Oscar-winning UK producer David Parfitt shared insights from the highs and lows of his 35-year producing career at a masterclass for the Doha Film Institute’s Qumra talent incubator over the weekend. “I have been staggeringly lucky,” said Parfitt, who won an Oscar in 1999 for Shakespeare in Love with other high-profile credits including Much Ado About Nothing, The Madness Of King George, My Week With Marilyn and the Oscar-winning drama The Father.
Parfitt, who has worked in film and TV most of his life having started out as a child actor in the 1970s, said he knew from adolescence that he wanted to stay in the business but not in front of the camera.
He credited Kenneth Branagh for enabling his crossover into producing. The pair met on a West End theatre show in the 1980s. “We had next-door dressing rooms.
We were young and had too much time on our hands. We used the six months of the play to plan our escape. As younger actors in the theatre, we had no control over our careers.
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