![]() Following that particular train of thought, one could and should also question why the narrative of a producer’s influence on film tends to center the relationship between them and the director. Regarding cinema, this is especially true, seeing as it’s one of the more intrinsically collaborative artforms-making blanket statements on the dynamic of its makers would be a fool’s errand. In any form, essentialism is never a good school of thought to bring into historical considerations or art criticism. Those two have escaped the vilifying fate of the David and Goliath archetype, but they’re certainly not the only ones who deserve to be spared. Arthur Freed too, for no individual did more to define the midcentury musical than MGM’s very own music man. Val Lewton is another example of a producer some might rightfully call an auteur, his RKO horror movies having a long-lasting legacy, even beyond those helmed by Jacques Tourneur. Van Dyke, 1938) being completed according to his vision after the producer had met an untimely end in 1936. Thalberg’s influence managed to last beyond death, with The Good Earth (Sidney Franklin, 1937) and Marie Antoinette (W.S. And they were his films more than they were anybody else’s, so strong was his control over their making. For as much as one might bristle at the tales of Thalberg’s iron-fisted disputes with Stroheim, his productions marked an era of American Film History. Maybe it’s even been too influential, robbing the figure of the producer of a more benign reputation, of authorial intent altogether. ![]() The celebration of a director’s authorial voice, theorized to significant effect in the postwar years, has shaped some of this historical narrative. How many cinephiles have dreamed of seeing what Erich von Stroheim’s version of Greed (1924) would have been without the judicious cuts of Irving Thalberg? That’s just one example out of many, a story that has repeated itself countless times within the Hollywood industry and elsewhere. Considering the wealth of tales about producers butchering great artists’ visions, flattening complicated art into disposable Pablum, it’s easy to see why this David and Goliath archetype has persisted. From the early days of cinema to modern times, many stories have been told and re-told about the clash of producers and directors the money men fighting the creative commerce in contention with art. To cast producers in the role of the antagonist is one of film history’s most pervasive quirks. Essay Part of Issue #8: The Soul's Interior, The Divine Hand
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