In light of the release of HORRIBLE BOSSES and the compilation of the Boss Database, I thought it was worth mentioning that not all bosses are equally terrible. I know that this blog can err on the side of negativity and complaining, but even I have to admit that some of my bosses have been great. Hell, I’d say most of my bosses have been great most of the time.
Going into a new production office, you really have no idea of what to expect. Will they be screamers? Will they be overly demanding? Will they be babies?
But occasionally, you’ll find a production office filled with competent, intelligent adults where no one screams and no one passes the blame unduly. All in all, I’ve been very fortunate. Of all the coordinators and APOCs I’ve worked with, only one has been a real malcontent. The rest have been pretty great to work for – even the one who required two people to explain to him how to chat on Facebook.
Now that I think about it, most of my grief has come from people in other departments who think that just because you’re a PA, they have carte blanche to shit all over you. And from other PAs, who think that a production office is an episode of Survivor and we’re all competing against each other.
(Oh. I totally forgot about 2nd ADs, 2nd 2nd ADs, and Set PAs. They’re almost always assholes, because they think that all we do in our cushy production offices is check Twitter and update our blogs all day long. What nerve.)
For the most part, people want to get through a show with as little drama and as few headaches as possible.
One Response
From my experience, the dynamic of a crew… whether everyone’s happy or completely frustrated… hinges largely upon the attitude of the 1st AD, and how everybody responds to that 1st AD.
If the 1st AD is a complete asshole, and a lot of them are, he makes life hell for the Set PAs, the video assist, and even the art department/grips/electrics if his attitude is bad enough to reach into those departments. Those people, in turn, pass the anger on to the other people around them that they have to deal with. Department heads have the power to make their own departments miserable… but an cranky 1st, sometimes just a dick on his own merits and other times just a dick because he’s responding to an asshole director, can spread that misery through the whole production.