Our guest this week in my television symposium class was the Executive Producer for the televisions series "Better off Ted". He also produced other shows like "My Name is Earl" and was nominated for an Emmy for "Mad about You".Again, we got to do a 2-hour Q & A session with him, and although not as funny as the previous week's Ray Ramano, Fresco was incredibly knowledgeable about the Industry itself.
He spoke about the stars he has worked with, and said that many of them are quite professional. However, he did have a reoccurring disdain for Burt Reynolds (Don't ask me why). The most interesting thing that I got from the experience was that there is an entire world that goes into making our famous stars who they are. It is interesting how we love our stars for making us laugh when it is usually the writers and producers that are the real creative masterminds. I am a perpetrator of this phenomenon as well. I will watch a show and think to myself "man that actor is funny", but it is not even the actors creative words most the time and it is often been remolded by the vision of the director and others. In other words, and to close this post, I will try to remember the next time I see something funny on TV to say to myself "Man, that was funny, I am gonna go see what funny writer who wrote that." And, then go follow the funny writer instead of the automaton star.
1 comment:
Yes the labor that goes into producing the star is largely hidden from us - and Dyer has things to say about why - a general disavowal of how individuals are embedded in labor and economic systems.
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