Studio Execs - Stupid White Men

Originally published here.

"Ok guys, here's my idea. There's a plane which crashes on a small island in the Pacific and the people left alive have to learn how to survive together. Soon, they realize that there's something weird about the island - there's some kind of mysterious creature living there and other strange things going on. It's a world waiting to be explored and we get to see the best and worst sides of the survivors as they discover the island...and themselves.

"Sounds like expensive crap."

"Ok, I have another idea, for a film this time. It's the life story of one of the world's best-known musicians. He has a disability and nobody thinks he'll be able to go very far with it. But he goes from strength to strength until his music is loved by millions and he becomes an international celebrity. Oh, and he's black."

"Black? Won't make any money".

"Alright then, how about we just take one of the most loved stories of the 20th century and film it? I know a great epic story, so the whole project just screams sequels!"

"Hmm...Ok, but only if you squash the story down to one film. Two hours maximum."

What's going on with the big studios? I just described ratings topper and Emmy Award winner "Lost", double Oscar winner "Ray" and Peter Jackson's US$3 billion revenue reaper, The Lord of The Rings.

All three had problems getting into production.

The executive who backed "Lost" left the television network halfway through the filming of the pilot over a disagreement with the network owners. "Ray" was financed with zero help from the studio that released it, and Miramax decided they didn't know enough about big budget films or sequels to make The Lord of the Rings trilogy and wanted to cut it down to a single film.

Is it really that hard to recognise a good idea when it presents itself? Or are media executives just stupid?

Cynicism aside, the answer lies more towards the former - the vast majority of studio executives are middle aged white men who don't represent the general population. Michael Moore explained this phenomenon in his book Stupid Whit Men, and while you many not agree with his politics, it's difficult to find fault with his logic.

How many women come to mind when looking at international politics? Condelleza Rice, Queen Elizabeth...um...oh, whatshername, the Prime Minister of New Zealand. Just about everything else is run by men. We often have little idea who they actually are but they toil away doing their jobs the way most middle aged men would.

It's a well known fact in US politics that you can't win the White House by pitching your policies to white men. The two most important demographics are women (because they make up more than half the population), and "minorities" like latinos and blacks. Actually, white men usually back the losers.

Why then, are we happy to let them run our TV stations and movie studios? Would the quality of our entertainment perhaps improve with a little (or a lot) of input from some different points of view? Why are we letting our creativity and culture be influenced by such conservative, profit driven people?

I can understand why these guys think the way they do: they're not as young as they used to be, they like attractive young women, they never got the chance to blow stuff up or play with big guns. So in essence, they back stories they want to see.

I can understand how they think and feel because I mix with an incredibly diverse group of people: black, white, Asian, men, women, old, young, rich, poor, smart and stupid. I get the benefit from all these different points of view.

We're seeing the games industry get their act together since people realised that women like playing The Sims. It's a different experience for a different audience, which just happens to include an incredibly large number of people.

Wow, who would have thought it. Bring on the best selling PC game of all time.

When Lloyd Braun left ABC after the fight over "Lost", he asked his children whether they'd prefer to give up their TV or their computer. The kids voted to ditch the TV. They must have thought the internet had more to offer them.

Lloyd Braun is now the head of media and entertainment at Yahoo!

There's at least one middle aged white man out there with some kind of an idea about where the world is heading.

Now let's hope we can find a few more.