as diplomats and peacekeepers between the “money” and the “art,” and they never let go from the day the lights are turned on to the day they’re turned off. Someone very specific has done all of this on each one of the five “TBA” films announced yesterday morning.

So, here’s what needs to happen a quarter decade into the mess we’ve made with the proliferation of producer credits doled out like snacks at a softball game: We need to stop and press the reset button. Producer credits go to the person who does the job, and if that person achieves enough success in nurturing a movie all the way to an Oscar nomination – or even to a Best Picture win – let that Producer shine. God knows it’s a thankless job – so much so that calling it such has become an accepted Hollywood-ism.

Right now, here’s what’s happening: lawyers, agents, movie stars, studio and streamer heads and others are lobbying the Academy and the PGA to recognize various people who they think are the appropriate Best Picture nominees. Again, we all know who produced those films, but that doesn’t mean the real producers will win in the credit determination derby happening behind closed doors. More importantly, why are real producers being subjected to this contest? I would rather enter into the Squid Games!

How did we get here? It’s 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. When a movie is sold and the agents for the gatekeepers (producers, writers, directors, lead cast, financiers) are making their deals with a distributor, the bartering begins. This is where the problems take hold and Producer credits are proliferated. During that process, business affairs executives at the commissioning company start asking “So, who is the ‘producer producer’ here? Who do I sort things with? Who will be managing the movie? Who will be responsible for signing off on the budget and production plan, assuming liability for the safety of the cast and crew and protecting our investment?” That gets answered easily, because there is always a Producer – the same person who should be accepting the Oscar for Best Picture should the movie win that accolade. This is where the course correction needs to occur.

Yes, filmmaking is a collaborative process. We work on scripts together, choose cast together, make style and craft decisions together – but there is still a ‘producer producer.’ That person should be the only one with the job title that describes their services. Could there be two? Sure. Are there sometimes three? Rarely. Are there ever more? Not likely. Has a writer, director or actor ever been the service-rendering producer in addition to their primary role? It has happened a few times, and there are some very unique people who have mastered two career paths to excellence.

And then there are those who contribute some valuable producing services along the way. Those individuals should be respectably credited with the Executive Producer title, as the job is defined by the PGA. And maybe those people should receive Oscar statues. That’s another issue to be considered. But Executive Producers are different from Producers. Awards and marks aside, a Producer is a Producer. Most of the time we all do a little of everything, but no one who makes a comment about a camera angle or a color gel can take a Director of Photography credit. No one who sits through an edit – and many people do – can take an Editor credit. And God knows the DGA and WGA protect their credited artists like a SWAT team.

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 are easy to spot, because we are compensated exclusively for our producing services, as distinct from others involved in a production who also receive compensation for services other than producing, such as writing, directing, acting, representation or financing. We formed a collective called Producers United to advocate for the sustainability of dedicated producing and ensure its future by correcting the systemic degradation of career producing. It’s time for studios, streamers, networks, financiers, agencies, unions, guilds and our creative collaborators to make a change. We just want to be what we are: producers. But we’ve lost the word to more than a quarter century of degradation events. Producers United is working to stop credit proliferation and the related hardships that are putting real producing on the cliff of an extinction event.

Let’s work together as an industry to let those wonderful, talented, exceptional producers who produced five fantastic films this year – The Brutalist, Emelia Perez, I’m Still Here, Nickel Boys and The Substance – head to that ceremony in glory. 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.

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