, the first order of business was defining what it means to be a producer, a title — and a role — that encapsulates a number of responsibilities on a film.
Said Jamie Gonçalves, who produced Juan Pablo González’ “Dos Estaciones,” “it’s protecting the film — sometimes even from the filmmaker.” Nikkia Moulterie, who produced Nikyatu Jusu’s “Nanny,” explained that she was inspired — and motivated — by watching producer Effie Brown on the HBO series “Project Greenlight.” “I saw her struggle and I was like, wow, if I’m going to do this, I have to know everything and then more because there’s always going to be someone challenging and questioning me just because of who I am and what I look like,” Moulterie said.
Rishi Rajani, who produced Jingyi Shao’s “Chang Can Dunk,” said that he’s driven by a singular impulse to create stories for audiences that did not exist when he was cultivating his own tastes. “As a kid, whenever I was reading books and thinking about the heroes of those books in my head, those heroes never looked like me,” Rajani said. “Those heroes were always white.
Rodriguez, who began her career as an intern at Sony Pictures before breaking out on her own, admitted that listening to one’s gut and trusting it are sometimes two different things. “I was on set, my first movie after leaving Sony. I called Clint Culpepper, who was the head of Screen Gems at the time when I worked there. I was like, ‘I don’t know how to do this. I don’t know what the decision is or what choice to make.’ And when you’re a producer you got two minutes to make the decision.
Discussing her experience on “Nanny,” Moulterie countered, “I couldn’t look to the market. I couldn’t look to pre-sales. I couldn’t look to comps because traditionally this industry doesn’t really value the type of story ‘Nanny’ was. …So I don’t look to the market. I just push. That’s a risk because maybe we don’t recoup, and then the next filmmaker of color that wants to take a risk doesn’t get to. But the industry doesn’t really allow for me to try anything else.