Dish
By Michael Fleming

After spending 25 years in the music business producing records, writing songs and supervising movie soundtracks with such artists as Tina Turner, Stevie Wonder and Cheap Trick, Spencer Proffer is trying a new trick: producing movies with musical themes under his Morling Manor Music and Media banner.

His first was co-exec producing the James Whale biopic "Gods and Monsters" and the second is "Mr. Music," a film that just wrapped for Showtime, about a 15-year-old kid put in charge of a struggling music company run by a rapscallion played by Mick Fleetwood. Proffer, who exec produces that film with Dan Paulsen, is readying several other films he'll set up shortly, and will be the rare producer who also serves as music supervisor on each.

" My career has always been anchored in music, but my goal was to always produce films with a musical component," says Proffer. "I've spent the last five years working on the music of films, and now have about 50 under by belt and a couple dozen TV shows." After handling the music for more than 40 Showtime efforts, Proffer expects to do a lot of producing biz with them, following "Mr. Music," which bows in March.