Ralph Kamp

At the dawn of his career, Ralph Kamp had a hand in "The Meaning of Life," the last of the feature-length comedies starring those bizarro Brits, the Monty Python troupe. Kamp must have made an impression; he worked with the Pythons again, individually, following their semi-official disbandment, in movies like "A Fish Called Wanda," which starred John Cleese, and "The Adventures of Baron Munchausen," which featured Eric Idle and was directed by another Python alum, Terry Gilliam. Kamp worked as a sales executive at Majestic Films, which had a string of critically acclaimed hits during his tenure in the late 1980s and early '90s: Kenneth Branagh's "Henry V," Bruce Beresford's "Driving Miss Daisy," and Kevin Costner's "Dancing with Wolves." Working the business end, in finances and as an executive, Kamp oversaw the companies Icon Entertainment and Lumiere, cultivating the comedy "What Women Want," starring Mel Gibson, and bringing a pop sensation to the screen with "Spice World." He eventually founded his own company, Odyssey, which has afforded him credit as executive producer on movies like the Johnny Depp historical drama "The Libertine" and the film version of the musical blockbuster "The Phantom of the Opera."