Persistence,
Passion and Page
BY STEVEN SCHUSSLER
DAVID PAGE IS PRESIDENT of Page Productions. After 14
years of persistence he became the creator and executive producer
of Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives, the Food Network’s top-rated series. He is a New Yorker who relocated to the Twin Cities for a job,
fell in love with it and made it his home.
« Steven Schussler
(steven@schussler
creative.com) is the
Founder, Chairman
and CEO of Schussler
Creative, Inc., which
specializes in creating,
designing and
developing theatrical
attractions, restaurants, retail stores and
entertainment venues
worldwide.
SS: How did you launch the series? DAVID >> I had been trying to sell something—anything—to the Food
Network for quite a while, and a very kind executive kept listening
to my pitches. I was on the phone with her one day, and I’m
pitching and pitching and pitching, and she’s not buying.
Exasperated she asked if I had anything about diners and I said,
“Oh yeah, I’ve been developing a show called Diner’s Drive-Ins
and Dives.” Actually, I hadn’t been. It’s a name that just fell out of
my head. It was a Thursday, and she asked for a write-up by the
following Tuesday. I spent the weekend calling restaurants around
the country and delivered a write-up on Monday. They had a
development meeting on Tuesday and within a matter of weeks
they had commissioned a one-hour special called Diner’s Drive-Ins and Dives, and that’s what eventually turned into the series.
SS:Did you think the show would be this big? DAVID >> When we first did the special, no one told
me that they were looking at it as a pilot for possible series. I was
just glad to finally get an opportunity to produce a show of any
kind. By the fourth episode, they started using the word ‘hit,’ but at
that point, I was kind of in shock. You know, for 14 years I had been
trying to sell anything to anybody, and now I’ve got a series on one
of the most influential cable networks. It just went from there.
SS: What lead to your relocation? DAVID >> I got recruited to come to Minnesota and
serve as senior vice president and executive producer of the home
shopping channel ValueVision, which was being rebranded as
ShopNBC. We came out to do that and completed the change over,
and I decided I wasn’t going to finish my career in home shopping. So we decided to take another leap and open a production
company; and we liked Minnesota. This is a creative community
with a long history of making cable television, so there is a talent
pool here that you won’t find, with all due respect, in any number
of other Midwestern cities.
SS: Your wife, Roberta Brackman, is your business partner. What’s it like working with
your spouse?
DAVID >> Roberta and I have been working together since 1992
or 1993 when she was my lawyer at NBC. She is the vice president
and general counsel of Page Productions and runs all administrative aspects of the business. One of the nicest things about working
with your spouse is the intellectual interchange about things that
matter to both of you. You are creatively involved together. One
of the challenges is to be careful to not let business disagreements
become personal arguments, especially if you screw up.
SS:Did you ever put everything on the line? DAVID >> Oh yes, you know those zero percent credit
card offers where you can move the balance from one card to
another? There was a period of time there shortly before I finally
got the show where my wife had become a master of that process.
For the better part of three years, money was an issue.
SS: What are some words of advice? DAVID >>It isn’t about starting a business generically; it’s about
wanting to do something you love. If you really love something and
you know it and you have a reason to want to do it, well, then all I can
tell you is it’s not going to be easy. It’s going to take a long time.
I kept sending in ideas for shows that no one would buy. Comments included, ‘I’m sorry, you’re a news guy’ and ‘Why do you
think you can do this?’ You really have to be stubborn and potentially stupid to stick with it. The key ingredient is curiosity and
lucky timing. But, I stuck to it because I just believed that if we did
it long enough, if we kept trying, something would hit. I just didn’t
expect it to hit this big.
