Quincy Newell is Executive Vice President and General Manager of Codeblack Films, a subsidiary of Lionsgate Entertainment Corp. He has served as producer on the Shaquille O’Neal Presents: All Star Comedy Jam series, Live from Las Vegas, Live from Atlanta, and Live from Orlando; Kevin Hart: Let Me Explain; and Why We Laugh: Funny Women. He has also produced a variety of other projects, including Why We Laugh: Black Comedians on Black Comedy, directed by Robert Townsend. Over the years, he has helped to launch and steer three successful business ventures that have generated over $500 million in revenues collectively.

Quincy Newell

What does it take to work your way up in the business, winning the respect of producers who can give you a job? What does hard work and persistence look like from a producer’s perspective? Newell has been working in the entertainment industry since the mid-1980s, beginning with Rhino Entertainment, partnering in the launch of UrbanWorks Entertainment, and now heading Codeblack Entertainment. From his producer’s chair, he has an informed and relevant perspective for the aspiring director.

As a producer, how would you advise the filmmaker who aspires to be the next Quentin Tarantino?

Sure, well, they need to realize Quentin Tarantino isn’t just a writer and director. He’s also a businessperson. He understands how to get a film made. Most people see the writer-director-specific skill sets, but they’re not seeing the complete business construct. So what I always throw out first is, if a person wants to make a film, number one, they’ll do it. That statement means they’ll play all parts—they’ll have to put on a producer hat, a development hat, a writer hat, an investor hat. And all of that happens before you actually shoot a film, which is when a director comes in. So that’s number one. So just do it. Learn to play all roles.

The second piece is to find mentors. Shadow someone, call, intern for free. There are so many avenues to get close to a production where you can see how it operates—and none of these have anything to do with being a director. So it’s basically, become part of the DNA somehow. Find a mentor who’s willing to guide you through the processes as you encounter them and then navigate your way through the system. The entry point might be the mailroom or as an assistant PA. It might be a variety of things, but it’s one step closer to your ultimate objective, which is learning, number one, and number two, understanding the function of the role of a director in the overall system.

So if an aspiring filmmaker approached you to be his mentor, what kind of qualities would you be looking for in this person?

That’s interesting. For me it’s a bit of humility, a willingness to learn, an open mind. I’ve been approached by a few folks wanting to discuss this scenario, but it felt more like I was an object. They had no interest in knowing me—just very robotic, like steps out of a book. But mentorship is a reciprocal thing. As a mentor, you want to give and share. But it’s also—and a lot of people won’t admit it—it’s fulfilling, and it’s something that you get a lot out of. So I think that’s helpful for a young person to understand. As much as they’re seeking mentorship, they’re also fulfilling another person’s desire to be of service. And however that looks, that’s probably the construct where mentorship is the most fruitful, because nobody wants to be in a scenario where the other person isn’t giving.

I would also take a person who’s hungry, someone who’s doing everything he or she needs to do to achieve their goals. I’m more than willing to help and assist someone on their journey, but I won’t create the journey for them.

What kind of work are you looking for a mentee to put into a relationship? Would you be bothered, for instance, if a mentee is putting in 70 or 80 percent as opposed to 110 percent?

Of course, that’s human nature. For me, I think what people sometimes don’t understand is the concept of completion, so I always put completion on the table. If you set out to do something, then your mission is to complete it. How well you complete it is up to you. But your mission is to complete the race, whether you’re in fourth place, fifth place, or first place. That’s success to me. Completing what you set out to do. If you realize you’re not going to be in first place, you don’t just stop running.

There are some people who won’t do it. They talk a lot, but they won’t finish. And there are a lot of folks who really want to do it, and they’re putting forward the effort, but they just don’t know how. So it’s distinguishing between those two types, I think—that’s important to me. Like I tell my kids, “I can’t do it for you. You have to do it for yourself. I can give you a head start and some insight that maybe another person might not have. I can offer you that. I can give you the tools, but you have to build it.”

How would you advise the creative person who wants to be a director but is concerned that he doesn’t have the business know-how?

The idea that creative people don’t have a solid grasp of the business? Look, when you go to the gym, you favor the areas you’re strongest in. But what the trainer always tells you is to focus on the areas where you’re weakest. That’s the hardest to do. So if you’re serious about bodybuilding and you’re naturally strong in your shoulders but weak in your core and your legs, you’ll work on your legs more, right? If you’re not serious about it and you’re really just bullshitting yourself, you’re going to work on your shoulders. But they’re already big. You don’t need to do that.

So it’s really about shifting your paradigm and asking yourself, how bad do I want this? Am I really willing to do what it takes to achieve my objective, because if you are, then you’ll work on the muscles that you’re weakest in. Just because you’re creative and you’ve built that muscle because it’s something you lean on, that doesn’t mean you can’t build your other muscles. It just means you’re shying away from that, whether it be fear, lack of interest, or whatever. But if you’re serious about something, then those things have to go away. That’s a fact. You’re not going to win if you’re not willing to do what it takes.

So what do you say to the person who says, “But I don’t actually need to know the business. I want to be a director. I don’t want to be a producer”?

Of course you do. Entertainment is a business. They don’t call it entertainment fun—they call it entertainment business. Marketing business, business of sports, whatever it is, it’s all a business. And as a director, how are you going to get paid? You need to understand what a director’s worth. So if you’re going to be a director, you have to know what the going rate is. It’s just the basic idea of, “How much do I work for?” Someone’s going to ask you to sign a contract, so you have to have some understanding of what an agreement is. So no, the idea that any creative person might say they don’t need to understand the business of their field, that’s nonsense.

Maybe that’s part of the problem—that we tend to compartmentalize things. But the truth is, you have an investor, and there’s a budget and overhead. You have your expenses, and you have to meet your budget obligations. You have to work to spend what you have budgeted. That’s what business is. As a director, you have an obligation. There’s a certain amount of pages that you have to shoot, a certain amount of dollars to shoot those pages, and you, as a director, should be working in the construct of, “Hey, I have to get this created for this amount of money. How do I plan to do that?” That’s all a business discussion.

Can you explain how a producer works with a director to get a project off the ground, what that collaboration looks like?

Here’s what’s always first for me: A project on the creative side starts in a script. Based off of this concept and the demand of the concept by the marketplace and the size of the marketplace, and also the distribution mechanism that’s available to place this kind of content in this marketplace, I have to determine the formula that makes the most sense—and that informs what size picture it could and should be. We should have this kind of talent, or this caliber director, or this caliber producer. Can we budget X and have it work in our model? Is there any wiggle room here? Can we make that happen? So it’s always rooted in business financials.

The idea is to create reasonable constraints in trying to place elements within the structure that can help achieve your goal. That’s why money people don’t run productions. That’s why they’re not directors, because they’re cut from a different cloth. So when it comes to the director, you want a creative person who understands how to achieve the vision. You don’t make the decision solely on financial aspects when it comes to the director, but that does play into it. So if there’s a director with a reputation of blowing off the studio, hijacking the production, and always going over budget, then you’re like, “No. I can’t risk that on this picture.” Now, on some pictures, you’re betting big, and you’ve got to play big, and some of those things become less important. But in the world I operate in, where we’re working with smaller budgets and trying to be more efficient, it’s really about playing within reasonable constraints most of the time.

Your collaboration with director Leslie Small is significant. You continue to work with him. What does Leslie Small do to make that happen?

Well, he knows what he’s doing, but Leslie has also been working with the company pretty much from the inception, so there’s a sense that we’ve grown together. When you establish a working relationship that’s positive and everybody’s on the same page, understanding how to get things done in the way it needs to get done, then you tend to work with those people again.

But I will say this about Leslie. He’s a very talented director, but he also understands the business. So when we’ve done things for a minimal budget, he’s always made an effort to figure out how to work in that constraint scenario. That’s a key to why the relationship has continued and also grown—because he worked with the system. He understood that this was the system, and he built his construct around that, and it’s served everybody’s purpose.

You hear about conflicts between a director and a producer over budget—projects that get pulled at the last second, or directors who get fired. What do you think a director needs to know to stay in the game and satisfy what the producers are looking for while at the same time setting herself up to achieve her own creative vision?

It’s first being on the same page with the overall mission. Everyone has to compromise to some degree, but in some cases we have to be honest. Some people don’t know what the hell they’re talking about at times, and some people may have a voice that they probably shouldn’t. But the fact is, they’re empowered, they have a voice, and it is what it is.

So I think it falls back to the muscle-building discussion. Sometimes, if you’re able to read between the lines, you might see that some notes or feedback can really have to do with money. And if you can see that, then you might have the ability to get what you want and address what they’re trying to address. So it’s being fluent in intuitiveness but also being knowledgeable about what conversations you’re actually having.

Then there’s the whole graciousness thing where communication is key. We work in a business where some people don’t communicate well—let’s be honest—and some people are just forcing points of views. But if we’re always paying attention and listening and trying to articulate our position from all perspectives, then it’s not just, “I want this thing because I think it looks better.” If this thing costs $5 million and your budget is only $1 million, then there’s a huge discrepancy there. So you’re really not talking about what works better—you’re talking about a $4 million difference in the budget.

As a money guy, I’m always going to fight money, but if I’m dealing with a director with years of experience and we’re talking the same language, I’m most likely going to defer to them in most cases when it comes to the creative.

What kind of advice would you have for a student just graduating from school and looking to become a working director? Next steps?

My biggest thing is just do it. We’re living in an age now where a person can be in Omaha and economies of scale is such that a kid can buy an iPhone and just make his first project happen. There’s no reason to wait for anybody to do anything for you in this day and age. So if you’re looking to be a director, I would say first educate yourself and learn the craft, learn the business of film, and then make one, because you have the ability to distribute it globally through various platforms on the Internet. You have the ability to be in Omaha and create a buzz in California and Japan so people can see your content if it’s good. We live in an age where the old approach is no longer appropriate. There’s a whole new dynamic, a whole new opportunity where you can distribute your own product. There’s really no excuse for anyone not do it if that’s what they want to do.

Embracing this idea that you don’t need permission to create your own content.

Absolutely, you don’t. And also, because all of those pieces have to come into play, everything we talked about—finance, budgeting, operating a business. When you’re putting in your own money, whether ten bucks, fifty bucks, or a hundred bucks, it’s your money. You have to sort out your idea of how you’re going to monetize it. You have to create a plan for that. You have to market it. You have to assemble a team, because a director isn’t the whole team. And then the outcome of that is, if you’re doing it well, and you’ve done it multiple times, and you’ve learned your craft, then you could possibly find yourself in business.

We live in a time where the excuses have been wiped away simply by the availability of technology. It’s ingenuity and creativity too. You absorb yourself in the filmmaking community wherever you are, and collaborate to create content and display your work. A writer can be part of the process, a director, actors—the whole nine. And if the content is good, it rises to the top. If you’re good, you’re good. And if you’re not good, with practice, you’ll get better.