What to Expect on the Road to Becoming an Ace Documentary Producer [PODCAST]
If you love the excitement of documentary but are turned off by the prospect of working on the same one for years at a time, why not skip directing and become a producer?
You might freeze your toes off in sub-zero temperatures, or find yourself overnighting a laptop to a filmmaker with a four-hour rough cut, but it will be one heck of a ride! That's how it works for experienced documentary producers Kate McLean and Glen Zipper, our guests on this episode of the No Film School podcast.
As Zipper points out in this episode, while a doc director might find themselves poring over one doc for an average of about five or six years, a documentary producer will often have several documentaries to work on in a single year. According to Zipper, being a documentary producer means you can facilitate a number of projects at any given time, so you can maximize your creative slate.
In this podcast, we talk about the multifaceted role of producing a documentary.
Topics that are discussed:
- What it takes to be a successful doc producer
- How to pick filmmakers and projects to produce
- Kate McLean's working with relationship with Bill Nye: Science Guy directors David Alvarado and Jason Sussberg
- Glen Zipper's working relationship with Ramblin' Freak director Parker Smith
- Why being a doc producer can be the best job in the biz
Listen to the episode by streaming or downloading from the embedded player above, or find it on iTunes here.
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This episode was produced and edited by Jon Fusco.