THE FILM BIZ: LESS AND LESS DEALS
By Tom Teicholz at 12 August, 2008, 11:09 am
This week Variety released their “Facts on Pacts” which deals which producers have deals at which studios. For a while, I’ve been saying that the studio system under which many persons such as myself prospered or at least survived was disappearing. Turns out the facts support it.
In 1998, at which time I was coming off a job as a development executive at a production company based at Universal, there were more than 300 producer deals at the studios. Today there are 180 and many believe that number will be even less by year’s end. Also, many of those deals are smaller than prior deals.
Consider that all those producer deals meant the hiring of one to three development executives (sometimes more), assistants, and meant breakfasts, lunches and drinks for agents, writers, executives, and scripts optioned and many many ideas hatched, pitched, revised, considered. I won’t say that the movies that resulted were any better, but we can also say that the studios were no less profitable then than they are now and the collateral damage to producers, writers and the economy at large is considerable.
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