ED MCDONNELL - Producer

Team Deakins

James Ellis Deakins

Tv & Film, Filmlighting, Deakins, Movies, Filmmaking, Production, Film, Cinematography, Film Interviews

4.8 • 1.4K Ratings

🗓️ 13 December 2023

⏱️ 72 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

On this episode of the Team Deakins Podcast, producer Ed McDonnell (SICARIO, PRISONERS, INSOMNIA) joins us in a lively conversation about his craft and his career. After producing a play at age 12 in his neighbor’s garage, he survived two brief stints in Washington and on Wall Street before leaving it all behind to work in Hollywood. While charting his quick rise from assistant to executive, Ed shares the most important lesson he learned after being fired for failing to read the room during a meeting over an early draft of BEVERLY HILLS COP. Ed also discusses how he takes scripts out to directors and collaborates with them to tell the best story possible, and we later consider why we always prefer projects that promise ample amounts of collaboration over other opportunities to simply act as functionaries. Towards the end, we discuss the nature of sequels and also reflect on the value of the oft repeated question: “Do you really need that shot?”

This episode is sponsored by Fiilex

Instagram: @fiilexled

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hi and welcome to season two of the Team Deacons podcast, a collection of
0:08.8	informal conversations between Roger and James Deacons and a guest.
0:13.0	We never know where the conversation will take us,
0:16.0	so listen in and see where it goes.
0:19.0	This episode is sponsored by Philex, a California-based lighting company with close to 40 years of in-house lighting and expertise.
0:30.0	Philex is known for their LED color franels ranging from the smallest
0:35.4	philex Q3 to the largest philex Q10 and they set the gold standard in the
0:41.5	motion picture industry with precise color science, brightness, and beam shaping.
0:48.0	Philex recently launched a new LED color ellipsoidal called the phylex g3 which can make razor sharp cuts.
0:57.0	Today we're speaking with a producer. His credits include Three Kings, Insomnia, and Sakario. We're pleased to welcome Ed McDonnell.
1:08.0	Ed, thank you for doing this. Yeah.
1:11.0	Thanks for having me. It's kind of like, you know, it's a dream come on I've watched and listened to the I the podcast so far so thank you for having me. Oh good
1:21.6	Great. Well, we're going to start with our normal question, which is, how did you get to where you are today?
1:28.6	Was this something always that you wanted to do?
1:30.9	Were you bossing people around as a kid or did you come to it later?
1:36.0	Yes, I produced my first play when I was 12 years old in a neighbor's garage.
1:41.0	Oh, wow.
1:42.0	Did you really? I did and actually I got the local newspaper to come out and photograph it and you know
1:48.3	Literally, I can't remember where I wrote it. I think I did write it and I get the neighborhood kids to play in it but I
1:54.8	produced it I kind of directed it but you know when you're 12 you direct yourself but yeah
2:01.0	I always did and I always love movies because growing up in the country in Connecticut, you know, it's
2:06.8	You would watch these afternoon, you know old movies that's what came on at three o'clock when you got home from school
	...

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