What a Concept: Taking a Producer Credit Where It’s Due

Everyone probably has his or her own image of what a producer does, doubtless influenced by characters like the desperate Max Bialystock in “The Producers” or Max Fabian in “All About Eve”--stressed-out, cigar-chomping types with a copy of Variety under one arm and a list of impressionable ingenues at his fingertips.

“Why do they always look like unhappy rabbits?” a young actress, played by Marilyn Monroe, says with a sigh in the latter movie, to which the smarmy theater critic portrayed by George Sanders replies, “Because that’s what they are.”

These are stereotypes, to be sure, but at least such films gave you a vague understanding of the term--something you would never gain from surfing the television dial, where “producers” are more plentiful than talking-head “security experts” on the Fox News Channel and MSNBC.

The public’s confusion regarding the title was recently underscored by a message from Rich Varenchik of Valencia, who works as deputy communications director for the California Air Resources Board. After watching a prime-time drama, Varenchik found himself hoping someone could clear the air on what all those names meant.

“Seems that there were executive producers, co-executive producers, producers, other producers, more producers, my son the producer, etc.,” he wrote. “Then, I started watching the opening credits for other TV shows and saw pretty much the same thing--all TV shows seem to be overrun with various types of ‘producers’ in some form or another.

“Who are these people? What do they do? Do they get paid? Why do they need so many of them?”

These are legitimate questions. For while there are thousands of people roaming the streets of Los Angeles claiming to be producers, it takes more than a business card and an ugly sports jacket to truly merit the title. Moreover, even real producers carry less weight now that a few giant companies have swallowed Hollywood.

Back in olden times (in television parlance, before the birth of the Olsen twins), some producers actually financed projects and cashed in fabulously by owning the rights. Aaron Spelling, to cite one, furnished a 56,000-square-foot mansion with help from folks like the cast of “Charlie’s Angels” and “Dynasty’s” Joan Collins. Producers found material, assembled talent and oversaw all aspects of production. They also served as a buffer, theoretically, between writers and directors on one side and networks and studios on the other.

Very few people credited as producers in television today do anything remotely like that. The closest would be the top executive producer, or “show runner,” who supervises the writing staff and production but is almost invariably employed by a studio. Most begin as writers, gradually ascending the ladder from co-producer to producer to supervising producer.

As a result, most producers credited on a show are really writers who help churn out 20-odd scripts each season. A few others are directors given staff positions as--what else?--producers.

After that, you get into the nebulous world of managers and television executives, who sometimes take producer credits on individual shows. Stars get into the act too, if they have enough clout, with Ray Romano (“Everybody Loves Raymond”), Ellen DeGeneres (“The Ellen Show”) and Pamela Anderson (yep, the “V.I.P.” star) all receiving executive producer titles on their respective series.

Not everyone is thrilled about the credit “producer” being bandied about so loosely, especially at a time when networks insist they are trying to cut costs. ABC, for example, wants to eliminate such titles for those managers who don’t serve any role other than pocketing $25,000 to $50,000 an episode just for making sure their client shows up to work. Given the hunger for marquee talent, most within the industry are skeptical as to whether ABC will truly enforce such a policy.

Established producers have also railed against what they characterize as a proliferation of the credit. Barney Rosenzweig, who produced such programs as “Cagney & Lacey” and “The Trials of Rosie O’Neill,” contends that credits are real currency in the entertainment industry and blithely handing out such titles renders them meaningless.

So what does a producer do, in his eyes? “He decides what story to tell to an audience,” Rosenzweig said. “He comes up with or finds that idea and sees it all the way through to its production and exhibition.... [Producers] are the first one there in the morning and the last one to leave at night.”

Yet even producers who fit that description frequently lack the decision-making autonomy they once possessed, as networks and studios--often united under a single corporate umbrella--increasingly assume more control over the creative process. Small wonder that the Caucus for Television Producers, Writers and Directors--a “collection of Don Quixotes,” as producer Gerry Abrams put it--felt compelled to draft a “creative bill of rights” trying to spell out where the producer’s authority begins and the network’s ends.

As it stands, most producers today--including those who really produce--are employees who don’t own their work outright, unlike the entrepreneurial spirit that guided Spelling, Norman Lear and other titans of the 1970s. And while that distinction might seem minute given the riches top producers can still amass, in essence it’s the difference between owning a small company and being a product manager at Procter & Gamble.

That’s certainly the way it looks to Joe and Harry Gantz, the brother tandem that produces “Taxicab Confessions”--the long-running voyeuristic HBO series, which may lack the cocktail-party cachet of “The Sopranos” or “Sex and the City” but is nonetheless an attraction to many subscribers.

The Gantz brothers oversee all aspects of their show, from going out on shoots in an unmarked van (the better to capture conversations between the driver and unsuspecting passengers) to guiding editors as the program is put together. What they don’t do is own the store.

“You make a salary, more or less,” Joe said. “We’ve had some success and won an Emmy, and still it’s very hard to get ownership. It’s really not a great situation for creativity ... and it’s not going to get any better.”

“Do people other than independent producers care?” added Harry. “They should, because it affects what they watch on television.... Any time you have so much power in the hands of a few, it affects the diversity of ideas.”

True enough, but at least their mother can say, “My sons, the producers.”

Whatever that means.

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Brian Lowry can be reached via e-mail at brian.lowry@latimes.com.