Dan Ogawa

In His Own Words

• What do you do (in 5 words or less)?

  Manage the operation.

• What's the weirdest job you've ever had (before Free Range)?

  Short order cook.

• What's the best advice you ever got?

  You'll learn that being hit doesn't hurt as much as you think it will.

• Tell me about the happiest you've ever been.

  I directed a play at City College, called "Paradise Lost," written by Clifford Odets. It was dense material, and required a lot of outside research. And these kids did it. The school spent the ENTIRE year's budget on the set, we had adjudicators from the American College Theater Festival come by, and we won three awards.Two students got scholarships, and they bought me the FINEST bottle of bourbon I've ever had. Still have two sips left.

• Is there a book from your childhood that helped make you who you are today? Explain.

  Franny & Zooey. It's hard to explain, but it basically gave me permission to be forthright.

• Who is your mentor?

  Ted Brown, professor of Art History. He told me one time, "Life is going to happen to you. You can make choices, or allow it to make choices for you."

• If you had a time machine, what historical moment would you rewrite?

  August 6, 1945.

• What's the best flavor combination you can think of?

  Coffee. But let's not combine it with anything.

• Free Ranger Bio

  Dan comes to Free Range after a long and varied career in film, television and corporate video production. His journey to Free Range started in Labor Relations at NBC, through film sets at Warner Brothers, Columbia Pictures and Fox, and rounded out experiencing the corporate world at Apple and Hewlett Packard. Most recently, he spent eleven years making television and managing finances at KQED, the Bay Area PBS affiliate, as well as numerous evenings and weekends editing the news for KRON, formerly San Francisco's NBC affiliate. He is excited to be a part of Free Range, a place where the process and people matter just as much as the great creative products we turn out. During the day, Dan is responsible for managing the studio's operations, and at night and on weekends he spends time playing tennis, reading obscure texts and manuscripts, and generally sitting back and relaxing.