9:00 AM - 10:15 AM
Session co-Sponsored by the Producers Guild of America
Session A:
Global Superstars – Understanding the Power of Hollywood
This session serves as the perfect centerpiece discussion and kick-off of the two day conference. As the opening panel, it represents the basic proposition of what makes the entertainment industry a world cultural, as well as commercial institution. While the power of Hollywood is not the monolith it was forty years ago, it remains the number one center of entertainment glamour, excitement as well as blockbuster film, television and music production. While the creative communities of Europe and Asia are quickly expanding their own explosive reach, Hollywood for the time being remains the world center of Superstar power. It is why the premier of the Entertainment Globalization conference is appropriately being held in Los Angeles. Whether a global blockbuster is being produced on a backlot in Los Angeles or on a faraway location, it remains the power of Hollywood that is at work.
Mindy Herman, President and CEO, E! Entertainment Television Networks
Mace Neufeld, Film Producer, Hunt for Red October, The General's Daughter, Patriot Games, The Omen
Randy Greenberg, Senior Vice President, International Marketing and Distribution, Universal Pictures
Robert J. Dowling, Publisher, Hollywood Reporter, Moderator
Additional speakers to be announced
Mindy Herman, President and CEO, E! Entertainment Television Networks: As President and CEO of E! Networks, the world’s largest producer and distributor of enter
tainment news and lifestyle-related programming, Mindy Herman leads a team which oversees the ongoing growth and development of E! Networks’ flagship network, E! Entertainment Television. In addition, she is responsible for shaping and directing the evolution of style. Network, its online affiliated companies, which include E! Online, moviefinder.com and shop.eonline.com, and international business ventures. Ms. Herman joined E! Networks in 2000 from In Demand L.L.C. (formerly Viewer’s Choice) where, as President and CEO, she led the company’s campaign to establish the first national consumer brand identity for the cable television pay-per-view experience. By building on the cable industry’s aggressive rollout of digital services and responding to greater competition for viewers, Ms. Herman constructed a new business model that continues to help shape the changing cable television landscape. From 1990 through 1998, Ms. Herman held a number of executive positions with News Corporation, but it was in 1993, as Senior Vice President, Business Affairs at FX Networks, that she played a key role in the launch of Fox’s first cable network. Ms. Herman was active in all areas of the new network’s business, including programming, branding and strategic positioning, as well as negotiating key MSO affiliation and retransmission agreements which fueled post-launch growth of the network. In addition, she developed the programming and business strategy for Fox’s commercial-free movie service: FXM: Movies From Fox. During her tenure at News Corporation, Ms. Herman participated in the start-up of several of the company’s high-profile businesses, and was one of the principle negotiators of many of Fox’s key sports rights deals, including the NHL agreement. In 1997, she was named Executive Vice President of Fox Television Studios, the News Corporation start-up unit involved in the creation of programming for network, cable and international outlets. In this role, she oversaw the studio’s worldwide sales and marketing, program enterprises, production, finance, administration and business affairs. Prior to joining Fox, Ms. Herman practiced corporate law. She holds a B.S. degree in Economics from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, and received her J.D. degree and an MBA in finance from UCLA. She also attended the London School of Economics where she studied social policy and government. Recently, she was invited to serve on the board of directors of the International Council of the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences.Mace Neufeld, Film Producer, Hunt for “Red October,” “The General's Daughter,”
“No Way Out,” “Patriot Games,” “The Omen,” “The Frisco Kid,” and “The Saint”: With his films grossing over one billion dollars worldwide, Mace Neufeld is one of the most prolific and successful producers in Hollywood. His keen eye for talent and ability to turn published works into box-office hits has helped launch the careers of such stars as Kevin Costner, Alec Baldwin and directors Richard Donner, Roger Donaldson, Phillip Noyce and John McTiernan. After an incredibly successful decade at Paramount Pictures, Neufeld has moved his production company to Columbia Pictures, where he has a signed three-year first-look production deal. Under his new deal, Neufeld will produce two Nelson DeMille thrillers, The Lion’s Game and Plum Island, as well as an adaptation of the H.G. Wells novella, The Man Who Could Work Miracles. Also with Columbia, Neufeld will produce Michael Connelly’s crime thrillers Black Ice, The Concrete Blonde and Black Echo. Neufeld has a large slate of projects at Paramount that are in various stages of production. Among them are the highly anticipated adaptation of Tom Clancy’s The Sum of All fears, starring Ben Affleck and Morgan Freeman and directed by Phil Alden Robinson; the adaptation of Patrick McCrat’s novel Asylum, with Liam Neeson and Natasha Richardson set to star, a remake of John Frankenheimer’s hit thriller, Seconds, to be directed by Jonathan Mostow and the action feature, Pathfinder, with Martin Campbell attached to direct. Neufeld began his career as a manager, discovering some of the most important performing and production talent in the entertainment industry. He was responsible for guiding the careers of Dan Adams (Get Smart), Don Knotts (The Andy Griffith Show), Jay Ward (Bullwinkle and His Friends), Gabe Kaplan (Welcome Home Kotter) and in the music field he did the same for artists including Jim Croce, Randy Newman, Herb Alpert & the Tijuana Brass and The Carpenters.Robert J. Dowling, Editor-in-Chief and Publisher, The Hollywood Reporter: Robert Dowling has one of the most unique publishing backgrounds in the business. With over three decad
es of successful experience, he has published in the international arena, as well as entertainment, sports marketing, technology, fashion and retailing. During that time he has created and launched five magazines and created and implemented an ad sales and publishing management program for technology media representatives. He produced conferences and expositions for marketing executives and developed a TV talk show for sports marketers. Dowling has spent the past 12 years as the Editor-in-Chief and Publisher of The Hollywood Reporter. When BPI Communications purchased The Hollywood Reporter in 1988 and placed Dowling in charge, the paper was the entertainment capital’s oldest daily trade and had been family-owned since the beginning. Due to Dowling’s leadership and vision, The Hollywood Reporter has had its most successful years in its 70-year history and is now the number one entertainment daily trade paper read by over 140,000 industry professionals worldwide. Dowling used his experience and instincts to mastermind long-term goals and strategic business initiatives to elevate the level of the paper and build on its potential. He added key professionals to the management staff and repositioned and sharpened the focus of the paper by committing editorial to Video, Cable, Marketing, Sports, Fashion, Electronic Games and Theme Parks. He created many of the paper’s most successful special issues, including the Next Generation, Women in Entertainment and Film 500. Dowling also launched The Hollywood Reporter’s Web site in 1996, the industry’s first online delivery of entertainment news. The recipient of several publishing honors over the years, Dowling has been honored as the Foundation of Motion Picture Pioneers’ 2000 Pioneer of the Year. He is the first publisher to receive this award in the FMPP’s 62-year history. He has also been presented with the prestigious American Business Press’ Crain Award for his distinguished editorial career. Dowling is President of the Film Group and Executive Vice President of BPI Communications, the world’s largest network of entertainment-related publications and services, including The Hollywood Reporter, Billboard, Adweek, Back Stage, Back Stage West, Film Journal International and Shoot. Dowling is president of the American Business Press’ Editorial Committee and a board member of the Los Angeles Sports and Entertainment Commission. He is a frequent guest speaker at universities and industry events due to his ability to observe, understand and predict what’s coming next in the markets he covers. Most recently, Dowling was invited to Washington D.C. to brief members of the White House cabinet on the entertainment industry. Dowling lives in Los Angeles with his wife Juanita and has three sons and three grandchildren.Randy Greenberg was appointed to the newly created position of senior vice presiden
t, international marketing and distribution for Universal Pictures in April 2001. Greenberg, a 12-year international marketing veteran, supervises the international marketing and distribution campaigns for Universal films released in territories outside of North America, and is responsible for distribution, creative, media, publicity, promotions, new media and research on these releases. He coordinates the execution of these campaigns on a day-to-day basis with United International Pictures (UIP), the joint venture marketing and distribution arm for Universal Pictures and Paramount Pictures, and serves on the UIP board of directors. In addition, Greenberg works closely with David Livingstone, president, marketing for Universal Pictures International, who oversees marketing and distribution for Working Title Productions and Universal Pictures International acquisitions. Since joining Universal, Greenberg has been involved with the record-breaking overseas releases of such films as Bridget Jones's Diary, which has earned $114.7 million in international box office to date, The Mummy Returns, which has earned $216.2 million overseas to date, and Jurassic Park III, which has tallied $152.1 million internationally to date. Greenberg is currently preparing for fall international launches of The Fast and the Furious and American Pie 2. From March 2000 until joining Universal, Greenberg served as vice president, marketing and sales at the online entertainment firm, ALWAYSi, where he was responsible for developing and coordinating global marketing and publicity campaigns, supervising in-house film acquisitions and offline sales of feature films and short films. Prior to that, he served for five years as vice president, international theatrical marketing for MGM, where he worked on such films as The World Is Not Enough, The Thomas Crown Affair, Stigmata, Tomorrow Never Dies, Ulee’s Gold, The Birdcage, Golden Eye, Get Shorty and Rob Roy. Before joining MGM, he worked from May 1989 to March 1995 as an account executive in the Los Angeles offices of Dennis Davidson Associates, handling international publicity for such clients as Carolco, Cinergi, Miramax, Polygram, 20th Century Fox, Morgan Creek and Village Roadshow and working on such films as StarGate, Mr. Holland’s Opus, Pulp Fiction, Reservoir Dogs, Terminator 2: Judgment Day, Basic Instinct, Cliffhanger, The Last of the Mohicans, Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves, Total Recall and Field of Dreams. Greenberg began his career in October 1988 working for Edwards Cinemas as the assistant manager of the Woodbridge Theatre in Irvine, California, after receiving his Bachelor’s degree in Marketing/Finance in June 1988 from the University of Denver. Universal Pictures is a unit of Universal Studios (www.universal studios.com), a part of CANAL+, the TV and Film division of Vivendi Universal, a new global leader in media and communications.