The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was keep. (non-admin closure) Atlantic306 ( talk) 18:53, 13 September 2018 (UTC) reply

Barry Mendel

Barry Mendel (  | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – ( View log · Stats)

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Non-notable producer. Previously PRODed and redirected, then recreated. I see no reason why his name should be redirected to any particular film. Searches reveal only press releases, brief mentions, or interviews (not independent). NOTE: seems to meet WP:ANYBIO #1, per two Best Picture Oscar nominations (which also seem to apply to producers), and two Producer's Guild Best Picture Nominations. I changed my !vote to 'weak keep' below. — Insertcleverphrasehere ^{( or here)} 00:24, 20 August 2018 (UTC) reply

Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Actors and filmmakers-related deletion discussions. IntoThinAir (formerly Everymorning) talk 01:07, 20 August 2018 (UTC) reply

• Keep Mendel appears to meet WP:ANYBIO (though apparently not by much) as someone who has been nominated for two Oscars ( source). There is a bit more coverage of him here and here. IntoThinAir (formerly Everymorning) talk 01:22, 20 August 2018 (UTC) reply

@ IntoThinAir: With regards to this source, it is an article written by the subject himself and published on behalf of him. He was nominated for no Oscars, two films for which he was one of the producers for were nominated for an Oscar, (very far from meeting WP:ANYBIO). The Chicago tribune source is no good for establishing notability, as it is a brief mention and is basically just a quote by him about something else. As for the Variety source, it certainly seems quite a lot like a press release to me, and appears to be the sort of mildly promotional story that is planted/solicited by a publicist. Given that he is a producer, and basically represents his own company, independence of sources should really be considered in light of WP:ORGIND, which warns against this sort of churnalism. Happy to reconsider the nomination if better can be found, but this currently isn't it. — Insertcleverphrasehere ^{( or here)} 02:36, 20 August 2018 (UTC) reply

@ Insertcleverphrasehere: Thank you for the response. I noticed that the Wrap source was an interview, but it didn't seem to be entirely written by him per se- it seems like it's all either him responding to interview questions or the blurb at the start, the latter of which seems to have been written by the interviewer (Eric Estrin) rather than Mendel himself. I certainly acknowledge I was confused by the sentence "Twice nominated for Oscars, (“The Sixth Sense,” “Munich”), Mendel began agenting as a way to learn the business while figuring out his true path." This seems to mean that Mendel himself was nominated for an Oscar (not true, as you noted). I do agree there aren't many sources that cover Mendel in depth and are reliable and independent, so I may change my vote given that ANYBIO is apparently not met. IntoThinAir (formerly Everymorning) talk 02:52, 20 August 2018 (UTC) reply

@ IntoThinAir: Thanks for your response as well. I had seen the 'Wrap' source before I nominated, and agree that the "was nominated by two Oscars" bit confused me as well; but I suppose that this is just the way that producers probably speak about the awards that their films get. Though the Chicago Tribune source came up in my searches, I hadn't seen the variety one, so perhaps there is additional sourcing out there that we still haven't found. In fact for some reason it still doesn't come up even in targeted searches: [1]. While searching for it other sources did come up which indicate that he was nominated for a producer's award (but did not win): [2] [3]. I'm not sure how high we would weight the Producers Guild of America Award for Best Theatrical Motion Picture against WP:ANYBIO, but it does appear that he has been nominated twice, once for "Bridesmaids" and once for "The Big Sick". If you think this should be sufficient, I'm willing to consider withdrawing the nomination. — Insertcleverphrasehere ^{( or here)} 03:39, 20 August 2018 (UTC) reply

@ IntoThinAir: Well, I can't withdraw (per the delete !vote below), and I also noticed that WP:ANYBIO requires "several" nominations, and he has only received 2. — Insertcleverphrasehere ^{( or here)} 20:20, 21 August 2018 (UTC) reply

Note: This discussion has been included in the list of California-related deletion discussions. CAPTAIN RAJU ^(T) 06:01, 20 August 2018 (UTC) reply

• Delete per nom producer. Emily Khine ( talk) 12:54, 20 August 2018 (UTC) reply
• Keep Notable film producer and winner of the Producers Guild of America Award for Best Theatrical Motion Picture. Meets GNG per above and this. ~ EDDY ^{( talk/ contribs)}~ 14:48, 21 August 2018 (UTC) reply

First, he never won that award, was only nominated twice. Your source is a brief mention, so wouldn't support notability via the GNG. He has two nominations for the Producers Guild of America Award for Best Theatrical Motion Picture, a bit shy of the "several" required by WP:ANYBIO for a presumption of notability. — Insertcleverphrasehere ^{( or here)} 20:20, 21 August 2018 (UTC) reply

• Delete – Imdb isn't a reliable source; the other source is just a list. No notability established. Unless more sources can be added (and I can't find any), then delete. Redditaddict 6 9 22:03, 4 September 2018 (UTC) reply
• Delete I was able to locate a feature in a very small - probably hometown - paper, and an announcement (brief) that ran in a couple of papers in 1999 "Universal lures producer from Disney". So, he exists, but he's not notable. E.M.Gregory ( talk) 22:33, 5 September 2018 (UTC) withdraw. bowing to David Tornheim's sourcing. E.M.Gregory ( talk) 15:27, 6 September 2018 (UTC) reply
• Keep per sources in Variety1, Variety2, Chicago Tribune, and discussion started by IntoThinAir. Meets both WP:BASIC and WP:FILMMAKER:

3. The person has created or played a major role in co-creating a significant or well-known work or collective body of work. In addition, such work must have been the primary subject of an independent and notable work (for example, a book, film, or television series, but usually not a single episode of a television series) or of multiple independent periodical articles or reviews.

In particular, he produced The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou established by the Tribune article.

-- David Tornheim ( talk) 15:02, 6 September 2018 (UTC) reply

Producers don't inherit notability from the works they produce, 'co-creating' is nebulous in that producers generally just organise people who actually do the creating, in any case there are a lot of 'co-creators' for films.. The first source you brought up contains a once sentence reference to Barry Mendel, because he shares a first name with some other 'Barrys'. That's about as far from significant coverage as it gets. The other sources are discussed above, they also are not enough for the GNG. — Insertcleverphrasehere ^{( or here)} 01:29, 7 September 2018 (UTC) reply

"Producers don't inherit notability from the works they produce..." I thought about whether this was an issue before I posted. I am a big film buff, and the artistic merit of any film is not always so easy to pin-point. Although often it lies with the director, sometimes it is the cinematography, lighting (e.g. film noir), screen-writing, acting, special effects, costume, or even the music (e.g. Jaws) that makes a film stand out. In literature, the editing of a Maxwell Perkins is indisputably a key factor to some of the greatest masterpieces. As for producing, I agree it is not so straight-forward. The producer may, in fact, have been a substantial obstacle to making the work great. The producer may have been hands-on or hand-off. But regardless of the producer's affect on the work, without the producer there is no film, so whenever they talk about films on Turner Classic Movies, the producer is frequently mentioned. So in that sense, the producer is always playing "a major role in co-creating" any movie. And if the WP:RS is talking about the producer as producer of the work, then the impact on the creation (for better or worse) makes it fit in with the criteria for notability IMHO.

As an aside, I am a very surprised we have no separate section for notability of people with regard to films, when we have that for sports, like WP:NFOOT. The reasonable concern you raise here about what is meant by "a major role in co-creating" in regard to film could be addressed in general there. -- David Tornheim ( talk) 02:23, 7 September 2018 (UTC) reply

• Keep. Contrary to some of the comments above, Barry Mendel was himself nominated for two Oscars, by virtue of being one of threee producers of Best Picture nominees The Sixth Sense and Munich. One can verify this by looking him up in the official Academy Awards Database. How many Oscar nominations does a person need in order to be considered notable per WP:FILMMAKER? In addition to the other nominations he received for those two films from other award-giving bodies, he has also been nominated twice for Outstanding Producer of Theatrical Motion Pictures from the Producers Guild of America, for Bridesmaids (2011 film) and The Big Sick. -- Metropolitan90 (talk) 04:09, 7 September 2018 (UTC) reply

When a film is nominated for an Oscar for best picture, nobody says that the producers were 'nominated for best picture'. This is a very strange affectation that I have only seen with regards to producers referring to themselves. The film itself was nominated for best picture, and a film is a collaborative work amongst many people. As for nominations he got for PGoAAfBTMP, there are 2, not 'several' as required by anybio. In any case, these would only create a 'presumption' of notability. We have in fact done the search and found the available sourcing very lacking. If we can find more than brief mentions of him for sourcing, interviews (not independent), or articles written by Barry himself (not independent), as the GNG requires, I'm happy to change my mind. — Insertcleverphrasehere ^{( or here)} 12:17, 7 September 2018 (UTC) reply

I'm going to disagree with the idea that nobody says the producers were nominated for Best Picture. For one thing, the official Academy rules say that for Best Picture, "The nominees will be those three or fewer producers who have performed the major portion of the producing functions." [4] (see p. 23). And this is not an affectation used by the Academy officially and ignored by the rest of the world; see [5] ("Oprah Winfrey, nominated for her work as a producer on Selma); [6] ("Brad Pitt ... has six noms — three for acting and three for producing best picture nominees"); [7] ("Michael Douglas ... won an Oscar for best picture for producing 1975's 'One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest'"); [8] ("Jonas Rivera ... was also nominated for a Best Picture Oscar by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences for 'Up'"). And so on. -- Metropolitan90 (talk) 01:27, 8 September 2018 (UTC) reply

• Weak Keep Ok, per Metropolitan90, I'm convinced that an Oscar nomination for best picture also applies to the producer (two nominations), and that this producer has also received two nominations from the producers guild best picture (so 4 major award nominations total). This meets WP:ANYBIO point #1 "The person has received a well-known and significant award or honor, or has been nominated for such an award several times.". That being said, it is only 'weak keep' because I'm not seeing a clear demonstration of sources meeting the standards of the General Notability Guideline, and ANYBIO only says that it is 'likely' that the person is notable. — Insertcleverphrasehere ^{( or here)} 06:31, 10 September 2018 (UTC) reply

I'm glad we convinced you. Assuming this AfD ends with keep, I am willing to help with deleting unsourced material. -- David Tornheim ( talk) 15:40, 10 September 2018 (UTC) reply

• Keep sources found suffice. In particular, the discussions of his role in the development of notable films found in books including: Steven Spielberg: A Biography, Second Edition By Joseph McBride and Joss Whedon: The BiographyBy Amy Pascale. E.M.Gregory ( talk) 21:14, 12 September 2018 (UTC) reply
• Keep. Subject comfortably and verifiably meets the criteria for independent notability conferred upon him by his many notable works, per sources. - The Gnome ( talk) 12:42, 13 September 2018 (UTC) reply

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.