Among a seemingly bottomless list of motivations for upgrading cable telecommunications systems, here’s one industry engineers may have overlooked: preventing bad first dates. 

That’s the idea behind a novel use case for broadband data transmission from Match Group Inc., the owner of digital dating applications including Tinder and Match.com. A company technology unit has been developing live-video streaming features that are designed to help subscribers visit with and evaluate potential partners before they meet in person. 

“Our ultimate vision here is for people to never have to go on a bad first date again,” Match Group adviser Shar Dubey said.

Score one for broadband. Whether it’s used to stream Netflix movies or chat with prospective romantic partners, high-quality video requires bandwidth, and bandwidth is what the cable industry is determined to deliver with its ever-expanding broadband network architecture. 

Ever since introducing residential high-speed data services at scale in the late 1990s, the cable industry has been on a never-ending mission to deliver more data bits at faster speeds over blends of fiber-optic and coaxial cable distribution networks. Determined to maintain an impressive lead in U.S. residential broadband connectivity — Leichtman Research Group has said cable companies currently command close to 67% of the market — industry strategists are working to elevate performance while they stave off threats from rivals that are extending high-capacity fiber networks deep into the nation’s neighborhoods. 

They’re also grappling with shifting consumer expectations around media and communications. Even though a large amount of video consumption is now happening over independent streaming services like Netflix or YouTube TV, cable providers often remain first in line when it comes to dealing with user complaints over signal quality or connectivity issues.

“Control of the complete experience for cable operators to consumers is being reduced, but expectations for a perfect, error-free experience remain,” Adrian Herrera, chief marketing officer for Varnish Software, told Multichannel News. That reality has pressured cable companies to ramp up network performance and quality of experience by embracing new tools and techniques. 

Expo Exhibitors Pitch Solutions

Varnish Software is among an emerging breed of suppliers working to optimize network performance partly by embracing an “edge” approach: caching more functionality closer to the point of customer interface in order to reduce latency and ward off network congestion.

These tactics and other industry advances will be on display at the 2023 SCTE Cable-Tec Expo technical conference happening in Denver, starting October 16. There, exhibitors will showcase a mix of technology enhancements that play out across the full breadth of cable’s “last-mile” access networks. 

At headends, new virtual cable-modem termination systems promise improvements in signal quality along with deployment and provisioning latitude. Across the network, upgraded amplifiers and passive devices can accommodate frequencies extending as high as 1.8 GHz, expanding raw capacity. 

In neighborhoods, distributed access architectures put more processing muscle at the network edge, reducing latency and adding flexibility. 

At street-side fiber-optic cabinets, node splits — techniques to pare localized serving areas into smaller and smaller groups of homes — allow for impressive bursts of bandwidth. 

And inside homes, multi-band Wi-Fi routers are spritzing out signals faster than ever. 

Behind it all are new ways to modulate signals, effectively squeezing more information into shared spaces, courtesy of the new DOCSIS 4.0 standard. 

All of these techniques are part of the cable industry’s “10G” ambition — a catchily-named initiative to maintain the high ground in prepping for the next major surge in bandwidth demand and playing a major role in the multi-gigabit data evolution. 

Impact of DOCSIS 4.0

A big enabler here is DOCSIS 4.0, the CableLabs-authored data delivery specification that will start to invade the market in a big way over the next two years. Nearly half of North American cable companies will activate DOCSIS 4.0 deployments before the end of 2025, according to a 2023 survey of roughly 100 industry engineering professionals conducted by broadband systems gear maker ATX Networks. Not all of these early adopters will rush to commercialize DOCSIS 4.0 capabilities right away, but the fact that they’re poised to do so reflects widespread recognition of the value of getting ahead in the speed race. 

Cable companies already are deep into the gigabit data revolution thanks to the widely deployed DOCSIS 3.1 specification, which uses bonded channels and higher order modulation to support faster data rates. But with the ability to push data rates into the multi-gigabit per second range both downstream and upstream, DOCSIS 4.0 promises to bring even more muscle to cable’s fiber-meets-coaxial architectures, likely extending the lifespan of these hybrid networks.  

Although many observers believe all-fiber architectures will one day prevail — a few cable companies, including Altice USA, are already well down that path — cable-industry proponents believe there’s plenty of life left in hybrid fiber coaxial (HFC) networks, especially those that are supercharged with a DOCSIS 4.0 engine. 

ATX Networks, for example, believes full-on replacement of cable’s HFC architectures with all-fiber successors won’t happen until around 2050. In the meantime, cable’s hybrid networks promise to provide a best-of-both-worlds reward: the ability to render multi-gigabit data rates in both directions at a cost well below what fiber-to-the-premise providers are spending to catch up. 

This confluence has cable industry engineers feeling heady about their competitive posture. ATX found only about 20% of respondents cited fiber-to-the-home providers as a serious competitive threat. That’s down from 27% a year before. 

Holograms and Health

Cable’s rivals maintain a different viewpoint. AT&T, which hopes to have all-fiber lines in place in front of roughly one-fourth of U.S. addresses — some 30 million — by 2025, is convinced fiber’s superior technical characteristics will win the day, possibly sooner than some theorize. CEO John Stankey, talking with investment analysts at a Goldman Sachs conference in September, said AT&T continues to steal away customers as it plows forward with ambitious network upgrades. 

Through the first half of 2023, AT&T added close to 523,000 fiber-broadband connections, bringing its total to 7.7 million. Some of those net gains are displacements of aging digital subscriber lines, but to Stankey’s point, there is almost certainly some success being had at cable’s expense. “The game is about taking share in those footprints (where) we build fiber,” Stankey said. “And we’re successfully doing that.” 

The ultimate arbiter of the network wars will be customers who make buying decisions across the roughly 112 million or so U.S. addresses where broadband data networks are up, running and increasingly ingesting gobs of digital data. As of the second quarter of 2023, the average U.S. residential broadband user was consuming slightly more than 503 gigabytes of digital data in a month, a record amount that compares with just under 491 gigabytes in mid-2022 and 271 GB in 2019. The estimates come from a detailed quarterly usage report published by Jersey City, New Jersey-based OpenVault, which makes a living by optimizing broadband network performance and parsing rolled-up usage analytics provided by customers serving close to 60 million end users. 

OpenVault founder and CEO Mark Trudeau, who has watched the usage numbers climb steadily year after year, points out that bandwidth-gobbling applications like 4K video and video gaming are dovetailing with ongoing video cord-cutting and a rise in the number of connected devices people and businesses are using. Because of these trends, data consumption is bound to keep rising. “I don’t think it’s ever going to stop,” Trudeau said.

This shared belief that bandwidth demand will continue to soar is what’s compelling the latest wave of upgrades and fiber buildouts. The intention is for providers to stay in front of the curve by retooling today’s networks as the world edges toward a possible all-fiber future. It’s an agenda rooted in hard data and an appreciation for historical usage trends, but it also hinges on educated guesswork. “We don’t even know what the next applications are going to be,” Trudeau said. 

Needed: Bigger, Faster Networks

What is certain is that new apps and use cases will depend on a rising supply of bandwidth. Mark Dzuban, president and CEO of the Cable-Tec Expo’s organizer, the Society of Cable Telecommunications Engineers, points to futuristic applications like holographic displays — imagine a near-lifelike version of Taylor Swift rocking out in the living room — that might require as much as 700 megabits of bandwidth per second over a single video channel.  These sorts of new-age visual apps will be paired with advancements in networked healthcare and home automation to support emerging societal shifts including the aging-in-place movement, Dzuban believes. Meaning: The world will need bigger, faster networks. 

Besides new data-engulfing apps, there are more gizmos than ever sipping from the broadband pipe. A cybersecurity report published last December by Comcast found there were an average of 15 connected devices in homes served by the MSO’s residential data network. More are coming: The networked “smart thermostat” market alone is pegged to grow at a 17% compound annual growth rate through 2028, cable equipment supplier CommScope pointed out in a recent analysis. 

Besides tracking health care and other applications, Dzuban also is keen on a new flavor of “convergence” that unites cable’s wireline broadband capabilities with the industry’s fast-growing mobile communications business. Devising ways to unify these networking concepts so that users perceive almost no gap between the two is a focal point for SCTE, which will stage a “Mobility Pavilion” at the upcoming conference. As the two technologies intertwine, the CableLabs subsidiary is also focused on “operationalizing” the industry’s tech advancements — transferring knowledge and skills throughout member organizations — as a way to achieve competitive superiority.  

Revving up broadband speeds and ramping up operational acumen aren’t the only boxes cable engineers are working to check off. Capital also is being plowed into better back-office software systems, more agile set-top boxes and business-services enhancements like software-defined networking and physical premise security. There’s also renewed action happening around the advertising sector, where the long-sought dream of dynamic ad insertion — imposing different commercials into different slots in real time, based on viewer characteristics — is gaining momentum. 

Rising investment here is partly an outgrowth of the Internet, which has taught a generation of media consumers to expect personalized content experiences, David Solomon, president and CEO of cable advertising provider Viamedia, said. “Consumers want flexibility in how and where they consume content, and they expect personalized ad experiences,” he said.

That and a better chance of actually enjoying a first date. 

Women have made undeniable progress in the worlds of sports and media in the last 20 years, as B+C Multichannel News has chronicled partly through these annual profiles of female leaders in the televised sports world, Women in the Game. But though steady, progress has been slow, although there was a greater change in attitude and tangible improvements after #MeToo burst into the headlines. 

One silver lining in the tragic and destructive pandemic has been the change in the way America goes to work, and there’s hope that this could bring greater progress for women in sports and sports media. “There are women talking sports now on TV and online every day as hosts, analysts, play-by-play announcers and reporters and they’re no longer exceptions,” Jodi Logsdon, VP of news and editorial for CBS Sports, said. “We’ve seen the change behind the scenes too. When I started, women tended to be in certain roles in marketing or operations and not in an editorial or production capacity, but that has changed.”

Roles, Attitudes Changing

Best of all, Logsdon said, there’s been a shift in attitude, so women and people of color are no longer being hired just for show or to meet a quota. “There’s now a recognition of the fact that having those different perspectives and truly hearing them and engaging them is not just the right thing to do but it’s also actually making us better,” she said. “Women and people of color bring different ideas and cover stories in different ways and appeal to broader audiences with stories that reflect them.”

That said, resistance can be tough to break down. Stephanie Medina, director of Fox NFL Sunday, said Fox Sports has brought in another woman director and has a third in training but “an agent told me that until two years ago there were other networks that didn’t even want the names of female directors on their lists of people to see.”

Meredith Battin, VP of content planning and programming for the National Football League, who was often the only woman in the room when she was starting out, said improvements have been slowest to hit at the most senior levels. “The changes over the course of my career have been tremendous,” she said.

“Change doesn’t happen overnight, but things look a lot different today for women in the field than they did 10 years ago,” agreed Karen Brodkin, who is co-head of WME Sports and executive VP of content strategy and development at Endeavor. She said there still needs to be more effort made to get women (and people of color) into the pipeline so that when hiring happens, there are more candidates. “I’m hopeful our agents and executives will look a lot more like our clients moving forward,” she said. “We’re certainly not there yet but we’re creating opportunities.”

Years ago, Battin said, the challenge was just about getting women in the door. Now it’s about finding ways to support working mothers. “The pandemic showed that people don’t have to always be in the office and there can be more flexibility for parents,” she said. While sports-related jobs are often going to require work on nights and weekends, “this is the positive for women that has come out of the pandemic,” Battin said.

Rosalyn Durant, executive VP of programming and acquisitions for ESPN, said leadership needs to “support people for their full selves, to be flexible as leaders to meet people’s needs so they can be successful.” 

Kat Harwood, a principal in Deloitte Consulting LLP’s sports-industry practice, said the pandemic produced a seismic change but workplaces are “reaching an inflection point” as companies start to mandate more days back in the office. While it will take time to sort out what works best for companies and employees, she said, there’s no going back to the rigidity of the past — and women will be the beneficiaries of this paradigm shift. 

Paying It Forward

She credits the women who came before her for helping break down barriers and push for change, adding that her generation has done the same. “There’s a sense among women in the field of banding together, of providing wrap-around support and pulling through the next group to pay it forward,” Harwood said. “Now we’re getting a multiplier effect for those efforts.”

Added Brodkin, “I hope we’ve left a strong legacy for the women who come up behind us.” 

When asked when progress would reach the point of true equality, Durant said: “I don’t know that I’ll ever get to answer that question and say, ‘It’s enough,’ though I hope I do one day. We have to continue focusing on it and intentionality, and acknowledge where there are gaps — then we can make sure women get support and truly get the same opportunities.” 

Meredith Battin 
VP, Content Planning and Programming, National Football League

KEY STATS: “My role has changed every few years,” Battin said. In recent years, she has overseen a team of more than 40 in portfolio-level planning and investment operations. She’s now helping bring together the content for linear and digital platforms, which is a shift driven by the need to reach more fans. Battin is responsible for everything from YouTube content to podcasts as the NFL strives to reach fans where they are. “We’re planning and programming with all the platforms in mind,” she said. “That’s an exciting shift.” 

VARSITY STATUS: Battin started out in the business world at American Express but wanted a job she felt passionate about. So she earned an MBA from UCLA to prepare for a career in the sports world. Battin graduated just as the NFL was launching its digital business and jumped in right away. She has been with the league for nearly 17 years, starting as a product manager for NFL Digital Media and taking on increasing responsibility across new areas since then. Her previous title was VP of business operations and club media. 

IN HER OWN WORDS: “I’ve had the great fortune to try my hand in all sorts of things in the media space. When I started we had a website and that was it, and now that’s not even the most interesting thing we do: there’s YouTube, podcasts, FAST [channels]. We want to get more content to more people and make things more accessible. 

“It’s a lot of work to rethink how we do our planning and how we bring our groups together. We have to figure out different strategies around our events: what content goes where and how to maximize our reach. We’re doing that in a resource-constrained world with more platforms, so you have to be smarter, more efficient, more creative. I like being able to pair what each platform brings to the table from a strategic value and from the fan’s value and put the full picture together. I see things holistically.”

Karen Brodkin
Co-Head of WME Sports and Executive VP of Content Strategy and Development, Endeavor

KEY STATS: Brodkin is, with Josh Pyatt, the co-head of WME Sports, which encompasses the agency’s representation of athletes, broadcasters, coaches and front-office personnel. She also leads business development and strategy for a range of business areas across the Endeavor portfolio, including partnerships with sports leagues, federations, conferences and teams; content licensing; strategy and development; media strategy and consultation; sports naming rights and venue programming, strategy and development; and eSports partnerships and events. “In the throes of the pandemic from 2020 to 2022, while we were working from home, we built a football business, a basketball representation business, a basketball coaching business and a Major League Baseball representation business,” Brodkin said. 

VARSITY STATUS: Brodkin started as a corporate attorney specializing in labor and employment matters, then spent five years as an entertainment attorney at two Los Angeles-based entertainment firms where her clients included Garth Brooks, Spike Lee, Warner Bros. and New Line Cinema. 

IN HER OWN WORDS: “I thought I had one of the best jobs in the world at Fox until I got recruited to come here in 2014, leaving legal business affairs behind to come in as a true dealmaker and help on strategy. My skills are in building and nurturing relationships. I’m a good manager of people and good at strategically building out a business. 

“I also think a lot about culture. I want the brand of WME Sports to stand for something culturally, and if we have the right culture internally that will resonate externally with clients and signing efforts. I’m not sure if there are any other sports agencies run or co-run by women, and there are no other media advisory businesses featuring two women at the top.” 

Rosalyn Durant
Executive VP, Programming and Acquisitions, ESPN

KEY STATS: Durant returned to The Walt Disney Co.-controlled ESPN in March 2023 after three years as senior VP of Disney Springs, Water Parks and ESPN Wide World of Sports. In her new role, she leads programming and media rights deals for all ESPN platforms. 

VARSITY STATUS: Prior to her three years in Florida, Durant spent two decades at ESPN, starting as an intern in affiliate sales and marketing in 1998. She signed on full-time in 1999 as a marketing coordinator and rose through the ranks. By 2005, she was senior director for national accounts and the following year she moved into programming as a senior director. Since then she has been VP, programming and acquisitions, managing the network’s relationships with the NBA, Major League Soccer, FIFA and other organizations, as well as VP of college sports programming and acquisitions, overseeing all of ESPN’s college sports relationships, rights acquisitions and programming, and senior VP of ESPN’s College Networks.

IN HER OWN WORDS: “I am back. ESPN is home. Even when I was at Walt Disney World, every week I’d talk to someone from ESPN — a friend or someone reaching out for advice or someone else — just to stay connected with the business. So returning here felt like a natural next step. 

“I’m back in the department I spent the majority of my time at ESPN in. I know the team here and understand the work that’s in front of us. We need a disciplined approach to acquisitions and content in order to find the right mix that will help
us broaden our reach to fans. It could be men’s or women’s sports, traditional or non-traditional, amateur, college or pro: It’s not one thing but the right mix. We want to round out the portfolio, not get sidetracked by all of the noise around us and focus on what we do well.” 

Kat Harwood
Principal, Sports Industry Practice, Deloitte Consulting LLP

KEY STATS: Harwood joined Deloitte’s sports consultancy not long after it began eight years ago. She advises those in the industry on how to maximize value from digital enablement opportunities across all aspects of their operations, from improving the fan experience to generating new revenue streams. 

“At first we were building awareness, but now we have strong partnerships and clients, so we are leveraging that and we can get more folks answering our calls,” she said. “We’re also showing them what we are doing outside of sports that has applicability inside sports.” 

Harwood’s group does consulting with the Olympics and others but is “really proud of the investment and impact we’ve had on a lot of women’s sports leagues like the NWSL, WNBA and the women’s U.S. soccer team.”

VARSITY STATUS: Harwood has spent her entire career at Deloitte. While tailgating at a football game during college at UCLA, she met an alum who connected her with the company. An internship led to a full-time job, starting as an auditor in the aerospace and defense industry. She then got an MBA from Wharton. “Business school helped me broaden my knowledge across all aspects of running a business, which was important if I wanted to be a consultant,” she said, adding that she purposely studied sports business while getting her graduate degree. “That became the foundation for a totally different career at Deloitte.” 

IN HER OWN WORDS: “The experience I’m most proud of is a program we started last year called The Student Athlete Leadership Experience, presented by and in conjunction with Deloitte Foundation. It’s often hard for student-athletes to understand how the skills in their sports translate into the business world and how to get in the door. We’ve doubled the number of participants this year, to eight schools and 50 student-athletes. We help them build a community of like-minded people and Deloitte folks donate their time, giving an introduction to business courses or doing interview prep and other things like that. I got to ideate the concept, pitch it and find the funding. Seeing it come together was one of the most genuinely inspiring things I’ve done.”

Tammy Henault
Chief Marketing Officer, National Basketball Association

KEY STATS: Henault joined the NBA last November to head the global marketing efforts for the league and its affiliate leagues. She also is a leader in overseeing the NBA’s new Next Gen platform, working with the product and content teams on the reimagined NBA App and on NBA ID, the league’s new global membership program offering fans benefits and rewards.

VARSITY STATUS: Henault spent her career in direct-to-consumer marketing, first at magazines like People and Time and then at The New York Times as it began moving toward the digital age. She then worked for CBS and finally Paramount Global, where she managed a team of more than 150 employees responsible for brand, partnership and performance marketing as well as audience development, customer acquisition and retention. She oversaw marketing for more than 100 movies and TV shows, including Star Trek: Discovery and 1883 and also for the global launch of Paramount Plus.

IN HER OWN WORDS: “At the magazines and The New York Times, I lived the transformation from print to digital. With The Times, we were shifting from free consumption to pay and trying to stay ahead of the curve. It was an incredible experience to launch a whole new model for an industry. I left Paramount for the NBA because it is such a global powerhouse of a brand, with such a passionate fan base, which makes it a dream to work for. There are a lot of synergies from a content and media perspective and I thought my background could add value.

“I’m still learning a ton about our fans and the different audience types, who’s a viewer on linear and who’s on streaming. I’ll have the ‘new’ CMO attached to my title until I’ve gone through a full NBA season.” 

Jodi Logsdon
VP, News and Editorial, CBS Sports

KEY STATS: Logsdon is responsible for editorial operations, newsgathering and research across platforms, serving as the lead editorial voice guiding CBS Sports productions. She also partners with leaders and other contributors to ensure CBS Sports’s high standards for news and reporting are met in all coverage across studio, game and digital productions. She also directs editorial operations for CBS Sports HQ and oversees the CBSSports.com editorial content division. Under her leadership, the research teams use data and statistics to enhance storytelling across productions and the News & Assignment Desk guides the reporting and presentation of breaking news and compelling developments across platforms. Logsdon also manages the CBS Sports Race & Culture Unit, which revolves around storytelling at the intersection of sports, race, identity and culture, and is the primary liaison for editorial coordination with CBS News.

VARSITY STATUS: A two-time Sports Emmy Award winner, Logsdon came to CBS Sports in 2015 after 12 years at ESPN. She had started as a news and copy editor for ESPN.com, eventually overseeing the daily news­gathering operation that supported ESPN’s studio productions. While there she was a contributor to ESPN’s Diversity & Inclusion Priority Team. She also was an inaugural member of the CBS Sports Inclusivity Advisory Council.

IN HER OWN WORDS: “I came to CBS Sports because they hadn’t had a dedicated news and editorial person on the TV side and were just creating the role, so I was able to design it. They envisioned it as an individual contributor to cover everything. I started as an individual contributor, a singular voice focused on the news that must be addressed in our coverage. In the years since, I have built and enhanced multiple teams dedicated to informing our storytelling, our productions and, by extension, our audiences. A few years in, I also took over our two research teams, one for broadcast and one for cable, and merged them together. Now we’ve undertaken a larger effort across all CBS Sports to integrate all our digital teams more closely with linear networks and all editorial will be under me. 

“For the editorial integration project we started this past spring I draw from experience I’ve gained at various stops along the course of my career, harnessing the lexicon learned in my tenure at ESPN.com and flexing the muscles I remember from my days with the ESPN news and assignment desk and as a coordinating producer on ESPNews. As we embark on our biggest college football season yet, and march toward our broadcast of Super Bowl LVIII, I’m humbled to know that the ever-growing news, research, editorial and Race & Culture teams I’ve built, and continue to build, serve to uplift the depth and breadth of that coverage.”

Stephanie Medina
Director, ‘Fox NFL Sunday,’ Fox Sports 

KEY STATS: For 2022, Medina oversaw a major overhaul at Fox NFL Sunday as the pregame show got a new set, control room, cameras and graphics system. “This felt like a new beginning, and I got to lead that,” the Emmy Award-winning director said. “It was challenging because I needed to learn the technology and incorporate it without losing what is the core of our show, those five guys at the desk.” 

VARSITY STATUS: Medina joined Fox as an associate director for the network’s Major League Baseball and NFL pregame shows in 2003. She directed the network’s Bowl Championship Series pregame coverage in 2006 and 2007, as well as MLB pregame shows in 2008 and 2009 and the pregame show for Super Bowl LI. She began as director of Fox NFL Sunday at the start of the 2013-14 season and made her Super Bowl debut at Super Bowl XLVIII in 2014. “No other women were getting to direct like this and some people didn’t want me to get the job, but producer Bill Richards and [Fox Sports CEO] Eric Shanks gave me this opportunity.”

IN HER OWN WORDS: “I was a news junkie at a young age and then on a field trip in eighth grade we went to see the working of a TV studio and I saw the chaos and the yelling and the monitors and it was like the angels started singing. It was like nirvana for me. 

“I was the first in my family to go to college. I majored in communications and just wanted to get into TV production — I liked the live crazy element — but I knew no one in the business. I realized my only way in was internships. I worked my butt off at an internship at KTLA [Los Angeles] and soon after they called me because they needed help on the assignment desk. I kept getting calls, to help in graphics or to load the tape. When people would quit, I’d fall in. I got to be assistant director on their early news show, and then their main one and then I became director. It took a good eight years to get from working for free to directing.” 

Gina DiGioia Sheldon
Chief Legal Officer, Fubo

KEY STATS: Sheldon was Fubo’s first in-house legal hire, joining just before the company listed on the New York Stock Exchange. She built Fubo’s legal team and became the company’s first chief legal officer. Sheldon now leads all legal matters for Fubo, including financing, acquisitions and corporate governance. On the executive management team, Sheldon helps shape Fubo’s internal legal function and helps define the company’s strategy.

Sheldon closed two acquisitions to expand Fubo’s global footprint and tech capabilities: Edisn.ai, an AI-powered computer vision technology firm based in Bangalore, India, aimed at creating a more interactive and immersive live TV and sports viewership experience, and live TV streaming company Molotov SAS in France, which reaches nearly 4 million monthly active users in Europe. She also headed the legal proceedings at home for carriage agreements at regional sports networks, including Altitude Sports in 10 Rocky Mountain states and with Sinclair Broadcast Group to bring the Bally Sports-branded regional sports networks to Fubo, making the streamer home to more than 35 regional sports networks.

Sheldon also was involved with rights deals, including an exclusive year-long partnership with former NFL player Shawne Merriman’s Lights Out Xtreme Fighting MMA league and a multiyear renewal with NBA All-Star Gilbert Arenas for his series No Chill. She also oversees patent filings for proprietary technology that will differentiate the Fubo streaming platform.

VARSITY STATUS: Sheldon began her career as an apprentice with the State Department at the U.S. Embassy in Rome. She then went to law school hoping to get involved with international transactional work. After working for small firms, she spent 17 years at Alloy Inc. and Alloy Digital, working on media deals, mergers and acquisitions and e-commerce. “I like to say I grew up at Alloy,” she said. 

IN HER OWN WORDS: “I joined Fubo because my sweet spot is working with growth-stage companies and Fubo had just gone through a merger and was growing and looking to do an IPO. I love to be hands-on and dig in, working with an entrepreneurial managerial team. At a growth stage, you can have more of an impact because you’re not put in the box of just doing legal: There’s enough work to go around and I’m one of the more experienced folks here. There was a large learning curve, but I bring my experience into conversations and transactions. I’m not just thinking about just legal rights and clearances, but about dollars and long-term strategy. I’m looking at things holistically.”

The editors of Multichannel News are pleased to recognize the 2023 Wonder Women of Los Angeles, our third class in the West Coast extension of our long-running Wonder Women event. The 15 industry executives in this exceptional group will be honored at a June 20 breakfast ceremony at the Sofitel Los Angeles, the kickoff to the L.A. TV Week of events sponsored by B+C, Multichannel News and Next TV.

For more than two decades, the Wonder Women program has celebrated the female leaders in media, entertainment and technology who are making a lasting impact on their businesses and the industry. These remarkable women executives continually show up to innovate, inspire, speak up for equality and lead their teams and organizations from the front. 

Once again, we are proud to partner with The WICT Network: Southern California chapter on this event.

Also to be honored at the breakfast is the 2023 Multichannel News Los Angeles Woman of Influence, Spectrum 1 News Southern California anchor Giselle Fernandez, a veteran of the local and national TV news industry. And The WICT Network: Southern California will recognize its 2023 Catalyst Award winner, Hallmark Media distribution executive Holly Henderson. 

Read about this year’s honorees via the profiles linked below, then go to mcnwonderwomen.com to learn more about the June 20 morning event. 

The Wonder Women of Los Angeles breakfast is just the start of the two-day L.A. TV Week program, which also includes the Advanced Advertising Summit, the Next TV Summit and an event recognizing our L.A. 40 Under 40. 

For more on all of the L.A. TV Week events, go to latvweekevents.com.

Click through to read profiles of this year’s honorees: 

• Michele Barney, President of Affiliate Distribution, Warner Bros. Discovery
• Valerie Bruce, General Manager, L.A. Productions, BBC Studios
• Carrie Brzezinski-Hsu, VP, ESPN Creative Studio
• Kristen Cuffee-Brown, Assistant VP, Content Acquisition, Cox Communications
• Terri Hines, Executive VP, Communications, Fox Sports
• Amina Hussein, Head of Sports Talent, Amazon Prime Video
• Holly Leff-Pressman, Chief Client Engagement Officer, Screen Engine/ASI
• Sharon Levy, CEO, Endemol Shine North America
• Ramsey Naito, President, Paramount Animation and Nickelodeon Animation
• Kirsten Polley, Senior VP, Operations, WWE
• Lisa Richardson, Executive VP, Business & Legal Affairs and Associate General Counsel, Fox Corp.
• Jennifer Rogers, Executive VP, Consumer & Corporate Marketing for U.S. Networks Group, TelevisaUnivision
• Donna Thomas, Senior VP, Studios, Vubiquity
• Robin Thomas, Executive VP, Content Strategy & Research, Hallmark Media
• Erin Underhill, President, Universal Television

Woman of Influence: Giselle Fernandez, Spectrum News 1 Anchor in Southern California

Honor Roll: A Full List of Past Wonder Women Honorees

B+C and Next TV have named the winners for the Best of Show Awards for this year’s NAB Show in Las Vegas. A panel of industry experts judged these exhibited products on the criteria of innovation, feature set, cost efficiency and performance in serving the industry. Winners were chosen from companies that exhibited at the 2023 NAB Show and submitted nominations.

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Wildmoka Digital Media Platform
wildmoka.com

Wildmoka’s Digital Media Platform allows leading sports broadcasters and rightsholders to create and distribute unlimited amounts of content such as near-live clips, highlight reels, and live streams across web, mobile, OTT, and social networks (including Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn and TikTok). It enables content creation and distribution from any source to any destination, in any format, at speed and scale. The cloud-native platform offers a set of easy-to-use, web-based tools for fast and efficient creation and repurposing of near-live clips, highlight reels and live streams. It is ideal for working with live sports and breaking news content that has a higher value now than it will five minutes later.

Homatics and THX Ltd.
Homatics X THX Home Click Smart-Home Theater Speaker System
thx.com/blog/thx-homatics-sei-robotics-speakers

The Homatics X THX Home Click Smart-Home Theater instantly turns your TV into a cinematic experience that is “tuned by THX.” Users will access clear images with Dolby Vision and immersive panoramic surround sound through the powerful Dolby Atmos 5.1.4 channels surround sound AI (Artificial Intelligence) enhancement technology. The easy-to-use design is plug-in and play through seamless wireless connections so users can enjoy theater-quality entertainment in a snap, all through voice or RCU control. Additionally, the Homatics’ Humming EQ feature adds to a personalized audio-visual experience that is truly one of a kind.

Matrox Video
Matrox Origin
video.matrox.com/en/products/broadcast-media/origin-series

Tier-1 live production in the cloud requires frame-accurate, deterministic, low-latency, redundant and responsive interconnected systems at large scale. So far, there have been no cloud solutions that satisfy those requirements without compromising quality, latency and reliability. Instead of simply shifting on-premises workflows to the cloud — thereby giving up some quality and latency — Matrox ORIGIN tackles the problem at the infrastructure level. This disruptive technology is a software-only, vendor-neutral, asynchronous framework that runs on IT infrastructure. It can achieve highly scalable, responsive, low-latency, easy-to-control and frame-accurate broadcast media facilities for both on-premises and cloud deployments.

Amazon Web Services (AWS) 
AWS Studio in the Cloud
aws.amazon.com/getting-started/hands-on/studio-in-the-cloud

The AWS Studio-in-the-Cloud solution includes media applications running on virtual machines for creative production workflows. The pipeline can run at 12 bits with color-accurate monitoring. Content providers can employ various creative applications and partner solutions. The cloud is already widely used for storage of media files, file transfers, lightweight proxy editorial, and for large compute jobs. However, AWS is filling gaps to create more effective, efficient cloud-based workflows. With new cloud-enabled tools, open APIs and an expanded ISV partner ecosystem, a holistic production workflow with shared storage is now a reality. 

Cobalt Digital
SafeLink-8TS-VM (Virtual Machine)
cobaltdigital.com/products/4966/safelink-gateway

The Cobalt Reliable Internet Stream Transport (RIST) product line includes the SafeLink Gateway, an openGear card that can provide eight channels of conversion between RIST and plain UDP/RTP. SafeLink is compression-agnostic and can protect any type of transport stream. Each input channel can support independent/unrelated primary/backup streams, or SMPTE ST 2022-7 seamless switching or bonding. The SafeLink Gateway is designed to provide RIST functionality to legacy devices.

Zixi
Software Defined Video Platform 5G
zixi.com/zixi-for-5g-delivery

Zixi is the architect of the Software-Defined Video Platform (SDVP), the industry’s most complete live IP video-workflow solution. Zixi has integrated support for managing 4K video streams on 5G networks within multi-access edge compute (MEC) infrastructure. 5G networks and MEC infrastructure unlock exciting new opportunities, including ultra-low latency live remote production, satellite rationalization for distribution and new fan experiences both in and outside the venue. 

Backlight 
Zype Playout
zype.com/product/playout

Zype Playout enables content owners to transform live and on-demand video into digital linear channels for millions of viewers. Built for broadcasters, digital publishers, consumer brands and developers, Zype Playout’s intuitive tools make operating playout a breeze. The user-friendly interface features drag-and-drop scheduling, dynamic ad-break setup and insertion capabilities, and flexible distribution to FAST or owned-and-operated destinations. 

Evertz
Reflektor On-Premise & Cloud Signal Processor
evertz.com/resources/press/NAB2023%20100%20Celebrations.pdf

Reflektor, Evertz’s SaaS IP distribution platform, is ideal for providers of live/linear services, cloud applications or OTT. Reflektor is a microservice-based signal processor for onboarding and normalizing video transport streams, transcoding and replication. It addresses the challenges of today’s cloud workflows: handling multiple transport formats and codecs while delivering incoming feeds to different software instances.

Quickplay and VionLabs
Quickplay-VionLabs Preview Clips
vionlabs.com/visual-discovery

Quickplay and VionLabs are bringing together Quickplay’s cloud- native CMS and VionLabs’s AINAR Visual Discovery solution to create AI Automated Thumbnails and Preview Clips. AI-derived metadata for content moods, micro-genres, story descriptors, keywords and more are leveraged by advanced personalization algorithms from Quickplay to find all the main characters through presence and importance to story, pinpoint exactly where in the frame to feature main characters for thumbnails and find the best scenes using energy and emotion tracking across the story arc.

Vizrt Group
Viz Vectar Plus
vizrt.com/products/viz-vectar-plus

Viz Vectar Plus, a software-based live production system, enables broadcast and media organizations to quickly adopt an IT- and IP-friendly solution as a software plan, it’s a system that can be deployed in different ways depending on organizational needs. Viz Vectar Plus provides multisource live video mixing of up 44 source channels, each supporting key and fill and multidestination delivery including eight high-definition mix outputs over internet protocol. 

QUANTEEC
QUANTEEC  
quanteec.com

QUANTEEC is a French startup offering the streaming sector an innovative technology capable of solving video-streaming scaling issues, while enabling users to significantly save costs and reduce their energy footprint. The QUANTEEC motto is “more with less,” and to achieve that, the technology relies on three core fundamental optimization principles: performance, costs savings and energy reduction. Its Web3-inspired technology shifts the current generalized paradigm and turns each single viewer into a “smart and virtuous re-streamer.” In doing so, it allows the audience to scale up almost infinitely without the need to rely on deployment of additional servers.

The media and entertainment industry has no shortage of rising stars and established veterans making their mark between their college years and when they turn 40. For more than a decade, Future plc’s Multichannel News, along with Broadcasting+Cable and Next TV, have been shining a spotlight on a select cadre of these executives below a certain age across a range of content production, distribution and related businesses as the industry has evolved and expanded. 

More recently, we have celebrated their accomplishments in the best way, with a party, and the next one will take place the evening of Wednesday, June 21, at the Sofitel Los Angeles, closing out L.A. TV Week. For more information about the 2023 honorees and the event on June 21, please visit latvweekevents.com.

Honorees were chosen after a nomination and judging process.

Representing a range of companies and responsibilities, these men and women are helping to lead media in new directions, wherever the viewers are. 

Meet the 2023 “40 Under 40” in Los Angeles, in alphabetical order.

Alissa Bachner
Executive VP, Development
Tomorrow Studios

Since joining Tomorrow Studios, an ITV Studios partner, Alissa Bachner has developed and produced compelling television dramas with storylines that tackle class warfare, climate change, female empowerment, body image, how far one would go for love and more. Plus, she’s a champion for indie, female, voice and book-driven projects, bringing them to a broadly commercial company with globally recognized IP. Since 2016, she has been producing Snowpiercer, starring Jennifer Connelly and Daveed Diggs. Other series include Physical, starring Rose Byrne, and Let the Right One In, starring Demián Bichir. Known for her hands-on, calm style, Bachner continues to champion a wide array of voices and to produce series with global appeal. Before Tomorrow Studios, Bachner served as VP of TV development at Peter Berg’s Film 44, where she oversaw the development slate for deals at Fox and HBO. A graduate of Boston University, Bachner began her career at ICM before shifting to TV production, working on series including Scrubs and Detroit 1-8-7, both for ABC.

Fanny Baudry
Managing Director
Wheelhouse DNA 

Fanny Baudry is managing director of Wheelhouse’s digital-first and influencer arm, Wheelhouse DNA, where she leads intellectual property development and production and oversees the company’s day-to-day operations. Wheelhouse launched DNA in 2020 and CEO Brent Montgomery tapped Baudry, then Wheelhouse’s VP of business development, to launch the division that serves as a home for emerging talent. DNA creates and produces content for all platforms from creators across the digital landscape. At DNA, Baudry has shepherded such series as Facebook Messenger’s Cookin’ with Brooklyn, starring Brooklyn Beckham; the podcasts Dark History with Bailey Sarian and Discovery’s Curiosity Daily; and Viceland TV series Tumbleweeds with Killer Mike. Prior to Wheelhouse, Baudry was head of content and development at Scooter Braun’s The Creative Studio. Before that, she served as VP of global acquisitions formats and programs at Banijay, responsible for building the acquisitions division and acquiring nonscripted formats for the company’s subsidiaries including Bunim/Murray, Air Production and Nordisk Film TV. 

Adam Bergman
Group VP, Advertising & Data Sales
Vizio

Adam Bergman is responsible for the go-to-market strategy for Vizio’s Platform Plus Ads business, a platform with one of the largest connected-TV footprints in the U.S. His role includes building brand and agency partnership strategy, as well as informing product and marketing decisions. He helped launch YuMe’s connected television suite, driving advertisers to consider the relationship between OTT and traditional TV investments. From there, he led partnerships and strategy at The Daily Beast. That path led him back into the data, measurement and OTT community via a leadership post at Samba TV. He helped launch Vizio Ads in 2019 with the company’s chief revenue officer, Michael O’Donnell, and has helped scale platform revenue to over $300 million in 2022. He also oversees Inscape, the ACR data division of Vizio. At NAB Show in April, Vizio was awarded with a Technology & Engineering Emmy Award for Extraction of Granular Census Level Behavioral Data using ACR.

Evan Bregman
General Manager, Streaming
Tastemade

Evan Bregman is responsible for driving viewership and growth of Tastemade’s streaming business. Since joining the company in 2022, he has overseen a jump of 10% in viewership and 12% in revenue on Tastemade’s streaming channels. Tastemade’s streaming business reaches viewers in four languages in more than 50 countries and is available in more than 140 million television homes worldwide. This year, he oversaw the launch of the company’s fourth 24/7 streaming channel, Tastemade Home, on Samsung TV Plus, YouTube TV, Amazon Freevee, Tubi and Sling TV. He also oversaw the premiere of several original series, including Weekend Refresh starring Tia Mowry and The Curious Chef with Stephanie Izard. Tastemade streaming ended the year on a high note, setting new all-time highs in monthly revenue and watch time. Prior to joining Tastemade, Bregman was
VP, head of business operations at Rooster Teeth, the gaming lifestyle brand, where he oversaw strategic operations for its direct-to-consumer business. 

Michelle Byars
Senior VP, Development
ITV Entertainment

At ITV Entertainment, part of ITV America, Michelle Byars oversees all stages of development — from paper to casting, presentation and pilots — across the company’s slate of formats, series and specials for streaming, broadcast, cable and digital platforms. Most recently, Byars was instrumental in the development and sale of the Nikki and Brie Bella-hosted Twin Love for Amazon Studios, and currently has other projects set up with platforms including Netflix and Peacock. Other ITV Entertainment series include Love Island (Peacock), Queer Eye (Netflix), The Chase (ABC) and Hell’s Kitchen (Fox). Prior to ITV Entertainment, Byars spent eight years at Turner Entertainment, most recently serving as senior director of unscripted, series and live events. She was part of the core team at TBS that relaunched its unscripted business with Drop the Mic (hosted by Method Man and Hailey Bieber), Snoop Dogg Presents the Joker’s Wild, The Misery Index and Shaq Life. She also managed special events and awards properties including annual AFI Life Achievement Award tributes and the Screen Actors Guild Awards.

Kimberly Caraig
Account Executive
Fox Corp.

Kimberly Caraig joined the Fox Ad Sales division in 2017 as one of the organization’s first integrated linear and digital account executives, focusing on clients and agencies in Los Angeles. Her strong internal and external relationships yield opportunities to maximize linear and streaming revenue across Fox Entertainment and Fox Sports. Prior to joining Fox, Caraig was an account executive at CBS, first at CBS Sports Network and then segueing to CBS Interactive. She previously served in sales planning roles at Discovery Communications and FX. She started her career in ad sales at Comedy Central and Spike TV. Caraig serves as a mentor to account managers and associates across the Fox Ad Sales division, and also supports various organizations, including Project Sunshine at Children’s Hospital L.A., Walk on Water — Surf Therapy for children with special needs and GRLSWIRL Skate Boarding mentorship for youth in underserved communities. 

Colin Davis
Executive VP of Comedy Development
Sony Pictures Television Studios

Colin Davis oversees development of comedies for all platforms for Sony Pictures Television Studios. He recently joined Sony from Roku, where he was head of scripted originals for The Roku Channel, its free ad-supported streaming service. In that role, he led a team of creatives building and launching Roku’s move into original programming and spearheaded the production and rollout of successful series including the reboot of Reno 911! and Die Hart 2: Die Harter starring Kevin Hart. Notably, he greenlighted and shepherded the feature film Weird: The Al Yankovic Story, starring Daniel Radcliffe. Before joining Roku, Davis led scripted programming for the short-form streaming service Quibi and spent four years in comedy development at Turner, where he most notably championed Search Party. Davis started his television career at Fox Broadcasting. He is based at the Sony Pictures Studios lot in Culver City.

Alessandra Donadelli
VP, Business Development
Warner Bros. Discovery

At Warner Bros. Discovery, Alessandra Donadelli is responsible for overseeing growth partnerships for Max and Discovery Plus. In this role, she leads a fast-paced, cross-divisional team focused on launching growth initiatives that drive subscribers and revenue within the OTT space. She is also responsible for cultivating relationships with marketing, finance, legal, product and establishing processes to integrate Discovery Plus into ad sales partner outreach. Prior to this role, Donadelli was director of partnership strategy at Disney Plus, where she established guidelines and frameworks to evaluate and prioritize partnership initiatives, resulting in enterprise wholesale deals and co-marketing programs. Donadelli has also held roles at Fox Networks Group and Fox International Channels. She sits on the board of FEME (Female Executives in Media and Entertainment) and is actively involved in the mentorship and development of young professionals both within and outside of Warner Bros. Discovery. 

Rebecca Evans
Executive VP, Nonfiction Content
Campfire Studios

Rebecca Evans has produced across all genres of nonfiction television,
from shiny-floor shows to reality TV and premium documentaries. Recent credits include Hulu’s WeWork: Or the Making and Breaking of a $47 Billion Unicorn, named Outstanding Business and Economic Documentary at the 2022 News & Documentary Emmy Awards; HBO Max’s Low Country: The Murdaugh Dynasty, The Way Down: God, Greed and the Cult of Gwen Shamblin and Heaven’s Gate: The Cult of Cults, as well as FX’s Hysterical and CNN’s The Lost Sons. While at Campfire Studios, a premium scripted and nonfiction production company run by film producer and CEO Ross Dinerstein, Evans’s work has led to the sale of more than 20 series and films, all of which she’s overseen creatively. As of late last year, she had projects in production for platforms including HBO Max, Netflix and Hulu. Her expertise spans development and production, and Campfire’s yearly unscripted output has more than tripled during her tenure at the company.

Daniel Farkas
VP, Distribution Strategy and Content Planning
Sony Pictures Television

Daniel Farkas works cross-functionally to maximize the domestic financial performance of Sony Pictures Entertainment’s features and TV series following their initial theatrical or first-run exhibition. This includes valuing demand for Sony’s content across transactional retail platforms and licensing partners, determining windows and pricing, and advising on key deals. He leads SPE’s efforts to redefine the studio’s theatrical windowing strategy. He was part of the team that negotiated SPE’s pay-one and pay-two deals in the U.S. and is outlining its presence in the premium video-on-demand space, working with the Motion Picture Group to test and evaluate new approaches to the at-home offering. Since the merger of SPE’s Home Entertainment and licensing divisions, he has established an integrated approach to catalog management that optimizes returns across the digital, SVOD and AVOD businesses. After joining SPE in 2013, Farkas advanced within its Home Entertainment division, focused on structuring and executing SPHE’s go-to-market approach. Farkas began his career as a management consultant with The Monitor Group (now Monitor Deloitte).

Falon Fatemi
CEO and Co-Founder
Fireside

Falon Fatemi co-founded Fireside, an interactive entertainment app, with fellow serial entrepreneur Mark Cuban in 2021. Fireside “is the first interactive web free streaming platform that really puts the power of a production studio in the palm of your hand,” Fatemi said alongside Cuban last August at the Podcast Movement conference in Dallas. She cited a cooking show where you not only watch, but cook along in real time with the chef, ask for substitute ingredients and then turn your camera around and appear on the stage to show off your end product as an example of what Fireside aims to provide. Fireside hopes to gain access to smart TVs, Fire TV, Apple TV and Roku via its acquisition of technology provider Stremium, as TechCrunch recently reported. Fatemi previously was the founder and CEO of Node Inc., an artificial intelligence platform that was sold to SugarCRM in 2020. She reportedly was the youngest employee ever hired by Google (at 19) when she joined the company in 2005.

Mike Fazzino
Principal, Content Acquisition, WW Major Studio Licensing Strategy
Amazon

At Amazon Studios, Mike Fazzino is responsible for much of Prime Video’s worldwide licensing of third-party content, having closed more than $1 billion in licensing deals with Warner Bros. Discovery, Paramount Global, BBC, MGM and more for iconic series and movies including The Lord of the Rings, the James Bond franchise, The Big Bang Theory, Supernatural and Two and a Half Men. He also helped build and manage Prime Video Direct, Prime Video’s distribution service for independent films, helping thousands of filmmakers find distribution opportunities for their projects on SVOD, TVOD and AVOD. He is a member of the Television Academy and holds an MBA from Cornell’s Johnson School of Management (where he was editor of the Cornell Business Journal) and a bachelor’s degree from Sacred Heart University. While he’s based in Los Angeles, he has also traveled for Amazon frequently and has spoken at film festivals including Sundance, SXSW and TIFF.

Laura Foster
VP, Product Marketing
Innovid

Innovid’s Laura Foster has shown she is one to watch in the advertising technology industry. She leads all of Innovid’s product-marketing efforts, spearheading an agile team that develops and executes internal and external product positioning. In early 2022, she played a key role in crafting go-to-market positioning and a sales enablement approach of Innovid’s acquisition of TVSquared — which, renamed InnovidXP, pushed Innovid to the forefront of the converged TV measurement landscape. In late 2021, she executed the launch and positioning of Innovid Key, the company’s “identity as infrastructure” approach to identity resolution, and she also named the product. In 2019, she developed and led the go-to-market positioning and sales enablement approach for Innovid’s acquisition of Herolens, the dynamic creative personalization (DCO) tool. In 2021, Innovid began trading on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker symbol “CTV.” Before Joining Innovid, Foster held increasingly senior roles at Sizmek. The Product Marketing Alliance recognized her as a Top 100 Product Marketing Influencer in 2021.

Katherine Gallagher
Programming Manager
Sinclair Broadcast Group

Katherine Gallagher has more than 10 years of comprehensive experience in various areas with a recent focus on and passion for digital content planning, specifically developing and implementing strategies to promote company or brand growth and progress. She is programming manager for STIRR, Sinclair Broadcast Group’s ad-supported OTT streaming service. During her time with STIRR, she has actively implemented the successful launch of multiple revenue-generating initiatives and has overseeen the National STIRR City Channel. These initiatives include The National Desk on 87 Sinclair-owned stations (including all of the compay’s MyNetworkTV and The CW affiliates), STIRR High School Football, which has live-streamed 1,000-plus local games since the channel’s launch, and multiple specials with local, specialty programming. Previously, she worked for a decade in digital media and advertising for companies including NBCUniversal, ESPN and Grey Global Group. Highlights include supporting Olympics coverage, managing NBC show syndication for all brands and breaking major news stories. 

Nick Garvin
Chief Operating Officer & Managing Partner
Mobile TV Group

Nick Garvin oversees all of Mobile TV Group’s operations, which includes over half of all NBA, MLB and NHL broadcasts across the country and over 4,000 live events annually. Based in Denver, MTVG has offered high-quality broadcast engineering for nearly 30 years. In 2020, the company introduced Cloud Control, the first managed service for fully remote production, in response to the evolving industry and its needs. Following Cloud Control, MTVG launched MTVG Edge, a new edge-computing
product delivering MTVG’s live production solutions for small and midsized productions anywhere with a minimal on-site equipment footprint and for a much lower cost. Garvin also expanded MTVG’s expertise to the Los Angeles community with the launch of its newest mobile unit. He is on the board of Armstrong Capital Development (ACD) and served as a development committee member at Teach for America. Earlier, he founded and developed Stackup, an education technology company that was acquired by Global Grid for Learning in 2021.

Samuel Harowitz
VP, Content Acquisitions & Partnerships
Tubi

Samuel Harowitz leads all third-party licensed programming acquisitions with indie partners and major studios and brands for Tubi, including international content acquisitions, sports and FAST channels. On the heels of a banner content year for Fox Entertainment’s streaming service, Harowitz is instrumental in helming the expansion of Tubi’s content library of more than 50,000 titles. Harowitz most recently oversaw TV content acquisitions at Freevee, Amazon’s AVOD service
formerly known as IMDb TV, where he led third-party licensed programming and optimized its first-run licensing program. Previously, Harowitz served as VP, digital content licensing at A+E Networks, where he was charged with licensing programming to SVOD and AVOD platforms and led partner management of digital and OTT platforms. Prior to that, he held roles as senior VP, development and production at Lisa Kudrow and Dan Bucatinsky’s Is or Isn’t Entertainment and VP, acquisitions and co-productions at FremantleMedia.

Stephen Hodge
CEO
OTTera

With his technology background, Stephen Hodge spearheaded companies like Toon Goggles, Digital Media Interactive, Anywhere Artists and now OTTera. Hodge leads OTTera’s overall strategies for content licensing, business development, monetization and ensuring OTTera and its related companies stay ahead of their competition. OTTera’s team launched the company in 2017 after working in the industry for more than seven years, forging successful partnerships with Roku, Vizio, Sony, Samsung and Hisense. OTTera provides a fully managed suite of OTT applications and FAST channels worldwide. Recent partnerships include ones with LAFIG Belgium and IMPS, the worldwide licensors for The Smurfs, to bring two 2D-animated linear FAST channels to kids and families around the world. OTTera also made an investment deal in AfroLandTV, a Black-centered streaming service aimed at bringing pan-African stories to global audiences. AfroLandTV also is backed by players such as Comcast NBCUniversal and Techstars. Hodge also joined AfroLandTV’s executive board. 

Kate Hoenigsberg
Senior VP, Drama Development
Universal Television

Kate Hoenigsberg oversees a slate of more than 50 drama series in development at Universal Television, a division of Universal Studio Group. Hoenigsberg also works closely with the studio’s talent roster, which includes Jenna Bans, Jenna Bush Hager, Jessica Goldberg, Jordan Peele, Julie Plec, Amy Poehler and more. Projects under Hoenigsberg’s purview have successfully sold to a variety of broadcast and streaming platforms, including NBCUniversal’s NBC and Peacock, as well as external buyers such as Netflix and Prime Video. Such series include We Were Liars (Prime
Video), Murder by the Book (NBC), Freeman (Peacock) and Confessions (Netflix). Prior to joining Universal Television, Hoenigsberg was the senior content executive and scripted programming lead at Quibi, where she oversaw series including Veena Sud’s The Stranger and When the Streetlights Go On. Before that, she spent more than 10 years at NBCUniversal, most recently as VP of the scripted cable group. 

Fernando Hurtado
Manager, Digital Video
NBCUniversal Local

Fernando Hurtado is an award-winning bilingual journalist and content producer with experience producing engaging editorial segments for TV, digital, OTT and emerging platforms. In his role as a manager of digital video for NBCUniversal Local’s Digital Innovation Team, he produces digital video for the division’s NBC- and Telemundo-owned stations, regional sports networks and LX News, the TV network for millennial and Gen Z audiences. At NBCUniversal Local, Hurtado has covered major events including the Beijing and Tokyo Olympics, presidential elections, the Las Vegas massacre and the 2016 Democratic National Convention. He also serves as an adjunct instructor at the University of Southern California. He worked as supervising producer on LX News’s My New Favorite Olympian podcast, which earned two Webby Signal Awards in the categories of Best Limited Sports Series and Best LGBTQ+ Episode. Hurtado wrote the podcast’s LGBTQ+ episode and oversaw the entire series. Prior to NBC, Hurtado worked at ATTN: and Circa, Sinclair Broadcast Group’s digital video news outlet. His work has appeared on Fusion, USA Today, The Huffington Post and Variety Latino.

RJ Larese
VP of Talent and Development and Brand Partnerships
Paramount Global

RJ Larese’s commitment to shepherding great talent into Nickelodeon and AwesomenessTV has transformed casting for both brands’ unscripted and digital content and has paved the way for a new, diverse slate of young BIPOC and LGBTQ+ talent. His strong relationships with up-and-coming digital creators and TikTok talent have greatly contributed to building a representative talent pool across both brands, turning breakthrough influencers into spinoff projects including The Sorta Scary Show with Matt Taylor and Ace B. King, former contestants on the Paramount Plus reality competition series Next Influencer. Larese works with digital creators and unscripted talent for both brands, finding them opportunities within Paramount for scripted and unscripted content, brand partnerships, consumer marketing, events and more. Prior to joining Paramount he was a talent, casting and development executive with more than a decade of experience at networks, production companies, and publishers, including ABC, ATTN:, Endemol, ITV America and PopSugar. He has also cast and developed shows for Bravo, E!, Lifetime, MTV, NBC, TLC, truTV and VH1. 

Hillary Povar Levinsohn
Executive VP
Smithhouse

Hillary Povar Levinsohn has worked in entertainment publicity, media relations and talent relations for 15-plus years since starting her career at Showtime. She has launched and contributed to over 60 original scripted and unscripted series, specials and events that have covered virtually every major genre in storytelling with some of the biggest and most recognizable personalities in the entertainment industry, including Norman Lear. She is best known for her work as the creative mastermind behind the publicity campaigns and FYC effort for what was originally a quirky, unknown series ― Pop’s Schitt’s Creek ― that spectacularly morphed into a cultural icon making Emmy Award history. Most recently, Povar Levinsohn has led all creative and strategic efforts on the beloved Prime Video series, The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel. She also spearheaded work with Susan G. Komen in partnership with Yogaworks and the nonprofit The Pancreatic Cancer Action Network, where her work resulted in meaningful donations and elevated brand awareness.

Christian Linke
Co-Creator, Showrunner and Executive Producer, Arcane
Riot Games

Christian Linke is the Emmy-winning co-creator, showrunner and executive producer of Riot Games’s Netflix series Arcane: League of Legends, the game-making company’s first animated series. Arcane tells the origin story of two iconic League champions, set in the utopian Piltover and the oppressed underground of Zaun. The show held Netflix’s No. 1 global spot for three weeks in a row, also hitting the top 10 in over 87 countries. He and fellow Arcane co-creator and executive producer Alex Yee are working on the show’s second season, which is in production now. Linke won a Primetime Emmy in 2022 for Outstanding Animated Program for Arcane. Enemy, the song by Imagine Dragons from the original soundtrack, reached No. 1 on the Billboard Mainstream Top 40 and Adult Top 40 charts. A former musician himself, Linke has also used his skills to create Riot’s music division from the ground up. Upon joining Riot 11 years ago, he used his talents as a composer to produce music for League of Legends, including its events, cinematics, albums and in-game music. 

Betsy Lippitt
VP, U.S. TV Distribution
Sony Pictures Television

Betsy Lippitt leads Sony Pictures Entertainment’s library and new content film and television sales across the U.S. TV networks and streaming platforms of The Walt Disney Co., Warner Bros. Discovery and Paramount Global. In her role, she leads complex, multiyear content distribution deal negotiations in all media (basic cable, pay TV, SVOD, AVOD, FVOD). In 2022 alone, Lippitt generated nine figures of revenue for SPE. Having previously been an SPE client, Lippitt drives sales for the studio through her client-focused, results-driven strategy of addressing the rapidly evolving demands of the TV and streaming market. Lippitt joined SPE from the AVOD streaming startup Tubi (now owned by Fox) in 2018, where she struck the platform’s initial deals with every major Hollywood studio. Throughout her time at Tubi, Lippitt reported to the chief content officer and grew her role to oversee three global divisions: content acquisition, content planning and strategy and content partnerships. Prior to Tubi, Lippitt managed AVOD, home entertainment and worldwide nontheatrical sales for Miramax. She received her bachelor of fine arts degree from New York University.

Helen Lum
Executive VP
App Science

Helen Lum oversees all business and growth strategies for measurement and attribution platform App Science, a division of global advertising technology company Sabio Holdings. She has more than 10 years of experience in digital media, campaign management expertise and scaling business operations. Prior to her role as EVP, she helped build and manage Sabio’s global account management team and assisted in spearheading the first mobile retargeting campaign in the industry. Helen’s favorite apps are LinkedIn and Yelp. Prior to joining Sabio, she spearheaded the first mobile retargeting campaign in the industry and led campaign management teams at Opera Mediaworks (AdColony) and Conversant. Then, as one of the first employees hired at Sabio, she rose through the ranks from associate director of account management to senior VP of operations. She helped build and manage Sabio’s global account and campaign management team, where she integrated teams, created efficiencies, and improved how the company delivers proposals, services and insights for its diverse client base. 

Andrew Matero
VP, Platform
Ampersand

Andrew Matero is responsible for taking Ampersand’s AND Platform to market. His passion for data allows him to take a consultative approach to supporting clients through advanced measurement and insights within the platform. He is charged with driving buy-side adoption of the platform, a buy-side TV interface that supports both national and local TV investment strategies. He partners closely with Ampersand’s Media Sales Product and Research teams to effectively scale adoption. Even in a challenging macroeconomic year, per Ampersand, advertisers who use the platform are increasing their investments with the company by an average of 20% or more year-to-date. In one particular instance, the platform’s role in working with a leading auto brand drove a nearly 40% increase in investment year-over-year. Matero joined Ampersand in 2019 as VP of client partnerships, with a focus on data, analytics and addressable TV buying. Before joining Ampersand, he worked at Comcast in advanced advertising and at NBCUniversal in a variety of broadcast, local and digitally focused roles. 

Kelly Miller
Senior VP, Global Partnerships
BBC Studios

Kelly Miller is responsible for driving BBC Studios’s global original opportunities business and bringing the best of new U.K. scripted content to U.S. audiences while accelerating activities across genres with world-class television and digital clients. Since joining BBC Studios in 2021, Miller has strengthened existing and established new relationships with production companies in the U.K. such as Various Artists Limited, Sid Gentle, Clerkenwell, Lookout Point and the BBC Studios in-house production team to develop a robust content pipeline consisting of diverse voices and appealing storylines for U.S. audiences. Through these efforts, in a little under two years Miller has secured prominent partnerships stateside for several BBC Studios titles led by deals with Hulu for Am I Being Unreasonable, AMC Networks for Happy Valley, HBO for Rain Dogs and BBC America for Mood. Before joining BBC Studios, Miller was senior VP, international strategy at Endeavor Content. Prior to that, she led international co-productions and originals for Vimeo and was part of the content acquisitions team at Hulu. Previously, Miller held roles in the comedy department at 20th Century Fox Television.

Paul O’Malley
Independent Executive Producer
Formerly of 3 Ball Media

Paul O’Malley shepherded long-running hits for 3 Ball Media while helping develop new series and formats for top streamers and broadcasters, including CBS’s family dance competition format Come Dance With Me and Prime Video’s LGBTQ+ docusoap Tampa Baes, the platform’s first-ever docuseries. He also developed and served as a consulting producer on Netflix hit My Unorthodox Life. One of O’Malley and 3 Ball’s projects, Sampled, debuted in December 2022 on Paramount Plus, and he also was behind Amazon’s LGBTQ+ docuseries starring Hispanic pop icons Callé y Poche set to debut this summer. Now an independent producer, he recently had a show premiere on HGTV, Selling Dubai, that he developed. Prior to his time at 3 Ball, O’Malley was VP of development at Authentic Entertainment, where he helped develop unscripted hits including TLC’s Trading Spaces and Toddlers and Tiaras as well as Esquire Network’s White Collar Brawlers and Knife Fight. His other credits include RuPaul’s Drag Race, American Gladiators, Parental Control and Tabitha’s Takeover.

Trixie Pacis
Director of Acquisitions & Original Programming Development
ChimeTV

Trixie Pacis curates and develops programming at ChimeTV, a newly launched Asian American and Pacific Islander cable network delivered in English that highlights the diverse stories, issues and culture of the AAPI community. A Filipina-Canadian with more than a decade of film-industry experience, her perspective on programming stems from heading script development at Drive Films as well as screenwriting, producing and directing in North America and Asia. Pacis is a go-to executive on every facet of programming, from acquisitions to scheduling to finding the best original content. She also pinch-hits on marketing and design. Pacis came up in the industry step by step as a writer at Los Angeles magazine, an assistant at Trisko Talent Agency and a script development coordinator at Drive Films before embarking on independent roles in those areas, plus photography and social media. She’s won awards for films she’s written, recieved promotions and accolades and has wound up in L.A. with Chime TV, on the verge of launching a network with female and Asian-American ownership. 

Joy Phillips
Senior VP, Publicity
AMC Networks

With more than 15 years of public-relations experience in the entertainment field, Joy Phillips oversees consumer publicity campaigns for several series across the AMC Networks linear and curated streaming platforms. Recent highlights include AMC’s Dark Winds and Kevin Can F Himself, AMC Plus’s This Is Going to Hurt and Gangs of London, BBC America’s Killing Eve Season 4, Acorn TV’s My Life Is Murder and Harry Wild and Sundance Now’s State of the Union. Her upcoming series include Dark Winds Seaseon 2, Happy Valley Season 3, Monsieur Spade and Parish. She also oversees public relations strategy for WE tv and ALLBLK, brands that feature popular and targeted programming such as Brat Loves Judy, the Love After Lockup franchise, MC Lyte’s Partners In Rhyme, Á La Carte and more. She has been with AMC Networks since 2019 and oversees the L.A.-based PR team. Phillips started at Rubenstein in 2015, and prior to Starz, she worked at Fifteen Minutes Public Relations. She began her career in personal publicity at Wolf-Kasteler Public Relations.

Michael Rycyzyn
Director, Digital Licensing
A+E Networks

Michael Rycyzyn has worked for A+E Networks for eight years in both ad sales and global content sales. He began his career in ad sales before becoming a sales planner and then moving to the global content sales team, where he was promoted twice. He is at the forefront of business development and industry growth. His work ensures A+E programming placement on platforms such as Apple TV, Amazon, Google/YouTube, Vudu-Fandango, Xbox, Comcast, Verizon
Communications and Frontier Communications, resulting in a significant growth in brand awareness and revenue for the company. Rycyzyn has led A+E’s electronic sell-through and TV video-on-demand business to garner some of the largest revenue-generating EST content premieres in the history of the company, as shown through Lifetime’s Surviving R. Kelly, Girl in the Basement and History’s Alone and The Curse of Oak Island, A+E said. He also successfully expanded the A+E EST business in Japan and other countries, expanding global partnerships and presence. 

Shaheen Sayani
Head of Content Partnerships, Samsung TV Plus
Samsung Electronics America

Shaheen Sayani is an accomplished professional with 10-plus years of experience at the intersection of technology and entertainment. She partners with the industry’s leading content companies to cater to the rapidly expanding digital audience, leading her team to be subject-matter experts on diverse viewership habits. Her entrepreneurial spirit has inspired her to work on the leading edge of tech and entertainment, seeking to build the TV experience of the future. With keen business acumen, Sayani has developed complex content strategy, managed high-value acquisitions and built internal systems that adapt to the ebbs and flows of the streaming world. Her prior tenures at Netflix, VideoElephant and Caffeine have leveraged her prowess over distribution across several commercial models, and with many years as a film festival programmer under her belt, curation of content categories is second nature to her. Sayani is a Southern California native.

Ahmadou Seck
VP, Scripted TV
Macro

Ahmadou Seck is an innovative executive who is passionate about working with diverse creatives to amplify their stories. As VP of scripted programming at the multiplatform media company Macro, he produces projects in the scripted and unscripted spaces. He has worked on the Emmy-nominated show Raising Dion and as an executive producer on Apple TV’s dark comedy Government Cheese and FX’s The Scent of Burnt Flowers. His professional journey includes experience in the agency world (Creative Artists Agency), at a television network (Participant Media-owned Pivot) and with Will Smith’s production company, Overbrook Entertainment. At Overbrook, he was an associate producer on the critically acclaimed show Cobra Kai. Raised by Senegalese parents in Seattle, Seck was taught the importance of being an active member of the community. Since moving to Los Angeles, he has brought that same spirit to the entertainment industry and has held leadership positions with the CAA Multi­cultural Committee, Colour Entertainment and AfroBrunch. He has a bachelor’s degree from St. Martin’s University.

Matt Shanfield
Executive VP, Development
The Intellectual Property Corp. (IPC), a part of Sony Pictures Television

Matt Shanfield is the creative executive behind the development of original concepts, unique formats and breaking new talent. Within the last year-plus, he has shepherded or executive produced titles such as Secrets of Playboy (A&E), The D’Amelio Show (Hulu), The Curse of Von Dutch (Hulu), Restaurant Rivals (Discovery Plus), The Climb (HBO Max) and Jewish Matchmaking (Netflix). He joined IPC after heading development for Asylum Entertainment. Prior to Asylum, Shanfield served as the VP of development at Oxygen, VP of development at Irwin Entertainment and director of development at Shed Media US. He also developed and produced for Mark Burnett Productions where he was a producer on series such as Shark Tank, The Apprentice and Trust Me, I’m a Game Show Host. He began his career at The William Morris Agency.

Kyle Simon
Partner
Perkins Coie LLP

Kyle Simon is a partner and member of Perkins Coie LLP’s M&A practice and the Digital Media & Entertainment, Gaming, and Sports industry group. He represents public and private companies and private equity funds in complex business transactions, including mergers, acquisitions, leveraged buyouts, carve-outs, minority investments, secondary investments and joint ventures. He has additional industry expertise with media and entertainment company M&A transactions, including the purchase and sale of broadcast television and radio stations (including Big Four network affiliates in major markets), broadcast and digital ad representation companies, programming enterprises and programming joint ventures. He has been involved in a range of TV-related transactions, including representing Fox Corp. in its acquisition of TMZ; representing Estrella Media in its innovative deal to sell its Dallas station to Tegna and enter into a long-term affiliation agreement with Tegna; and helping Cox Media Group to acquire Fox affiliate KLSR Eugene, Oregon. 

Evan Statton
Senior Principal Architect, Media and Entertainment
Amazon Web Services

Evan Statton has spent the last 20 years inventing the future of media technology with some of the largest media companies in the world. He leads a worldwide team
of Solutions Architects at Amazon Web Services whose work impacts thousands
of customers in all facets of media and entertainment. His work includes leading technology roadmap sessions within AWS, as well as visioning and education sessions with media and entertainment customers around the globe. He has influenced more than 40 AWS features including the ability to manipulate fully uncompressed 4K video in the cloud. He has earned seven patents in video processing and transmission, and recently earned a Hollywood Professional Association Award for Engineering Excellence. Before joining AWS, he deployed the first national HD IP transmission system for MLB.com at a time when many in the industry were saying internet-protocol transport was not possible. He then spent four years at NBCUniversal leading the design and implementation of over 200 transmission and playout channels. 

Adam Sussman
VP of Development
Furry Prawn Productions (NBCUniversal)

Adam Sussman is a veteran television executive and has worked in the NBCUniversal family since 2011. As VP of development for Jason Raff’s Furry Prawn Productions, a network overall deal with the America’s Got Talent showrunner, he creates, develops and sells original unscripted formats across broadcast, cable and streaming platforms. In 2020, he conceptualized the special, Sit Down Comedy Sessions with Howie Mandel (for Just for Laughs), where the star host sat down with the late Bob Saget, Ms. Pat and Bobby Lee for candid conversations about how they turned tragedy into comedy gold. His proudest talent-driven projects center on pro-social issues including mental health, inclusion and representation, gender equity, LGBT stories, women in STEM, and activism. Earlier, he was director of development for Steele Mill Productions. He climbed the entertainment ladder at Zodiak USA (formerly RDF USA), where he was manager of development. He started his career working in comedy for veteran producers Pat Tourk Lee and John Moffitt at Moffitt-Lee Productions and HBO’s The Comedy Festival. 

Brian Tannenbaum
Head of Originals, The Roku Channel
Roku

Brian Tannenbaum leads all aspects of original programming for The Roku Channel, including scripted series, unscripted series and feature films. A key member of the team behind the launch of the Roku Originals banner, he manages Roku’s content strategy across all original series commissions and development. Roku Originals programs include scripted programs, like Weird: The Al Yankovic Story and Die Hart, and unscripted fare like The Great American Baking Show and Meet Me in Paris. Tannenbaum (who was promoted on the departure of Colin Davis to Sony) was part of the original Roku Originals team. Prior to joining Roku, Tannenbaum led alternative and unscripted programming for the short-form streaming service Quibi, managing a slate of more than 50 television titles. He got his start in the entertainment industry at Lionsgate, where he last served as senior VP of creative and business affairs, alternative programming. During his tenure, he guided the development and production of series for Lionsgate’s alternative television business, including Kevin Hart: What the Fit (YouTube) and Selling Sunset (Netflix).

Brendon Thomas
SVP, Distribution and Business Development
Paramount Streaming

Brendon Thomas is responsible for Paramount Plus and Pluto TV’s rapid audience growth via partnerships with original equipment makers (OEMs), platforms and other strategic partners for the streaming services. Prior to joining Paramount Streaming, Thomas co-founded and served as CEO of Shindig, a crowdfunding platform. Shindig was acquired by content monetization platform provider Okanjo, where he then served as president until joining Pluto TV. Thomas and his 10-member team are tasked with growing global streaming distribution through dealmaking, renewals and partnerships across the Paramount Streaming portfolio of offerings, including and especially Pluto TV and Paramount Plus. His efforts have helped secure and retain Pluto TV’s spot as a leading FAST service, and accelerated distribution of Paramount Plus beyond all other SVODs: Paramount Plus was the fastest-growing SVOD in the last year.

Kim Wendt
Senior Solutions Architect
Amazon Web Services (AWS)

Kim Wendt is responsible for helping global media and entertainment companies on their journey to the cloud at Amazon Web Services. She also leads the engagement between AWS and Motion Picture Laboratories Inc. (MovieLabs) to drive the industry towards the MovieLabs 2030 Vision. In addition to her day-to-day responsibilities, Wendt participates in the Amazon Future Engineer Class Chats program to encourage future generations to pursue careers in STEM, mentors early-career talent Amazonians and raises the hiring bar at Amazon through interviewing. She holds a master’s degree from Georgia Tech in computer science with a machine learning specialization. As creator of technical architectures for workflows such as Dailies in the Cloud, VFX Plate migration and archival migrations, she has had tremendous impact within media and entertainment businesses in Los Angeles and beyond. Wendt has also mentored multiple women in the industry, participating in high-school coaching sessions across the U.S. and running training initiatives at industry events. 

Alex Yee
Co-Creator, Writer and Executive Producer, Arcane
Riot Games

Alex Yee began his journey with Riot 12 years ago as a player support specialist. Since then, he has helped guide League of Legends in his role as creative designer, leading the team through preproduction, including story development, writing scripts and concept design. He is the co-creator, writer and executive producer of Riot’s hit Netflix series Arcane, the company’s first animated series, now in production on its second season. Arcane was nominated for five Primetime Emmy Awards and took home four, including Outstanding Animated Program. He and fellow co-creator and executive producer Christian Linke are currently working on the show’s second season, which is in production. Yee prides himself on the lore and world-building he has done for League of Legends, but notes his favorite contributions are some of the champions he’s contributed to, including Riven, Thresh, Draven, Leona, Graves and Lulu. 

Universal Television president Erin Underhill is partly responsible for at least one and probably many of your favorite television shows.

Over the nearly three decades Underhill has worked at NBCUniversal, she has had a hand in some of the most iconic shows on television, including ER and The West Wing. She has shepherded such critically-acclaimed shows as American Dreams, Parenthood, Friday Night Lights, Good Girls and New Amsterdam. Right now on NBC, she oversees Dick Wolf’s Law & Order and Chicago franchises and she’s also responsible for production on non-NBC series such as CBS’s FBI franchise, HBO’s The Gilded Age and Max’s Hacks. 

Also Read: Wonder Women of L.A. 2023: Hollywood Power Players

And now, with Peacock to populate as well, she has championed such new series as The Best Man: The Final Chapters, Bel-Air and Girls5eva. All in all, she’s currently caring for more than 50 primetime comedies and dramas for broadcast, cable and streaming platforms. Considering that each TV show is its own little business, that’s quite a roster.

Sticks to Basic Values

Even with all of that to track, her approach to the business is simple.

“I entered the business 25-30 years ago and the same primary tenets guide me today as they did then: Lead with respect and kindness whether you’re dealing with the showrunner, coordinator or assistant,” Underhill said. “Everyone needs to be treated equally with kindness and respect. 

“Second, focus on teamwork and collaboration,” she continued. “I believe we’re better together. When you’ve got some challenging issues to solve — and there’s never a shortfall of issues and challenges — when you can work with a team and brainstorm, we can find a solution and do our best work.”

Underhill grew up in Los Angeles and graduated from UCLA with a degree in English literature. She’s been at NBC — later NBCUniversal — for almost her entire career. For the past 11 years, she’s worked with and for Universal Studio Group chairman Pearlena Igbokwe.

The two met when Igbokwe came to NBC from Showtime to head drama while Underhill was on the studio’s drama team. When Igbokwe was named head of Universal Television four years later, she appointed Underhill to lead drama. And when Igbokwe was named chairman of Universal Studio Group in September 2020, she promoted Underhill to president of Universal Television.

“We have a phenomenal working relationship and we talk a lot about the fact that we’re very similar,” Igbokwe said. “We get it done at work and we juggle work and motherhood. Erin is very calm, very warm and full of positive energy. There are so many people who bring a negative energy and can’t-do attitude to things, but a big part of our jobs is overcoming obstacles.”       

Underhill is also known as a person who will step in, roll up her sleeves and help. 

A Nurturer of Creativity

When Malcolm D. Lee was producing his first TV pilot for the studio, he was coming off of directing movies such as Girls’ Trip and The Best Man and didn’t feel familiar with the TV world. 

“She was good about encouraging my creativity and my thought process and being supportive of that,” Lee said. “Some executives you meet, they don’t take the time, but something about her is very nurturing and professional and you just feel safe in her hands.” 

“Erin has always been a calming, grounded presence,” said Carla Banks Waddles, who wrote on NBC’s Good Girls and also is executive producing and showrunning Peacock's Bel-Air. “She brings such a humanity, kindness and respect to her job. She has a high regard for writers and understands story. She has a way of getting to the heart of things without ever overhauling your original vision or intention.”

But running a studio isn’t just about being kind and supportive. Sometimes Underhill has to tell people things they do not want to hear. 

“What I appreciate about Erin is that she’s comfortable having difficult conversations,” Igbokwe said. “By the time she’s having to have those conversations, she’s earned their trust and respect. She does it with compassion, which is all you can ask.” 

Donna Thomas got her start in the TV business in cable programming, at Discovery Networks. She was working in an Atlanta office as a temp and persuaded her boss, Kim Martin (later president of WE tv), to relocate her to Silver Spring, Maryland, when the Atlanta office was closing. Even though, as Martin pointed out, she didn’t really work there.

“I just knew that I needed to go with them,” Thomas recalled. 

Hired as an administrative assistant, within six years she was a senior VP of affiliate marketing. “Meteoric,” Thomas said. “I was there for like 10 years. So that’s how I started.”

Also Read: Wonder Women of L.A. 2023: Hollywood Power Players

These days she is helping to grow the Studio Post-Production Services business line for Vubiquity, the video-distribution services firm acquired by Amdocs in 2018 for $224 million. 

Digital Media Know-How

She’s an expert in the digital media space and has worked in every aspect of the content supply chain, from creation through distribution, as stated by her colleague at Vubiquity, senior VP of strategic planning and business development Fred Handsman. 

Handsman cited some of her accomplishments in nominating her to be a Wonder Woman. They include:

• She was in charge of the business when Discovery launched the first suite of digital channels, in the 1990s, and was even dubbed Discovery’s Digital Diva in one trade article. 
• She played a key role in transitioning from physical to digital media by executing the first digital library management deal between Ascent Media (her then-employer) and Paramount in 2010. 
• She’s helped grow Vubiquity’s Studio Post-Production Services line of business from inception to over $30 million annually.

Not bad for a girl from Warner Robins, Georgia, who grew up loving acting, performs her own one-woman show about her life and founded The Thomas Angel Foundation, which has given out more than $150,000 in scholarships to women pursuing careers in media and entertainment.

One of the friends she made along the way is Michael Trainotti, senior VP of technical services, worldwide technical operations at Paramount Pictures. They worked together on that digital library management deal in 2010 which, as Thomas related, was a long exercise in solving technical problems. Since then they have worked together on many projects, professional and personal, Trainotti said, including making horror movies.

“Donna will always find a way to get it done right or to help us solve that problem,” Trainotti said. 

That might mean finding the right other person to bring in to help, he said. “Because she’s also a people person. Half of this industry is knowing people and having that network. She’s really good at having a big pool of people that trust her and that she trusts to get the job done. She’s really, really talented at what she does.”

Digital Segue Was Fruitful

Thomas, who was interviewed shortly after traveling solo on a two-week vacation in South Korea, said she’s very glad she transitioned away from the traditional cable business into digital media, and credits various bosses who helped her learn the acronyms and the technology because they knew she knew how to serve clients. Other mentors besides Martin who are well-known in the cable industry include Maggie Bellville, Rich Fickle, Peter Stern and Dave Watson. “Those are good ones to have,” she said. 

She gives kudos to Vubiquity CEO and Amdocs Media general manager Raman Abrol, who succeeded former CEO Darcy Antonellis. “He’s on the East Coast, but he rolled up his sleeves, came out, really spent a lot of time trying to learn our side of the business and it shows,” Thomas said. “He’s very well-respected for that and just an all around great guy.”

She said she enjoys broadening potential new customers’ knowledge of Vubiquity, which had roots in TVN-Avail and video-on-demand services. ”When I go in and pitch studios today, it’s like, here’s what we do. We don’t do dailies, but we do color all the way through to distribution,” Thomas said. “We hold the libraries of Warner Media, we hold MGM Library, that was my deal. We do everything from soup to nuts. We’re not your grandfather’s Vubiquity. We’re backed by a $4 billion company and we’re able to operate as a boutique, a white-glove facility, which is so cool.”

Valerie Bruce oversees a varied portfolio that includes both unscripted shows, such as Dancing With the Stars and Alaska docuseries Life Below Zero, and scripted fare that includes CBS’s breakout comedy Ghosts and Fox’s offbeat comedy Welcome to Flatch. When season 32 of Dancing with the Stars begins in the fall, the show will be expanding its distribution. It moved from ABC to Disney Plus for season 31, and will be simulcast on both networks this fall. 

ABC called it the first time a show has been simulcast on both platforms and Bruce sees it as a unique opportunity. “We’re very excited to be able to tap into multiple audiences,” she said. “ABC and Disney have been amazing partners all the years we’ve produced the show.”

Also Read: Wonder Women of L.A. 2023: Hollywood Power Players

Traditional TV has its challenges in the streaming era, but Bruce mentioned seeing, at least anecdotally, a move back to more appointment viewing. More and more streaming shows are going with the weekly episode drop, she added, as opposed to the whole season coming out on premiere day. 

My Old Kentucky Home

Growing up in Louisville, Kentucky, Bruce graduated from the University of Kentucky and got her juris doctor at Brooklyn Law School. She credits Louis­ville with steering her toward a career in entertainment. Residents with a taste for ballet, theater or art museums have it all at their disposal, she said. 

“It’s something you’re exposed to,” Bruce said, speaking just after getting home from a whirlwind trip to the Kentucky Derby. “People might not at first think about that when they think of Kentucky.”

After law school, she landed an internship with a music attorney, and that started her career path in entertainment. Before Bruce ended up at BBC Studios, she held senior executive positions at IFC, Sundance Channel, MTV Networks and Broadway Video, among other entertainment outlets. She mentioned Susan Beckett, who was a consultant at Broadway Video when Bruce worked there, as a mentor, the seasoned veteran offering the young executive tips on the nuances of negotiations. 

Bruce also learned from another boss at Broadway Video. That would be Lorne Michaels. “I got to observe how amazing he was with talent relations,” she said. “I used that as a foundation in terms of how I would like to deal with talent.”

Bruce arrived at BBC America as senior VP of business affairs in 2011. In 2016, she joined the production team as senior VP, commercial director of BBC Studios L.A. Productions and was later promoted to executive VP. She was named general manager of L.A. Productions in May 2020 and headed west. 

Those in her BBC Los Angeles office credit Bruce with working hard to establish a positive culture, noting how the range of companies she’s worked for has shown the benefits of a favorable workplace, and the challenges where the vibe is not as positive. 

“Valerie is incredibly pragmatic and even-keeled, and generally one of the most rational people, no matter what the predicament is we may be facing on any given day of production,” said Ryan O’Dowd, executive VP, entertainment and music, L.A. Productions, BBC Studios. “She’s unbelievably adept at managing talent situations, networks, staff.”

Bruce said she has an open door for any staffer facing a challenge. “Everybody on the team knows they can come talk to me about anything,” she said. “I’m always happy to talk to anyone, give my opinion, guide them and help them in their careers.”

Surf City

To unwind from her high-stress job, Bruce enjoys watching basketball, as one might expect from a Louisville native. She’s picked up surfing since arriving in Los Angeles a couple of years ago, seeing it as something she can do with her teen son. Same goes for the concerts and music festivals they attend. 

Bruce is also a fan of fashion, and put her passion and professional skills into an initiative where she linked up a friend from streetwear label Homme + Femme with Kentucky Derby organizers. The Derby and Homme + Femme partnered on letterman jackets that were a nod to the Black jockeys who competed in the race’s earlier days. 

“I always love connecting people, thinking of ideas outside the box and finding ways to make them happen,” Bruce said. 

When Carrie Brzezinski-Hsu was a kid, she made commercials in her free time.

“For some nerdy reason, my idea of creating content wasn’t like creating a makeup show or doing a dance performance, it was setting up a VHS camcorder in our basement and creating commercials,” Brzezinski-Hsu said. “Growing up as an only child, I was like my dad’s son. I knew I wanted to do something in sports and advertising.”

By the time she was in fifth grade, she also knew she wanted to work at ESPN’s SportsCenter, which she watched every morning with her dad. “I’m in the career of a lifetime — I’m at ESPN, I’m making commercials in sports and I’m taking that to the next level and running creative,” she said. “That’s beyond what I even dreamed.”

Also Read: Wonder Women of L.A. 2023: Hollywood Power Players

After graduating from her beloved University of Michigan (where she was the commencement speaker for the School of Kinesiology in 2021), she moved to New York in 2000. Six jobs — at such places as Maxim, Blender, USA Today, Hachette Filipacchi Media and DoubleClick — and eight years later, she landed her dream gig at ESPN as senior director at ESPN’s branded content studio, Creative Works. She was promoted to VP, Creative Works, in 2013.

“All of those jobs were the building blocks of my understanding of branded content,” Brzezinski-Hsu said. 

Building the Creative Studio

In 2020, she worked closely with Tina Thornton, head of content operations and creative surround at ESPN, to establish ESPN Creative Studio, which incorporates Creative Works but also includes everyone who works in ESPN’s creative areas, such as editors, motion graphics designers, music producers and so forth. Creative Studio provides whatever is needed to make an ESPN story work. The team that she oversaw ballooned from 50 people to 450 people — and she made it her goal to meet every single one of those people in the following year. 

“The way she’s been able to bring those teams together as one and create an efficient approach to all of our content has been something that we didn’t have in the past,” Thornton said. “Now that it’s all together, it has not only made us more efficient in the way we approach things, it has allowed people to grow in other areas. There are editors who are engaging with the branded content space, music people who are engaging with the visual storytelling team — whether they are in the linear or digital space, they are all together and that allows us to do special things.”  

While Brzezinski-Hsu is overseeing an enormous team and has many responsibilities, she still makes time to mentor others — even those who do not report to her. Several years ago, Terrell Bouza, now a coordinating producer at ESPN, observed Brzezinski-Hsu in the workplace and decided she was someone from whom he would like to learn.

“I reached out to her and asked if she had some time and she was very responsive and gracious. She connected with me for an hour,” Bouza said. “From that first meeting, it evolved into a mentor/mentee relationship.”

Since then, both Brzezinski-Hsu and Bouza have grown in their careers, but they continue to stay in touch. 

“Carrie has always told me that as a leader, you have to lean into who you are,” he said. “You have to tap into what makes you uniquely you and use that superpower to build your teams and set your culture.” 

An Authentic Leader

That philosophy is also reflected in the way Brzezinski-Hsu runs her teams, Ibelka Fernandez, VP of human resources at Walt Disney Studios, said. Fernandez was the HR leader “partnering with her on organizational design, transformation and leadership changes” as Brzezinksi-Hsu was building out the division.  

“Carrie’s gift is bringing her authenticity while inspiring others, and she probably doesn’t even know she’s doing that,” Fernandez said. “She does it in a subtle way while she opens doors for others. She’s an absolute rock star.” 

Asked what advice she gives up-and-comers, Brzezinski-Hsu said: “Honor your values but also know that the company has values. If you stray too far from your values to support the company, you aren’t going to like it, and vice versa. You need to find the intersection of your values and what the company needs. When you hit the sweet spot, a lot of synchronicity happens.” 

While research is her forte, what makes Robin Thomas a Wonder Woman of Los Angeles is her ability to build teams and grow people in their careers.

“She’s an amazing leader,” said Thomas’s own leader, Wonya Lucas, CEO of Hallmark Media. “She has a great sense of team and how to get the most out of people.” 

“Teamwork is what’s really helped drive what I’ve done here — teamwork and collaboration across my New York- and Los Angeles-based teams,” Thomas said. “Ideas come from everywhere. We like to huddle and do a lot of thinking together to bring the best insights, not just report the ratings.” 

Also Read: Wonder Women of L.A. 2023: Hollywood Power Players

Thomas got her start in research and then grew her management and leadership skills as she grew her career.

After she graduated from the University of Georgia’s Grady School with a bachelor’s degree in journalism, she entered the world of research, starting her career at an advertising agency but quickly moving toward entertainment. Her first job in television was as a research assistant at Turner Broadcasting System starting in 1988, and she maintains many of the connections she made during the 20 years she worked there. 

One of those connections was Lucas. When Thomas and Lucas first met, Thomas was in research while Lucas was a marketing manager. 

“What I loved about Robin was she was the person I could go to to learn about the business,” Lucas said. “I was coming from Coca-Cola and she taught me a lot about audience insights and how to turn insights into action in this medium.”

Fast forward 20-plus years when Lucas, who had previously run Public Broadcasting Atlanta and TV One, was hired to run Hallmark (then Crown) Media. Her first hire in her new role was Thomas in October 2020. 

Reconnecting at Hallmark

“Robin has helped us lean into our audience, not just women 18-49, 25-54 and 55-plus,” Lucas said. “In terms of performance, we are looking at how you diversify the storytelling in ways that you can both reach the sales audience but also the audiences that we are looking to expand, which is a different psychographic.”

One of the ways Hallmark is looking to expand is by turning some of its sub-brands — such as Christian card line Dayspring and Black culture line Mahogany — into original movies and other programming to reach new and potentially younger audiences. It’s also offering subscription-based streaming service Hallmark Movies Now and making its channels available on such streaming platforms as Peacock, Philo, Hulu Plus Live TV, Vidgo, Sling TV, Fubo, DirecTV Stream and YouTube TV.

Throughout her career and work at Turner, Disney-ABC Television Group and WGN America (where she was senior VP of research), Thomas has distinguished herself by her willingness to throw herself into any project, no matter how ambitious.

“Robin has a terrific work ethic,” said E.W. Scripps chief research officer Jon Marks, for whom Thomas worked when Marks came to Turner to head research in 1999. “It’s not that she’s one of those people who will work until midnight, but when she’s there she’s super-focused and working at a very intense rate and pace. She’s really committed to what she’s doing and she gets her team focused and committed.”

Making Data Work for Business

“Robin not only knows how to source the best data and analytics, but she knows how to piece it together to make a clear picture,” said Ken Schwab, who consults for Hallmark Media and who Thomas also met while they were both at Turner. “I think she also understands the business implications of that picture. She’s not just someone who’s handing you overnights — she’s optimizing key programming initiatives and building out long-term plans.”

Thomas also understands the value that Hallmark’s viewers place on it and works to protect that value.

“The amazing thing about Hallmark is that it is really a brand,” Thomas said. “Hallmark really means a lot to the viewer and the consumer, it’s not just a TV network. It’s the way Hallmark makes them feel emotionally. They get carried away in a story that takes them somewhere they’ve never been before. Love is why our viewers love us. Connectivity is what they want to get out of watching us.” 

Imagine stepping into a role with a company known for its captivating live events at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. That’s just what Kirsten Polley, senior VP of operations at WWE, did. The company, though, was able to create a successful opportunity out of an unusual situation with the launch of WWE ThunderDome, she said.

 When Polley joined WWE in August 2020, fans weren’t able to attend events. So WWE recreated the in-arena atmosphere synonymous with pro wrestling when it unveiled WWE ThunderDome.

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 “It’s an immersive experience that welcomed fans back into the arena virtually via proprietary technology,” Polley said. “I was truly amazed by the production of WWE ThunderDome and the company’s ability to continue to be there for its staff, partners and fans.”

With nearly 1 million registered fans, the creation of WWE ThunderDome delivered a new level of excitement and further solidified the company’s leadership in technology, live events, and production. After seeing that project unfold, Polley knew she found a company focused on fan-first innovations where she’d have the opportunity to thrive.

New Levels of Entertainment

Polley noted that the excitement behind WWE is about to build even more. In April, WWE announced a landmark deal with Endeavor Group Holdings that will see WWE and mixed martial arts promoter UFC form a $21 billion global live sports and entertainment company. Bringing the two iconic ring-sports entities together will be transformational for WWE’s brand, fans and partners, according to Polley.

It also underscored what Polley shared during this interview and that is: No two days at WWE are the same. WWE strives to provide the best elements of sports and entertainment 52 weeks a year, she said, whether that is through weekly flagship programming, premium live events or social media content.

Plus, Polley is bringing a new level of entertainment and excitement to WWE fans through her role. She leads operations for WWE’s revenue strategy and development team, where she oversees new business ventures and identifies innovative and creative new lines of revenue to expand the company’s footprint. Polley helps WWE reach untapped audiences through new integrations and collaborations with premier sports and media organizations. 

“Kirsten has great instincts and a tireless work ethic,” Alex Varga, senior VP, head of corporate development at WWE, said. “Her attention to detail and ability to execute under pressure have been instrumental to WWE delivering strong results 52 weeks a year.” 

Polley played a key role in the landmark licensing agreement with longstanding partner NBCUniversal that gives Peacock exclusive streaming rights to WWE Network content in the U.S. She also helped lead the strategy and development around the creation of WWE’s first-ever NFT drop. The success of the initial drop resulted in a multiyear agreement with Blockchain Creative Labs to launch WWE’s NFT platform, WWE Moonsault, showcasing the company’s catalog of digital assets, including iconic moments, legendary Superstars and more.

As a team, Polley said WWE is always looking for new ways to identify revenue streams and monetize its intellectual property. There is talent branding for the Superstars, e-commerce and licensed merchandise, all reaching a global fan base. 

Exciting New Deals

Prior to joining WWE, Polley was an agent at CAA where she worked alongside Nick Khan, then the agency’s co-head of television and now WWE’s CEO. At CAA, they helped WWE executive chairman Vince McMahon and team on the media-rights deal that brought Friday Night SmackDown to Fox in October 2019. Around that time CAA’s client, heavyweight boxing champion Tyson Fury, also began an agreement with WWE that gave Polley a front row seat to the world of WWE’s Superstars.

Her role at CAA, maximizing sports media rights and talent development, prepped her well for WWE. “At CAA, I was fortunate to work with some of the top agents in the sports media and entertainment world where we had the privilege to work alongside some of the most recognizable names in the industry, including Colin Cowherd, Skip Bayless and Charissa Thompson, and sports media properties such as WWE, SEC and Top Rank Boxing,” Polley said.

 While the assumption about WWE is its appeal is mainly among men, Polley said she is a member of WWE’s Women’s Affinity Group, a resource group focusing on leadership development, recruitment, mentorship and more.

“It has allowed me to meet and learn from women across the entire organization,” she said. “Mentorship has played a huge role in shaping me into the person I am today both personally and professionally.” 

When you have a job as wide-ranging as Jennifer Rogers does, it helps to have a superpower. Rogers leads marketing strategy and execution across linear, brand and product teams at TelevisaUnivision, the Hispanic-language multimedia content giant. She heads up all creative, branding, messaging and media planning on- and off-network for the conglomerate’s portfolio of U.S. Networks. Good thing her superpower is empowerment.

Leader Who Listens

The ultimate team leader, Rogers likes to have all creative voices in the room from the start of a project, whether it’s strategizing for one of the company’s successful music awards shows or its recent rebranding of the news division. “I think the special sauce of teams is making sure there’s a diversity of skill sets, a diversity of thinking,” Rogers said. “What I really stress with my team is workflow process. People tend to work in linear order — they tend to do the next thing they have to. But when you change the workflow, [everybody is] part of the process from the beginning, which makes a huge difference in terms of results. … We let the experts do their work, and respect it.”

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The respect does not go unnoticed. “Relatable, transparent, straight-shooting, she leads with a solid moral compass and is one of the most empathetic leaders I’ve ever worked with,” Erica Mesa, VP, media strategy and consumer marketing for TelevisaUnivision, said. “Jennifer deserves to be a Wonder Woman not because of her superhuman skills, but rather her superbly human leadership style.”

It helps to love the arena you get to play in every day, and for Rogers, that sensibility was born at the very start of college at the University of Pennsylvania. “My whole childhood, I wanted to be a pediatrician. I went to college, and I took a biology course and a marketing course in my first semester freshman year, and that was it,” Rogers recalled. “From that first marketing class, I knew that I wanted to be a marketer. It was so challenging. There was so much to learn, so many goals to meet, and it was creative. I moved to that major immediately, and I haven’t looked back.”

It led her to a consumer marketing post at PrimeStar/DirecTV and, later, to a post heading up the Sales Marketing & Production department at NBC TV Network/Telemundo/Mun2. Through myriad corporate shifts at NBC, “I kept being asked to do new and different things,” Rogers said. The need to constantly adapt served her well. “We’re in this business because of change, right? Not to be comfortable, but to constantly keep an external focus and learn and grow and shift. I’m grateful that it really prepared me for the reality of now.”

The “now” finds Rogers awash in the unique challenges of serving TelevisaUnivision’s viewership and anticipating the flow of trends. “We’ve always been a mission-driven company,” she said. “We serve our audience like no one else can, and it really gives the job a meaning behind the role. Yes, it’s about ratings and share and metrics, but people really work here in service of the U.S. Hispanic community, and they never lose that focus.”

Representing at All Levels

It helps to not only have access to the right data, but to embrace the whole process. “It’s the backbone of everything we do,” Rogers said. “And it’s challenging. Consumer behavior shifts minute by minute. We’re constantly testing and learning. My biggest challenge is making sure that the data is based on the proper measurement and truly representative.”

The “truly representative” piece also applies to TelevisaUnivision itself, which is why Rogers is a founding member and current steering committee leader of the company’s Women’s Leadership Committee, which works to ensure a diverse next generation of executives. “Particularly for women and minorities, I continue to keep the focus on raising women up,” Rogers said. “It’s given them career skills, and it continues to allow us to give women a voice in the company.”

Leading by example and empowerment, Rogers’ voice continues to be a beacon of success at TelevisaUnivision. Ignacio Meyer, president, Univision Television Networks Group, specifically cites her contributions to the rollout of the global streaming platform ViX last year, while also recalibrating the U.S. network’s promotional plan, which “yielded results met for ViX penetration, and a ratings turnaround on our primetime programming. She is able to synthesize the big picture and get granular enough to craft a rigorous on- and off-network plan,” Meyer said. “This is rarefied air.” 

Focus. It’s the key word in describing Lisa Richardson’s journey.

Focus is what led her from high-school tennis star to college to law school to executive VP and associate general counsel at Fox.

And focus remains the key to her success. Her current role is a mix of intense attention to detail and a lot of hard work. The same can be said for her tennis game.

Richardson oversees the legal components of multiplatform content distribution for all of the company’s brands. She also manages all legal aspects of distribution for the Fox-affiliated television stations in more than 200 markets.

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As a Los Angeles native, Richardson always knew she wanted to work within the entertainment industry. After graduating from USC Gould School of Law, she worked at Latham & Watkins.

She interviewed at Fox in 2003. And while the stars didn’t align for that specific role, she was recommended to the team at Gemstar-TV Guide International, which was part of then-Fox parent News Corp. at the time.

“I was at Gemstar for two years,” Richardson said. “I started with distribution work. It was a steep learning curve and I really enjoyed it.”

When a position in distribution opened up at Fox in 2005, Richardson was thrilled to join the team.

“It’s complex work,” she said. “You need a lot of attention to detail.”

That brings us, once again, back to the concept of focus.

Despite Richardson’s attention to her own career, she’s equally focused on the success of others. She spent much of an interview about her praising her team and the teams she works with at Fox. Others at Fox have noticed Richardson’s commitment.

“Lisa is a warm person and cares very much about her team,” Fox executive VP, network distribution and marketing Jessica Fang said. “She fosters good camaraderie.”

Richardson described her team as collaborative. She said it’s the key to staying on top of trends in this constantly evolving business — along with reading the trades, of course. Meeting regularly allows the group to discuss what they’re facing and the best way to tackle it.

“When I first started, we were dealing with traditional cable companies and launching a network every year,” she said. “Now it’s FAST (free ad-supported TV) channels, virtual MVPDs and deals with CE (consumer electronics) manufacturers. Our content is distributed in so many ways and my team is the hub for all of that.”

In the early part of her career, Richardson said, she was often the only woman in the room negotiating deals. She felt she wasn’t always taken seriously as a female junior attorney, so she went out of her way to be more prepared than everyone else. 

Now that Richardson and her team have conducted multibillion-dollar deals, she’s solidified her reputation and proved she’s a leader. She’s now using that focus to help others rise.

“I make a huge effort to mentor my team and that’s something I pride myself on,” she said.

The Walt Disney Co. announced on December 14, 2017, that it would acquire 21st Century Fox. The deal was completed on March 20, 2019. After Fox merged with Disney, Richardson became head of the department and her team chose to stay with her. She said that many of these colleagues have now worked with her for 15 years.

All Work, No Play? Not for This Ace

With an incredibly demanding career, a husband and two children, it may seem impossible to carve out personal time once the daily routine takes hold. During the COVID-19 pandemic, though, Richardson had a bit more flexibility in her schedule and returned to her teenage passion for tennis.

“I love so much the amount of focus it takes when I’m playing,” Richardson said. “My focus has to be 100% on tennis. It’s the only time my mind isn’t racing about work, my kids, my to-do list.”

Richardson now competes regularly on a number of U.S. Tennis Association teams and said she’s playing better now than in her teen years.

Stiff competition brings out her best.

“Lisa is as conscientious as anyone I have ever had the pleasure of working with,” Fox president of operations and distribution Michael Biard said. “She can retain a courteous and composed demeanor under the most extreme circumstances and she’s a fierce competitor. Her ability to balance these seemingly opposing qualities makes her a formidable opponent in any arena.”

After years in marketing at Kodak, Volkswagen and Nissan, Terri Hines was starting to feel “overqualified and a little bored,” she said. Her mentor at Nissan worked in public relations and communications and Hines had always found that intriguing. So she asked him to show her the ropes. 

“He allowed me to shadow him for five months,” Hines, now executive VP, communications at Fox Sports, said. “I found my aha moment. This is what I wanted to do.”

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Hines’s mentor eventually helped her land a job on his side of Nissan, and later Hines, whose undergrad degree had been in business administration, earned a master’s degree in communications from American University in her hometown of Washington, D.C. “I wanted to learn more and I knew graduate school would make me a more well-rounded communications professional and give me a leg up on
my peers,” she said.

Today, Hines is Fox Sports’s chief spokesperson, responsible for communications, brand and social responsibility strategies. As a member of the senior management team, she leads strategic direction and corporate positioning and is a senior adviser on crisis, social-justice and diversity, empowerment and inclusion (DE&I) matters.

“Terri’s job is half ‘comms’ and half helping guide the company,” Fox Sports CEO and executive producer Eric Shanks said. “She is strategic and always gives it to you straight. She’s a real consigliere and a trusted voice as a leader.”

Growing up, Hines said her parents required her to get good grades, pick a musical instrument (she’s a classically trained pianist) and pick a sport. While she liked swimming, tennis, gymnastics and softball, she focused through high school on track as a sprinter. Hines wore Nikes, so the company became “the North Star” for her. “I dreamed about working for the Nike brand,” she said.

After a decade at Nissan, in 2007 she fulfilled her dream, jumping to Nike — and not only to Nike but to the Jordan brand, helping lead the introduction of Air Jordan 23, the biggest launch in the company’s history (and, incidentally, the subject of the current theatrical release Air, starring Ben Affleck and Matt Damon). 

“Working on the Jordan brand was one of the highlights of my career,” said Hines, who also worked on the Converse brand, acquired in 2003, during nearly a decade at Nike. “I had a great time there and got to find creative ways to tell the story and become a better storyteller around the brand.”

Hines also wanted to work in television or film in some way, so when Fox Sports offered an opportunity in 2016 she made the leap. 

“My personal journey has not been a straight line, but I’ve enjoyed the windy road,” Hines said.

Happily Hectic

The job is hectic — in the last year, the network had the NFL, the men’s World Cup, the Super Bowl and the Daytona 500 — and Hines said “there’s no off button.”

But that’s the way she likes it. “I thrive on challenges,” she said. “The more things I have to juggle, the better I am.” In fact, since the pandemic, she has also been taking weekly vocal lessons to work on her singing.

While Hines is “maybe too good at multitasking” and falters with too much downtime, she has taught herself to delegate. “I used to worry about letting things go but now I trust my team and let go a lot,” she said, adding that as a leader she also tries to be a good listener. “I don’t always have it right and don’t profess to know it all.”

Beyond all her career success, Hines has another goal. “It’s important that I give back, leaving a legacy around inclusion opportunities and creating seats at the table for women and people of color,” she said. 

At Fox she helped create the first inclusion council and became executive sponsor of its employee resource group, Fox BLK+. She also is involved in her community as a director of The LAGRANT Foundation and as a corporate adviser to the UCLA Center for Media, Entertainment and Sports.

“This is what I’m passionate about and it’s integral to who I am,” Hines said. “As a successful leader I want the people coming up behind me to get the opportunity to sit in my chair.” 

People first. That’s the message put forth by Cox Communications and it’s also a personal belief for Kristen Cuffee-Brown. It’s what helps guide her successful career — along with boundless energy, an inquisitive nature and a love of deadlines rooted in her journalism aspirations.

“Kristen has a contagious spirit,” Cox executive VP and chief operations officer Colleen Langner said. “She has a passion for our business and people love to work with her.”

After graduating from the University of North Carolina with a degree in journalism, this Southern California native took a job at a small newspaper while juggling additional work in sports broadcasting in an effort to pursue her dream of becoming a broadcast journalist. Cuffee-Brown’s next role was with a startup during the dot-com era.

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She then transitioned into marketing at Cox Communications in 2005, joining what at the time was Langner’s team. The company has been Cuffee-Brown’s home for 18 years. Currently an assistant VP of content acquisition, Cuffee-Brown began her tenure at Cox as a marketing specialist. Over the years, she grew within the company’s divisions, moving up the ranks in marketing. She then transitioned to director of video product before joining the content acquisition team in 2019.

Her current role includes negotiating program agreements for genres such as sports, international and faith-based. She also works on SVOD agreements, OTT apps and now FAST channels.

Customer-Minded Mentality

Cuffee-Brown mixes her “people-first” mindset with her marketing expertise to always keep her eye fixed on the customer. In her current role, she’s tasked with working across a variety of groups within the organization gathering what’s needed to complete deals whether that’s working with marketing, tech or product specialists.

Suzanne Fenwick, senior VP of content acquisition for Cox and Cuffee-Brown’s boss, said that she has relationships across the company to successfully accomplish this.

Fenwick explained that Cuffee-Brown brings her product marketing experience to everything so she never forgets about the customer, always asking the hard questions and pushing for the information she needs.

The business landscape is evolving and changing so much that Cuffee-Brown said it’s important to take a step back to make sure Cox continues to deliver for the customers and the business.

“Sports agreements have become extremely complex, so it always feels good getting one of those completed,” Cuffee-Brown said. “I’ve enjoyed negotiating and onboarding diverse programming through SVOD and FAST services. It’s been a great way to supplement our linear offering and provide value to our customers.”

Cuffee-Brown is deeply involved in so many aspects of Cox because as she explains, “Cox is a culture that puts people first and our leadership embodies that.”

She’s had key mentors along the way that invited her to grow within her various roles and then move up every step of the way. In addition, she works tirelessly to mentor others.

 My work style is to empower and serve those around me,” Cuffee-Brown explained. “It starts with showing up and being present. It’s also about being a good communicator and being adaptable given how fast things are changing in this space. It’s about supporting a diverse and inclusive work environment.”

Cuffee-Brown served as a Women in Cable Telecommunications (now The WICT Network) board member and a Cable Telecommunications Association for Marketing (CTAM) board member. She also informally mentors women and noted that
an informal mentoring style has worked best in her career.

Family First: On and Off the Field

But the most important people in her world are her family. Cuffee-Brown lit up when talking about her husband and three children. She said they love to travel and Hawaii is a favorite destination. Most importantly, she proudly said, “We are a sports family.”

Her husband, Omar Brown, played football with the National Football League’s Atlanta Falcons and in college at North Carolina, where the couple met. Cuffee-Brown enjoys tennis. Her two daughters play soccer. Her 12-year-old son plays basketball and football.

“My daughter attends Princeton and plays Division I soccer,” she said. “We live and breathe sports. We’re at a field or a court every weekend.”

 Whether on or off the field, Cuffee-Brown emulates People First.

 “She’s an empathetic leader who mentors not only her team but she mentors other young women because she wants to see them succeed,” Langner said. “She looks to pull out the best in people.” 

When there’s a big job to do, people call on Sharon Levy, CEO of Endemol Shine North America.

In January, Endemol’s parent company, Banijay, restructured and Levy was Banijay CEO Ben Samek’s first choice to run Endemol.

As Endemol’s chief creative officer, Levy had already been running the shows, Samek said. “That’s the lifeblood of the company,” he said. “You look at many creative executives and it’s just about the shows. There’s a balance of commerce and creativity that has to be reached to keep a company thriving. And that’s one of Sharon’s great attributes is looking at shows to be both.”

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Years ago, in a similar vein, when programming executive Doug Herzog returned to Viacom to run Spike, a cable network for men, the first person he hired was Levy to oversee original programming. “She’s incredibly dynamic, she’s got a great attitude,” Herzog said, noting that some of the shows she launched are still running on what is now Paramount Network, like Ink Master and Bar Rescue. “She’s super fun to work with and she’s got great taste.”

The first pitch Corrie Henson took after becoming executive VP of entertainment unscripted content at NBCUniversal was from Levy. When Henson was with WarnerMedia, she had bought the series Hot Wheels from Levy. That fell through when WarnerMedia was acquired by Discovery and cleaned house. Levy improved the series, giving it more heart, and Henson bought it again. Hot Wheels: Ultimate Challenge launched on NBC and Peacock on May 30.

“She’s a problem-solver. She’s a big-picture thinker. She is able to keep her hands in all of the details without getting too in the weeds, the ultimate in quality control,” Henson said. “When I’m talking to Sharon I feel like I’m the only person in the room, but I always know that she has a million balls in the air. I always look forward to Sharon. She’s not a sister, but  a really close, fun cousin I look forward to seeing at the holidays.”

Levy got her start in the business as a publicist at Comedy Central, which was the first of three times she worked for Herzog. She was considering starting her own PR agency representing talent from the network when she had a meeting with David Stanley and Scott Stone of Stone Stanley, who she’d met on the set of The Man Show.

At first they asked if she was interested in running marketing for the production company. Then they mentioned an open job they had in development.

“I didn’t really even know what that meant,” Levy said. “They really took a shot with me and it really changed my career.”

Now as a CEO of a production company, Levy says the focus is on the shows. “It almost sounds folksy, but I do believe that in order to grow a business the creative has to be great,” she said. “The plan right now is to create, ideate, adapt the best content we can. And then make a concerted sales effort to all of our networks and platforms so they keep buying from us.”

Driven by Relationships

At the same time, people matter. “This business is about relationships, it really doesn’t matter what title you have. You are not in the business of building and nurturing and keeping and growing all those relationships from talent. I consider anyone who works with me talent,” she said.

Allison Wallach, president of unscripted programming at Fox Entertainment, gives Levy props for convincing Will Arnett, the host of Fox’s Lego Masters, which Endemol produces, to stick with the show when production moved from Los Angeles to Atlanta. 

“She is fearless. She is thoughtful. She’s a force of nature,” said Wallach, who counts Levy as a friend.

Levy’s touch is evident when she hosts business meals at her home instead of at a restaurant. 

“There’s a great personal connection that comes when you invite people into your home and cook for them,” Levy said. “I think it says, ‘Thanks for all you’ve done.’ ” 

Levy not only hosts but cooks. Her go-to dish is a carrot souffle from Martha Stewart’s Thanksgiving cookbook.

Cooking isn’t Levy’s only skill. She’s an amateur floral arranger, and during the pandemic, she started making paper flowers that look like real ones. She scours antique markets, looking for items she can take apart to make jewelry.

Levy also packed a punch. Until recently, she worked out at CMC Boxing. She didn’t just hit the speed bag. “I sparred with the best of them. I sparred with mostly men,” she said. “And took a bunch of them down.” A southpaw, she specialized in body shots.

Now, she’s a big hiker and Pelotoner. “My Golden Gloves days are way behind me.” 

When Ramsey Naito began overseeing development and production at Nickelodeon in 2018, she had a mandate: “To make Nickelodeon a world-class animation studio,” she said. 

Within two years, Naito had expanded the production pipeline from seven projects to more than 40 and was promoted to president. In September 2021, Naito was given the new title of president of Paramount Animation and Nickelodeon Animation, responsible for animation content in all formats, including theatrical films, streaming, linear, digital and TV movies. 

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Naito expanded the slate of content with book adaptations, including Big Nate; spinoffs and extensions of popular franchises, such as Kamp Koral: SpongeBob’s Under Years and Paw Patrol: The Movie; as well as the projects Monster High: The Movie, produced in partnership with Mattel, and an original animated Transformers series produced with Hasbro’s Entertainment One. She also hired 500 new employees, enticed by Naito’s promise of a corporate culture that values creativity and “allows an outlet to play.”

Bringing a Spirit of Fun

“What Ramsey brought was like opening the doors and windows and letting the spirit of Nickelodeon return,” Eryk Casemiro, executive VP of global series content at Nickelodeon Animation, said. “She started assembling a new group of people who shared the Nickelodeon spirit that put the channel on the map in the 1990s. She told everyone, ‘Come play in my playground.’ ”

Creatives see Naito as a kindred spirit, Casemiro said. The daughter of a sculptor and a painter, Naito attended Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, earned her master’s degree at the California Institute of the Arts, then landed a job as production assistant on an animated film. After that, “I just continued working in animation because I loved the community,” she said. 

Gina Shay, a producer at Dreamworks Animation, first met Naito at Pratt, then reconnected with her when they were working in animation. When Shay was line producer on South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut, she hired Naito, who became the film’s production manager. “I needed a fighter, and there’s no one who fights better for your movie than Ramsey,” Shay said. 

In managing a film crew, Naito recalled, “I realized that my superpower was understanding the artistic process and explaining it in a way that was palatable to people who aren’t artists.” Naito gained more production credits and executive experience at Nickelodeon Movies, Blue Sky Studios, Cartoon Network and Dreamworks Animation, where she produced The Boss Baby, earning an Oscar nomination. 

Her varied experience gives her confidence to oversee projects across multiple platforms. With streaming, she noted: “Kids can watch 20 episodes a night. That means your characters need to be strong, the comedic tone has got to be hilarious and you want to tell stories that keep your audience interested so they watch them over and over again.”  

Her audience is also diverse and global. “It’s our responsibility as content creators to speak to those kids with stories that feel authentic and inclusive,” Naito said. Again, she draws on her own experience: “When I was a young girl, there was very little for me to watch, as an Asian-American, where I could see myself reflected. I think of that little girl when I think about the audience.” 

Eye Toward Diversity

She cited The Casagrandes, Big Nate and Bossy Bear, whose title character
explores a neighborhood modeled on Koreatowns around the U.S., as examples of shows that bring diverse characters and experiences to the screen. Finding and developing such content, she said, “starts with making sure our leaders over development, production and casting are diverse.” Naito also launched the Intergalactic Shorts Program, encouraging creators from around the world to submit their ideas for evaluation by Nickelodeon executives.   

Whether she’s recruiting new talent or forging new production partnerships, “I search for people who are bringing a refreshing take on the work, stories and characters, and don’t want to make work that looks like everything else that’s been done,” she said. Making work that’s fresh is what keeps the artist in Naito motivated. 

“We’re creating culture, stories and empowerment in a medium that’s always pushing a new look,” she said, adding, “Everything I do at work is exciting.” 

Holly Leff-Pressman has had her finger on the pulse of innovation in television’s content distribution, marketing and transactional business for most of her more than 30-year career.

Born and raised in Los Angeles, Leff-Pressman said her focus growing up was always on a career in the entertainment business. “I always knew I was going to be in the media business, but my mom said I was going to go to law school,” she recalled.

After graduating from UCLA with a degree in international relations, Leff-Pressman would indeed earn her law degree from Loyola Marymount University in 1989, but she never strayed from her desire to land a gig in the entertainment industry. She would work at various entertainment-based companies while in school before landing a job as a litigation associate at entertainment law firm Cooper Epstein and Hurewitz in 1990. 

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“We represented some of the biggest names in the business including Larry Flynt and New World [Entertainment],” she said. “But I knew I didn’t want to be a lawyer for the long haul.”

In 1992, Leff-Pressman set her sights on Viewer’s Choice, a company that was at the forefront of the then-emerging pay-per-view business. She would oversee the licensing and distribution of original and event pay-per-view and video-on-demand programming. 

“It was exciting to be a part of an evolving business,” she said. “I was able to work on incredible music concerts, and we actually greenlit the launch of the Ultimate Fighting Championship.”

Wide-Ranging Roles at NBCU

Leff-Pressman in 1995 would move to NBCUniversal, eventually serving as its senior VP of worldwide PPV/SVOD and overseeing some of the company’s biggest transactional and subscription video-on-demand deals domestically and internationally. 

“Back in the day companies had a home-entertainment group, a TV group and a pay-per-view group, and I kept switching between the groups and learning the business from different perspectives,” she said.

Leff-Pressman also said she met a number of female executives at NBCU who had a major influence in her career. She says one colleague in particular, Madeline Di Nonno, who is now CEO of The Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media, helped pave the way for Pressman to transition to her next position at Nielsen as its executive VP, business development and client service.

“They were looking for someone to start and grow their television media practice,” Pressman said. “I wasn’t a researcher, but I knew the television business and was able to develop data deals with such companies as Comcast and Charter.” 

In 2017, Leff-Pressman would take her talents to media research company Screen Engine/ASI, where she is currently chief client engagement officer, helping to build and expand its client base.

An Authentic Influencer  

“Holly is an experienced market research expert whose insights are sought by power players in the media and the entertainment industry,” Screen Engine/ASI founder and CEO Kevin Goetz said. “Holly has effectively influenced the growth of the industry and demonstrates how a powerful woman can effectively lead in an authentic way.” 

Indeed, Leff-Pressman hasn’t been afraid to take on new challenges and has shown grace and strength in the face of adversity, particularly as a breast cancer survivor. A 2018 Cable TV Pioneers inductee, Leff-Pressman said she draws much of her strength and fortitude from her husband, two daughters and stepson.

As for the future, Leff-Pressman said she’d like to tap into her creative talents and develop original content and intellectual property. She’s also focused on mentoring young women within the business.

“I’m a strong believer in looking at your skills, focusing on your strengths and being able to take what you’re good at and move toward greater goals,” she said.  

Amina Hussein was enough of a basketball star growing up in Oakland that she was interviewed by the local newspapers. One clipping saved by her mom was from when Hussein was in 10th grade, where young Amina proclaimed that she wanted to get into sports broadcasting.

On the court, Hussein liked defying expectations: At 6 feet 1 inch, she was
expected to play close to the basket but “I had a mean jump shot and 3-pointers were my bread and butter,” the captain of the Holy Names University (Oakland) basketball team said. When it came to her career game plan, though, Hussein, now Amazon’s head of U.S. sports on-air talent and development for Prime Video, mostly stuck to the script. 

Also Read: Wonder Women of L.A. 2023: Hollywood Power Players

The big change came early on, when she abandoned her plan to be a broadcaster after realizing she was happier behind the scenes. After college, she nabbed a job in sports radio in the San Francisco Bay Area, building up connections in the NFL and NBA. She had never really left the Bay Area but when the then-Oakland Raiders made the Super Bowl in 2003, she traveled to San Diego for the game and met folks from ESPN, which led to a job offer.

Culture Shock in Connecticut

“You can imagine that as someone who wanted to be in sports broadcasting, ESPN was the pinnacle,” she said. “I couldn’t turn the job down, although moving from Oakland to Bristol [Connecticut] was culture shock.” Not only had she never owned a winter coat before, she went from living in one of the nation’s more-diverse cities to being the only person of color on ESPN’s radio side, she said.

Still, Hussein loved ESPN. When she decided the “ceiling was too short in radio” she segued into TV, starting the network’s booking department more or less from scratch. “I think I was called the talent producer manager,” she recalled, adding that her social skills enabled her to flourish on the talent side. “That’s my sweet spot. I’m just good at working with people. I can identify good people, I like to give feedback and I’m open and honest.”

Brandon Lowe, who worked for Hussein at ESPN and now is a producer on her team at Prime Video, said her people skills extend to those she leads. “I remember my job interview.  She was so personable and struck me as someone you’d want to work for and alongside.” 

Hussein liked her talent gig for another reason. “It allowed me to be in the control room and learn the ins and outs of live television production, which is what I wanted to do.”

She ultimately became an Emmy-winning senior coordinating producer, working on shows such as NFL Live and Sunday NFL Countdown before getting out of Bristol for Los Angeles to work on basketball shows such as NBA Countdown.

Eventually, Hussein wanted a new challenge in a more modern arena. “I felt I was turning into a Flintstone at ESPN,” she said. “I wanted to get into the tech space.”

During the pandemic, she moved on to Peloton, the workout-bike maker, calling her brief six-month gig there “a 30-minute bike ride.” 

‘Thursday Night Football’ Recruiting

She didn’t want to move to New York and the logistics became convoluted, so she quickly took the opportunity to work at Prime Video, where she recruited talent for the new Thursday Night Football program there. “Building something from scratch was intriguing,” she said.  

In fact, she brought on the legendary Al Michaels for play-by-play duties and, to help create pre- and postgame shows that were “younger and cooler,” hired recently retired players like Ryan Fitzpatrick and Richard Sherman, who went to Harvard and
Stanford, respectively. 

“The big challenge was the unknown, especially because chemistry is really
important in these pregame shows,” Hussein said.

That it all came together smoothly should not be a surprise, according to Lowe. “She’s a great leader because she always has a plan and executes it, but she also empowers those around her,” he said. “She gets to know you as a person, knows your strengths and puts you in a position to shine.”

Hussein is now simultaneously focused on the new season and looking ahead to the future. “I hope we get the NBA, in part selfishly for me,” she said. “And I’d like to get back into production, too.” 

Michele Barney spent two decades at DirecTV and then AT&T, one of the biggest pay TV distributors in the country, negotiating deals with programmers. She loved it and earned a reputation for being a fair bargainer who wanted to solve problems for both parties at the table. 

Trained as an accountant and then as a lawyer, she became an attorney for DirecTV doing programming deals. There, she fully embraced the business of TV. That’s a good thing because, after it became clear that AT&T was planning to sell the pay TV business to private equity, she opened herself up to consider other opportunities. And an excellent one presented itself on the programmer side of the business. 

Also Read: Wonder Women of L.A. 2023: Hollywood Power Players

Discovery Inc. hired her in early 2021 as president of affiliate distribution, managing Discovery networks’ carriage with cable, satellite, telco and digital distributors across the U.S. and Canada. 

After the merger that created Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD), Barney transitioned into a new role leading partnership management for WBD’s affiliates, global platforms and retail partners and transactional businesses. At WBD, there have been relationships with distributors to maintain, keeping vital revenue coming in, and new things to help grow, such as Magnolia Network and streaming platforms Discovery Plus and HBO Max. 

The next big challenge — which she embraces — is the new combination of the two streaming entities into one, called Max and having launched May 23. 

Keeps Calm in Chaos

WBD senior VP, marketing strategy Kelly Kane knew of Barney from her time at DirecTV before working for her at Discovery and then WBD. She’s been impressed with how her boss has rolled with the changes.

“She left a job of 20 years,” Kane noted. “She came to Discovery during the pandemic. She was so determined and hardworking. And then the Warner Bros. Discovery merger was announced, five to six months into her time with us, and never did it come across as anything like the sky is falling. It was always very even-keeled. She’s very good at ensuring that people remain calm and keep doing what they love.”

WBD senior VP, distribution Gabe Sauerhoff was impressed that, even though Barney came from the distributor side of the negotiation table, “how open-minded she was to seeing how the proverbial sausage gets made on the other side of it. And I think she incorporated the best of both perspectives into the way that she did her job here at Discovery.”

That helped in a short period of time to complete a number of strategic renewals and forge new relationships that “really put her stamp on her tenure at Discovery,” he said. (He cited deals with Hulu Plus Live TV and Verizon.)

“Her positivity is infectious, but it’s not positivity without regard to the reality of the situation,” Sauerhoff said. “I think that’s one of her real gifts.”

Barney, a California native whose parents met when her Navy dad was stationed in Japan, leveraged her corporate transactional skills acquired at Latham & Watkins to get the DirecTV job, at a time when distributors were acquiring stakes in programmers as part of deals. “Even as a lawyer, I really liked it,” she said. 

Coming over to Discovery, what she really loved about it was “it was so small and nimble and decisions were made just more quickly” than at AT&T (where, she proudly notes, she was promoted to corporate officer). Then the WBD merger happened. “And so now we’re a much bigger company again, not as big as AT&T though,” she said. “But I really like it. I feel like I made the right decision because I’ve learned so much.”

The Thrill of a Launch

Asked what she likes most about her job these days, Barney said: “We’re getting ready to launch our new enhanced app, Max. It’s really fun, doing all of the work to bring a new product to market. I love the product, and it’s just a really exciting time for our company. And I’m still learning after 22 years in this business. I have a great team.” 

And what she likes least? “Maybe the uncertainty around what’s happening with video and linear video in particular, and long term where’s the business going,” Barney said. So she is mindful of “just keeping people positive and focused on the opportunities ahead and not necessarily just worried about the potential negativity.” 

Black viewers are streaming video and informational programming in unprecedented numbers, and a group of savvy TV veterans is leading the industry in striving to meet those consumers where they are looking for content. 

African-American audiences spend a majority of their viewing time watching streaming services — and 62% of those viewers say streaming is the most relevant platform for stories depicting Black life and culture, according to a recent Nielsen Diverse Intelligence Series report. The three dynamic and uncompromising executives profiled here are dedicated to making sure quality scripted and reality series are streaming — as well as news and informational content — are available to a Black audience with a voracious appetite for authentic, nuanced programming featuring their stories and images.

Brett Dismuke, GM, ALLBLK and WE tv

AMC Networks veteran programming executive Brett Dismuke has his hands full programming across multiple platforms as general manager of both cable network WE tv and streaming service ALLBLK.

Driving Dismuke’s efforts is an ultimate goal of providing quality, entertaining and relevant programming to Black viewers, especially on streaming via ALLBLK. “Many people in my generation grew up with the images we were allowed to have and see,” he said. “Now that we are in a position to control said images, I’m taking on the responsibility of guiding that ship.” 

Dismuke oversaw the 2020 rebranding of the streaming service Urban Movie Channel — formerly owned by BET founder Robert Johnson — to ALLBLK and has created a service that features original scripted and reality series, as well as short films targeted to Black viewers. In particular, scripted series such as comedy Partners in Rhyme, starring iconic hip hop artist MC Lyte, as well as drama series A House Divided (which last month launched its fifth season) and Double Cross, have helped Dismuke grow subscribers and audiences for the service over consecutive quarters, according to AMC. 

“Our goal is to make ALLBLK the No. 1 service in the world for Black stories and storytellers, and Brett Dismuke is a leader who is up for that ambitious objective,” AMC Networks president of entertainment and AMC Studios Dan McDermott said. “He expertly continues to not only develop unique, gripping content for ALLBLK — super-serving the audience — but also finds opportunity and success in the targeted alignments of WE tv and ALLBLK with incredible proficiency. Both platforms continue to grow under his skillful leadership.” 

For Dismuke, the ability to draw from popular reality content from WE tv such as series Love After Lockup, as well as offer original scripted comedy series like Millennials and dramas like Monogamy, gives ALLBLK a large library of diverse content that explores all aspects of the Black experience.   

“I want people to view ALLBLK as a trailblazer in the fairness of equal representation,” he said. “Nothing in life is 100% good, and sharing the depictions of Black and Brown narratives should be no different. I want ALLBLK to be considered a truth teller and an equal sharer of our stories.” 

The entrepreneurial producer and executive, who ran his own company, So Chi Entertainment, and also served as CEO of independent urban production company The Swirl Group prior to joining AMC Networks, said it is critical that Black consumers have viewing options across all platforms.

“Access to a reflection of one’s self can make or break how one views themselves,” he said. “It is great that some mainstream services and networks offer a small section of Black content, but it is a complete game-changer to have services dedicated to highlighting the vast array of our stories.”

Devin Griffin, Executive VP and GM, BET Plus

BET’s efforts to expand its iconic linear cable brand to streaming with the launch of BET Plus in 2019 paid off handsomely in 2022 with Emmy Award nominations for signature comedy series The Ms. Pat Show and drama series The Porter. 

Leading BET Plus’s charge to reach Black viewers on streaming is Devin Griffin, who has overseen operations for the service since its launch. Under Griffin’s tutelage, the service offers more than 2,000 hours of content, including a bevy of original series from such diverse producers as Tyler Perry, Kenya Barris, Lee Daniels, Pat Will­iams, Kirk Franklin and other leading Black content creators. 

“BET Plus puts us in a position to speak to the diversity of perspectives and interests that are within the Black community and those that love Black programming and stories,” Griffin said. “We believe that our edge is that we can tell stories from a place that is unique, but is broadly appealing and relatable.”

BET Plus has developed popular series including Tyler Perry’s Bruh, All The Queen’s Men, Tyler Perry’s Ruthless, The Family Business, Kingdom Business and First Wives Club — as well as series launching in 2023 including Average Joe starring Dion Cole. In 2022 the service struck gold with Emmy nominations for The Porter, which earned an Outstanding Choreography for a Scripted Program nod for its portrayal of Black Pullman workers in the aftermath of World War I, and original comedy The Ms. Pat Show, which garnered a nomination for Outstanding Directing for a Comedy Series. The series follows the exploits of a convicted felon turned suburban wife, mother and comedian. 

The Ms. Pat Show star J. Bernard Calloway said the show’s Emmy nomination is verification of the quality of content that BET Plus is producing under Griffin’s leadership. 

“It’s great to be part of a project that has made history for [BET Plus],” he said. “The nomination is basically the respect of our peers and the recognition of how great the show is.”

Griffin said that recognition is helping to build greater awareness for BET Plus and confirms its strategic business plan is headed in the right direction. 

“One of the big driving forces for me is being able to contribute to expanding the ways Black stories and experiences get portrayed,” he said. “With BET Plus, we’ve been able to expand the canvas that we’re able to paint on.”

Geraldine Moriba, SVP of News, Entertainment andEmpowerment, theGrio

Emmy- and Peabody Award-winning producer, journalist and Stanford University Brown Institute research scientist Geraldine Moriba is successfully mixing the Allen Media Group-owned theGrio’s originally-produced news and information programming across multiple distribution platforms to create a successful media formula targeting a Black audience.  

To complement theGrio’s signature news and entertainment website and basic cable network theGrio.tv, Moriba in 2022 launched theGrio streaming network and mobile app dedicated to programming about and featuring unique Black voices. She also launched theGrio Black Podcast Network, offering more than five weekly podcasts on political, social and entertainment issues affecting Black culture. 

“Geraldine continues to pave the way in delivering high-quality, African-American-focused content,” AMG founder, chairman and CEO Byron Allen said. 

Extending theGrio’s reach beyond media, Moriba — who prior to joining theGrio in 2021 produced documentary series for PBS such as Sinking Cities and Chasing the Dream through production company, Moriba Media — also developed and oversaw theGrio Awards, celebrating excellence in entertainment and social justice. The inaugural event aired in November on CBS and Paramount Plus.  

Moriba wants to position theGrio as a global brand that serves Black consumers with quality, informative programming wherever they are consuming content.

“Right now, theGrio is the largest Black newsroom in the nation, and our reporting is unapologetic,” she said. “When you couple that with the entertainment and lifestyle value, it makes us very successful at targeting a diverse multimedia audience.” 

Allen Media Group’s purchase of Black News Channel assets this past July bolstered what already was arguably one of the leading Black-oriented news and entertainment websites. Moriba has already integrated former Black News Channel on-air personalities Marc Lamont Hill and Ebony K. Williams into its news and informational strategy by creating daily news shows for both that will run across theGrio’s multiplatform offerings.

Moriba’s ultimate goal is to ensure Black issues and stories are heard across all platforms, she said. 

“Without doubt, Black people are central to the fabric of American culture, and there are not enough platforms telling our stories,” she said. “Our mission is to build a portfolio of a broad representation of Black people across the spectrum. We are trying to get people of globally varied backgrounds, gender identification, ages and sexual orientations, with the driver being Black culture to help us move forward faster and stronger.” ■

When Lizzo, host of Lizzo’s Watch Out for the Big Grrrls, accepted her surprise Emmy Award in the best competition program category this past September, she said that the heartwarming stories of the plus-sized dancers in her show were not that unique, they just needed a platform on which to be showcased.

For nearly 40 years, Bunim/Murray Productions has successfully provided a platform for a myriad of unique, sometimes unorthodox but always authentic and true voices, including the performers on Lizzo’s Watch Out for the Big Grrrls, which it produced for Amazon Prime Video.

On stage with Lizzo when she accepted the Emmy was Bunim/Murray president Julie Pizzi, who is leading the production company known for such hit reality shows as Keeping Up With the Kardashians, Bad Girls Club, I Am Cait and Born This Way in this new and evolving world of TV production. The Emmy win for Lizzo’s Watch Out for the Big Grrrls is the latest milestone for the veteran producer, who began her career at Bunim/Murray under founders Jonathan Murray and the late Mary-Ellis Bunim nearly two decades ago on MTV competition show The Challenge.

“Talk about someone who could handle the pressure — it was clear to me that the crew had a lot of faith in her and she had faith in the crew,” Murray said of Pizzi. “That’s one of the things that makes a great producer. I’m so proud of her, and I know that Mary-Ellis Bunim would be so thrilled to see a woman leading this company.”

Since taking the reins in 2021, Pizzi — who left BMP in 2004 to start her own production company, P&J Television, before returning in 2016 — has overseen the development of hit shows including Lizzo’s, BET dating series After Happily Ever After and recently announced Paramount Plus series The Family Stallone, while continuing to roll out new seasons of reality hits such as USA’s WWE-themed Miz & Mrs. and the third part of the Emmy-nominated, culturally-defining docuseries Surviving R. Kelly, which aired in January. Pizzi has also reached into alternative media with Facebook Watch shows The Sway Life and House of Creators.

Pizzi helped breathe new life into two classic Bunim/Murray-produced MTV staple reality series, MTV’s The Real World and The Challenge. The Real World, which launched on MTV in 1992 and is considered a reality TV pioneer, has expanded under Pizzi with two “Homecoming” reunion editions, bringing back early stars from the show for a second go at the format. 

The Challenge — which Pizzi first worked on as a showrunner in the late 1990s — was renewed this past June for a remarkable 38th and 39th season. Pizzi has also successfully expanded the franchise to broadcast television in 2022 with CBS’s The Challenge: USA spinoff and to streaming with Paramount Plus’s original series The Challenge: All-Stars.

“She understands what goes into making really great content, but what sets her apart is her ability to modernize the approach for what this era calls for,” MTV Entertainment Group, Paramount Media Networks and MTV Entertainment Studios executive VP and head of global production Keri Flint said. “She continually improves on the shows that are already amazing as she looks for ways to elevate our partnership.”

Industry executives said Pizzi’s ability to understand all facets of the business has endeared her to show crews and to distributors. “The experience that Julie has both as a producer and an executive makes her the ideal leader for Bunim/Murray,” Drew Tappon, OWN TV head of unscripted development, programming and specials, said. BMP produces the network’s reality series Family or Fiancé, which recently completed its third season.

Pizzi’s ability to build on the legacy of Banijay Entertainment-owned Bunim/Murray while laying the groundwork for a new path forward across multiple distribution platforms has earned her the B+C Multichannel News Producer of the Year nod for 2023. In an interview, she spoke about the company’s long-running programming success, its current and future business prospects as well as the overall television marketplace. Here’s a version of that conversation edited for space and clarity.   

B+C: You were a producer for Bunim/Murray in the 1990s and then left to start your own company, only to return and eventually become president of the company. What is it about Bunim/Murray that keeps you coming back? 

JP: I simply adore this company. Everything I learned about unscripted and how to make what is considered a reality show I learned from Bunim/Murray, and I actually learned from Mary-Ellis Bunim and John Murray. When I started my career here, I was a superfan of Road Rules [the BMP/MTV sister show to The Real World] and what they were doing in the genre, and getting into this company was really difficult. It was like getting into Harvard: when you showed up here, you were exhaustively interviewed. You had to do research before you came in and write mission packets and submit writing samples. It was really the only company doing this, and for me, everything I learned here, I just always had such admiration for the company. Then working here in my early 20s was the best time of my life. I literally started traveling right out of the gate. I was doing Road Rules and The Challenge, and there were so many young people that were really trying to play in this space and create what the genre was. So it was a really exciting time. 

B+C: You mentioned working on shows like Road Rules and The Challenge. Why do you have such an affinity and drive for the production side of the business? 

JP: I feel like unscripted allows creators to be really close to the fire. You come up with ideas, you talk to executives, you sell the ideas, and then you come up with these outrageous, crazy things that you could do, especially with some of the genres that Bunim/Murray does here, like The Challenge and Road Rules. Then to actually make them happen and to be the person doing that was really invigorating. It moves really fast and creators really do get to create and see the end product. I don’t think you can say with a lot of entertainment jobs. 

B+C: The list of successful reality shows that Bunim/Murray has created over the years is impressive. You chose to continue building on two shows from the company’s past — The Real World and The Challenge — from MTV. Why do you feel those two shows can transcend generations and still be relevant today? 

JP: I think the core of both of those shows are human stories and they’re very much like a soap opera. If you look at the history, particularly of The Challenge and how we bring back cast members year after year, you see their lives go through ups and downs and victories and losses. Real World was meant to be an unscripted soap opera, and The Challenge really picked that up and ran with it. Last year, MTV came to us and said we really want to do reunions, and I think everyone always loves ‘where are they now?’ But to also know these characters so intimately and to have shared 20-plus episodes with them some 20 years ago, there’s something really impactful about that. It’s not only feeling like you know them, but really seeing people’s stories play out in a way that you not only can relate to, but that also may be aspirational as well. 

B+C: Is it fair to call those shows genre-defining? Put into perspective the influence The Real World and The Challenge have had on the reality genre. 

JP: I think they are sort of the nucleus and sort of where everything started. If you look at competition formats that are successful, a lot of them borrow from each other. If you look at some of those early shows like The Challenge, Survivor, Big Brother, they all have their own unique DNA, but they’ve also borrowed from each other. But when you really get down to it, it’s really these regular people with cameras put on their lives, and what happens when everyone stops being polite and starts getting real. And whether that’s on Big Brother, Survivor, The Challenge or Real World, at the end of the day, why people are viewing these types of shows is to see that character development. 

B+C: Is it easier now to develop, produce and get a reality show distributed, with all of these new outlets, than it was 20 years ago? 

JP: It’s so hard to say because the business has changed so much. Technology has advanced so much, so that’s helped us get programs moving faster, but to actually get a show from an idea onto a screen can have so many steps now. I mean, the development process can take years. We just finished producing a show that took two years to get on the air. It’s a fantastic product, but sometimes it just takes that long for the actual green light. Sometimes you have a casting step, you have a further development step and then you have to get certain deals done. And by the time that all happens, it can be a year and a half. 

B+C: Are you finding that the streaming services are moving more toward reality content, and are you reaching out to them more than cable or broadcast networks for distribution of your shows?

JP: When we create a project, we don’t create for linear or [digital] platforms, we literally just create an idea and then we pitch everybody equally. What we do find is that we get offers from both cable and platforms on the same project. It really doesn’t change the ideas, but I will say that I do believe that all the streamers are interested in unscripted programming. They’ve seen a lot of success in it in the last 18 months, and I think there are some shows that have really cut through. There definitely seems to be a need and certainly an appetite for it. 

B+C: One of those shows that has cut through is Lizzo’s Watch Out for the Big Grrrls, which of course won the Emmy. When you were initially producing that program, did you expect it would be so successful? 

JP: There’s a couple of unique things about that project. The whole show was her idea, and we were brought in after she had already sold it to Amazon. You can look at it as a dance competition show, but it wasn’t that she wanted to do a reality show. She literally wanted to find dancers that looked like her, so there was a real intention behind it. It wasn’t like, ‘I want to make a reality show to be more popular, or to just do reality.’ It was more like, ‘This is a service that I need and this is a great way to get there.’ The second piece of it is that we knew she was going to be on camera. That was always the agreement, but the level in which she showed up on camera and the vulnerability and the honesty that she showed was, I think, unparalleled. I think audiences felt like they got to know her better. She was intimately involved with the dancers and what they were doing. She really cared about them, and you just don’t always see that. I think that magic really came from her and what she really gave to the project, and I really think it translated on-screen. 

B+C: You mentioned the importance and draw of Lizzo to the success of that show, and Bunim/Murray has been successful in building other shows around such celebrities as the Kardashians and Lindsay Lohan. But then you look at the success of shows that don’t have celebrities, like The Real World. What exactly makes for a successful reality show — is it celebrity star power or is it a compelling story about the lives of everyday people?

JP: I think it is always helpful to have a big name. It does draw viewers and that certainly helps for promotion and marketing. But the core of all of these shows are the regular people that are extraordinary and that we care about as humans. I will say that about the dancers that participated in the Lizzo show — they were amazing women that you just fell in love with. Bunim/Murray’s casting department is by far the best I’ve ever seen at finding people to be open enough and raw enough to tell their stories and to be vulnerable. The truth is a lot of the people that are on these shows have never been trained and never been in front of a camera before. For them to really give of themselves is asking a lot, so I really do think the success of this genre is always the casting.

B+C: Are there any genres that you have not jumped into that you would like to explore at some point? 

JP: This summer we produced a 90-minute documentary film called [Dead Hot: Season of the Witch] with Vanessa Hudgens and GG Magree. We had initially pitched it as a series and we had done a presentation, and then we really pivoted and were like, let’s just produce this. I’m not kidding with you — we grabbed like every employee at this company and said, ‘OK, we’re going to  just make this show.’ We all went to Salem, Massachusetts, and shot this spiritual journey for these two women who are like two best friends through the lens of the supernatural world. It ended up being just so good. We paid for it and then sold it after. It was so fun because we could do whatever we wanted. Often, you go out on a show and you have real marching orders of where the project needs to go. But with Dead Hot, we went out with an intention, but then we really let the journey take itself and we ended up with a very different product, and that was really exciting. 

B+C: Is there anything that you haven’t done in your career that you would want to explore going forward? 

JP: I would love to do a real long-form documentary. We’ve done quite a few here at Bunim/Murray, but something that we could shoot over the course of a year. We have schedules and budgets, so it’s really hard to tell a story that has to really unfold over a long period of time. I think that that would be really rewarding. I do think there’s a few spaces that we’ve been looking in, but we’re still on the hunt for a really special project that could take a moment to unfold.

B+C: Any thoughts about developing scripted content at all?

JP: I look at it like this: I’ve been doing unscripted for decades, and Bunim/Murray is so well-known for unscripted. Unless it really made sense, meaning it was like a scripted show about an unscripted world, I don’t think so. There’s so many people that are so excellent at that, that I feel like, why compete when there’s already people that do that so well?

B+C: How do you see the overall television business evolving over the next year? 

JP: Budgets are going to get smaller, but I think orders can get bigger, so there’s ways around that. I don’t know if as many shows are going to get picked up next year, but I think that we’re all hoping for it. One of the things I will say is that unscripted generally is less expensive than scripted, so the hope is that there’s always room for it. We’ve seen so much change this year, and I feel like things are sort of leveling out and there are all these new opportunities popping up. Hopefully unscripted will find its footing, but I think there’s always a concern that there are so many ideas that you really hope that yours can move forward.

B+C: So does that affect the amount of content you’ll be looking to develop in 2023?

JP: It never affects how much we develop. We have actually doubled
down on our dev team this year and hired five new people. Our pipeline is robust and we’re constantly developing shows and pitching shows that we think are good ideas. It’s stuff that we believe in, but we’re literally volleying, and somebody still has to pick up the ball on the other side. We’ll still continue to create as much development to get out
to the buyers, but it’s really whether or not they have the budgets and the marketing money and the space to launch new shows. ▪️

B+C: Jonathan Murray told me that Mary-Ellis Bunim would be thrilled to see a woman leading this company. Put into perspective what it means for you to serve as president of Bunim/Murray. 

JP: It means a lot to me. Mary-Ellis and John mean a lot to me. I will say that it is such an honor to be in these shoes. I think one of the things that was really important to me is to make sure that Bunim/Murray is still a really fun place to play. It’s like a big family. There are people that have been here for decades and people just know each other. They’ve been there when they started their careers, when they got married, when they had babies — we’ve sort of been together for a really long time as a community, and, honestly, the community of Bunim/Murray really expands the walls of the company. There are so many incredibly talented producers in our business that came from here, or worked here and really left an impact. So I really wanted to continue that sentiment of this family business culture at Bunim/Murray, that Mary-Ellis and John had set up years ago — that magic feeling of working in an environment with people that are creative, excited and passionate about making unscripted television. 

B+C: Where do you want to take the company in 2023 and beyond? 

JP: I think one of the biggest things that we have been working on as a team here is expanding what we do. We’ve been through a lot of changes in the last four years — we’ve had a lot of franchise series that have ended or that have gone to different producers or different platforms — so it has created an opportunity for us to expand on who we are. I wouldn’t say reinvent ourselves, because we’re very comfortable being Bunim/Murray, but as the market continues to change and appetites evolve [show] that we’re really capable of producing anything. We really wanted to make sure that our pipeline of development reflected that. We were putting out shows that maybe Bunim/Murray is not known for, but we wanted to show the audience and the buyers that we could do them, and we really succeeded at that this year. We want to continue to grow and take some risks since we still have a lot of franchise series and we have incredible relationships with our partners. They’ve been really fun, and I think the creative process has always been so honored here that we try to step in some directions that might make us uncomfortable and just kind of see what happens. And so far that’s really worked out. ■  

In the aftermath of Lionel Messi and Argentina’s thrilling FIFA World Cup win over France this past December — ending arguably the greatest tournament in the history of the sport — no one would have begrudged Fox Sports from taking its own victory lap. Fox Sports’s successful coverage of the international soccer tournament wrapped up one of the most successful performances in the 28-year history of the organization.

In a year in which live sports programming firmly secured its position as the foundation for the struggling linear television universe, Fox Sports was the category’s North Star, led by its CEO and executive producer Eric Shanks. In 2022, the company’s live sports programming — which ranged from the World Cup and Major League Baseball’s World Series to Big Noon Saturday college football games, Fox NFL Sunday “America’s Game of the Week” coverage and NASCAR races — aggregated an industry-high 265.3 billion minutes of live event consumption this year. It’s the fourth straight year Fox Sports has led all sports distributors in minutes viewed while continuing to embrace the traditional TV bundle for distribution of the majority of its marquee events.

“The thing that’s worked very well for Fox Sports and for Fox is their increased emphasis on broadcast,” TV sports consultant Lee Berke said. “They’ve placed most of their major events on broadcast, buttressed by [cable networks] FS1 and FS2. Sports is a growing percentage of primetime programming on broadcast in general and Fox early on has taken a leadership position on that.”

Fox Sports programming was so prevalent on the Fox network, particularly in the fall, that more than 90% of all the broadcaster’s viewing from Labor Day to New Year’s Eve was attributed to sports. The remarkable amount of consumption was bolstered by Fox Sports’s World Cup coverage. The morning and afternoon telecasts — which aired in November and December, instead of the typical summer, due to host country Qatar’s desert heat — averaged 3.6 million viewers across Fox and FS1, up 30% over Fox’s 2018 World Cup coverage from Russia.

Shanks, the former DirecTV programming executive who joined Fox Sports as CEO in 2010, continued to fortify the division’s portfolio in 2022 by reaching long-term TV rights deals with several important properties. Under Shanks’s tutelage, Fox Sports worked alongside the Big Ten college conference to negotiate a new, seven-year rights deal with Fox, NBC and CBS worth a reported $7 billion. 

Fox Sports in October renewed its Big 12 TV rights as part of a reported $2-billion deal that also includes ESPN and keeps the conference on Fox through the 2030 season. Fox also renewed Major League Soccer in a four-year deal, shutting out ESPN and ABC, which had aired MLS games since the U.S. league’s inception in 1996.

Fox Sports also forged a league of its own with the April 2022 launch of the United States Football League (USFL), the spring league it owns and manages. 

Industry executives said Shanks’s ability to build strong relationships with content partners has helped Fox Sports lock down most of its high-profile sports properties through the latter part of the decade.

‘A Moving Force’

“Eric is a moving force,” MLB commissioner Rob Manfred said. “He’s always coming to us with ideas about things that we might consider rather than him just being receptive to ideas that we have. That’s what makes for a good partnership.” 

NFL commissioner Roger Goodell commended Shanks for being a key member of the team that has helped foster the three-decade relationship between Fox and the league. “Quite simply, Eric has made the NFL better,” he said. “He’s been an incredible partner who’s never afraid to challenge us, which is something I really appreciate.” 

Under Shanks, Fox Sports has also helped evolve the way viewers watch live sports content through technological innovations that have added to the enjoyment of fans rooting for their favorite teams. Whether it’s aerial drone usage and virtual production technology in its NASCAR productions to the introduction of a helmet cam for its USFL telecasts, sports executives said the company’s on-air technical innovations are second to none. 

“Working with Eric Shanks and Fox Sports has been nothing short of phenomenal,” NASCAR president Steve Phelps said. “We love how Fox Sports is willing to push the envelope from a technology and production perspective when it comes to covering NASCAR.”

Not one to rest on laurels, Fox Sports in 2023 will air a second season of the USFL, new baseball and NASCAR campaigns and the FIFA Women’s World Cup. First up this month is Super Bowl LVII, the network’s first telecast of the Big Game since the pre-pandemic 2020 contest. 

“Eric thrives in constantly innovating while consistently executing at the highest levels,’  News Corp. executive chairman and CEO Lachlan Murdoch said. “From launching the new USFL this past spring to the epic fall calendar consisting of the best coverage of college and NFL football, the World Series, World Cup and preparing for the Super Bowl, Eric and his team have performed masterfully in bringing our audience the best in sports.”

Fox Sports on-air veteran Kevin Burkhardt will call his first Super Bowl after succeeding the ESPN-bound Joe Buck as Fox’s top NFL play-by-play announcer. Burkhardt said the Fox culture under Shanks’s direction is to remain aggressive and innovative in its approach to working marquee events.

“We go after things that we want and get big properties and hire good people to work on those properties,” he said. “It’s a message and attitude of being loose, having fun and embracing being on the big stage.”

Shanks, who is the B+C Multichannel News Sports Executive of the Year for 2023, spoke about Fox Sports’s phenomenal 2022 performance and discussed the future of the sports TV in a wide-ranging interview, presented here with edits for clarity and space.

B+C: Put Fox Sports’s 2022 campaign into perspective. Did it meet your
expectations?   

Eric Shanks: Clearly, we couldn’t have predicted such an unprecedented year. When we set our budget in 2021, we couldn’t have predicted that we were going to have probably the greatest sporting event of all time in the World Cup final. The performance of everything that we’ve put on the network just validated the strategy that Lachlan Murdoch and [Fox chairman] Rupert Murdoch put in place, which is to be very focused on being the leader in live television, whether it’s sports or news. It feels to me like we’re unique in that there’s no doubt that we know who we are, and we aim to be the leader in live sports and news every day. By any metric, whether it’s total consumption or whether it’s the individual performance of our events or our leagues, that’s the case. And in the areas where we’re not quite No. 1, I mean, that’s the challenge that we have going forward. 

B+C: You mentioned the World Cup. Fox Sports had some daunting challenges going into the tournament, including an unprecedented fall start plus unfriendly time differences with Qatar. How was Fox Sports able to overcome those challenges? 

ES: It really is all about planning. We were in Qatar two and a half years before the World Cup to start setting all of the pieces in place for the planning. So when that month [of the tournament] comes on the air, it’s the result of this amazing team that we have here to put a plan in place and to execute it. Of course, we can’t predict that an event will unfurl where the biggest stars in the sport actually show up and are the key components of the event at the end. So that’s what kind of paid off: the planning was there and then the stars showed up. 

B+C: Fox Sports continues to offer all of its marquee sports events, whether it’s all 64 World Cup games, the Super Bowl, or even USFL games, on linear television. In a TV environment when more content distributors are moving to streaming, why is Fox Sports so invested in the traditional television platform? 

ES: I actually look at it a little bit differently. If you look at the big rights deals that have been done, there might be media companies that are trying to move things into their streaming services. But if you look at what the professional leagues are doing, the NFL deal had clear priority on broadcast. There are more games on broadcast now for the NFL than ever before. If you look at the Big Ten deal, it’s a move away from cable to three broadcast entities. You look at the MLS deal that we just did. While they did a streaming deal [with Apple TV Plus], they really wanted to have games on broadcast every week. The biggest events from the biggest leagues are still on broadcast television. So our focus is there because we know that being a leader in news and sports is the driver of value in the bundle. 

B+C: So what is Fox Sports’s streaming strategy going forward? 

ES: A big chunk of our consumption comes from streaming — it’s just not direct-to-consumer streaming. We still have great products and availability for people to watch on any device, anytime. So we’re not against streaming; we just aren’t in the business model of direct-to-consumer. For the World Cup, we did a unique deal with Twitter, where we showed the first few minutes of every game live, which set social records for us. We used [Fox Corp.-owned streaming service] Tubi for highlights and on-demand replays which help set streaming records. When the games ended there was a message to go to the Fox Sports App, so the conversion of those fans was tremendous for us. 

B+C: Having said that, could we see a Fox Sports direct-to-consumer streaming service in the next five years? 

ES: We have the rights and the flexibility if we ever wanted to jump in and go DTC. Whether it’s the NFL or Major League Baseball, we have the same rights as everybody, so it’s our choice what to do with them. We can look at our crystal ball and know some of the things that will happen in five years. We know in five years that Fox’s [NFL] ‘America’s Game of the Week’ is still going to be the No. 1 one show on television. We’re still going to have the NFC package and the Super Bowl. We’re still going to have the World Series. Those are the core properties that drive our business. There are a lot of things outside of our strategy that can’t be predicted, such as how many streamers will be around in five years and how many direct-to-consumer offerings there will be in five years. There are things that we have already solidified while letting others help us make future decisions without us having to make the investments. 

B+C: In an era where sports rights are seemingly moving from network to network or to streaming services, Fox Sports last year was able to secure TV rights to such marquee properties as the Big 12, Big Ten and Major League Soccer. How have you been so successful in securing rights deals in such a competitive marketplace?

ES: From a non-business standpoint, we pride ourselves on being a good partner in terms of promoting, cross-promoting and producing content. If you look at our core rights for football, including the NFL, Big Ten, USFL, Pac-12, and also the core rights of NASCAR, Major League Baseball and FIFA international soccer, we really focus on promoting them on-air and being good partners which drives value for us and for them. Our core partners are not commodities; they’re not interchangeable. So I think we’re good partners and because we have identified our core rights, we know that they’re a part of our value equation. I also think one of our success stories was getting more upstream in the rights process, whether by starting our own league or acting as a true partner to the Big Ten as a media rights consultant and playing that role that we did with securing the rights. That’s another thing that we feel sets us apart this year, other than our distribution strategy. 

B+C: Do you see a more competitive marketplace over the next few years as Google, Apple, Amazon and other digital/streaming companies negotiate for sports rights? 

ES: Every time you think that it’s going to be less competitive, it’s always more competitive and a competitive marketplace doesn’t drive prices or costs down. That’s a good thing: You want your partners to be successful if they’re driving value for you. Just like earlier when we talked about our crystal ball, I don’t know in five years if there’s going to be more people bidding for rights or less, but I think they’re in that mode right now. You have companies that aren’t in the sports business now looking to be in the sports business. We’ve always been used to competition, but this is the first time that we’ve competed against $2 trillion companies that aren’t even in our business for rights. So it’s yet to be seen in this competitive environment what will be a success for them and whether they’ll keep going or revert back to their traditional business. 

For us, we’re in the sports business. It’s existential to us. To our newest competitors, it’s not existential; it’s kind of a toe dip in the water to see where it goes. That’s why I’m not sure if there will be more competition or less. History says there’s never less. Even with that, they really can’t impact our business in the next six years because we’ve wrapped up about 80% of our core rights deals, and I think we’re in a really good position to renew those other contracts like NASCAR when it comes up. So at least from our position, the window for them to really impact us has closed. 

B+C: One way to protect rights fees is to create your own league, which Fox Sports did with the USFL last April. Given spring football’s failed history, what made you confident that you could pull this off? 

ES: Well, it was a big jump into the deep end, and I credit my bosses here who believed in the vision. We were born to do football and we believe that in America there is demand out there for more high-quality football across more parts of the year, and we knew that we could make the media part of it a success. In year one, it performed as well as any longstanding sports event in that second and early third quarter. We have a long-term plan for growth. We took our media expertise and put a group together that actually was able to do the football operations, health and safety protocols for the players, ticket sales and marketing for the whole league. We even sold rights to another media partner at NBC. One of the most unique things we did in 2022 was having a media company actually run a league. The crowning of a champion, for the first time since the ’80s, of a spring football league was definitely a unique moment for Fox Sports. 

B+C: Fox Sports is televising Super Bowl LVII. The last time Fox had the big game was in February 2020, just a month before the pandemic. Are you approaching post-pandemic Super Bowl coverage differently than in 2020?

ES: The other thing that was interesting for our last Super Bowl was that it was the NFL’s 100th anniversary, so the content, pregame and everything that the NFL wanted to accomplish along with us was totally different than this year’s event. That being said, every year the network is really responsible for making the Super Bowl bigger than the one before, so we work hand in hand with the NFL on what moments to discuss, what we want America to remember from the event and making the event as big as possible.

B+C: Will we see any new technological innovations during the game?

ES: We’re trying to do some things to get fans closer to the game, whether it’s with audio or new cameras. We usually end up doing some really interesting things from a graphics perspective or data perspective. I think this year, obviously, the thing that’s on top of everybody’s mind is the continued improvement of Damar Hamlin, so we’ll be figuring out how we could celebrate his recovery or improvement. Whatever that ends up being is going to be a great moment. 

B+C: Fox Sports has been aggressive in creating content around sports wagering. Do you believe that such content will inevitably have a major influence on the overall sports television marketplace?

MS: I think we were really aggressive moving into the wagering space, not just as a vehicle for advertising or taking advertising dollars. I’m pretty sure we’re the only media company that has an investment in horse racing wagering, with our 40% ownership in [the New York Racing Association]. We have Fox Bet, and we have our 18.66% [purchase] option in FanDuel. We’re in poker and iGaming and we’re the leading free-to-play app. We’re the only media company that is really invested from an ownership standpoint. So yes, wagering is having an impact and will have an even bigger impact as more states roll out [legalized sports betting]. 

I would say that specific wagering-only content is probably less important because that’s speaking to a niche of a niche. Rather, what’s happening is, in every NFL pregame show and college pregame show, someone is talking about odds, spreads, odds to win a championship or even prop bets. It really has become integrated into the mainstream. I think that’s the biggest impact — everybody feels more free to talk about and use wagering in an event. People now understand odds, so I think those things have the biggest impact today, but we haven’t been able to figure out yet whether wagering is having an impact on viewership. 

I think that the amount of sports on television clearly impacts wagering, because the more sports that you have and the bigger that you make those events, the more [bets] there are. But we don’t really see any evidence yet of wagers impacting viewership.

B+C: In 2019 Fox Sports exited the regional sports business. Given the recent upheaval and evolution within the category, do you see any value in potentially getting back into the regional sports business?

ES: I think there’s a lot of forces that will cause it to evolve, whether it’s a new business model for consumers, whether it’s technology, whether it’s owners and leagues having an expectation of economics that they eventually use to pay players and to put a product on the field. So there’s no question that it’s going to evolve. 

I feel like it will create opportunities for us at Fox, because I’m not sure that the … volume of games will still be played on what we consider to be an RSN. There still may be some, but there may also be the ability to put more games on broadcast television that used to be on an RSN. Look at what [Los Angeles Clippers owner] Steve Ballmer did out here with the Clippers — he just took more games off of his RSN to put them on a broadcast platform. When you’re in 210 markets around the country with a broadcast station, that gives you the opportunity to do a few local over-the-air pro game telecasts and take advantage of our structure, our broadcast nature and our broadcast reach. That might be the evolution of some of that RSN product.

B+C: What’s on your wish list for Fox Sports in 2023? 

ES: As we look at 2023, we have another really unique event in the Women’s World Cup, which is something that we’ve been planning for for years. It’s an event where you really root for the U.S. women’s national team to bring home another World Cup. It’s exciting for us to be able to serve as the flagbearer for women’s sports in this country at the highest level. I don’t think there’s anybody that invests more in the success of women’s sports. Also for us, it’s the beginning of the new NFL contract next year, so working with the NFL on some of the new rules around scheduling and what games we get.

I also want to continue to be the leader in holiday sports fare. It used to be that the holidays were not a great time to put sports on television, but now it’s the best time. Owning Thanksgiving, Christmas, and being around with sports content on New Year’s and Thanksgiving Friday and Saturday is really exciting for us, and that’s only really come around in the last three years for the most part. ￭

The editors of Multichannel News and B+C are pleased to announce the 2022 Wonder Women of Los Angeles, the second class in the West Coast extension of the long-running Wonder Women event. The honorees are a diverse group of female executives from a variety of disciplines at companies involved in TV programming, streaming technology and related fields. 

This year’s honorees will be celebrated at a breakfast on Monday, June 6, at the Sofitel Los Angeles at Beverly Hills, part of the in-person L.A. TV Week 2022. Also to be recognized is 2022 Los Angeles Woman of Influence Holly Robinson Peete, whose extensive resume includes appearances in more than a dozen of Hallmark Channel’s popular made-for-TV movies and whose HollyRod Foundation advocates for causes such as autism and Parkinson’s disease. 

“After the successful return of Wonder Women of New York in March, we are excited about getting back together in Los Angeles to honor this diverse, dynamic group of women leading in so many realms of the media business,” MCN, B+C and Next TV content director Kent Gibbons said. “This will get our L.A. TV Week events off to a great start.”

LA TV Week also includes Advanced Advertising (see page 51), the Next TV Summit, the TV Tech Summit and 40 Under 40 (see page 38). To learn more about Wonder Women of Los Angeles, visit mcnwonderwomen.com/LA. To learn more about L.A. TV Week, visit latvweekevents.com.

For profiles of our 2022 honorees, click through to the profiles below: 

• Holly Robinson Peete, Peformer/Author/Philanthropist and 2022 Woman of Influence 
• Sylvia Bugg, Chief Programming Executive and General Manager, General Audience Programming, PBS
• Lisa Hamilton Daly, EVP of Programming, Crown Media Family Networks
• Ayo Davis, President, Disney Branded Television
• Tara DeVeaux, Chief Marketing Officer, Wild Card Creative Group; Managing Director, 3AM & Insights@Wild Card
• Tara Duncan, President of Freeform and Onyx Collective, Disney General Entertainment
• Michele Edelman, Head of Growth, Premiere Digital
• Lisa Knutson, President, Scripps Networks
• Nikki Love, SVP, Development & Production, ALLBLK, AMC Networks
• Wendy McMahon, President and Co-Head, CBS News and Television Stations
• Tricia Melton, Chief Marketing Officer, Warner Bros. Global Kids, Young Adults and Classics
• Katherine Pope, SVP, Head of Original Content, Charter Communications
• Julie Rapaport, Head of Movies, Amazon Studios
• Shannon Ryan, President, Content Marketing, Hulu & Disney General Entertainment
• Jennifer Turner, EVP, TriStar Television, Sony Pictures Entertainment
• Sarah Weidman, Head of Programming, Development and Multiplatform Content, AXS TV

As a child, Nikki Love drove her mother crazy, acting out scenes from every show and movie while the family was watching (and she was rewatching) TV. “She said, ‘You’re so dramatic, we have to put you in a theater program,’ ” Love said. 

On the surface, acting seemed like “the logical choice,” but it actually wasn’t really what captivated Love, a self-described introvert who also later did modeling. “I was always immersed in storytelling,” she said, adding that she’d be walking through Chicago with her friends with her nose in a book. “They’d have to say, ‘Nikki, a car is com ing.’ ” 

Love’s acting and modeling careers are long behind her. She is now senior VP of development and original production for ALLBLK (formerly Urban Movie Channel), the streaming service for Black TV and film owned by AMC Networks.

Also: Wonder Women of Los Angeles 2022: Hollywood Heroes

“I was never a fan of being in front of the camera,” she said. “I was always looking at what was going on behind the scenes and asking questions.”

Still, Love never would have predicted she’d be working for such a large company. “I’m a little rebellious,” she said, adding with a laugh, “but I’m working on it.” 

Her career shifted when she realized she could do better than the producers on the low-budget films she was acting in. “I thought, ‘I’m way more organized than them,’ ” she said.  

To help her move into producing she had side hustles doing makeup, ghostwriting, volunteering as a production assistant, helping in camera departments. “It wasn’t one set path,” she said. “I’d work for free because it was my own version of film school.” 

As she built a career line producing and executive producing on a wide array of projects, Love turned down jobs at established companies. “I wanted to make my own schedule and pick and choose my own projects,” she said. 

But in 2019, general manager Brett Dismuke, who had joined AMC, invited her aboard. “The first thing I asked was how much autonomy I’d have,” Love recalled. “I didn’t want a company telling me how to tell Black stories.”

She realized ALLBLK offered the best of both worlds, working for a major company but at a pioneering Black streaming network within it that was essentially a startup. At ALLBLK, she felt she could really shape the future, noting that the subscriber base was tiny when she arrived. While AMC would not provide numbers, she says it has grown significantly since then.

“I have a real job,” she said gleefully. “I’m adulting, finally.”

Love has relished the opportunity to take a chance on up-and-coming talent with innovative or unusual ideas. She has brought on MC Lyte (Partners in Rhyme); Michelle Ebony Hardy and Katrina Y. Nelson (Lace); and Kaye Singleon (Covenant). Other hits she has overseen include Craig Ross Jr.’s Monogamy; the Daytime Emmy Nominee Stuck With You; a psychological thriller, Terror Lake Drive; a male dating  comedy, For the Love of Jason; an artist profile docuseries, A Closer Look, and a new multicam comedy, Millennials. Love is involved in script development, production and post-production and is the on-set executive for all original series. 

“She’s attentive and engaged in the process, but she’s also easy to work with and she’s always feeding you positivity,” Nelson said. ■

Finding Ways to Give Back

As ALLBLK has grown, Love is getting more scripts from new and more established talent, but she’s also now realizing the potential of being part of a larger entity, saying she is bringing more of these shows to fruition by expanding their budget in co-productions within the company, with Shudder or AMC or other family members. 

And she has immersed herself in the company in another way, emerging as a leading voice in AMC Networks’ diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) objectives. She participates in the company’s employee resource group VIBE (Vested Interest in Black Employees), where she mentors other group members and is also part of the DEI Content Task Force.

Giving back like that fits right into what she loves about the job itself. “I love that we’re changing the game for Black streaming,” Love said. “It’s very important to me to feel like I am serving my community.” ▪️

In a career spanning more than two decades, Katherine Pope long ago cemented her place in the annals of TV history, helping develop and launch such iconic series as The Office, House, New Girl and 30 Rock through her relationships with studios and programmers big [NBCUniversal] and small [Chernin Entertainment and Studio 8 Entertainment]. 

Now, as head of Spectrum Originals since 2018, Pope faces a new challenge, developing original content for Charter Communications’s exclusive programming arm. It’s a challenge Pope’s boss, Charter senior executive VP David Ellen, said she has been more than up to.

Also: Wonder Women of Los Angeles 2022: Hollywood Heroes

“In a few short years, she and her small team have taken their deep industry knowledge and created a steady stream of high-quality scripted series available exclusively for our Spectrum viewers,” Ellen said. “With these originals, she has developed a truly differentiated experience for our highly engaged audience and exceeded our expectations at every turn.”

But challenges are nothing new for the seasoned TV executive. Throughout her career Pope has taken chances on programs that seemed well below the radar but later attracted huge audiences. At Spectrum, she heads a relatively new original programming unit but has already scored some wins with shows like Joe Pickett, watched by more than 1 million unique households in its first month, making it the most popular show in Spectrum’s short history.

A graduate of Sarah Lawrence College, Pope had brief stints at ABC News and VH1 before landing a job as an associate at NBC in 1998. She stayed there 10 years, rising to executive VP of the network and president of NBC Television Studios, helping to launch shows for both the NBC broadcast network [The Office] and Universal Studios [House], programs that weren’t hits from the beginning. Pope credited a host of other executives who kept those series and others on the air despite ratings pressure. 

“Certainly both House and The Office had amazing champions who stuck their necks out to keep them because they believed in them —- I’m paging you, [former Fox Broadcasting president] Gail Berman and [former NBC president of primetime development] Kevin Reilly,” Pope said. “That said, the worst thing about a show being canceled quickly is you don’t get to continue collaborating with people you love (RIP Ben & Kate!).”

While Pope had a string of successes at NBC, she got the ax in December 2008, along with a handful of other execs, after a disappointing fall lineup with shows championed by her then-boss Ben Silverman, who was let go a few months later. That just presented another challenge Pope quickly overcame, joining former News Corp. chief operating officer Peter Chernin’s Chernin Entertainment in 2009 to head his fledgling TV unit. 

There her run continued with New Girl, which ran for seven seasons on Fox, and others. While Chernin was a well-known, successful TV executive — he ran News Corp., which included Fox, several cable channels and the 20th Century Fox studio for 20 years — Pope said his company was still a departure from the big studio environment. 

“What was fun was Peter was leaving a gigantic job, and we didn’t even really have offices yet, and we would just talk about what we wanted to make and what the company could be and where the business was going,” Pope said. “It was a really special time.  I’m so grateful that I got fired from NBC when I did, and that I got to work with Peter and the team.”

Starting All Over Again

Pope moved to Studio 8 Entertainment in 2015 after Chernin’s development deal with Fox expired, helping to launch its independent TV division. Three years later, she joined Spectrum Originals, for a chance, she said, to build something “from scratch.”

“From the beginning, we said we were going to take a portfolio approach and offer shows that appeal to different segments of our subscriber base. And that is what we have done,” Pope said. “Our viewers are smart and love TV so we just want to be sure we’re making quality content that will keep them engaged and coming back to watch our shows, and we’ve been able to do that thus far.”

At Spectrum Originals, Pope has developed shows in several different genres — action (L.A.’s Finest), drama/thriller (Long Slow Exhale), mysteries (Paradise Lost and Eden), and comedies (The Bite and Mad About You). Viewership and engagement has been strong and programming enjoys a nine-month exclusive window for Spectrum customers, moving on to outlets like Amazon Prime Video and Netflix.

Pope said more is in the pipeline, including A Spy Among Friends (starring Damian Lewis and Guy Pearce), and Joe Pickett is about to start production on season two. “We’re going to keep doing what we are doing which thus far has proven to be successful,” Pope said. ■

Actress, producer, singer and author Holly Robinson Peete has helped redefine the notion of a successful entertainment career not only with five decades of iconic and memorable television roles but also by endeavoring to help others through her off-screen philanthropic works. 

Robinson Peete is best known for her roles in shows such as 21 Jump Street and Hangin’ with Mr. Cooper, as well as appearances in more than a dozen Hallmark Channel holiday films — a number that will increase significantly as part of a recently-signed, multi-picture deal with Hallmark Channel parent Crown Media Family Networks. Her on-screen success was recognized with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in May.

When she’s not in front of the camera, Robinson Peete and her husband, former NFL quarterback Rodney Peete, are tireless advocates for people dealing with Parkinson’s Disease and autism through their HollyRod Foundation.

Also: Wonder Women of Los Angeles 2022: Hollywood Heroes

“Holly is an incredible talent and sets a wonderful example as a strong, authentic and compassionate woman,” said Crown Media Family Networks president and CEO Wonya Lucas. “She is deeply committed to raising awareness about autism and Parkinson’s disease, among other causes, and uses her influence to make positive differences in the world.”

Robinson Peete’s exposure to the world of entertainment began at the early age of six when she made a cameo appearance on PBS’s Sesame Street alongside her father, Matt Robinson, the original Gordon in the beloved children’s series. 

“I wanted to be on Sesame Street with my dad, but he just did not want me to be a showbiz kid — he wanted me to be really good in school, get amazing grades and go to a good college,” Robinson Peete said. “But when I got there and saw those lights and cameras, this 10-foot bird and the dude in the trash can and a guy who ate cookies, I was like, Oh my God, I want to do this.”

She nevertheless heeded her father’s wishes and earned a bachelor’s degree from Sarah Lawrence College in New York before she ventured back into show business. She would land a role as a young undercover police officer in Fox’s 1987 television drama 21 Jump Street.  

“I kind of dabbled a little bit in show business as a teenager, but it wasn’t until 21 Jump Street that I really sunk my teeth into it full time and felt like I could actually make a career out of it,” she said. “I loved Judy Hoffs, the character on 21 Jump Street — she had so much integrity, and a lot of people connected with her and that character.”

She would continue to build an impressive television resume that included starring roles on such popular shows as For Your Love and, more recently, Mike & Molly and drama series Chicago Fire. 

But Robinson Peete said it was her time on the 1992-97 ABC sitcom Hangin’ with Mr. Cooper that had the most memorable effect on her both on- and off-screen. “My husband proposed to me on the set of that show, so that makes that show very special for me,” Robinson Peete said.

Holly and Rodney Peete would eventually star in Hallmark Channel’s 2018 reality series Meet the Peetes, which focused on the couple’s burgeoning family of four children, including a son that was diagnosed with autism. 

The Peetes would also make their mark in the world of philanthropy with their HollyRod Foundation, created to help find a cure for Parkinson’s disease and assist those dealing with autism. Despite all of her on-screen accolades, Robinson Peete said that her idea of success is now more determined by the fortunes of her foundation.

“I’m so motivated by my foundation,” she said. “When I think of success, I never think of whether I won a Grammy or an Emmy, but instead I think of how much money we raised for the HollyRod Foundation.”

Next Role: Executive Producer

Robinson Peete says she looks forward to adding the title of executive producer to her impressive portfolio through her new, multipicture deal with Hallmark. The agreement continues a relationship that began in 2015 between Robinson Peete and the network that has already yielded starring roles in more than a dozen Hallmark Channel and Hallmark Movies & Mysteries projects. 

“I love that Hallmark Channel looks to me as a content creator as somebody who
has more to say than just the lines and really understands or values my input to the creative process,” Robinson Peete said. “That was a huge part of this deal.” ■

There is a real dismissiveness around what women like, what they think about, what they talk about and how they talk about it,” said Lisa Hamilton Daly, who, as executive VP of programming at Crown Media Family Networks, strives to find the type of content that connects with a mass female audience. 

“Women of a certain age, who like a certain thing and who clearly want to be engaged emotionally in their programming are who we target,” she said. “So, to dismiss something simply as a Hallmark or a Lifetime movie — sentimental, dramatic, emotional and not rational, for example — only magnifies my desire to prove the value and the importance of this format.” 

Also: Wonder Women of Los Angeles 2022: Hollywood Heroes

Daly came to Crown Media after a successful three-year stint at Netflix, where she was brought in to develop “Hallmark-type” programs, including the hit drama Virgin River. Daly’s role at Crown Media Family Networks (Hallmark Channel, Hallmark Movies & Mysteries, Hallmark Drama and the Hallmark Movies Now subscription VOD service) is to build on programming strategy and options, attract new audiences across the various platforms and diversify the talent pool, all while staying true to the family-themed, women-centric brand.

“Male critics tend to not like emotionality or melodrama,” she said. “But my feeling is a massive hit show like Game of Thrones is really just a big soap opera. There is a long critical tradition in our community that sort of denigrates emotionality, where the assumption is you are thinking with your emotions and with your feelings, and those things are considered to be less valuable. But my taste is very wide-ranging, and while I might have a ‘fancy’ degree and I watch a lot of ‘fancy’ television, I also have a real sense for what can hit you emotionally.”

A top priority for Daly is to make Hallmark Channel’s storytelling and casting more diverse, she said. “We want to make sure we are telling everyone’s stories — the friendship, the love and the happy endings — all while being reflective of the world we live in.”

After graduate school and while working part-time at a library, Daly took internships for a few film companies, an early entry into the media field. Her first job in the business was at superagent Michael Ovitz’s company, Artist Management Group, in the book division.

“I initially started out wanting to be a writer, and I went to journalism school, Northwestern, for a couple of years,” Daly noted. “Then I realized maybe I did not want to major in journalism.” She eventually earned M.A. and Ph.D. degrees in English and American literature and language from Harvard University, in addition to a B.A. in English literature from UCLA.

After Artist Management Group came a film- and television-focused publishing role at HarperCollins, which led to a five-year stint at DreamWorks, first in New York and then in Los Angeles. There she worked directly with Steven Spielberg, among others, to navigate the vision for future projects and content. 

Daly arrived at A+E Networks, Lifetime specifically, as VP of programming in 2011. In 2018, she segued to Netflix, developing and producing female-driven dramas like Sweet Magnolias, Firefly Lane and the aformentioned Virgin River, shows with multiple seasons that continue to evolve.

Seeking Positive Connections

“We are in a moment of time culturally where there are so many awful things going on in the world that I think people want to find refuge and calm, they want a happy ending, and they want to be connected emotionally in a positive way,” Daly said. “At the core of it, you are really dealing with feelings rather than some intellectual response to something. And I think one of the strengths at Netflix, which I remain true to in how I do my job today, is understanding that not every program has to be super-highbrow.

“For me, the most exciting part of whatever I do is seeing that people are watching and enjoying our programming,” she added. “Being chosen as a Wonder Woman this year only validates my goal of making culture and connecting with the audience. Big ratings and big numbers make me happy, of course. But it really is more about actually experiencing the response from the audience.” ▪️

This year’s crop of TV emerging innovators and pioneers was so strong we couldn’t stop at just 40. On June 7 at the Sofitel Los Angeles in Beverly Hills, the editors of B+C Multichannel News will fete 42 executives at the “40 Under 40” program, part of Future’s L.A. TV Week festivities that also include the Advanced Advertising Summit, Wonder Women of Los Angeles and the TV Tech Summit. 

For more on 40 Under 40, go to tvweek40under40.com. For the full L.A. TV Week lineup, go to latvweekevents.com.

Nicole Baio
Partnerships
Vizio

Nicole Baio is on the business development team at Vizio, where she oversees partnerships for WatchFree Plus and manages various connected-TV app and tech partner relationships and development. Previously, she was at Sony Pictures Television-owned Game Show Network, where she held various roles in content distribution and partner marketing. As an account director, she oversaw all  sales to the NCTC and successfully expanded GSN’s distribution with multiple partners. She also created and executed several collaborative marketing campaigns with major affiliates including Comcast, Charter Communications, Verizon Communications and more, which produced significant media value for GSN and exposure and customer value for partners. She has been an active member of The WICT Network’s Southern California chapter. She is also actively involved in the mentorship and development of younger professionals and is particularly passionate about her work with the T. Howard Foundation. She spends her free time frequenting fitness classes, road tripping, hiking, camping and having dinner parties with family and friends.

Eli Baldridge
Senior VP, Development
A. Smith & Co. Productions

Eli Baldrige spearheads all aspects of development for A. Smith & Co. Productions, the award-winning unscripted television powerhouse. An Emmy Award-winning producer and series developer, Baldrige has produced hundreds of hours of highly-rated unscripted TV shows including Welcome to Plathville (TLC), Pharrell Williams’s Voices of Fire (Netflix) and Canine Intervention (Netflix) since joining the company in 2018. One of his strengths is finding talent and bringing out the best in them in every episode, which was the case with Canine Intervention, a show he conceptualized about a dog trainer. Earlier in his career, Baldrige produced unscripted content including ESPN’s Sport Science and The Weather Channel’s Brainstorm, serving as showrunner. He has also produced several award-winning feature documentaries, including Citizen Soldier and Apache Warrior. After growing up in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, Baldrige studied journalism and film at San Diego State University.

Michael Bucklin
SVP, Digital Content
Fox Sports

Michael Bucklin manages production, distribution and strategic integration of content across Fox Sports digital platforms, including the Fox Sports app and FoxSports.com, as well as Fox Sports social media, video and audio platforms. His team develops digital content to complement Fox Sports coverage of the biggest events in live sports, including the Super Bowl, the FIFA Men’s and Women’s World Cup, the World Series, top-level college football, NASCAR and more, in addition to the network’s studio programming. Bucklin and his team have also developed several successful original digital franchises, including the NAACP Image Award-nominated Club Shay Shay, hosted by Shannon Sharpe; The People’s Sports Podcast with Mark Titus and Charlotte Wilder; Flippin’ Bats with Ben Verlander; The No. 1 Ranked Show with RJ Young; and Out of Character with Ryan Satin. Prior to joining Fox Sports in 2016, Bucklin spent over 10 years at ESPN, rising to producer of social content and leading social media strategy for SportsCenter, SportsNation, First Take and others. He is a graduate of the University of Georgia.

Jennifer Cavrikas
Director, Partner Marketing
Fox Corp. 

Jennifer Cavrikas is responsible for the development and execution of partner
marketing for all networks and digital products in the Fox Corp. portfolio, including Fox, FS1, Big Ten Network, Fox News Channel, Fox Business Channel and a variety of FAST/AVOD services. Her work leverages the company’s sports, news and entertainment brands — with clients like Amazon, Hulu and YouTube TV — to acquire and retain subscribers, increase brand awareness and launch new services. Earlier, she served as manager, creative services, responsible for art direction and event marketing for the 44 national and regional programming services that comprised Fox Networks Group. In previous roles, she executed initiatives for Fox Sports networks, coordinating large-scale and local events and multiplatform media campaigns to drive network visibility and secure distribution and renewal. Cavrikas graduated from the University of California Santa Cruz and serves as board VP of The WICT Network’s Southern California chapter. In 2011, she was chosen as the chapter’s Woman to Watch.

Tal Chalozin
Chief Technology Officer and Co-Founder
Innovid

Tal Chalozin is co-founder and CTO of Innovid, a connected TV and video advertising platform for advertisers to engage consumers across all screens and channels. He leads Innovid’s long-term technology vision, global product creation and implementation and business-development efforts, and also identifies and develops
emerging trends and opportunities for product innovation and digital TV/OTT collaborations. He has forged partnerships with Facebook, Snapchat, Twitter, Samsung, Roku and Hulu, among others, to help advertisers bring interactive video to viewers everywhere. Chalozin is a serial entrepreneur and tireless global leader in video technology. He is a board member for the IAB’s Digital Video Center of Excellence and for the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences. He was named a 2018 inductee to the American Advertising Federation’s Advertising Hall of Achievement for his significant impact on the industry via mentorship, inspiration, volunteerism and training. Prior to Innovid, he co-founded GarageGeeks, a nonprofit organization and one of Israel’s largest hacker spaces and innovation hubs. He owns several global patents in digital video technology and is a regular speaker at global events, including Cannes Lion, CES and Wired magazine’s NEXTFEST.

Stephanie Cobian
VP of Media Services and Talent Relations
TV Guestpert 

Stephanie Cobian is VP of media services and talent relations at TVGuestpert, a media development and publishing company. TVGuestpert strategizes, manages and communicates messaging for companies and their executives, providing a 360-degree PR plan. She books talent appearances on national TV and local radio, produces shows, develops content for social media and news releases and stages events. She is also co-host and producer of the broadcast podcast Front & Center with Jacquie Jordan, which aired on KSWB San Diego and KTLA Los Angeles, and hosts the media podcast WICT Wisdom. She has booked, prepped and produced “guestperts” for national radio and television appearances, host auditions and studio development pitch meetings. She is in the trenches with the producers and experts working out the details of content and elements to provide the most effective, informative and entertaining appearances. Previously, she held positions with Project: Hollywood Cares and IBN Sports and produced several radio shows for KZSB Santa Barbara. She is active on the programming board for The WICT Network’s Southern California chapter and is a volunteer for several local Los Angeles animal rescues.

Jonny Cogut
VP, Development
Jeff Jenkins Productions

As VP of development at Jeff Jenkins Productions, Jonny Cogut shepherded Netflix’s acclaimed Coming Out Colton and global reality franchise Bling Empire and has produced pilots for Lifetime, TLC, NBCU, HGTV and Discovery. Prior to JJP, Cogut was on the development team at Brian Graden Media, working across its slate of docuseries, game shows and unscripted formats. He has also served as creative director at Refinery29, developing short-form projects for digital platforms. Cogut originally worked with Jenkins when he was co-president of Bunim-Murray Productions. There, Cogut served as producer on hit series including Keeping Up with the Kardashians and Total Divas (E!), Miz & Mrs. (USA) and Lohan Beach House (MTV). Bling Empire, a series following an ultra-rich Asian-American community of friends and families in Los Angeles, was a fast hit for Netflix with a second season set to debut in 2022. On the heels of Bling’s success, JJP launched Netflix’s My Unorthodox Life, also ordered for a second season. The docuseries Coming Out Colton, following former Bachelor star Colton Underwood, is the company’s third show for Netflix. Cogut and team currently have several unannounced unscripted series in development and production for a variety of platforms.

Kelle Coleman
SVP, Global Content and Experiences
Nielsen

Kelle Coleman is responsible for broadening Nielsen’s visibility, corporate strategy and industry influence through U.S. and global event execution, content marketing, innovative marketing strategies, communications, C-suite executive engagement cross-functional collaboration, improving best practices and increasing return on investment. Coleman has always been driven by her interest in marketing, but more specifically by understanding business objectives and driving the company toward those goals in a way that tangibly impacts the bottom line. Prior to Nielsen, she served in national partnership marketing at Macy’s, managing strategic development and procurement of partnerships with brands such as American Express, Unilever and Patron Spirits for key campaign planning and event initiatives such as the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, the 4th of July Fireworks events and  the Annual Flower Show. Before joining Macy’s, Coleman held marketing positions with the New Jersey Nets and Reebok International, where she began her career. She
serves as executive sponsor for Nielsen’s Business Resource Group. She has a
bachelor of science with a business administration concentration from Florida A&M University.

Derek Crocker
VP of Collegiate Sports
Fox Sports

Derek Crocker is responsible for creating the college football and basketball broadcast schedules for Fox Sports, including which games are selected in the football “draft” process — a multifaceted, data-driven analytical process of determining the strategic planning and programming to select which games will air on the appropriate Fox Sports network. Over his 15-year career with the company, Crocker has cultivated relationships with Fox Sports’s collegiate league partners and commissioners and is the “boots on the ground” executive collaborating with Big Ten, Big 12, Pac-12, Mountain West and Big East football and basketball conferences to navigate big-picture issues, which recently included the unprecedented impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. In the past nine years, Crocker has been an integral part in maintaining Fox Sports’s relationship with the Big East as well as a part of the team that landed its Big Ten rights agreement and helped secure a new partnership with the Mountain West Conference. Beyond his corporate success and with a pay-it-forward attitude, he dedicates personal time to foster the growth and student mentorship of those with an interest in careers in sports media.

Angela Dallas
Scripted Television Agent
CAA

Angela Dallas is a television literary agent at Creative Artists Agency (CAA). Based in Los Angeles, she represents many accomplished television writers, playwrights, producers and directors, including Morgan Cooper (Bel-Air), Steven Canals (Pose), Tim Federle (High School Musical: The Musical: The Series), Matthew Lopez (The Inheritance), Rafael Casal (Blindspotting), Dayna Lynne North (Insecure), Karim Amer and Jehane Noujaim (HBO’s The Vow), Victoria Mahoney (Star Wars: Episode IX – The Rise Of Skywalker, Lovecraft Country), Tom George (This Country), Dave Hill (Game of Thrones, Wheel of Time), Joel Fields and Joe Weisberg (Fosse/Verdon, The Americans), Lila Byock (Watchmen, Castle Rock, Devil in the White City), David Hollander (Ray Donovan), Catalina Aguilar Mastretta (Everybody Loves Somebody), Andrew Hinderaker (Away, Let the Right One In), Malcolm Spellman’s The 51 (The Falcon and the Winter Soldier) and Shawn Ryan’s Middkid Productions (S.W.A.T.), among others. Dallas also helps guide the television efforts of celebrated actors and artists, including Rachel Brosnahan, Billy Porter, Luke Evans, Haim, Todrick Hall, Pentatonix, Norman Reedus, Storm Reid, Emmy Rossum, RuPaul, Yara Shahidi and Kerry Washington. She began her career at ICM and joined CAA in 2011. Dallas graduated from the University of Mount Union in Alliance, Ohio with a degree in business administration and theater.

Aileen Del Cid
Head of Marketing, Samsung TV Plus
Samsung

As head of marketing for Samsung TV Plus, Aileen Del Cid oversees all marketing operations, strategy, branding and strategic partnerships for the global streaming platform. She has more than a decade of experience in entertainment marketing and has led branding efforts, product launches, integrated campaigns and strategic partnerships for multiple organizations throughout her career. Prior to Samsung TV Plus, she held roles as CTV advertising lead marketer for DirecTV Now and digital advertising lead marketer for the DirecTV mobile app. In these roles, she oversaw marketing strategies that grew subscriber bases, managed and grew relationships with entertainment partners and emerging platform partners and was responsible for customer adoption and retention. Earlier, Del Cid worked in distribution marketing at Game Show Network, where she led the sales team through the development and execution of strategic marketing efforts to drive subscriber acquisition. She joined GSN from Universal Sports Network, where she managed and developed strategic B2B and consumer-facing marketing campaigns and governed a
multimillion-dollar marketing budget. She graduated from California State University, Northridge, and has served as a board member of The WICT Network’s Southern California chapter.

Ross Dinerstein
CEO
Campfire Studios

Ross Dinerstein is the founder and CEO of Campfire Studios, a premium production company known for its broad bench of content across scripted and unscripted, for both feature film and TV/streaming platforms. Over the past 20 years, Dinerstein has produced or executive produced more than 50 series and feature films, premiering projects at the most prestigious festivals in the world, including Sundance, SXSW, Tribeca and Toronto. Dinerstein and Campfire’s current and most recent projects include HBO Max’s The Way Down: Part 1 and Part 2 and Heaven’s Gate: The Cult of Cults; Hulu’s WeWork: Or the Making and Breaking of a $47 Billion Unicorn; FX’s Hysterical and The Most Dangerous Animal of All; Magnolia’s A Glitch In the Matrix; Discovery Plus’s Scream: The True Story; CNN’s The Lost Sons; Voir (executive produced by David Fincher), Neymar: The Perfect Chaos and John Grisham’s The Innocent Man, all for Netflix, as well as the streamer’s Emmy-nominated scripted series Special. Dinerstein’s first foray into the podcast space resulted in the Webby Award-winning series Abuse of Power with David Rudolf and Sonya Pfeifer. Dinerstein has also produced nine Netflix Original features, including Rattlesnake; thriller 1922, based on the Steven King novella; comedy The Package; and the streamer’s upcoming rom-com Players, starring Gina Rodriguez and Damon Wayans Jr. His credits also include IFC’s cult horror movie The Pact and feature documentaries Jiro Dreams of Sushi and Silicon Cowboys.

Lindsey Emerson
VP of Product Management
HBO Max

Lindsey Emerson is VP of product management at HBO Max and leads the Kids & Family, Accessibility, Privacy & Consent, Tools and Sports/Live teams. She joined HBO Max as a founding team member. Her team launched the Kids & Family platform in the U.S. and continues to expand the offering to kids through an autonomous and age-appropriate experience, while giving parents simple-to-understand and transparent controls within each  region. Under Emerson’s leadership, her team builds on and improves the HBO Max platform to ensure stories are accessible to everyone through thoughtful and inclusive technology features. Her team has built processes to ensure that accessibility considerations are infused into each new feature on the roadmap, while also being data-compliant within each region as global expansion continues. Her team also launched HBO Max’s sports and live capabilities in 2021, including the ability to stream live soccer, concert series and more in Latin America. Prior to joining WarnerMedia in 2017, Emerson served as director of product management for The Bouqs Co., where she drove ecommerce platform optimization and improved distribution effectiveness, helping to secure a series-C funding round of $24 million. In 2013, she joined Pluto TV as a founding product leader and managed the FAST streaming service’s launch on 15 connected TV, gaming, OTT and mobile platforms, helping to secure investment rounds through series C. She graduated with honors from the media ventures graduate program at Boston University and holds a B.A. in communications from Elon University. 

Maura Feerick 
VP, Drama Original Series
HBO Max

Maura Feerick, promoted to VP of drama original series in April 2021, is part of the core programming team that launched HBO Max in May 2020, charged with developing an offering geared toward Gen Z and millennial audiences. Among the shows on her slate are The Staircase; Tokyo Vice; Pretty Little Liars: Original Sin, a new generation of the series based on the pop-culture phenomenon from showrunner Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa; and Love Life, a romantic comedy anthology starring Anna Kendrick and produced by Paul Feig. She also played an integral role in developing The Suicide Squad spinoff Peacemaker for HBO Max. Prior to HBO Max, Feerick worked on the launch of TNT hit drama series Claws, overseeing three seasons. She also oversaw Patty Jenkins’s period mystery I Am the Night, as well as sci-fi epic Snowpiercer, now in its fourth season. Before joining WarnerMedia, Feerick worked in television production at NBCUniversal, E! and Film 44. She is a graduate of The George Washington University and majored in communications and electronic media and is an active member of The WICT Network.

Joey Femia
VP, Current Programming
Universal Television Alternative Studio

As VP of current programming, Joey Femia oversees a wide range of series including live music competition American Song Contest, hosted by Snoop Dogg and Kelly Clarkson; comedy-variety event series That’s My Jam, hosted by Jimmy Fallon; Weakest Link, hosted by Jane Lynch; and College Bowl, hosted by Peyton Manning. Femia is also responsible for previous notable projects including holiday baking competition series Baking It, hosted by Maya Rudolph and Andy Samberg; LeBron James’s The Wall; Hollywood Game Night; World of Dance; and more. Femia began his career as part of Walt Disney World’s professional internship program. He went on to Blue Man Group as a stagehand at Universal Orlando Resort, followed by a production internship in New York at ABC’s The View. He relocated to Los Angeles in 2013 as a production assistant on programs ranging from NBC’s The Voice to The Academy Awards to The Grammy Awards. He then joined NBCUniversal as a coordinator in the alternative programming division before rising to director of current programming in 2020 at Universal Television Alternative Studio. Femia graduated with a B.A. in radio and television production and a B.S. in event management from the University of Central Florida.

Laura Forti
SVP, Business Operations, HBO, HBO Max TNT, TBS and truTV
Warner Bros. Discovery

As senior VP of business operations for HBO, HBO Max and The TNets (TNT, TBS and truTV), Laura Forti is responsible for business operations for original programming across these platforms and works to support expansion of these businesses. In this recently expanded role, Forti is responsible for coordinating all matters related to the distribution of original content from the four brands as well as creating strategy and executing deals for international original content created for HBO Max. She also works with international partners to expand the global reach of the brands’ U.S. programming and build new partnerships with third parties such as Sky and the BBC. She began working for the company in 2006, when it acquired her previous employer, Court TV. She has held a variety of roles within the international distribution and business affairs divisions. Based in Los Angeles, she reports to Susanna Felleman, executive VP of business affairs. She is a graduate of  The WICT Network’s Betsy Magness Leadership Institute.

Carrie Gillogly
SVP, Scripted Programming & Co-Head of AMC Scripted Series
AMC Networks

Carrie Gillogly has overseen such AMC series as Into The Badlands, The Terror, The Son, Dispatches from Elsewhere from Jason Segel and the stop-motion animated Ultra City Smiths, created by Steve Conrad, and currently oversees the production of AMC’s forthcoming animated drama Pantheon, as well as the series Kevin Can F*** Himself starring Annie Murphy and Anne Rice’s Interview with the Vampire, written by Rolin Jones. Based in Los Angeles, Miller shares duties with senior VP Emma Miller and reports to Dan McDermott, president of entertainment & AMC Studios. Before AMC, Gillogly worked as an executive at Gerber Pictures, participating in the development of such projects as Gran Torino and A Star Is Born. Since joining AMC in 2012, Gillogly has risen through the ranks, becoming an instrumental leader of the company’s development team responsible for attracting new voices and stories. A champion of mentorship and inclusion, Gillogly serves as an executive sponsor of Elevate, the AMC Networks employee resource group dedicated to empowering the personal and professional growth of women employees and allies across the organization. 

Lindsey Green
SVP, Content Sales
Disney Platform Distribution

Lindsey Green, a 17-year veteran of The Walt Disney Co., is responsible for licensing feature films and television content from The Walt Disney Studios and Disney General Entertainment Content as senior VP, content sales, in Disney Platform Distribution. Her business responsibilities include domestic and global subscription video-on-demand and advertising-supported VOD platforms, West Coast-based cable networks and select pay TV networks. She and her team also manage the company’s distribution of content to its direct-to-consumer streaming services — Disney Plus, ESPN Plus and Hulu — and its linear networks. Her client roster includes Netflix, Amazon, YouTube, Starz, Roku and Tubi. Prior to her content sales role, Green oversaw key distribution agreements across a wide array of media platforms including MVPDs, digital retailers, global airlines and hotels. 

Will Gurman
VP, Global Partnerships & Content Strategy
Paramount Streaming

Will Gurman works cross-functionally to optimize the growth and performance of Pluto TV’s content partnerships and Paramount’s vast content library and to expand the global reach and monetization of the content Pluto TV acquires. He sources, evaluates and acquires TV series, films, sports and digital content to distribute across Pluto TV’s expanding FAST platform consisting of ad-supported live, linear channels and on-demand properties. He also manages key partnerships with top entertainment and news networks, major studios and indie distributors by delivering business reviews, optimizing content pipelines and developing and executing against individualized strategic plans. Before Paramount, he was senior director of content acquisition and strategy at Fullscreen, playing a key role bringing Fullscreen’s SVOD service to market by shaping content strategy, budget plan and programming schedule by sourcing and acquiring content for a millennial and Gen-Z audience. He began his career at 20th Century Fox Television in the brand management and strategy group. He graduated from Yale University with a B.A. in political science and earned an MBA from UCLA’s Anderson School of Business.

Rachel Koehler 
VP, Original Content
Tubi

Rachel Koehler brings a holistic and creative approach to Tubi’s content strategy, leveraging a wide range of industry experience and expertise across programming development, content acquisitions and digital sales. With a keen eye for splashy and breakthrough content, Koehler most recently helped lead Tubi’s debut into originals, playing an active part in developing more than 140 hours of Tubi Originals in 2021 alone. From script to screen, she has shepherded premium independent-minded titles across the Black cinema, thriller, horror, sci-fi, romance and Western genres. Koehler also led the development of Tubi’s upcoming original movie event Corrective Measures starring Bruce Willis and Michael Rooker, slated to premiere in 2022. She previously led the indie content acquisitions and partnerships team at Tubi, forming partnerships with major studios and brands including Samuel Goldwyn, Lego, Mattel, FilmRise and Magnolia, and she spearheaded Tubi’s content deal with STXfilms. \

Prachi Kohli
Legal Affairs
National Diversity Coalition (NDC)

Prachi Kohli is a lawyer by profession, currently working in legal affairs with the National Diversity Coalition (NDC), a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization dedicated to advocating for greater opportunity, financial equality and economic empowerment for the diverse, minority and LMI communities and to being a voice for the voiceless. NDC partners with cable and telecom companies, program networks, financial institutions and others to bring information and initiatives to low-income communities aimed at creating economic opportunities. With NDC, Kohli also is advocating for Chime TV, the upcoming Asian American-owned network featuring Asian culture and entertainment. Charter Communications is the first launch partner for Chime TV. Raised in India, she has been passionate about working for equal opportunity and has a deep appreciation for diverse cultures. She joined the NDC in 2019. She wishes to use her legal skills to serve and advocate for the right thing and to continue to empower the next generation. Outside of work, she has a keen interest in astronomy and developments in outer space exploration. She also enjoys sci-fi documentaries and Bollywood movies.

Megan Macmillan
SVP, Comedy Development
Universal Television

Megan Macmillan joined Universal Television as manager, comedy development in 2016, promoted to VP, comedy development in 2019 and now is senior VP. While at UTV, she has been involved in developing multiple series for home networks NBC and Peacock, most recently including Grand Crew, Girls5eva, MacGruber, Killing It and the upcoming Pitch Perfect. She focuses on comedy, diversity and inclusion as fundamental aspects of these series. She also has been integral to developing Universal's dynamic streaming slate including Schmigadoon! for Apple TV Plus, Harlem for Amazon Prime Video and the upcoming series Blockbuster, starring Randall Park as one of the employees at the last remaining U.S. Blockbuster Video store, for Netflix. Macmillan came from Davis Entertainment where she served as a creative executive in both television and film and previously had stints at Sony Pictures Television in the comedy development department and CAA.

Patrick McCarthy
VP, Series Publicity & Talent Relations
Universal Studio Group 

Patrick McCarthy is VP of series publicity and talent relations at Universal Studio Group: scripted studios UCP and Universal Television, unscripted studio Universal Television Alternative Studio and Universal International Studios. Under the mentorship of executive VP of communications and marketing Tracy St. Pierre, McCarthy leads campaign strategies for programming including Hacks, The Umbrella Academy, American Song Contest, Girls5Eva, Chucky and Dick Wolf’s Law & Order, One Chicago and FBI franchises.  Recently, he implemented campaigns for groundbreaking television series including As We See It, featuring a neurodiverse lead cast; and We Are Lady Parts, about a group of Muslim women setting out to be rock stars; as well as Dr. Death and The Girl From Plainville, two limited series with pro-social messages of patient safety and mental health awareness, respectively.He lives in Los Angeles with his husband, film and television writer Tyler Christensen, and their dogs Lambeau and Brom Bones.

Maryam Mehrtash
VP, Integrated Marketing, CBS Entertainment & Paramount Plus 
Paramount

Maryam Mehrtash oversees Paramount Plus, CBS Entertainment and CBS Media Ventures and is responsible for driving revenue by proactively positioning the platforms and their programming to the advertising marketplace and overseeing post-sale execution for monetized opportunities. Having spearheaded Paramount Plus’s go-to-market launch strategy in 2021, Mehrtash has led the team through a period of exponential growth by innovating in creating novel opportunities for brands. She brings to her role more than 15 years of experience in content, marketing and sales across entertainment and media. She has driven multimillion-dollar sales strategy and execution from CBS late night to The Grammy Awards to multiplatform franchises including Star Trek, Yellowstone spinoff 1883, The Challenge and the upcoming Halo. Prior to Paramount, Mehrtash led the digital monetization strategy for KTLA Los Angeles, was a consultant and adviser to top media and television agencies and produced two lifestyle television shows. A gifted storyteller, her clear-eyed vision, trailblazing spirit and creative drive have led her to constantly push boundaries to bring custom solutions to brands and the industry at large. 

Emma Miller
SVP, Co-Head of AMC Scripted Development
AMC Networks 

In her role as senior VP and co-head of AMC Scripted Development and Programming for nine years, Emma Miller focuses equally on developing new series and overseeing current shows. Her credits include Fear The Walking Dead, Hell on Wheels; The Son, Dietland, NOS4A2, Soulmates, The Walking Dead: World Beyond and the upcoming Dark Winds. Previously, Miller was a creative executive at Steven Spielberg’s Amblin Television, where she worked on FX’s The Americans, Under the Dome and Showtime’s The Borgias; and as a creative executive at Grady Twins, Marti Noxon and Dawn Olmstead’s production company. In 2022, AMC Networks will premiere its largest original content slate to date, with Miller at the helm of some of its most anticipated dramas, including Dark Winds, a psychological thriller executive produced by George R.R. Martin and Robert Redford, based on the Leaphorn & Chee book series by Tony Hillerman. The show features a writers’ room staffed entirely by Native American writers, with a cast led by Zahn McClarnon and featuring Native American actors, filmed largely in and around Native American lands, with the full support of the Navajo Nation. Miller began her career as a literary assistant at The William Morris Agency, later WME. Based in Los Angeles, Miller shares duties with SVP of scripted programming Carrie Gillogly and reports to Dan McDermott, president of entertainment and AMC Studios.

Jordan Neyer
SVP, Corporate Strategy
Crown Media Family Networks

Jordan Neyer leads the strategic planning and growth tactics that support the advancement of overall performance at Crown Media Family Networks (Hallmark Channel, Hallmark Movies & Mysteries and Hallmark Drama; Hallmark Movies Now and Hallmark Publishing). He has been a transformational strategic leader guiding the evolution of the Hallmark portfolio, including linear and OTT platforms, and has been successful in creating new media entities based on existing Hallmark IP. He works directly with company executives and stakeholders to develop both long and short-term strategic initiatives that will improve the business’s growth and profitability. Prior to joining Crown Media, Neyer was VP of media and entertainment at Metrixlab, where he led commercial strategy and new business development. Previously, he was VP of strategy at Fox Networks Digital Consumer Group and held additional strategic roles at Fox Film and Fox Home Entertainment. “What differentiates Jordan from others is his strong collaborative skills, congenial demeanor, and a fearless approach to examining the future state of our business and our industry,” Crown Media CEO Wonya Lucas said. 

Sarah Pilla
Multimedia Journalist
Spectrum News 1

Sarah Pilla is an Emmy award-winning multimedia journalist for Spectrum News 1, where she covers lifestyle, entertainment and the environment for the 24/7 local news network. In 2021, she won a Los Angeles Area Emmy Award for  “Outstanding Environment News Story” for “Oceana Trash” on the dangers of plastics and their effect on ocean ecosystems. Since joining Spectrum News 1 SoCal, she’s covered national politics, Hollywood awards shows, lifestyle and wellness topics, but she is a passionate advocate for the environment and our changing climate. Pilla is dedicated to helping viewers understand the importance of preserving our planet through everyday lifestyle choices. Prior to Spectrum News 1, she hosted lifestyle shows at Ignite Now Media, and also served as an anchor for One America News Network and as a sports anchor and reporter at KSAN San Angelo, Texas. She holds a B.A. in journalism from California State University, Northridge in 2011 and is a 200-hour registered yoga teacher.

Anastasia Puglisi
SVP and Supervising Producer
Wolf Entertainment

As senior VP and supervising producer for Wolf Entertainment, Anastasia Puglisi is responsible for day-to-day creative and production-related activities for all Wolf Entertainment’s scripted series: Law & Order: SVU, Law & Order: Organized Crime, Chicago Fire, Chicago PD, Chicago Med, FBI, FBI: Most Wanted, FBI: International newly rebooted series Law & Order and all development and operations-related activity at the company. She joined Wolf Entertainment in 2015 and quickly rose through the ranks, advancing from a showrunner’s assistant on Chicago Fire to an executive in just a few years. The Connecticut native graduated from Fordham University with a degree in communications, film studies and business administration and is a classically trained ballet dancer. Prior to joining Wolf, Puglisi was as a freelance production coordinator in independent film in both New York and Los Angeles. 

Si Rajadhyax
Multiplatform Producer
Cox Media Group

Originally from Lake George, New York, Si Rajadhyax’s passion for music production took him to Full Sail University in Orlando, Florida, to earn a degree in entertainment business. He began his story with Cox Media Group by pursuing an internship at radio station WPYO (Power 95.3), which eventually led to his current position as multiplatform producer. Over the last 10 years, he has filled different roles at Cox  and excelled in digital content creation. His talents and work ethic brought him to Atlanta to join an emerging corporate team focused on OTT content and the evolving media landscape. When not behind the camera, Rajadhyax is as an actor, DJ, podcaster, singer/music producer, host and personality. He has a strong passion for innovation and said his ultimate goal is to stay happy, stay learning, spend more time with family, make people smile and entertain. 

Jenny Ramirez
SVP, Unscripted Programming
TBS, TNT, truTV 

Over the past five years, Jenny Ramirez has developed a slate of premium nonfiction projects across TNT, TBS and truTV. Highlights include launching four top cable comedies: Snoop Dogg Presents: The Joker’s Wild, The Misery Index, TBS’s reboot of Wipeout and the network’s first cooking competition, Rat in the Kitchen. She oversaw TNT’s live medical series Chasing the Cure and AEW’s first spinoff series, Rhodes to the Top. She is currently leading Rich & Shameless, TNT’s first foray back into the world of true crime since Cold Justice, followed by dating social experiment The Big D and comedic variety show Stupid Pet Tricks. Both series will premiere on TBS in 2022. Her passion for storytelling began while serving as assistant editor for legendary book publisher Judith Regan. Then, while working in FremantleMedia’s nonscripted development department, she adapted formats for the U.S. and modernized game shows from the Mark Goodson library. She developed series for A&E, NBC, Fox, MTV, CBS and Syfy.

Lynzie Riebling
VP, Insights
Revolt TV

Lynzie Riebling, VP of insights at Revolt TV, has earned a reputation as a creative and effective powerhouse within the insights industry. Specializing in qualitative research, she approaches her work in a way that most don’t — by valuing human behaviors over big data and finding new and unique approaches to reach consumers. She does this using her interdisciplinary background in insights and strategy to keep her finger on the pulse of culture, identify emerging youth trends, track consumer shifts within the millennial and Gen Z mindset, and map out the ever-evolving media landscape. “I thought I wanted to work in fashion — which is what initially prompted my move to NYC, but after taking a market research class my junior year of college I realized it was indeed insights that spoke to my soul and never looked back,” she said. Profiled in Forbes and other publications for her research analysis, she is an expert panelist (for The WICT Network and the California Cable Telecommunications Association, among others). Despite her youth, her research expertise spans more than a decade.  

Christina Rieger
Director of Sales, National
Ampersand

Christina Rieger has spent the last 10 years of her career in the addressable TV space engaging with clients and agencies on an audience-first approach to buying and measuring TV media. She is a tireless client advocate and constantly challenges the norms of how traditional television should be measured and bought. As a pioneer in the addressable space, she has had a front-row seat for the convergence of TV and digital. With her role at Ampersand as director of sales, national, she is moving TV forward by simplifying addressable activation for her clients with direct access to audiences at scale across 52 million-plus addressable homes and providing more in depth data and measurement across a client‘s full TV investment. In 2021, Rieger and her team surpassed revenue targets, reaching 160% of its goal for Ampersand’s West Coast unit. She is passionate about reducing her carbon footprint whether it’s recycling, creating less waste or driving zero-emissions vehicles. She also is a passionate animal lover, rescuing multiple cats and dogs and donating to animal welfare charities.

Kimberly Rosenblum
SVP, Business and Legal Affairs
ITV Studios America

As senior VP of business and legal affairs at ITV Studios America, Kimberly Rosenblum serves as a lead negotiator for the production of premium scripted content for distribution via streaming, cable, and broadcast networks and as an adviser to her creative colleagues. A graduate of Stanford University and USC Gould School of Law, Rosenblum began her career at Weintraub Tobin. She lives in Westwood, Los Angeles, with her husband, Eli Greif. She transitioned seamlessly from representing high-end talent at a major California law firm to handling a wide variety of business and legal matters for ITV Studios America. She contributes greatly to ITVSA’s goal of maintaining an independent studio culture rooted in collaboration, ingenuity and supporting its production and creative colleagues. As an experienced talent attorney, Rosenblum is able to look at deals from the talent’s point of view, thereby supporting ITVSA’s mission to foster a talent-friendly environment. She is committed to finding creative and collaborative solutions when making deals. 

Andrew Schotz
Head of Development
Anvil 1893 Entertainment

Award-winning producer and director Andrew Schotz serves as head of development of prolific production company Anvil 1893. Having joined the company in 2016, Schotz produced Kids Say the Darndest Things starring Tiffany Haddish for CBS (he also worked on the series’s previous run on ABC) and developed the primetime original series Money Court for CNBC, starring Shark Tank’s Kevin O’Leary and currently in preproduction on season two. His credits also include CBS’s primetime hidden camera show I Get That a Lot, MTV’s dating show Time’s Up, History’s Transition of Power and Travel Channel’s America’s Secret Swimming Holes. Schotz’s career launched in 2012 when he directed, produced and edited the viral video “Grandmas Watch the Kardashian Sex Tape,” which garnered more than 6 million views and was nominated for Viral Video of the Year. The viral sensation caught the eyes of millions, including Oprah Winfrey, which ultimately led to The Golden Sisters TV series on OWN. He has produced nine national commercial spots and continues producing and directing online content. 

Samantha Serigano
National Advanced TV Account Director
Ampersand

Samantha Serigano has been in the ever-evolving TV industry for five-plus years and at Ampersand has helped build the foundation for national and local data-driven TV on digital and linear platforms across the West Coast. She started at Ampersand as a digital account manager, then as a digital account director, cultivating relationships and building strategic partnerships across a wide portfolio of agencies and brands in the media marketplace. She migrated to the Ampersand National Advanced Advertising Team, where she has been responsible for growing the largest portfolio of addressable-TV partnerships across a multitude of brands. Since National Cable Communications rebranded as Ampersand in 2019, followed by its launch of the AND Platform, she has been one of the most visible evangelists in getting clients to adopt a cross-platform, integrated approach. She volunteers at a local daycare center/preschool, teaching art classes, and organizes weekend volunteer events to help local food banks. She also participates in Malibu/Topanga Beach cleanups a few times a year, as she is passionate about a clean environment.

Ariana Tejero
Senior Producer
Spectrum News 1

Ariana Tejero is the senior producer of Spectrum News 1’s weekday evening newscast, Your Evening on Spectrum News 1, in Southern California. 
She also manages the news department’s internship program. She has poise and credentials far beyond her years. Previous roles range from intern to executive
producer, the latter position in which she oversaw eight shows and mentored seven reporters at a local NBC station upon college graduation. She started working professionally in 2015, as a sophomore in college, at that NBC affiliate. In 2016, her junior year, she launched an ongoing local talk show there that went on to win an Emmy the subsequent year. Tejero earned a B.A. in screenwriting from Loyola Marymount University, graduating as valedictorian of the School of Film and Television in 2017. 

Simon Thomas
President of ITV Entertainment and Head of International Programming
ITV

Simon Thomas oversees ITV Entertainment’s robust slate, shepherding the development, sale and production of splashy formats and live-event programming. At ITV America, Thomas has overseen or executive-produced a range of hit series for broadcast and cable networks, as well as streaming platforms, including Love Island; musical competition The FOUR and American Grit with John Cena for Fox; Pawn Stars and Forged in Fire for History; and HBO Max’s upcoming My Mom, Your Dad; as well as projects for ABC, A&E, Food Network, Facebook Watch, National Geographic, Netflix, NFL Network and TLC. Prior to joining the ITV America group — first as a showrunner for ITV America’s Leftfield Pictures — Thomas had accrued more than a dozen years of experience across all genres of unscripted television, including live, studio, documentary and reality programming. He spent several years at Endemol Australia, where he worked on large format reality hits such as Big Brother and Beauty & The Geek Australia. He also helped develop several shows while producing smaller projects such as the acclaimed series Last Chance Surgery. 

Kenny Tsai
SVP, Current Programming
Universal Content Productions

As a senior VP, current programming at Universal Content Productions, Kenny Tsai oversees a roster of shows that include Queer as Folk, The Umbrella Academy and Chucky. He was previously VP of current programming at Universal Television, where he was responsible for overseeing drama and comedy series, including the recently launched Bel-Air on Peacock as well as Netflix’s Master of None and Never Have I Ever; Amazon Prime Video’s Harlem; Peacock’s Saved by the Bell; and the Apple TV Plus anthology series Little America. He started in the industry as the showrunner’s assistant on HBO’s Emmy-winning Boardwalk Empire before moving over to UCP and then Universal Television, where he worked on A&E’s Bates Motel and NBC’s Good Girls. He has been a champion of series focused on diverse stories and characters from the start. 

Thomas Wadsworth
Chief Product Officer
Struum 

Thomas Wadsworth is co-founder and chief product officer of Struum, a new type of streaming service backed by Michael Eisner’s venture firm Tornante, Canadian-based media company Corus Entertainment and investment firm Gaingels, aimed at creating a simpler way for people to find and uncover programming they may love from across an increasingly cluttered premium SVOD landscape. He oversees all product, user experience, program management and R&D across customer-facing apps and backend tools. He is focused on delivering a product that allows customers to sample content from a wide variety of services and select the ones that they want to enjoy on a monthly basis. As an executive in the digital media and entertainment space, Wadsworth has led the charge on innovations for some of the largest brands. Prior to Struum, he held leadership positions across innovation groups within The Walt Disney Co. for over 12 years, leading product, research and design teams both domestically and internationally to create new product categories and business models that present new revenue opportunities. He held leadership roles within Disney Parks & Resorts, Walt Disney Imagineering, Pixar and Disney Interactive Labs as they expanded into new direct-to-consumer offerings such as voice-enabled devices, smart home products, AR headsets and SVOD across online, mobile, in-park and OTT. 

Mary-Hollis Williams
Senior Director, Talent Relations
Fox Sports

Mary-Hollis Williams is an experienced producer and booker of A-list musical artists and talent. She joined Fox Sports in 2018 and oversees all guest bookings for its high-profile live events, celebrity guests for FS1’s daily studio shows and talent bookings across all Fox Sports platforms. Williams currently heads up the talent booking team at Fox Sports for the NFL, MLB, WWE, FS1, college football and the biggest events in live sports, including Super Bowl LIV, the World Series and the 2019 Women’s World Cup. Prior to joining Fox Sports, Williams spent several years producing content for media companies including CBS, Comedy Central, ABC, Fox and Amazon. She has secured celebrities, musicians, athletes, authors and comedians since 2010. In 2014, Williams secured the first ever late-night performance from Metallica at CBS for The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson — a week-long residency of Metallica’s biggest hits. She went on to produce notable episodes with John Mayer, Ed Sheeran, Bob Weir, Ryan Adams and John Legend for CBS guest-hosted episodes. 

Elliot Wolf
EVP of Digital
Wolf Entertainment

Elliot Wolf leads all of Wolf Entertainment’s digital initiatives including podcasting, social media, e-commerce and licensing. As a senior executive, he oversees brand strategy and is involved in project development for streaming platforms. Over the past two years, he has overseen the company’s rebrand from Wolf Films to Wolf Entertainment and accumulated over 1.3 million followers for the brand on social media. He serves as the executive producer of IMDb TV’s new half-hour police drama, On Call. Previously, he executive-produced fiction podcast Hunted, starring Parker Posey, in association with Endeavor Content. He also developed and executive-produced The Squadroom, the companion podcast to Law & Order: Special Victims Unit. He also oversees development and production of several upcoming audio fiction series. He has launched a successful merchandising business for Wolf and its franchises (Law & Order, Chicago, FBI) while leveraging newly created marketing channels to expand the company into new mediums of storytelling. 

Stefanie Zuroff
Director, Business Development & Content Partnerships
Samsung

Stefanie Zuroff has spent the past few years helping to build Samsung’s fast-growing FAST channel platform, Samsung TV Plus. In her current role, she oversees all third-party channel licensing and is responsible for sourcing and negotiating licensing agreements with linear and VOD content owners to enhance the content offering on the platform. Prior to her role at Samsung, Zuroff spent five years working at AT&T/DirecTV in content acquisition, negotiating licensing agreements and managing the day-to-day relationships with traditional and digital-native content partners for DirecTV’s streaming platforms, including TV everywhere, OTT, VOD and mobile. Prior to DirecTV, she worked in content strategy and acquisition at Verizon Fios, helping to launch the Fios TV EST offering and TV-everywhere mobile and web platforms. She also has worked on the content creation/distribution side, in business development at Fuse/MSG Networks and in the music business at Universal Music Group. She has a B.A. in Economics from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and an MBA from New York University’s Stern School of Business. ▪️

Jennifer Turner started out wanting to be a banker but instead has built a Wonder Woman career in television production and in health advocacy. 

Along with her impressive list of jobs — currently as executive VP of Sony Pictures Television’s TriStar Television studio — her academic credits include a Ph.D. in public health and behavioral science from Rutgers University, an MBA from Stanford University and a BA from the Wharton School of Business. 

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She joined Sony Pictures Television by consulting on the hit NBC series The Blacklist and then, as SPT’s senior VP of scripted programming, she oversaw creative for shows including The Good Doctor, The Boys and Woke. She was promoted to her current role at TriStar this past January. 

Her first jobs in television (after a stint on the trading floor at Goldman Sachs) were at The Walt Disney Co., working with the ABC daytime soaps General Hospital and Port Charles. She was promoted at ABC to director of current programming, working on shows such as Desperate Housewives and Grey’s Anatomy. 

She moved to NBCUniversal as VP of drama programming, managing creative for Friday Night Lights and Crossing Jordan, before becoming VP of licensing and strategic partnerships for NBCU, helping to find new revenue streams for Bravo and Oxygen properties, like Top Chef-branded cookware. 

An interest in health and fitness that stemmed partly from seeing an obesity problem among residents of East Harlem, New York, took her away from TV for a while. She founded Mad Cool Fitness, an inclusive, multicultural healthy lifestyle brand that uses holistic, behavior-based wellness initiatives to foster long-term healthy lifestyle change in everyday people.

“I wanted to start a company that helped people learn how to be healthy,” she said. 

For Turner, these disparate roles in media and health advocacy have a common theme.

“On the face of it, it looks like the two different faces of Jennifer Turner,” she said. “But really looking at both of them together, when I think about who I am and what I’m about, I’m really about empowerment. I’m about empowerment in health. I’m about empowerment in stories and storytelling. I’m about empowerment in education.”

She started taking classes toward a public-health doctorate at Rutgers, and her dissertation evaluated a school-based childhood obesity prevention program. In the process, she learned a lot about the challenges facing charter schools. That led her to connect with Jersey City Global Charter School.

Nadira Jack, chief school administrator at the school, said Turner’s help with the staff and students at her school has been invaluable. 

Turner came into the school and did an overall health and wellness assessment, Jack said. “And then from that, she just volunteered her time to do these, as she called it, mad cool fitness sessions with our kids and our staff and it has been amazing.

“She would come in and talk to [students] about things like their self-image, body image, relationship-building,” Jack said. “Our students absolutely loved it, because they were getting to connect with a member from the community and they were able to ask very honest and candid questions. She shared her personal experiences with us, which was extremely valuable to our kids to see that, hey, you know, if, if Dr. Turner can do this then, so can I.”

An Innovative Storyteller

Turner’s vision for TriStar as an independent boutique studio — home to such shows as On Becoming a God in Central Florida, Good Girls Revolt and The Afterparty — is to be perceived as “first and foremost, artist forward, super-premium, cinematic, innovative. And I would say as a part of innovation and telling new stories that would include diverse writers and talent, as well as stories that feature female protagonists.” 

But not exclusively: one of the shows TriStar has in development is Straight Man, the next AMC project for (Sony’s) Better Call Saul’s Bob Odenkirk. “We’re all still in the Bob Odenkirk business, which is a good business to be in,” she said.

Aside from her work with the charter school, Turner’s spare time activities include playing the violin (she trained in violin and dance). “I basically play for my dog now,” she said with a laugh. “He likes to howl!” ▪️

There are two driving forces behind Sarah Weidman’s career in television.

“The bottom line is that I find real people very interesting,” said the three-time Emmy Award nominee, who joined AXS TV as head of programming, development and multiplatform content in January 2020, where she’s responsible for original productions, acquisitions, on-camera talent development and content strategy.

That explains her initial interest in becoming a psychiatrist, although after taking organic chemistry and other premed courses at the University of Michigan, she switched to broadcast journalism and communications. You can see it in a career that in her early days took her from television news to The Jerry Springer Show to The Dating Game before she was brought to MTV by then-programming chief Brian Graden to work in series development. “To be honest, I didn’t know development was a job,” she said, adding that she loved “coming up with ideas then flipping on a producer hat and saying, ‘How do I make it happen?’”

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(Years earlier, she’d made an audition tape to be a VJ that included her “talking to a statue of a lion,” a tape she swears “will never see the light of day.”)

Another thing she discovered in those early days in television was that “if there’s no room to continue developing, I’m going to get really bored,” Weidman said. “Shows like The Dating Game rely on formula and there’s no room for reinvention.”

She loved MTV until she found herself listening to NPR instead of a rock station in the car and knew she was done with thinking of ideas for a teen audience. “I’m always looking to grow,” she said, adding that after a stint at Sony Pictures Television doing development and seven years at the Style Network, her career shifted again. The network closed down right when she had a baby, and she used that time to reflect on her strengths and her interests. 

“As a producer, I can see the micro needs and can go through the checklist and make sure all the details happen,” she said. “But I’m able to step back and also look at the big picture. How does what I’m working on plug into the larger universe and brand?” 

Making the Digital Move

Blending that mindset with her desire to try something new, Weidman shifted her focus to the digital universe, working at such outlets as AwesomenessTV, Joyous and Clevver Media before settling in at AXS.

She looks at all those previous jobs as ideal building blocks. “Every step of my career has been about taking what I did previously and adding to it,” she said. “I know linear and I know digital.”

She now brings that expertise to building up the digital side of AXS, which she said had a website that previously looked like “a blog from 1995.” Heading a tiny team means she gets to be involved in almost every aspect of the job. 

“Sarah is one of the most collaborative people in content and production I’ve ever met,” said Frank Tanki, president, Sports & Music Group, Anthem Sports & Entertainment, which owns AXS. “She’s dogged and prepared and her energy and resourcefulness is contagious.”

Tanki also praised Weidman for remaining dedicated to the audience, talent and production team without ever losing sight of the bigger picture for the business and brand. 

“As a content person, I’m looking at the universe where the content can live and finding the best dispersion of all content for the network while also keeping in mind our carrier agreements and their restrictions,” she said. “I get to take a very macro view of content but also tunnel in as well.” 

For example, Weidman pointed to an ambush game show she’s launching called Parking Lot Payday. She came up with the idea but she also makes sure that each location agreement gets signed.

She has sought to attract younger and more female viewers without losing the core adult male audience by highlighting a wider and younger slate of musicians. She also developed programming strategy for AXS TV’s new direct-to-consumer platforms as well as video content for the network’s social platforms, and helped launch programming for AXS TV’s first-ever FAST channel, AXS TV NOW, and content for a YouTube channel (including the At Home and Social music performance series).

“This job is always an interesting challenge,” Weidman said. It ranges from being involved in FAST (free, ad-supported TV) channel deals to overseeing acquisitions, which helps Weidman find the right programming to match with AXS TV’s originals as she builds a schedule. “This adds whole new layers to my job, so I’m not getting bored.” ▪️

When Tricia Melton ran marketing for TBS, she spearheaded a campaign for the off-network debut of HBO’s Sex and the City that included a multi-choice question: “What is a ‘yogasm?’ (a) a type of yo-yo trick, (b) sex with Yogi Berra or (c) what Samantha has with a guy from yoga class.” 

When Berra, then 79, saw that ad splashed across New York City buses and billboards, he promptly filed a defamation lawsuit against TBS. But such is Melton’s charm that it didn’t even phase her then-CEO and boss, Steve Koonin.

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“We were sued for 10 million bucks and I still loved her,” said Koonin, now CEO of the NBA’s Atlanta Hawks. “Tricia is all about passion. She’s incredibly bold and takes risks, but they are smart risks. She is somebody who tries to find the knockout punch. She doesn’t want to play around the margins.”

Since then, Melton has gone on to oversee such campaigns as Freeform’s “A Little Forward,” TCM’s “Where Then Meets Now” and Cartoon Network’s “Redraw Your World.”

“She’s a tireless advocate for great ideas,” Linda Ong, CEO and founder of cultural consultancy Cultique, said. Ong first met Melton when Melton was a young marketer at New York-based Channel One Networks and then hired her at Oxygen, which was just starting up. “She is really tough in the best way possible,” Ong said. “There’s no ego involved in it for her — she’s really about the work and the people involved.” 

After Oxygen, Melton moved to another female-focused network, Lifetime, and then on to TNT, TBS and Turner Classic Movies, where she was senior VP, entertainment marketing and branding from 2003-2014.

After a brief stint running her own consulting company, she joined Freeform in May 2017 as senior VP of marketing, creative and brand.

“What I found with her at Freeform was that she’s an amazing blend of strategic and creative mind, and that’s a rare blend,” said Tom Ascheim, who until recently was CEO of Warner Bros. Discovery’s Kids, Young Adult and Classics group. At the time he was president of Disney’s Freeform. “When we were building the Freeform brand, we needed to inject some emotional energy to lift people and the organization and help them believe. She’s a great co-pilot in belief — helping people to see the vision and making them laugh along the way.” 

At Freeform, Melton rebranded the network with its “A Little Forward” campaign and gave the brand a strong voice on social media. “She’s an early embracer of new technologies and not just trying them out, but mastering them,” Ong said. “Freeform’s voice was created on social. That was her leadership.”

When Ascheim left Freeform in 2020 to go to WarnerMedia (now Warner Bros. Discovery), he brought Melton with him. “Tricia is fierce and funny, which are two really good qualities when you are trying to get people from here to there,” Ascheim said. “She’s keenly smart but with an incredible sense of humor.” 

Favoring the Bold 

While Melton is known for backing bold campaigns, it’s her backing of bold people that really sets her apart. “She’s truly able to get the best out of people and develop them as leaders,” Koonin said. 

But she also sticks by her word: “People really have to believe you when you say that nothing punitive is going to happen if you pitch crazy moonshot ideas.” And when Melton says “moonshot,” she means that literally. For the fifth-season premiere last summer of Adult Swim’s cult animated hit Rick & Morty, Melton and her team launched a model of Rick’s space cruiser 150,000 feet into the air, complete with an iPad that played the first episode from space.

“I’m like a kid in a candy store,” Melton said. “I am privileged to have some of the most iconic brands and characters to work with, an amazing abundance of incredible [intellectual property], and franchises with more than 100 years of history. The fun part is we get to constantly find ways to make these legendary franchises relevant for totally new audiences.” ▪️

Few programming executives over the past year have had as golden a touch as Freeform and Onyx Collective president Tara Duncan.

From overseeing the summer 2021 debut of Freeform’s most-watched series ever in Cruel Summer to winning a 2022 Oscar for Best Documentary Feature in March for Onyx Collective’s Summer of Soul — produced by musician Questlove — Duncan is pushing all the right buttons, as she has throughout her career.

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Duncan’s brand is already synonymous with some of the most iconic shows in the history of television, including Orange Is the New Black, Bosch and The Killing, and she hopes to continue to successfully create content while opening the doors for other diverse voices to make their mark on the industry. 

Duncan grew up in Southern California as a rabid television viewer, but she couldn’t see herself building a career in the industry. It wasn’t until one of her favorite TV shows was canceled that she began to understand there was more to the business than what was on-screen.  

“I was such a big fan of My So-Called Life, so when they canceled it I wrote a letter to ABC demanding that it be put back on,” she said. “So I guess in some way I was aware that there were some decision-makers behind the scenes, but I never really saw myself as someone who would be in that position.”

As a high school senior, Duncan interned at ABC through her participation in the cable industry’s Emma L. Bowen Foundation diversity organization. She recalled being an avid General Hospital fan and having the opportunity to do some extra work on the show as an intern. 

“It was the Emma Bowen Foundation that really provided the access and opportunity to get into the business,” she said. “Even though I really wanted to work in the movies, I always had a track to be in television.”

After graduating from Loyola Marymount University and working a stint at production company Section Eight — founded by George Clooney and Steven Soderbergh — Duncan moved to New York City in 2005. She worked for HBO before taking a production job at AMC. 

“It was still the early days of building the original series slate over there at AMC,” she recalled. “My first day I watched the pilot for Breaking Bad, which was the new show that the network was going to be putting on the air.”

Plunged Into Streaming

It would be the lure of a new distribution platform that would draw Duncan away from the cable industry and toward the streaming services, where her production fingerprints are on a number of iconic series. At Amazon’s Prime Video, she produced the pilot for the service’s first drama series Bosch. As a Netflix creative executive, she oversaw the development of Orange Is the New Black and Narcos, and at Hulu she is developing an adaptation of Zakiya Dalila Harris’s novel The Other Black Girl as part of a 2020 development deal. 

“With the streamers, you can make more programming for more types of audiences because you’re not as beholden to a linear schedule,” she said. “Especially for where I was in my career, it provided me with the opportunity to just dive in and actually get my hands dirty.” 

Duncan’s ascent up the content production ranks was aided by a number of powerful, female mentors that she says has helped her achieve her career goals, including HBO executive VP of comedy programming Amy Gravitt, Amazon Studios programming executive Christina Wayne, former Netflix programming executive Cindy Holland and Walt Disney Television entertainment chairman Dana Walden. 

“When I first started working with the Hulu Originals team, Craig Erwich told me I had to meet Tara Duncan, who had an overall deal at the time with Hulu, because I was going to love her,” Walden said. “He told me she has amazing taste and fantastic relationships in the creative community. He was exactly right. 

“As soon as we had a president-level role available, Tara was my first call,” Walden continued. “Her sensibilities are exactly right for our young adult brand, Freeform: Her first series out of the gate, Cruel Summer, was the biggest series debut in the network’s history. And given that she hand-picked Summer of Soul, which went on to win an Oscar, to be the inaugural piece of content for Onyx Collective, I’d say we got the perfect leader for that team,as well.”

Along with continuing to build on Freeform’s youth-targeted brand and to provide quality, diverse content for the one-year-old, Hulu-centric Onyx Collective, Duncan hopes to serve as a mentor herself to the next generation of diverse content creators seeking to tell their stories onscreen. 

“I would love to be a positive influence for another generation of executives who are coming in,” Duncan said. ■

This Wonder Woman is one and the same. She is that young girl practicing her news report in her bedroom mirror, using a hairbrush as a microphone. 

She is that woman being honored as a distinguished alumna at her alma mater on the same day she is set to talk with a reporter about her revolutionary efforts to drive change in the public broadcasting industry.

She is a Wonder Woman who, as a young girl in southern Virginia, realized the pillars of diversity, inclusion and community engagement were the pathway forward. Those are the essentials Sylvia Bugg was raised with; those are the ambitions she brought with her when she first began working at PBS in the early 1990s. And those are the priorities Bugg now brings to her role as chief programming executive and general manager of general audience programming of PBS.

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“Throughout my formative years, I was exposed to diversity across geography, community, race/ethnicity and points of view,” Bugg said. She absorbed life lessons from a lineage of female relatives who radiated self-empowerment and resilience. “I wanted a career that would allow me to serve audiences through programming where people from all backgrounds could see themselves reflected.”

That’s because everyone has a story, she said. That stint with a microphone/hairbrush was just the first step in hers. 

One who always enjoyed public speaking, Bugg went on to earn an undergraduate degree in communications with an emphasis in radio and television at Old Dominion University. She then started at PBS as an administrative assistant in the programming department. 

It was there she garnered a great deal about program evaluation, as well as how to
package and deliver a show and to work cross-departmentally within an organization. At PBS, she found a kindred home where the development of unique programming strategies was encouraged and supported. As she puts it: PBS manages to “meet the moment” in a way that can only be found at PBS.

Along the way, she earned an MBA from the University of Maryland and a master’s in journalism from American University. After working in programming at the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and for several Discovery networks, Bugg is now conceptualizing multiplatform content and producing programs like Unresolved, which includes a film, a podcast, a mobile art installation and an interactive website that examines the nation’s effort to grapple with America’s legacy of racist killings. 

“She has led the way in ensuring that we share diverse, distinctive and impactful stories that represent and reflect our audiences, and she is tireless in her work to elevate new voices and perspectives,” PBS president and CEO Paula Kerger said.

Unresolved is an ideal example of Bugg’s core philosophy when it comes to understanding content: creating programming that meets the moment and resonates with an audience.

“She is a Wonder Woman because of the way she embodies PBS’s core values of living the mission, valuing the team, leading by example and embracing possibilities,” said Cecilia B. Loving, senior VP of diversity, equity & inclusion at PBS. 

Bugg has called for initiatives that focus on opportunities to amplify diversity both behind and in front of the camera. In 2022 alone, Bugg helped unveil a new fellowship program for rising filmmakers, announced a call for film submissions from diverse/BIPOC producers and revealed the funding of a $3.6 million program to support mid-career nonfiction filmmakers. 

Driving for More Diversity

Supporting new, diverse voices is paramount, Bugg said. “One question our editorial team poses every day is, ‘Why now and why on PBS?’ That is our mantra,” she said. “Public media provides a place for informed discussion and dialogue.”

Mentorship is one of her priorities, especially for other rising women leaders.
“A significant part of my leadership style is that of being a servant leader,” she said. “Many mentors supported and encouraged me along the way, so I must continue to pay it forward.”

Those who know her are not surprised by that generosity. She’s called courageous, humble, visionary, compassionate. “Sylvia is the epitome of fierce female realness,” said PBS VP of marketing Amy Wigler. 

She is wise but also gracious: A trailblazer whose impact as a Black woman driving change encapsulates the definition of a Wonder Woman. ▪️

It’s not a stretch to call Michele Edelman, with her 30-year career at the forefront of some of the biggest innovations in digital content distribution, a cable industry and technology pioneer.

From her stints at Warner Bros., marketing and distributing the studio’s movies and events during the early days of linear pay-per-view, to her current role at Premiere Digital Services, where she is helping to script the future of digital content distribution, Edelman has been at the forefront of the digital TV revolution. 

“It’s great to see Michele recognized with this amazing group of Wonder Women,” said Steve Rosenberg, chief commercial officer for Premiere Digital, which offers content aggregation, management and distribution services for media and entertainment companies. “We have been fortunate to have her on our team and as the driving force behind Premiere Digital’s brand identity/awareness and growth efforts.” 

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Growing up in upstate New York, Edelman initially thought her career path would be in business operations for her family’s manufacturing company before she set her sights on a marketing and advertising career. While at the University of Rhode Island, Edelman got her first taste of the entertainment industry in the Warner Communications summer internship program.

“My first job was at DC Comics working on press kits, and then I worked at Geffen Records,” Edelman said.

The following summer she went to work with Warner Bros., aiding them in licensing movies and event content to pay-per-view distributors like Request TV and Viewer’s Choice, as well as to hotels. “It was there that I learned about the pay TV business,” she said.

After graduating from college in 1989, she would settle in at Warner Bros. for the next four years before moving to Los Angeles to work for the The Walt Disney Co. 

As the cable industry expanded into digital, Edelman would transition to Request Television to handle the PPV content purveyor’s expanding distribution offering that included numerous digital channels. 

“Digital cable really launched everything and introduced user interfaces and video menus to the consumer,” Edelman said.

After a stint at the upstart Classic Sports Network, Edelman returned to Warner Bros. in 1999 as VP of worldwide marketing, programming and acquisitions for the company’s digital distribution division, overseeing the company’s pay-per-view distribution and marketing efforts. She would advance to VP of worldwide direct-to-consumer marketing, helping launch one of the industry’s first subscription video-on-demand sites that featured archival Warner Bros. movies and other content.  

It was at Warner Bros. that Edelman said she benefited from the counsel of several mentors, including executives Jeffrey Bernstein, Lisa Gregorian and Darcy Antonellis. 

Passion for Distribution

Edelman would stay at VOD’s forefront when she joined pay-per-view content distributor Vubiquity in 2014 as VP of marketing and content strategy. After a sale to Amdocs in 2018, Edelman in 2020 moved on to content aggregation and distribution company Premiere Digital Services, where she is head of growth.

“I wanted to get back into distribution,” she said. “There’s two sides of the entertainment business: production and distribution. I like the ability to deploy a product on a wide scale and cast a wide net.” 

Going forward, Edelman said she looks forward to continuing to work and evolve within an industry that reaches so many people with so many technically enhanced entertainment options. She also hopes to serve as a mentor to those looking to advance their careers. 

“I want to be doing something that I love and work with and for great people,” she said. “Entertainment does so much for so many people, and it’s nice to know that I helped provide services that people could take advantage of and feel comfortable with.” ▪️

Movies spark all kinds of magic. For Julie Rapaport, head of Amazon Movies, the collaborative magic that goes on behind the scenes is reminiscent of days spent at the camp her family runs in her hometown in Maine.

“I’m a camp counselor at heart,” said Rapaport, who taught waterskiing for multiple summers. “And sometimes being on a set feels a little bit like movie camp, which is one of the special pieces of making movies.”

Reporting to Amazon Studios head Jennifer Salke, Rapaport took the solo reins of the film division this March after her former co-head, Matt Newman, transitioned to a new role creating content for the company’s global sports group. Top of mind for her these days is breaking through in a crowded marketplace of consumers with increasingly shorter attention spans.

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“I think that bar to create distinct content is going to continue to be higher,” she said. “Ultimately, it’s a real opportunity to make things that will grab that attention and spark that conversation, and that do feel special enough to have that ripple effect that creates the urgency to watch.”

For Rapaport, the solution is balancing niche films that bubble up among select audiences and a hefty serving of more general-interest fare that can grab headlines come awards season. Amazon Prime Video was the first streaming platform to take home Oscar statuettes back in 2017, two for Manchester By the Sea and one for foreign-language film The Salesman. Sound of Metal won for best sound and best film editing last year.

“We always look at our slate holistically because we want to make sure that we’re making movies that can serve all our customers,” Rapaport said. “Of course, awards content is part of that, and so is championing new and diverse filmmakers and bringing in new audiences. It’s OK if not everyone loves something, but if we know there’s a certain audience that’s going to love something that’s what drives us to get excited about it.”

As a new mom, the swath of stories that excite Rapaport these days is expanding. “I had a baby during the pandemic and having her has inspired me in a new way,” she said. “I’ve always loved storytelling but I didn’t know being a mom would affect the type of stories that touch me in a whole new way.”

Among those she’s currently jazzed about is director Carey Williams’ comedic thriller Emergency. It’s based on his 2018 short that was the opening-night film at the Sundance Film Festival this year and received accolades there (including an award for screenwriter K.D. Davila) and at South by Southwest. The film — which follows three college students, all men of color, who must weigh the pros and cons of calling the police when faced with an unexpected situation — opened in theaters May 20 before its May 27 Prime Video debut.

“It’s a special movie that could create that cultural conversation but is also really funny and has something to say,” she said. Also upcoming are the Harry Styles starrer My Policeman and Catherine, Called Birdy with Lena Dunham.

Finding the Right Mix

Rapaport also balances the scales when it comes to producing films or acquiring finished titles on the market.

“We look at projects at all stages, and it really is about the timing of the project and when it might make sense for us or not,” she said. “We might hear a pitch, we might read a script, we might see footage, we might see the finished film. I sometimes say, 99% of the films we acquire we actually passed on at an earlier stage because it didn’t make sense for what our needs were at the moment.

“Our goal is to be able to not rely on the market, but of course we’re always going to be opportunistic because there are always going to be things available on the acquisition side as well.”

As Amazon’s international markets expand, so too does Rapaport’s palette.

“For my team the focus is, how are we making things that have a real potential to break out in the U.S., and then we can partner with our different teams in local languages to look at, is this a story line that works?” she said. “And how can we be collab­orative in delivering that great content internationally.” ▪️

It was just over a year ago that CBS combined its news and stations departments, with Wendy McMahon and Neeraj Khemlani overseeing the unified group. McMahon had been president of ABC Owned Stations since 2018, but was eager to get back to CBS, where she’d been a creative services director at WBZ Boston and WCCO Minneapolis. 

She was intrigued by the unified model drawn up by George Cheeks, CBS president and CEO. “He understood that the audience has evolved in terms of how they consume news,” McMahon said. “The broadcast organizational model had not evolved much. He built a blueprint for that when one hadn’t existed.”

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Starting in May 2021, McMahon oversees 27 CBS stations and 13 local news OTT platforms, while Khemlani has oversight of CBS News. McMahon is in Los Angeles and Khemlani is in New York, but the two work closely to ensure that CBS’s news-producing outlets are connecting with viewers, and users, on all platforms and on both a national and local level. “We speak daily and we text even more,” McMahon said. “Neeraj and I get along incredibly well. It’s based on respect and trust —  we both have respect for what our prior experiences were. We understand what each other brings to the respective table, and lean on each other for guidance and consideration.”

McMahon spent nearly a dozen years at The Walt Disney Co., starting as VP of marketing and promotion at KABC Los Angeles, shifting to senior VP of ABC digital in 2015, and taking over the elite station group at the start of 2018. In 2020, the eight-station group was given B+C’s Station Group of the Year honors. 

McMahon credits Rebecca Campbell, the previous president of ABC’s stations, for being a mentor. “Culture and people are always No. 1 for Rebecca,” McMahon said. “People are the reason the entire organization works or doesn’t work.”

The first woman to run the CBS station group, McMahon is an active mentor herself, offering guidance to aspiring young news professionals she works with, and plenty that she’s never met. By doing so, she’s doing good for others, and often doing good for the group she oversees. “The connection I can make that may enable someone to realize their career at one of our stations, that’s really important to me,” McMahon said. “That’s why the time investment is so very worth it.”

McMahon has worked to make the station group more diverse, on both sides of the camera and in leadership positions. This year, CBS Stations is increasing its local news streaming hours from 30,000 to 45,000.

Cheeks said the group is well-positioned for the future thanks to McMahon’s early moves. “Wendy is an outstanding executive, leader and innovator who has made a big impact at CBS News and Stations in a very short time,” he said. “Her close collaboration with Neeraj Khemlani has led to important strategic changes to better position local and national news for its streaming news future while maintaining CBS’s journalistic and storytelling values.”

All News Is Local 

Most every national story is, at its heart, a local story, and the unified CBS group means both CBS News and a station in a market where major news has happened can dive deep to find the facts for their respective audience. “On a daily basis, we’re leveraging one another’s strengths to enhance audience and drive storytelling,” McMahon said. “We know what makes a city, what makes a community tick, and there’s real value to that when there’s a big story.”

CBS Stations is building a news organization in Detroit, where WWJ plans to launch a regular slate of news, on air and online, in the fall. “We are literally building an entire newsroom there,” she said, a rare chance to do so based on how people consume news in 2022 and beyond. 

Cheeks said McMahon’s passion is contagious. “Wendy leads with clarity, enthusiasm and empathy, which generates positive momentum in all areas of her work, and shows that she can take on any challenge,” he said. “At the local level, she has our stations laser-focused on content, community and culture as their core values and the progress is palpable.”

It has been an eventful first year, and McMahon is just getting started. “We reset the entire group so very quickly and so very urgently,” she said. “But it was oh so necessary.” ▪️

As chief marketing officer of the entertainment marketing agency Wild Card Creative Group and director of its content studio, 3AM, Tara DeVeaux thinks a lot about what inspires a viewer to become a loyal fan. With so much content to choose from, she said, media consumers “don’t want just to hear about a great story, they want to be involved in a story.” For clients such as HBO, HBO Max, Hulu, Amazon, Sony and EA, Wild Card Creative and 3AM have developed integrated campaigns, social-media marketing and creative content that entice consumers “to be involved, dig in, to find out more about the worlds they enter,” she said. 

When DeVeaux joined Wild Card in 2018, the agency had been making official trailers and ads for TV and movie studios for a decade. But Wild Card CEO Alison Temple and chief creative officer Nick Temple saw a need to expand beyond ad campaigns that raise awareness and were exploring branded content, virtual reality (VR) and other forms of storytelling as tools to help clients compete for consumers’ attention. They asked DeVeaux, formerly CMO at ad agency BBDO New York, to help them imagine what “the entertainment marketing company of the future would look like,” she said.  

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She launched research division Insights@Wild Card to provide audience data to clients and help 3AM’s creatives understand what resonates with viewers. In its 2019 white paper, “Worldbuilding: Answering the Engagement Problem,” the Insights team reported that 67% of all U.S. media consumers want to explore further once they are exposed to the world of a favorite show, game or movie. They also studied what inspires consumers — in every age group and demographic — to immerse themselves. 

“Sometimes it’s escape, sometimes it’s nostalgia, sometimes it’s a connection with a community,” DeVeaux said. The research showed “it’s not just cosplaying, Comic Con-going people that are interested in this kind of participation.” 

Wild Card’s “world-building” strategy was already attracting new clients. “Then, in the pandemic, it became even more crucial not only to understand the audience, but also encourage fandom and participation,” she said. 

DeVeaux has expanded 3AM, adding a social media team. For the HBO Max superhero comedy Doom Patrol, 3AM produced a commercial featuring a toll-free number viewers could call to book a vacation at a fake resort, then followed up with videos on social media. In partnership with Mattel, 3AM created a virtual “Barbie DreamHouse Sleepover,” a POV video on YouTube. The agency then worked with influencers to build interest in the online event.

To meet the needs of varied brands, DeVeaux recalled advice from David Lubars, BBDO’s chairman and chief creative officer, who told her to rely on her team. “I’m surrounded by very smart and creative people,” she said. “Asking for help or guidance is a sign of strength.” She likes to hire “Swiss Army knives” — knowledgeable people “immersed in cultural pursuits.” 

As a hiring manager, she values Wild Card’s commitment to finding and recruiting diverse talents. The agency works with HBCUs on its summer internship program and encourages creative people of color to consider marketing careers. On DeVeaux’s recommendation, Wild Card works with Courageous Conversations, a nonprofit that offers training and consultations to create welcoming, anti-racist workplaces. When Wild Card pitches new business, DeVeaux  said, “Many clients have mentioned it: We‘re showing up with a team that is representative of the audiences we’re trying to serve.”

DeVeaux is also a mentor. “I’ve been in rooms where I was the only Black person or the only woman. Being ‘the only’ is never easy,” she recalled. She often counsels other women and people of color “on how I navigated that.”  

Role Model with Heart

Shaina Morrison, global marketing manager at Netflix, worked for DeVeaux as a 19-year-old college intern at BBDO NY. “She leads with her heart,” Morrison said. “It makes teams really excited to work with her.” Morrison said she has sought DeVeaux’s advice about every major career decision. “I think that her ability to see what’s next for the industry, where consumer behavior is going, and how to entertain those consumers — that’s helped guide me in my career.” 

Like the people she strives to hire, DeVeaux “has that balance of art and science that marketers need,” Morrison said. “The insights she has gained from being so well-versed in the world and the culture, she balances that with an understanding of how to build business and decide what’s right for a brand and the consumer. She’s definitely a visionary.” ▪️

Shannon Ryan is a true Hollywood success story. 

She started her career as a publicity assistant at Fox, promoting such shows as The Simpsons, Arrested Development and Glee. She moved steadily up the ranks until she emerged from Disney’s acquisition of 21st Century Fox’s entertainment assets as president of content marketing, Hulu and general entertainment, including ABC Entertainment and News, Disney Television Studios and Freeform.

“The impact that Shannon has had on our business cannot be overstated,” said Dana Walden, chairman, entertainment, Walt Disney Television, in a statement. “She has impeccable creative instincts and is a masterful strategist as well. She understands how to connect with creators, talent and, ultimately, our audience.”

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Ryan is the first to admit that managing this many brands takes a village — a big one. “It really comes down to finding incredible people — smart, strong leaders — and putting them in the right roles. You have to find superstars, trust them, support them and give them what they need to do their best work,” Ryan said.

That includes Naomi Bulochnikov, whom Ryan promoted to oversee all publicity at ABC and General Entertainment. “Shannon has not only been an incredible boss, she is a mentor, a friend, a therapist and my daily voice of reason,” she said. “Watching her lead this team during a time of tremendous change and disruption in our industry has been so inspiring.”

With lieutenants like Bulochnikov in place, Ryan is free to focus on the organization’s top goals. “Prioritization is key,” Ryan said. “With so many titles across so many brands, you have to focus as much as you can on the big picture and then trust your team.”

The big picture is to get the widest possible exposure and engagement for the massive amounts of content on the platforms Ryan oversees. And while she’s thinking big, she’s also thinking about how best to market each and every program under her purview.

For Hulu’s hit comedy Only Murders in the Building, Ryan’s team staged an experiential marketing stunt in New York, in which actors dressed up as “tie-dye guy” from the show and roamed the streets in their hoodies. They were eventually joined by trucks loaded with LED screens, promoting the program. The stunt ended at an event with stars Steve Martin, Martin Short and Selena Gomez.

For the September 2021 premiere of ABC’s The Wonder Years, the team created a pop-up retro diner and gas station offering free burgers and gas for 34 cents a gallon that — unsurprisingly, considering those prices — nearly shut down Hollywood traffic. 

With the pandemic less of an issue, the team has been able to resume in-person events, such as a celebration of Black-ish at the African-American Museum of History and Culture in Washington, D.C., and Emmy “For Your Consideration” events at Hollywood’s El Capitan Theater. 

Precision Marketing 

“We talk a lot about meeting our audience where they are and we try to be very surgical about the creative we serve up to different audiences, making sure we are sending the right message to the consumer at the right time,” Ryan said.

The result of such on-the-ground campaigns, in combination with linear, digital and social efforts, has been tangible, with rookie shows The Wonder Years and Abbott Elementary among those breaking out. Abbott Elementary has become the only comedy in ABC history to quadruple its rating after 35 days of multiplatform viewing. Meanwhile, Hulu saw a 6% lift in hours watched in 2021 versus 2020 and a 15% gain in active subscriber engagement.

“Shannon is a talented leader with a deep understanding of the media landscape,” Hulu Originals and ABC Entertainment president Craig Erwich said. “She is relentlessly enthusiastic about the content, and always pursuing the most innovative approaches to marketing. Her ability to capture audience attention and drive viewership through a curated marketing approach and industry leading campaigns is unrivaled.”

Ryan has established programs that encourage collaboration and inclusivity, including a multicultural committee of staffers that reviews marketing materials through their own cultural lenses. “It’s incredibly important to foster a culture where everyone is supported, respected and heard,” Ryan said. 

Even though her job is big, Ryan is good at keeping it simple. “I always tell the team that our job is to be the best storytellers for our storytellers — whether that’s a piece of key art, a 30-second spot, social asset or even a press release,” she said. “At the end of the day, that is truly our biggest task.” ▪️

Talk about being able to separate your work and personal life. Ayo Davis, the executive who oversees some of the world’s most iconic children’s programming, is an unabashed horror fan at heart. 

“I love horror,” she said. “I cannot get enough of a good zombie or vampire movie, I really can’t. I couldn’t have imagined two years ago I would be working in the animated space or with kids content because of my desire to watch nothing but horror all day long.”

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Davis, who in 2020-21 was executive VP, creative development and strategy at Disney Branded Television, clearly has a knack for bringing sunnier material to the screen. In September, she replaced Gary Marsh as president of the content group and now leads creative and operations across Disney Channel, Disney XD, Disney Junior, Disney Television Animation and Disney Plus. 

Her ascent in the kids and family realm follows nearly two decades at Disney and ABC, where as executive VP, talent and casting at ABC Entertainment and Disney Plus, she was a key driver behind series including The Good Doctor, How to Get Away with Murder and Black-ish, helping to enhance the careers of Viola Davis and Eva Longoria, among others. 

She cites as her not-so-secret sauce “my ability to identify talent, and I use that term loosely. Ultimately and at the core, it really is about telling great stories:
Who you’re casting, the directors you’re hiring, the producers you’re working with. They are all big pieces of a large puzzle that we put together and the goal is to identify and create incredible stories that will continue to connect with our audience. It’s those aspects of what I did in casting that I take into this new role, and I do it daily,” she said.

“Ayo has an extraordinary eye for finding talent, as well as an exceptional ability to bring out the best in everyone around her,” said Peter Rice, chairman, Disney General Entertainment Content, to whom Davis reports. “She’s also passionate about a brand that represents some of Disney’s most iconic characters, and yet she’s already developing so many new stories that have the potential to bring joy, hope and wonder to audiences around the world.”

20th Television president Karey Burke concurred. “What has always impressed me is her strong belief in her own creative taste and instincts; she knows what she wants and she fights for her vision, and by extension the visions of the creators with whom we are in business,” she said. “She understands deeply how much the right performer in the right role can make or break a project and she settles for nothing less than getting it absolutely right.” 

As she drives the evolution of classic Disney properties, ranging from a live-action reboot of Winnie the Pooh to Alice’s Wonderland Bakery, and launches new content across Marvel, Pixar and Lucasfilm, Davis is inspired by her own “testing demographic” — her 7-year-old daughter. “I love knowing the content we are creating actually affects her and affects how she views the world,” Davis said. “And I not only get to do it for my daughter, I get to do it for everyone, everywhere. We are creating content for larger audiences. I always say our demographic now ranges from 2 to 102 with everyone who watches.” 

A Platform-Agnostic View

Those viewers are now watching on an expanded array of platforms, which has enabled Davis to expand her lens on content creation.

“Everything we’re doing, we approach from an agnostic perspective. Whether they premiere on the linear channel first and then land on Disney Plus, we now have a forever home for all of that content; it never goes away,” she said. “It lives across the ecosystem, and we want to ensure whatever stories we are telling are connecting with the right audience, we’re speaking to the right demographic and we’re going for the largest audience we can with one specific story.”

When it comes to those stories, staying ahead of the game in the ultra-competitive kids and teen market for Davis means continuing to create storylines that “are full of magic and adventure and heart.” 

“We can’t ever underestimate our audience,” she said. “They are incredibly savvy and incredibly smart. That’s something we talk about all the time, and it is our goal to focus on ensuring we are maintaining a deep respect. We have to continue to expandand stretch our brand, and I certainly think we are doing that with the stories we are developing.” ▪️

Kate O’Brian, head of network news for Scripps National Networks, wasn’t planning to take a full-time job when she met with Lisa Knutson, president of the newly formed E.W. Scripps division.

An ABC News veteran, O’Brian had been consulting when Scripps CEO Adam Symson suggested she talk to Knutson, who was looking for someone to oversee Newsy and Court TV. They set up a half-hour meeting.

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“One hundred and ten minutes into the 30-minute interview and I was impressed by her mind, impressed by her demeanor,” O’Brian said. “She was a fun, interesting person. That meeting literally changed my mind about coming back into full-time work.”

O’Brian applied for the job and became part of the team that Knutson assembled to run the new unit. 

With a background in accounting, Knutson joined Scripps as senior VP of human resources, What Knutson is really interested in, though, is transforming companies.

Scripps has been transforming since Knutson arrived. She quickly got involved in the company’s spinoff of Scripps Networks Interactive in 2008. She oversaw strategy for Scripps as chief administrative officer starting in 2011. She became chief financial officer in 2017 and spearheaded the 2021 acquisition of Ion Media Networks, which was combined with Katz Networks, acquired in 2017, and Newsy to form the new national networks division.

As CFO, Knutson said her primary concern was making sure the new unit achieved operational synergies so it could pay back investors and lenders. “I said to Adam [Symson], ‘Whoever’s running this, I’m going to be all over them,’ ” Knutson recalled. “And he said, ‘Why don’t you run it?’ ”

Though Knutson didn’t have operating experience, Symson worked closely with her on the Ion acquisition and decided she was the right person for the job. “I was really looking for somebody with the financial acumen and discipline, the risk tolerance, the creativity and most of all, the soft and hard leadership skills,” he said.

Knutson has done an “awesome” job, Symson added. “She was able to execute the integrations, hit the first-year synergies and simultaneously invest in the business for the longer-term return with the launch of several new networks,” he said. “By every financial measure, we’re exceeding our acquisition thesis. I think she’s adapted really well to being an operating executive.”

Knutson is a native of Cincinnati, where Scripps is based. With her husband of 34 years, she has three grown children and two grandchildren. She loves reading and sports and is trying to learn pickleball. In addition to what she’s doing at Scripps, she’s a director for publicly held WesBanco and privately held Canadian broadcaster Blue Ant Media. “I am very passionate about getting more women into boardrooms,” she said. “I’m very supportive and help to mentor women that are trying to get their first gig as a public company director.”  

Knutson said that Scripps’s vision is to be the leader in free TV while also pursuing the “noble cause” of providing high-quality news. Founder E.W. Scripps started the company to deliver that news with the Penny Press newspaper in Cleveland in 1878, and she’s glad she gets to be the one executing it. “It’s been quite a wild crazy ride over the last 15 months, but one that’s probably the most rewarding of my career,” she said.

Starting Off on a Roll

The new division is off to a strong start. In addition to launching new networks, Scripps Networks is bringing the Scripps National Spelling Bee to its networks from ESPN. “Kids and families across the country are going to be able to enjoy this national treasure,” Knutson said.

Naturally, Knutson’s numbers look good, too. “We grew by 13% in terms of revenue last year with margins in the 40% range,” she said. “That was year one. We’re going to continue to see growth. We have indicated publicly that the growth that we see is in the 10% range over the course of the next several years.”

None of this surprises Symson. “The TV marketplace is dynamic,” he said. “Our biggest advantage is that at Scripps we embrace the disruption. Lisa embraces disruption. Lisa is not satisfied to simply stay still. Lisa is always in evolution mode and understands the need to be that way in this environment.” ▪️

Few television executives can say they had a hand in building two legendary cable brands while at the forefront of working to diversify the cable industry’s C-suites before launching a successful streaming business. Curtis Symonds can certainly lay claim to that fame, as well as many other TV-industry accomplishments. 

From the 1980s through the 2000s, Symonds was instrumental in steering ad sales and marketing fortunes of ESPN and BET. He also worked behind the scenes to foster greater employment of people of color as an active and influential board member of the National Association for Multi-Ethnicity in Communications (NAMIC) and as president of the T. Howard Foundation.

Later, as an entrepreneur, he launched HBCUGo.TV, one of the first national cable networks or digital services targeted specifically to Historically Black Colleges and Universities.

Also: Welcome to the 30th Anniversary of the ‘B+C’ Hall of Fame

“Curtis Symonds is one of the great pioneers of the cable industry and a visionary in the new digital era,” said Byron Allen, founder, chairman and CEO of Allen Media Group, which last year purchased HBCUGo.TV. “Curtis has an impeccable reputation and is also an outstanding media executive.”  

High praise for the Bermuda, West Indies, native who grew up in Wilberforce, Ohio, wanting to follow in the footsteps of his mother, who taught at Central State University. Symonds would earn a bachelor of science degree at the historically Black college. 

“I believed my goal was teaching because I watched my mother for so many years,” he said. “I just loved the way she handled herself and what she did for students.” 

A part-time job laying underground coaxial cable for a local Continental Cable system launched his TV career. Symonds eventually became manager of the system in 1979. He relocated to Chicago in 1983 to work at ESPN’s regional office as a local advertising sales consultant. “At the time ESPN wasn’t the monster that it is now, so I had the opportunity to come on when they were beginning to grow,” Symonds said. 

As ESPN grew, so did Symonds’s profile, as he rose to director of affiliate marketing for ESPN’s Midwest region.

His influence transcended ESPN. He became one of the chief architects in building NAMIC, which sought to encourage African-American participation and employment  in the cable industry. Symonds served on its board for a decade beginning in 1983. 

“That was a critical time because there weren’t a lot of minorities in the business, and I liked the direction that NAMIC was going in because we were making noise about what we deserved from the business,” he said. “I think to this day, the group of individuals who were part of NAMIC’s national board did a masterful job of convincing MSOs and programmers that there was another group of folks who deserved a chance to be in this business and function at a higher level.”

His next big turn came in 1988 with a call from BET chairman Robert Johnson about coming to work at the African-American targeted channel. “I saw the vision Bob had for the network so I took a chance,” Symonds said. 

Symonds became executive VP of affiliate distribution and marketing for BET Holdings, helping transform the entertainment network into one of the industry’s most recognized and celebrated brands. Symonds was able to help increase the network’s annual sales revenue growth to 57% by 2001 by building a brand that had broad appeal. 

In 1998, NCTA recognized Symonds’s marketing prowess with a Vanguard Award. 

Entrepreneur and Advocate

After leaving BET in 2001 — the year the network was sold to Viacom for more than $2 billion — Symonds sharpened his entrepreneurial skills in the Washington, D.C., and Virginia area. He continued his advocacy as president of the T. Howard Foundation, a nonprofit organization devoted to promoting women and people of color in the satellite and telecommunications industry, from 2003 to 2006.   

He also had a stint as chief operating officer for the WNBA’s Washington Mystics before launching HBCUGo.TV as a cable network in 2011. The network pivoted to digital, operating independently until Allen acquired it and its 5,000 hours of original content. 

“It couldn’t have been a better dream for me because I’m now doing what I want to do,” said Symonds. “I have a visionary [in Allen] who is really behind me and I believe we’re going to make some big noise with HBCUGo. In fact, I predict that HBCUGo will be bigger than BET in the next five years.” ■

“Nearly everybody reads The Bulletin” was the popular slogan for what was once the top evening newspaper in the nation. In the summer of 1974, one of those readers was Steven Swartz, who would splay the broadsheet on the floor in his suburban Philadelphia home. It seemed a heady time for news and Swartz knew it. On TV, Sen. Sam Ervin prosecuted President Richard Nixon during the Watergate hearings; at 6 p.m., The CBS Evening News with Walter Cronkite became required viewing. Swartz recalls being captivated. He was also “around 11 or 12 years old,” he said. “I became a news junkie at a very early age. I loved the role it played in society.”

Years later, attending Harvard, he’d watch the local news on WCVB Boston, now a flagship station for Hearst, the corporation Swartz has run as president and CEO since 2013. By the time he arrived at college, the die was cast. “I had decided before I got to campus that my ambition was to become a journalist,” he said. But the dream didn’t end there. “My long-term ambition was to be able to lead a media company that at least in part did journalism.”

Also: Welcome to the 30th Anniversary of the ‘B+C’ Hall of Fame

That Swartz has risen to such corporate heights, with Hearst thriving during seismic shifts that have buckled many competitors, speaks to a remarkable mix of determination, talent and opportunity for the executive. (“I would throw a lot of luck in there,” he also insists.) His colleagues would add other qualities to the formula. “Steve is widely respected, forward-thinking, has tremendous energy and big insight, and he’s got an important voice in the marketplace,” said Leo MacCourtney, president of Katz Television Group and a fellow B+C Hall of Fame honoree this year. “Hearst might be, in my mind, the finest broadcaster in America. They just do everything right. And that’s no small tribute to Steve.”

Swartz’s prosperous run atop a 135-year-old company speaks to his eagerness to partner with great predecessors: “I’ve been really fortunate on the mentor side,” he said. He cited among them seventh grade English teacher John DeGregorio (“He just radiated enthusiasm and I learned a lot from him”) and Norman Pearlstine, then-managing editor at The Wall Street Journal, where Swartz was recruited out of college and where he eventually worked on the Page One desk. “That was my most enjoyable time there,” Swartz said.

The movement toward combining journalism with business came when Hearst and Dow Jones agreed to partner on a personal finance magazine that became SmartMoney, with Swartz named founding editor in 1991. Four years of award-winning copy later, Swartz was tapped as president and CEO.

SmartMoney introduced him to Hearst, with its corporate culture fixed and strong on legacy, thanks to leaders such as William Randolph Hearst and Frank Bennack, who served two tenures as Hearst’s CEO from 1979 through 2002 and from 2008 through May 2013. Toward the end of Bennack’s run, Swartz became executive VP, rising to chief operating officer in 2011.

Helping Hearst Grow

In his current tenure, Swartz has either continued or orchestrated growth measures that have well insulated Hearst’s vaunted place in the market. Along with the newspapers  on which the company built its foundation, Hearst’s empire currently includes holdings among cable networks (A&E, History, Lifetime and ESPN); 33 television stations that in total reach 19% of U.S. viewers; 250 magazine editions worldwide; and a successful roster on the B2B side, including global financial services (Fitch Group) and medical information and transportation assets.

The diversification is an asset that helps Swartz’s Hearst in these times of technological change where, as he said, “everybody is fighting to establish a sustainable growth business model. It’s a challenge but I think we’re up to it.”

Swartz’s colleagues agree because they see in him a leader bent toward inspiration, and a man whose understanding of what matters most at any given moment was bred back in his early newspaper-reading days. Hearst Television president and B+C Hall of Famer Jordan Wertlieb recalled that, at the start of the pandemic when other companies were cutting back, “Steve announced we were bonusing all employees. He wanted people to not only feel secure in their jobs, but to share in the success of the prior year. The timing of that was extraordinary.” 

Unusual, but certainly in character. “I was not surprised at all that that was the way Hearst, through Steve’s leadership, acted,” MacCourtney said. “His legacy is the way that company operates.”  ■

Susanne Daniels has held executive positions at many networks and platforms in her time in the entertainment industry — ABC, Fox, The WB, Lifetime, MTV and YouTube — but her mission has remained the same: Find programming that resonates with young people.

That job has only gotten harder as those young audiences have migrated to digital platforms and social media. 

Still, Daniels managed to find a big hit for YouTube — and later for Netflix — with Cobra Kai, a sequel to the popular Karate Kid movies of the 1980s. Who knew that the kids of Gen X, who first fell in love with Daniel-san and his teacher, Mr. Miyagi, would grow up and want to see more? Well, Daniels, for one.

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Backing up a few years, when Daniels was overseeing programming for MTV, she developed a drama for the cable network called Finding Carter. 

“It was so good, I just loved it,” she said. “But it wasn’t getting a lot of traction even though we were marketing it well. One day, out of complete frustration, I turned to our head of research and said, ‘Where are they? Why aren’t they watching this show?’ And she said, ‘They’re all on YouTube.’ I then started educating myself on YouTube creators.”

Daniels started reaching out to those creators to see if they could work together. When Robert Kyncl, YouTube’s chief business officer, discovered what she was doing, he invited her to lunch and then to work at YouTube. “He told me, ‘You’ll have better success reaching the audience where these YouTubers live,’ ” she said. “I decided he was right.” 

Back to Cobra Kai. “I knew from YouTube’s data that Karate Kid was a highly searched term with our heavy users in a positive way. The pitch was one of the best pitches I have ever heard — they even brought in Ralph Macchio and William Zabka. There was no way I was letting them walk out the door without begging them to bring their show to YouTube.”

Daniels and her team pitched the benefits of YouTube to Cobra Kai’s creative team: Josh Heald, Jon Hurwitz and Hayden Schlossberg. When they heard Daniels’s enthusiasm, they were in. 

“She saw the vision before anyone else did,” Hurwitz said. “Nobody else was willing to say to us, ‘we’re going to make an entire season,’ but she had that passion, understanding and trust in us.”

She’s always been able to see the business from a producer’s point of view, and that’s helped her lure talent to any platform she’s leading. “There’s so much risk assessment in our business, but Susanne was willing to take a bet on who we were and what we could bring,” said B17 Entertainment’s Rhett Bachner, who launched Broke-Ass Game Show on MTV under Daniels’ watch.

Part of that understanding comes from a  very personal place: her marriage to Greg Daniels, creator and EP of such shows as NBC’s The Office and Parks and Recreation. They met when she was assistant to Saturday Night Live’s Lorne Michaels and he was a writer there. 

After three years at SNL, Daniels moved to Los Angeles to join ABC as a director of reality and variety programming. She then served as VP of comedy at Fox. Her next move was to startup The WB, where founder Jamie Kellner first offered her a job as head of comedy. 

Rolling the Dice at The WB

“What I said to Jamie Kellner was, ‘I’m going to take a chance on your startup network, but I’m only going to take this job if I can oversee all development.’ He didn’t get back to me for a couple of weeks because I think he was desperately trying to find someone else during that time. But he came back and offered me the job I wanted,” she said. “I don’t think it was bravery to ask for more. I just think it was me wanting to maximize my potential.”       

At The WB, she helped develop some of the most generationally defining hits of the late ‘90s and early 2000s, including Dawson’s Creek, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Charmed, Felicity and Gilmore Girls.

By the time The WB merged with UPN to become The CW in 2006, Daniels and most of the original executives had left. She went on to oversee programming at Lifetime, MTV and YouTube. 

As YouTube’s global head of original content, Daniels also worked with pop superstar Katy Perry on Katy Perry Witness Worldwide and with Barack and Michelle Obama, Lady Gaga and Lizzo on The Class of 2020 Graduation Special.

With YouTube exiting originals, Daniels left in early March. As she considers what to do next, young audiences are always on her mind. 

“I would like to build something for young audiences again and I’m giving some thought as to what that is,” she said. “I truly love the medium of TV.”  ￭

Dan Mason compares his 20-year CBS Radio tenure that ended in 2015 with the career of Tom Landry, the Dallas Cowboys’ iconic coach.

“So many assistant coaches underneath Tom Landry became head coaches in their own right,” noted Mason, who similarly aimed to influence the next generation of broadcasting leadership. “A lot of people went on to run or lead companies.”

Currently venture partner and strategic adviser at SeventySix Capital, Mason climbed the corporate ladder to the C-suite after humble disc jockey beginnings. 

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“I grew up in Louisville,” Mason remembered, citing Cawood Ledford, the voice of University of Kentucky sports for decades. “All I wanted to do was be on the radio. He was a great role model to study. I read every word of his book three times.” 

Mason’s background reads like a modern-day Horatio Alger Jr. novel. 

“I had no intention of ever being an executive,” he reflected. “When I became an on-air announcer, somebody once told me I’ll never get off the all-night show.” That revelation led Mason to soon realizing, “I’d like to be the boss of the disc jockeys.”

Named a GM at 27

Atlanta’s WZGC-FM in 1977 kick­started Mason’s radio programming trajectory. Two years later, Mason became program director of WPGC-FM Washington, then served as national program director for First Media, the station’s parent company. In 1979, the 27-year-old Mason became one of the youngest general managers in the country at KTSA and KTFM of San Antonio, Texas. He returned to First Media, which was sold in 1988 to Cook Inlet Radio Partners, marking the first time Mason held the president title.

Group W acquired Cook in 1993, then two years later merged with CBS Radio which two years later merged with Infinity Broadcasting. 

“I worked with Mel Karmazin until about 2002,” said Mason, who took a five-year break from running the company, albeit remaining a consultant. “Les Moonves in late 2006 asked me to come back as president and CEO of CBS Radio,” Mason said. He oversaw 117 stations across 26 markets, establishing the 24-hour CBS Sports Radio Network and resurrecting the classic hits radio station WCBS-FM New York. 

In 2015, Mason “retired” from CBS at 64, leaving to call women’s basketball games for the CBS Sports Network and thoroughbred racing for the Horse Racing Radio Network.  

“You don’t retire,” Mason explained matter-of-factly. “Who knows what’s next?”

Indeed, this was no typical early retirement. Whereas most executives would spend more time on golf courses than in front of a camera, on a mic or in a boardroom, Mason’s post-CBS entrepreneurial itch led him to buy several radio stations, consulting with iHeart Radio and VSiN.

“I was going to do on-air talent for horse racing,” Mason said of the latter. After a dinner with VSiN CEO Brian Musburger, a sports agent and nephew of company founder (and legendary sportscaster) Brent Musburger, “it was pretty obvious they really needed me to advise in an executive role.” 

A few months later, Mason went from just being an announcer to owning part of  VSiN, which was sold to DraftKings four years after its launch in 2017.

Under his CBS watch, executives “flourished,” whether they stayed with the station group or went elsewhere (i.e., the Landry “coaching tree”). Weezie Kramer, who retired in 2020 as chief operating officer of Entercom after nearly 20 years, and Ezra Kucharz, DraftKings’ chief business officer, were among his successful colleagues.

True Radio Lover

Mason recruited Scott Herman as general manager of New York’s all-news WINS after being news director at Group W’s TV station KYW Philadelphia. 

Himself retired after 39 years at CBS, Herman last year followed Mason as chair of the Broadcasters Foundation of America. Herman praised his mentor’s ability of securing multiyear financial gifts for the organization. “I don’t think I ever worked with anyone in my career who has loved the medium of radio more than Dan,” Herman said.

Chris Oliviero, currently Audacy’s senior vice president/New York market manager, spent eight years reporting directly to Mason at CBS with his office right next to Mason’s. He said he learned two important things from his former boss. The first was that stations need to create “community and companionship” for listeners. The other is “integrity.” ■

The enduringly popular CBS procedural series Blue Bloods is known for its family drama. Tom Selleck stars as New York City Police Commissioner Frank Reagan, who also heads the Sunday dinner table every episode. Frank often delivers clear-eyed wisdom in the face of long odds. “Doing the right thing may be hard,” he once said, “but it sure as hell isn’t complicated.”

That may be how Brandon Burgess felt when he offered up one of the most successful and prescient ideas in modern media. After moving to head up Paxson Communications in 2005 from his spot running business development and global strategy for NBCUniversal, Burgess looked through the numbers. With over 70 stations, the knee-jerk option for the company — renamed ION Media Networks — was to spend big and build a roster of originals programmed for a younger demo. But ION’s hobbling debt and a fervent study of ratings suggested a different plan: license off-network hits, particularly crime dramas, for a song and aim them at an underserved TV market: older adults, especially women.

The strategy was crazy, counter­intuitive, vastly unpopular and brilliant. In time, ION found a home for popular procedural fare (including Blue Bloods) and turned a red ledger black with a smooth efficiency that matched the company’s chairman/CEO.

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“A lot of people would have blown their brains out trying to program originals, but Brandon didn’t fall for it,” said Jeff Sagansky, former Paxson CEO and cofounder of media ventures company Flying Eagle Acquisition Corp. “He licensed the biggest shows when there was no other audience for them. It was really a visionary move.”

Added Guggenheim Partners executive chairman Alan Schwartz: “In media and in business, there are some people who are really good at seeing the big picture, and others who really drill down and work on all the details. Brandon’s one of the few I’ve come across in my career that did both.”

None of this was accidental for Burgess. He grew up in Germany “with a healthy work ethic” and, after coming to the U.S., graduating from Wharton and doing stints at PepsiCo and Goldman Sachs, he set his sights on New York and a job at NBC. “Over time, we all have to figure out what we’re good at,” Burgess said. “I wasn’t going to direct episodes of Friends. The question is looking for the angles where you can apply yourself in the environment you want to succeed, and for me, that’s always been analyzing things, and if need be, playing the long ball.”

Toward that end, he understood early the eventual reach of digital and, at NBC, worked to create nbcolympics.com; he was also part of the purchase of Telemundo and instrumental in NBC’s first entertainment network acquisition, Bravo, and of buying Universal Entertainment. 

“Universal was the big cherry on top,” he said now of the deal that led to NBCUniversal. “The industry was consolidating around us. [NBC was] left with a 90% advertising business and declining ratings; it was the early 2000s and all the shows were expiring, and the content creators had all the leverage. We needed to diversify … and needed, basically, a transforming deal.”

Playing ‘Moneyball’ in TV

The same need explains the much more organic licensing move Burgess implemented in fall 2008, after coming to ION in late 2005. Burgess, a fan of the book Moneyball, about the Oakland A’s statistics-based strategic rise to success starting in 2002, used a similar tactic to explain the move to his people, who were dumbfounded. “Boy, did we have boardroom arguments,” he said.

Burgess has never shied away from such challenges, and his enviable record of reading trends and producing results speaks for itself. Favoring national over-the-air networks in 2007 sparked ION’s multi-network portfolio, and the U.S. multicast category. And he’s long been a leader on topics such as broadcast spectrum and wireless. 

With ION’s $2.7 billion sale to E.W. Scripps in 2021, Burgess has pivoted away from the boardroom to enjoy family and leisure time — for now. “It’s hard not to be intrigued by all the technologies that are coming out,” he said, looking down the road. “I think there are organizing principles out there that would require a whole new learning curve.”

Perhaps, but one expects he’d join a company, crunch the numbers and, true to form, make visionary moves, leaving other execs shocked, even dismayed. One gets the sense that, for Brandon Burgess, it sure as hell isn’t complicated. ■

Anyone who still subscribes to the adage that nice people finish last hasn’t met Nomi Bergman. 

Bergman has been shining her light and leadership on a family legacy that’s seen her serve early executive stints at Advance/Newhouse (in publishing and cable) and Time Warner Cable; as president of Bright House Networks, the sixth-largest U.S. cable operator at the time of its 2016 merger with Charter Communications; and in her current role as an adviser on the evolution of the cable infrastructure she’s been championing since day one.

“The continued innovation of our infrastructure has enabled us to deliver products and services to our customers that we might not have dreamed of during earlier days,” she said.

Also: Welcome to the 30th Anniversary of the ‘B+C’ Hall of Fame

A self-described “rational optimist,” Bergman has “a lot of hope for the remarkable things a healthy team can create by working collaboratively together, staying close to customers, falling in love with our craft and aiming high.”

It’s a descriptor shared by Comcast chairman and CEO Brian Roberts, a decades-long ally and friend who counts Bergman as a Comcast board member.

“Nomi is a force in telecommunications — having been at the forefront of many trends in media and technology over the last several decades,” Roberts said. “She is unique for her knowledge, passion and unwavering optimism. It has been a privilege to have her great insights on our board, and we are lucky that Nomi’s leadership and vision are helping to shape our industry.”

That vision began in the early ’90s with Bergman joining her father Robert Miron in the cable business, initially consulting on back-end systems including the streamlining of disparate billing systems.  

In 1998, she was on the ground in Charlotte, North Carolina, for the launch of Road Runner, TWC’s initial cable-modem internet service. 

“It really felt like a historical moment,” said the mother of three daughters. “The fact that plants could be two-way … it was huge. People didn’t believe it, and they didn’t think they needed it because they thought dial-up was fine.”

Bergman ascended to perhaps her most notable career highlight to date — helming, along with her father and brother, Steve Miron, Bright House Networks and its 8,500 employees serving 2.2 million customers.

“The opportunity to build a multibillion-dollar brand, and to build leadership teams and cultivate a culture of care by authentically engaging and listening to employees and customers and learning how to best show up to serve them was just incredible,” she said. 

Steve Miron, also a 2022 Hall of Fame honoree, said it’s been a career highlight to work so closely with his sister: “She’s the most driven person I know; she’s got a great strategic head. She always knows what I’m thinking, and I always know what she’s thinking … and 90% of the time it’s the same thing.”

Among notable customer-first initiatives, Bergman launched a campaign called Just Say Yes, plastering signage in call centers and ensuring employees knew the company had their backs as they super-served customers. Then came the Friends Campaign, centered on the premise that Bright House would pull out all the stops to treat its customers like family and close friends, whether that meant bringing needed food to house calls or technicians working after hours to ensure a student could take an online test. “It was a magical time,” she said.

“Nomi has made a career out of ‘saying yes’ to customers, colleagues, and partners who need her,” said Peter Stern, a VP at Apple who worked with Bergman at Time Warner Cable from 2006 to 2014. “She has enriched countless people’s lives with her insight, integrity, and boundless generosity.”

Sharing Industry Pride

Throughout her career, Bergman has led with a genuine love for the industry, and for the people who make it run. “I look at the infrastructure our industry provided during the pandemic, and I feel such humility and pride,” she said. 

What’s on the mind of the avid adventure traveler these days? Regulation and opportunity. 

Aside from Comcast, Bergman is on boards of Black & Veatch, Visteon and her alma mater, the University of Rochester. She is also on the FCC’s Technological Advisory Council. For Advance, she’s a board member of 1010data and Hawkeye360, which enables the observation of RF signals from space.

 “I love the space industry,” Bergman said. “There are a lot of ties to the cable industry.” ■

As president of Katz Television Group, Leo MacCourtney oversees sales growth for more than 800 stations in nearly 200 markets. About 80 broadcast groups are served by Katz and MacCourtney. 

MacCourtney joined Katz, the largest media representation company for TV and radio in the country, in 2007 and was appointed to his current position five years later. 

In his role, the longtime sales executive works with local television stations as the conduit between advertisers and ad agencies on the national representative side.

Also: Welcome to the 30th Anniversary of the ‘B+C’ Hall of Fame 

Those connections with clients are “tremendous,” his boss, Katz Media Group CEO Mark Gray, said. “He is extremely well-known and well-liked. He has the highest amount of integrity.”

Brian Lawlor, president of local media at E.W. Scripps, has known MacCourtney for more than two decades.

“He’s somebody that on a regular basis, more than annually, we’re talking about strategy [and] competitive positioning,” Lawlor said.  

MacCourtney previously was in charge of Eagle Television Sales and Blair Television. 

Using technology, Katz can access data and strategic insights for product research for their clients. They oversee all retail ad campaigns and book political spots across the country on behalf of those stations.

After more than 40 years, MacCourtney, 66, has honed his craft in TV sales and humbly considers himself an expert in the field.

A senior leadership team of 10 reports directly to MacCourtney.  

With 10 offices across the country, he will often leave his Manhattan headquarters to meet employees or his dozens of clients. 

“He attracts great talent and people are very loyal to him,” Gray said.

However, MacCourtney said: “It’s not about me. It’s about giving people great opportunities to knock it out of the park.”

Experience was only part of MacCourtney’s skill set. He got a front-row seat to broadcasting, thanks to his father, Leo MacCourtney Sr., who owned TV stations.

Although the junior MacCourtney didn’t have the same drive, he was introduced to the national scene when his father connected him to Blair TV head Harry Smart in the 1970s.

He started in Cleveland for Blair and within two years was transferred to New York, where he’s been based ever since.

Growing up in Pennsylvania, MacCourtney was already thinking about his future. 

“When I spent the summers at home, I liked hanging out with the sales guys at [dad’s] TV station,” he recalled.  

Getting a glimpse into his career, MacCourtney was hooked when he attended the University of Notre Dame in 1973. He earned a bachelor’s degree in business administration but didn’t rely on his degree for work. 

“The job was to get a job,” he said. 

After a slew of interviews, MacCourtney landed a sales job at Johnson & Johnson.  However, his path would be altered forever upon listening to the radio one day. A commercial came on the air seeking sales personnel at radio station WERE Cleveland.

With a love of sales and the culture at Katz, MacCourtney keeps the passion alive.  “There’s never been a day that I’ve gone to work that I didn’t like,” he said. “I’ve always thought broadcasting is the most fun job because it’s all people. It’s very outward.” 

MacCourtney, a strong advocate for local TV, regularly gives back to the industry that has meant so much to him. 

Giving Back to Broadcasting

His involvement in the Broadcasters Foundation of America, as VP and treasurer, makes sure that those in need are not forgotten. Katz Media has gone to bat for that worthy cause, raising more than $400,000 from employee and seller donations. 

“He devotes a lot of time and energy in doing that,” Gray said. 

The veteran exec also is on the board of the Washington Media Scholars Foundation, which “gives young people the opportunity to learn what’s going on in the business,” MacCourtney said. 

MacCourtney is also chairman of the International Radio and Television Society and previously held that title for the Television Bureau of Advertising.

“I do believe there is a huge mission here for people like myself to give back to the industry and I work very hard to make sure that I’m helping,” he said.

MacCourtney’s passion for his job is as strong as ever. “My motto in the business is, ‘There is no finish line,’ ” he said. ■

The career hallmark of longtime Graham Media Group president and CEO Emily Barr, who just stepped back to serve as a consultant before she retires, is that she has kept her stations connected to their communities while encouraging journalism to thrive.

“She is truly motivated by the mission of broadcasting,” National Association of Broadcasters president and CEO Curtis LeGeyt said. “That’s always been larger than her role at her specific company. She knows the importance of having a medium that unites and serves as a real local nexus to which people can turn to find the resources they need.” 

That’s on the macro level. On the micro level, to a person everyone notes Barr’s warmth and authenticity. 

Also: Welcome to the 30th Anniversary of the ‘B+C’ Hall of Fame

“The first thing that strikes you if you spend time with Emily is that she’s a very good listener,” LeGeyt said. “Her role at NAB [as chair of the Television Board] was to find common ground on advocacy solutions. She’s someone who can do that because she’s willing to put herself in others’ shoes.” 

Catherine Badalamente just succeeded Barr as Graham’s president and CEO after working closely with her as Graham’s VP and chief innovation officer. 

“She’s everything that you see and more,” Badalamente said. “I always tell the story about how I worked closely with Alan Frank [Graham’s CEO before Barr] and he told me that I was going to love working with her. I read every article I could find on her and I went to the comments, because that’s where you get the real story, and every story about her was how she was real and genuine and hard-working. All of that turned out to be true.” 

After graduating from Carleton College in Minnesota with a bachelor’s degree in film studies, Barr got a job as a news editor at KSTP St. Paul in 1980. 

She decided to get her master’s degree in business administration (MBA), starting first in Minneapolis and then transferring to George Washington University after she was hired as writer and producer at WJLA Washington, D.C. She transferred again to the University of St. Thomas in Houston when she was hired as promotion manager at KHOU, later moving up to creative services director.                   

MBA finally in hand after four years, she began to look around again, landing a job as director of broadcast operations at WMAR Baltimore working for then-general manager Arnie Kleiner. 

 She remained in Baltimore for six years, rising to assistant general manager. “I felt like Baltimore was the place where I really got involved in the community and started to understand the nuance of what it took to be a general manager,” Barr said.

Kleiner departed WMAR five years later to run KABC Los Angeles, and Barr started setting her sights on a GM position. WMAR’s owner, Scripps, thought that at 35 Barr was too young to run a TV station, but Kleiner tipped her off to a position at ABC’s WTVD in Raleigh, North Carolina. 

Just after she got married in October 1994, she and her new husband, Scott M. Kane, a freelance videographer, moved to Raleigh where she ran the station for just under three years. 

Getting Rooted in Chicago

In 1997, at seven and a half months pregnant with her first child, Barr decamped again, this time for Chicago, where she lives to this day. She ran ABC’s WLS Chicago, well-known as Oprah Winfrey’s home station, for 15 years. 

“I was very happy working for ABC and Disney for all those years,” she said. “I really got connected in the city and the community. I knew everybody — I was connected to the mayor and knew the governor — and I was on a lot of nonprofit boards.”

In 2011, Frank was due to retire and was helping Graham find his replacement when Barr’s name came up. After discussing the move for a year, Barr finally agreed to leave WLS to run Graham Media’s seven TV stations, remaining in Chicago even though the company was headquartered in Detroit. 

“When you are running seven stations versus running one, you have a slightly wider viewer of the industry and of the issues concerning the industry,” she said. “I also had to learn how to deal with the people directly at corporate and on the board of directors. It adds a different layer of complexity to what you do.”

After that full career, her guiding principle hasn’t shifted. “The ability to hold important people accountable in your community and celebrate and uplift your community — that’s the key to being a great local broadcaster,” Barr said. ￭

We gather to celebrate a very special event — the induction of the 30th anniversary class of the B+C Hall of Fame in recognition of their special contributions to our industry. 

In 1991, on the occasion of the 60th anniversary of Broadcasting magazine, the Hall of Fame  was created to honor 60 individuals who had through the course of their careers made significant contributions to TV and electronic media. The original class included industry legends ranging from Guglielmo Marconi to William S. Paley, Bob Hope, cable pioneers Bill Daniels and Dr. John Malone and C-SPAN founder Brian Lamb, to name but a few. Lucille Ball was one of three women honorees, alongside Irna Phillips, creator of the daytime soap operas Guiding Light and As the World Turns, and Joan Ganz Cooney, one of the founders of Sesame Workshop.  

This year’s class, announced in 2020 with the celebration delayed due to concerns over COVID-19, is a special one indeed. Its 12 members include six women, ranging from on-air journalists Hoda Kotb and Savannah Guthrie, co-anchors of NBC’s Today, to Emily Barr, the recently retired president and CEO of Graham Media Group. They are joined by Pearlena Igbowke, chairman of NBCUniversal Studio Group; and Susanne Daniels, former global head of original content at YouTube and a media consultant and lecturer. Also included is Nomi Bergman, president of Advance/Newhouse Investment Partnership and a director of Comcast Corp.  

Nomi is joined by her brother Steve Miron, CEO of Advance/Newhouse Partnership; their father, Bob Miron, was a member of the Hall of Fame Class of 2002, creating a First Family of Cable, if you will. The breadth of our class includes Katz Television Group president Leo MacCourtney along with the former CEO of ION Media Networks, Brandon Burgess. They are joined by Steven R. Swartz, president and CEO of Hearst, and Curtis Symonds, now CEO of HBCUGo.tv Network following a lengthy career at BET Networks and ESPN. Radio is well represented by a career-long veteran, Dan Mason, the retired president and CEO of CBS Radio and subsequent chairman of the Broadcasters Foundation of America, a primary beneficiary of our event, in addition to the Paley Center for Media. ESPN will also receive a first-time honor, recognized as our Iconic Network for its 40 years as the “Worldwide Leader in Sports” and a major entertainment industry presence. 

We are grateful to our co-hosts for the evening, Hannah Storm, anchor of ESPN’s SportsCenter, and Al Roker, weather and feature anchor of NBC’s Today and co-host, third hour of Today, for their contributions to the festivities. Thanks also to our in-house editorial and sales staffs at B+C; the marketing and production teams; and Future events leader Kelly Boon. And, of course, our event producers at Live Star Entertainment, Eric Drath and Danielle Naassana; as well as Alan Winnikoff and Carina Sayles, our PR team; and especially our sales team, led by Jessica Wolin and Jo Stanley. Finally, thanks to you, our inductees and company sponsors, alumni and attendees, for your 30 years of support and generosity.  

Thank you all!  

The 2022 ‘B+C’ Hall of Fame Class

• Emily Barr
• Nomi Bergman
• Steve Miron
• Brandon Burgess
• Susanne Daniels
• Savannah Guthrie
• Hoda Kotb
• Pearlena Igbokwe
• Leo MacCourtney 
• Dan Mason
• Steven R. Swartz
• Curtis Symonds

Iconic Network

• ESPN

Honor Roll: A complete listing of past Hall of Fame inductees 

For registration and sponsorship information for the B+C Hall of Fame, please click here.