Producer

The person who makes the necessary arrangements for a film or sound recording to be made (Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, section 178). In contrast with the director of a film, whose contribution is artistic, the producer’s contribution to the work is commercial or financial, in particular raising the money for a film to be made. The producer of a sound recording will normally be the record company which hires the studio, engages the sound engineers (who might be functionally equivalent to the director of a film), and in some cases perhaps provide chemical stimulants for the performers whose sounds are to be recorded. The producer of a sound recording or film is confusingly called an author in the 1988 Act. In the case of a film, the producer is a joint author of the film – though (because usually a company or other legal, rather than natural, person and therefore not having a necessarily finite lifespan) omitted from the list of persons whose lifespan determines the duration of copyright.