Is Producing a Dying Job in Hollywood? This Group is Fighting Back

If you’ve ever produced a film—whether it’s a micro-budget indie or a studio feature—you know the dirty secret of the job: you are often the first one working and the last one paid.

That kind of structure has made this a gig that is incredibly hard, and not always as rewarding. You can wait years for your passion projects and paychecks to go through.

And while directors, writers, and actors have powerful guilds (DGA, WGA, SAG-AFTRA) ensuring minimums, healthcare, and residuals, producers have long been the "management" left out in the cold.

But a new collective, Producers United, is trying to change that, and a recent feature in Variety sheds light on their fight to make producing a sustainable career again.

Let's dive in.

Movie Producers Have it Hard

Hollywood used to be where it felt kind of glamorous to be a producer. You were supposed to be the person moving and shaking and partying with the stars.

But these days, it feels like you're one of the last few mules left to carry the load.

Studios use their executives in your place, and even if you find a piece of material, it can be hard to take it somewhere and set it up unless you already have an overall deal or are working under someone else's banner.

Unlike your cinematographer or editor, there are no union-mandated minimum rates for producers. You might spend two years developing a script for free, only to get paid a fee that, when broken down by hours worked, amounts to less than minimum wage. If a project falls apart? You get nothing.

When projects do go forward, the producer credit is tossed around to lots of people who maybe didn't work to get the job done. They can be a vanity credit for actors or for other people tangentially involved in the project.

That means real producers have to share the allotted producing budget with other people as well.

That's led many to believe the profession is likely to die out without massive changes.

“Career producers are the guardians of narrative integrity and emotional truth,” says Producers United member Barbara Broccoli, who was behind the last 11 James Bond movies and who has been a staple of Hollywood for years.

She continued, “When the producer’s hand is diminished, quality suffers, and the audience feels this loss.”

Now, many people are not pursuing becoming producers or leaving the industry, and the profession is dying off.

How can we save a job like this that is responsible for so many movies being made?

Enter 'Producers United'

Formed by a collective of working producers who are tired of the status quo, Producers United isn't a union (yet), but it’s acting like a fierce advocate.

Their goals, as outlined in the Variety coverage and their own mission statements, are simple but revolutionary:

• Halt Professional Degradation: Demand basic rights to stop the "slow degradation" of the services career producers provide.
• Secure Health Insurance: Require studios and platforms to provide health insurance coverage while a production is active.
• Accelerate Compensation: Change the payment structure so producers are paid earlier in the process, rather than waiting until the final product is delivered.
• Protect Credits: Address the "proliferation" of vanity credits in TV and film by strictly adhering to a Producers United checklist that defines the job’s actual duties and responsibilities.

Summing It All Up

Being a producer is a job that used to be and sound so glamorous, but the changes in Hollywood have made it unsustainable and even harder to break into or have a life doing.

Hopefully, this new group can band together and help create an environment where we see movie producing come back to the forefront.

Let me know what you think in the comments.