Leslee Udwin On Producing Films

What advice would you give to a young strapling who wants to produce?
The first thing I'd say is they should attach themselves in some way as an observer to a producer, i.e. beg someone to take them on, not expect to get paid, and just watch at very close quarters.

Producing is the most complicated job imaginable because it ranges across so many disciplines; involves so many skills. You can only learn by watching and ultimately doing, by making mistakes. Also to ask yourself first and foremost the question Why do you want to be a producer? Because if it's to make money, go into the city. Only spend your time on projects that really impassion you, because it's such a mountain to climb: you need enormous staying power. If you haven't got it, you'll never do it. Ask yourself What kinds of projects make your heart beat wildly?

Describe the role of the producer
The role of the producer is all-encompassing. It's the most important and the most invisible. You are the first in and the last out, in terms of involvement.

For instance on East Is East, I identified the project, I saw a play, fell in love with it, I set about getting the rights, persuaded the writer and his agent that I was the right person to produce this film, then worked on it with the writer and developed it, turning it from a play into a feature film. Then I had to raise the money, that in itself was a mega-battle of several months. Having raised the money, I then had to choose the team. So I hired the director, together with him assembled the crew and the heads of department, continued to work on the script, and then was solely responsible for delivering that film on time and on budget and of the highest possible quality.

There is no pie that you haven't got a finger in, or indeed, for the most part have been responsible for baking! Of course if you go wrong, your house and goods are forfeit, so it's enormous pressure. But it is the most rewarding job imaginable. Ultimately the finished product is your vision as expressed in the choices you make.

There is an imbalance in the way these things are perceived. There is, I think, a general misconception that the director is the author of the film, it's a very continental idea. The fact of the matter is that the director comes in for a period of time and does a CRUCIALLY important job, and of course is responsible for the realisation of the actual film, but the director is not necessarily involved in the entire process. The vision is bigger than just that. How does the producer work with the director?
Sometimes with enormous difficulty. Hopefully often in collaboration. Like any working relationship, it depends on the chemistry of the people. Ultimately a producer has to support a director. And a director has to respect a producer amid the difficulties and exigencies of production. The best relationship is where that mutual co-operation exists. The relationship is open, you listen to each other.

Too often I think, directors see producers as a kind of enemy: someone who is going to deny them: money, time, whatever it is they want more of. The fact is that the producer has to have two feet firmly on the ground, because they have a responsibility ultimately to the financiers. All the contractual relationships are between the financiers and the producer.

What is the role of the executive producer?
The term is a very fluid one. Sometimes they get a meaningless credit just for being one of the financiers. Sometimes an executive producer has found a project, so it is a respect title for having done something substantial.

I have only ever worked once with an executive producer, on a television film I produced called Who Bombed Birmingham? And the executive producer of that was a wonderful man who knew The Birmingham Six case inside out. It was a hugely fruitful relationship because I couldn't possibly be wise enough about the political questions that the making of that film entailed. We named the real bombers on the programme, in an enormous act of courage that was fraught with legal difficulties.

In an ideal world an executive producer could and perhaps should act as a sort of mentor to young producers. Because it takes years to really learn what's involved and you could really do with guidance from a stalwart.

What motivates your choice of project?
I have to have an immensely vivid personal response to and relationship with the story. As a producer you spent an average of three years with a particular project, sometimes many more, and if you don't REALLY care about what you are doing, you give up at some point because it's far too difficult.

What matters to me is people, and stories that touch people and inform them about how they should live their lives. With East Is East I cared hugely about all the issues that story resonates with. I myself am an immigrant to this country and although the facts of the story are different, it could be my story. It has to matter in some way. I can't get fanatical about something that is simply light entertainment. How did you get into producing?
I had been working as an actress, very happily, for 15 years and suddenly the house I was living in was bought by the most notorious criminal landlord in Britain. For two and a half years I spent all my free time fighting this terribly unjust situation. And at the end of that process I thought this is an important story; I wanted to do a film about it. I didn't produce that film: I wrote a treatment, I sold it to the producer Mark Shivas, I was consultant, worked with the scriptwriter and acted myself in it. But that is what motivated me to become a producer: to communicate.

What is the producer's role in postproduction?
You have to keep your eye on all the logistics. You are still managing a budget and if anything, things intensify because you have less money left. More often than not, you've used up a large part of your contingency on the actual shoot. Things go wrong because you can't anticpate everything on a shoot. Your role is still very creative: a lot of films change substantially in the cutting room. You are still actually rewriting it by the editing. At that stage you are beginning to wade through the whole labour of delivery of the film. That is just a mound of paperwork, music rights clearances, delivery of technical materials to the financiers, etc.

What about when the film is finished?
You collapse with exhaustion and illness. But once you have the negative from which you can strike prints, there's still a whole load of legal clearances to sort. For you the film is only complete when delivery is complete. Then you are essentially working with whatever distributors you have. Test screenings, tests on posters, marketing materials. And positioning the film in the marketplace, in terms of festivals, in terms of how we are going to get this film known by the public and how we are going to position it.

Is the director still working at that point?
No. At that point the director is off. And we still consult the director. And the director of course still has an obligation to publicise. Contractually by that point, the director is on first call to you but subject to all his other commitments. He or she are generally developing their next film by then. What sort of advice would you give to someone trying to make the leap from shorts to features?
I don't think there's a huge transition. I would say just have courage, because it's only a question of scale. Everything you do in producing a short is the same as what you do for a feature, it's just with the latter, you have to work longer and be that much more responsible. Just be sure that it's something your heart is completely in.

What book would you recommend on producing?
There are several books that deal with dealmaking. I would say just read as much as you can from the point of view of getting to know the language. Because it is a completely different, new and frightening language system. So the more you read, the more familiar you are with the terms, the more confident you appear in front of the financiers when they are making outrageous and greedy demands. Books on how to produce are a complete waste of time because you cannot learn except by doing. The title I'd recommend most for beginners is: The Guerilla Film Makers Handbook ('The Ultimate Guide to Independent Film Making') by Chris Jones & Genevieve Jolliffe which gives a fun, user-friendly overview of the whole process of film-making. A drier, but useful, comprehensive view of financing and deal-making is: Producing, Financing and Distributing Film (a Comprehensive Legal and Business Guide) by Paul A. Baumgarten, Donald C. Farber, and Mark Fleischer. BUY THEM

Do you have to cast famous actors to get financing?
It depends on what the project is. On the Birmingham Six I wanted high-profile names to ensure the watch-ability of the film. Because it was so important for me to get x million viewers for this film, I wanted people to know that they were innocent and that they should come out of prison.

On the other hand, there were a load of financiers who didn't end up financing East Is East who were insistent on names. I had seen Linda Basset play it at the Royal Court and I had promised the writer we would cast her. I said to Ayub at the time I wouldn't dream of casting anyone else: she is completely brilliant. I undertook to do just that. And I was insistent on that, throughout the process. On a small budget film you don't have the pressure in the same way. From the point of view of realpolitik on bigger budget films, the expectation from financiers is that you will have some hooks to get big audiences in in order for them to able to cover their risks. Yes it's a cynical exercise, but you can't just shut your mind to it. Why was it difficult to find the financing for East Is East?
On East Is East there was a stage at which I simply could not fund this film. Everyone was saying This is a small British film with an Asian element that is going to be a major turn-off for audiences, you haven't got any names, it's an adaptation from a stageplay, it won't be watched. All the no-nos. At that point I was made an offer by a French company that they would give me £1.2 million to make it as a TV film. It was a tough decision to say Go to hell, to that, because nobody was biting. If I had accepted that, the whole history of this film would've been different.

How did you find the director, Damien O’Donnell?
Long search. I was looking for an incredibly rare quality. Because East Is East is set on Coronation Street-type streets, there was a danger that if this film was simply directed in a fairly pedestrian way, without any great sense of style, panache or visual humour, it would feel like a piece of television. That's what I wanted to avoid at all costs. So I knew that what I was looking for was someone with a heightened style and visual comedy, which is a very very rare quality. I waded through short after short and film after film and CV after CV. The writer had seen 35-a-side on television, as part of the BBC short film competition I've just seen it and I think it may be the one. I watched on the Saturday night when it was on, and it won. And the second I saw it I absolutely knew that this was the right style. I brought him in for an interview and he was a very good interview, and he was very mature and centred and I just thought even though he'd never done a feature before I was willing to take the risk.

Were you shocked by East Is East's box-office success?
No. I swear I believed in it. I know it's very uncool but that is the truth. It is the most universal piece of work. It's brilliantly written, hysterically funny, stunningly performed, why wouldn't it be a runaway success? It's only people who carry around the sort of baggage that a lot of sales agents carry, that this would only speak to an Asian market, which is totally ridiculous and thank god has been proven to be complete bollocks. Peter Buckingham in the FilmFour distribution department, had a betting stakes with the prize as a crate of champagne, because it did £10.65 million at the UK box office and I guessed ten. So no, I wasn't surprised. I was surprised that it didn't do very well in the States.

Why didn't it?
Miramax's marketing campaign. They had a red fez on the poster. A Tommy Cooper red fez!