Next Gen 2024: 35 Rising Hollywood Executives Under 35  (2024)

James Allen, 35

Head of Scripted Films & TV, 101 Studios

LOGLINE Steers projects like Yellowstone and the forthcoming JonBenét Ramsey limited series for Paramount+.

THE ARC James Allen arrived at the University of Arizona with lofty dreams of one day being a professional baseball player. Once those were dashed, the L.A. native pivoted to throwing events for his and other fraternities. Before long, he found himself crisscrossing the country producing massive events with talent like LMFAO and Steve Aoki. Eventually, he says, “I found myself at this weird crossroads where I was paying for myself to go to school and they were teaching me how to start a business, and here I was running a business, so I ended up leaving school and doing it full time.” That entrepreneurial spirit ultimately impressed David Glasser, who hired him to come work at the Weinstein Company, where Allen quickly worked his way up from an acquisitions assistant. Seven years later, he became Glasser’s first hire at 101 Studios, which launched on the back of Taylor Sheridan and his runway hit Yellowstone. In the years since, he’s helped build a formidable slate that has included George and Tammy, 1883, Tulsa King and Lawmen: Bass Reeves. Looking ahead, Allen, who’s married to a pilates instructor, is also shepherding projects like the JonBenet Ramsey limited series, starring Melissa McCarthy and Clive Owen, and theMichael Fassbender spy thriller The Agency.

INDUSTRY BUZZWORD I WISH WOULD GO AWAY “Yellowstone-esque.”

FICTIONAL CHARACTER I MOST IDENTIFY WITH “Jerry Maguire. I feel like the quote ‘Help me, help you’ resonates with many executives in this industry.”

Max Brabant, 34

Public Figure Innovation Partnerships, Meta

LOGLINE Gets buy-in from celebrities and other public figures in the tech innovation space, from partnerships on AI initiatives to collaboration on new features launching on Instagram.

THE ARC Growing up, Brabant was obsessed with all things horror. “Silence of the Lambs, Scream, Friday the 13th — all the classics,” she says, noting that “nothing was able to console” her when she couldn’t watch Hannibal in theaters due to restrictions around minors watching graphic content in the Netherlands, where she grew up after moving from the U.K. Having caught the film bug, she convinced her mom to let her study abroad at UCLA but eventually had to drop out due to financial reasons. Instead of leaving the U.S., she cashed in her work visa early and started her journey in Hollywood. Brabant’s first stop in Hollywood was as Toni Howard’s intern at ICM, followed by stints at Pantheon, ICM, Fox Searchlight and CAA, where she was at the forefront of transitioning influencers into mainstream media and guiding legacy clients into digital media. Eventually, Meta recruited Brabant to steward celebrity innovation partnerships, oftentimes dealing with AI initiatives. “It’s a lot of reading the room,” says the exec, who has helped with deals like Meta using actors’ voices (see Judi Dench) in its digital assistant product. “It becomes clear very quickly, having worked with talent for a long time, the ones who are skeptical and aren’t even open to it and the ones who are curiousandmaylean in.”

MOST HOLLYWOOD EXPERIENCE “Getting the famous coconut cake from Tom Cruise.”

I’D LOVE TO TRADE PLACES WITH FOR A DAY James Wan

WHY ISN’T HOLLYWOOD TALKING ABOUT … “Expanding the Nicole Kidman/AMC universe?! I’m talking merch, drinks, snacks etc.”

Brian Boone, 34

Talent Agent, CAA

LOGLINE Guides the careers of Emmy and Oscar winners like Lamorne Morris, H.E.R., Sheryl Lee Ralph and Ariana DeBose.

THE ARC Growing up, Boone was not allowed to watch television during the week, so he would cram all the movie and TV-watching he could into his weekends. It was in those binges that he developed his love for entertainment. Spurred on by a high school drama teacher who advised that he was “a bad actor” but “loud” and should be a talent agent, the Princeton grad landed a job in the CAA mailroom, where he rose through the ranks, signing Judy Greer as his first client. Now, he works with established stars like Viola Davis and Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor (Boone signed the Oscar-nominated Ellis-Taylor this month), as well as up-and-comers including Saturday Night star Gabriel LaBelle. Recently, the rep helped Morris transition from comedy to drama with his Emmy-winning role in Fargo. Says Boone, “Younger talent gives me the ability to really introduce them to the town, to filmmakers and creators, and I feel like I can really have an influence in developing them.”

FICTIONAL CHARACTER I MOST IDENTIFY WITH “Buzz Lightyear. I am infinit(ely) optimistic!”

BEST ADVICE I’VE GOTTEN “Return your colleagues’ calls first.” IT WAS FROM “Richard Lovett.”

Gaby Cohen, 32

Talent Agent, Gersh

LOGLINE Helps Katy O’Brian and reality TV favorite Ariana Madix make their next moves.

THE ARC The rep was a student at NYU when she attended a talk with Gersh’s Leslie Siebert, later telling the agency co-president, “I want to be you when I grow up.” Calling Gersh home since her intern days, Cohen handles a variety of talent, from up-and-coming performers to political pundits. She landed O’Brian after the actress’ Love Lies Bleeding premiered at Sundance, booking a role in the next Mission: Impossible three days later. She is guiding Madix (Vanderpump Rules and Love Island) into the scripted space and navigating Hollywood for JFK’s grandson and Vogue contributor Jack Schlossberg. Also on her roster are Alex Newell, the first gender non-binary Tony Award winner, Sabrina Impacciatore, who snagged a lead in Greg Daniels’ new Peacock show, and Chloe Cherry, an adult film actress who segued to the mainstream with a breakout role in Euphoria. She says, “It’s important to me to work with talent that is not conventional but who is emblematic of the change in the marketplace.”

MY FIRST JOB IN HOLLYWOOD ENTAILED … “Wrangling Smurfs during a press event on the Sony lot.”

BUZZWORD I WISH WOULD GO AWAY “Best and final.”

MOST HOLLYWOOD EXPERIENCE“Straight out of The Devil Wears Prada: stranded in the lobby of the Vogue offices, with one hour to replace a very specific kind of skateboard left behind in an Uber for a photoshoot. My assistant called [Gersh’s] New York mailroom, and we tracked down the last remaining Ripstik in all of Manhattan.”

Kira Cousineau, 35

Manager, Film, Netflix

LOGLINE Has a heavy hand in Netflix’s big-budget endeavors like Will Smith’s Fast and Loose.

THE ARC Despite being a theater fanatic growing up, Cousineau realized she wasn’t cut out for a career on Broadway. “Memorizing lines wasn’t my thing,” she says, adding that Hollywood called out to her during college. After dabbling in politics at USC (she grew up in Washington, D.C.), she got her foot in the entertainment industry door through internships at Mandate Pictures and The Weinstein Company. Cousineau is no stranger to a tentpole. After a four-year stint at Simon Kinberg’s Genre Films during which she worked on the X-Men movies, she was named director of development at Sony, where she oversaw the sequels to Goosebumps, Zombieland and Men in Black. Next up: helping shepherd studio films at Netflix, including the Kevin Hart action comedy Lift (which spent multiple weeks in the streamer’s top 10) and the action thriller Carry On. The first reunited her with former boss Kinberg, which, she says, “was a very full-circle moment for me.” When she’s not in the office, she’s bouncing ideas off of her husband, with whom she shares a seven-month-old son and dog.

I’D LOVE TO SWITCH PLACES WITH “Dame Prue Leith from The Great British Baking Show.”

TALENT I WOULD LOVE TO WORK WITH “Denis Villeneuve.”

Courtney Cunniff, 35

Senior VP Film, Black Bear

LOGLINE The indie film faithful’s year includes Greg Araki’s latest feature and a Sydney Sweeney boxing movie.

THE ARC Family camcorder in hand, Cunniff discovered early on that she had a knack for producing, remembering, “My friends and I made ridiculous little murder mysteries, and I realized how much I enjoyed bossing everyone around.” After graduating from the University of Oklahoma, the Dallas native was an assistant on the Oklahoma set of August: Osage County, which catapulted her to New York as an assistant at The Weinstein Co. and later to L.A. for Focus Features and eOne. Her latest post began this year at Black Bear with the Olivia Wilde starrer I Want Your Sex, Sweeney’s film about American pro boxer Christy Martin and the narrative debut from the Oscar-winning doc director behind Navalny. All three projects started production in the same week. Cunniff, who lives in Los Angeles with her “nine-year situationship”, two Bernese Mountain dogs, and two cats, says, “The version of the industry that I grew up in was very structured. Now, the playbook has been thrown out the window and it is anyone’s game. That is the spirit I approach indie filmmaking with.”

TALENT I’D KILL TO WORK WITH “Kirsten Dunst, without question.”

FICTIONAL CHARACTER I IDENTIFY WITH“Jesse from Free Willy. I love whales and I’m also an angsty teen.”

BEST ADVICE I’VE GOTTEN “Whatever you do, make yourself indispensable.” AND IT CAME FROM “Supposedly my TA in film school sat next to James Cameron on a plane and this is what he told her about working in entertainment that she then passed on to me. It was good advice!”

Alden Dalia, 35

Motion Picture Executive, WME

LOGLINE A connector of filmmakers and IP, the executive has carved out a lucrative niche digging up material for the likes of Alfonso Cuarón and Emma Stone.

THE ARC Years before Substack was hot, Dalia, then an assistant at Sony, started an email newsletter that he blasted out every Friday with three short films and five articles he found interesting that week. Appropriately titled “Alden’s Picks,” the newsletter ballooned from 30 to 1,000 recipients. Eventually, a WME agent reached out, saying, “Why don’t you just come to WME and do what you do with your newsletter but for our clients?” At a time when project development is happening outside of studio lots, Dalia has built out his own department where he connects filmmakers to IP, gaining fans in Cuarón and video game designer Hideo Kojima. Recently, he set up the book Checkmate at Stone outfit Fruit Tree. “One minute I am reading a very literary book and the next minute I am killing zombies on a handheld game device,” says Dalia of ferreting out new material. He takes a fan-first approach to his job, happy to hunt down rights wherever they may be: “I’ll email anybody. My superpower is I can ignore the awkwardness.”

BUZZWORD I WISH WOULD GO AWAY “Content.”

MY FIRST JOB IN HOLLYWOOD ENTAILED …“My first year as an assistant, I was asked to pull out all the green M&Ms before putting them into a bowl for my boss.”

Maia Eyre, 34

Senior VP Creative Development, Columbia

LOGLINE The exec has a keen eye for material, championing the runaway hit Anyone But You.

THE ARC Armed with a degree in English literature, the Toronto-born Eyre was on the fast track to being a university professor. But an internship at a small Canadian production company convinced Eyre, who hosted Oscar parties at her house when she was a tween, to change courses. After graduating from the MFA in the producing program at UCLA, Eyre landed at Sony, the first “hire” at the newly relaunched Tri-Star division, led by then newly-installed head Tom Rothman. Later, at Columbia Pictures, she found herself in a bidding war for a spec script titled Anyone But You. It came down to Columbia and a streamer. “We convinced them to bet on themselves, that they could make more money and a cultural impact if they went with us,” recalls Eyre, who is expecting her second child. The $25 million production made more than $220 million worldwide, minted stars out of Sydney Sweeney and Glen Powell and proved romantic comedies were viable again. “And we should keep making more. I plan to,” she says of the genre. Next up: reimaginings of both I Know What You Did Last Summer and Anaconda.

HOLLYWOOD DREAM JOB “Working in Hollywood in the ’90s.”

MOST HOLLYWOOD EXPERIENCE“When I was an assistant I was on Tom Cruise’s Christmas coconut cake list for one year because he had had a meeting with my boss. I really peaked that year, it’s my life goal to get back on that list.”

THE PERSON I’D LOVE TO SWITCH PLACES WITH FOR A DAY “Prue Leith from The Great British Bake Off. I have a crush on Paul Hollywood and I’d like to shoot my shot (sorry to my husband and child).”

Emily Furutani, 34

VP Comedy, Hulu Originals

LOGLINE She’s in charge of Hulu’s stand-up initiative, with monthly specials from the likes of Bill Burr, Roy Wood Jr. and Sebastian Maniscalco.

THE ARC “I’m very into manifesting,” says Furutani, a fifth-generation Japanese American raised in Southern California. She grew up on a diet of NBC comedies like The Office and 30 Rock and, despite her lack of industry connections, was dead set on a career in comedy. The Hollywood Reporter, and the “Next Gen” list specifically, became a bible of sorts for the San Francisco State grad, who was a student of the industry long before she became a power player in it. Ultimately, Furutani parlayed an entry-level agency gig into a job at NBC International Studios, which led her to sibling Universal TV, where she worked with Lorne Michaels’ Broadway Video along with Tina Fey, Jimmy Fallon, Seth Meyers and The Office’s Mike Schur. More recently, she made the leap to Hulu, where she’s now overseeing the platform’s major standup initiative. “The way I’ve approached it is how do we give comedians their flowers because these specials should all be huge moments,” says Furutani, who also works on scripted comedies across ABC and Hulu. When Fururtani isn’t at the office or at the Comedy Store, she’s often at home in Silver Lake, finding other ways to be creative. She even has her own hand-crafted, children’s clothing line, aptly named Furutiny, which has heavy Japanese influence. As for what she intends to manifest next? “My husband and I would love to start a family,” says Furutani.

THE TALENT I’D KILL TO WORK WITH Bernie Mac. He would’ve been my first stand-up booking if he was still with us.

HOLLYWOOD DREAM JOB “Honestly, a content creator. To be clear, it’s only for the free stuff, mainly the makeup.” Louis Vuitton was also giving out Neverfull totes recently. I’d take one of those too.

Reggie J. Glosson, 32

Associate, Gang, Tyre

LOGLINE Helped longtime client Dylan Mulvaney transition from TikTok star to full-fledged actress and works with firm clients like Daniel Dae Kim.

THE ARC As a student at Los Angeles filming hotspot University High School, where Bruce Almighty and Pineapple Express were shot, Glosson was friends with the theater kids without being one himself. He only got the itch to work in Hollywood after he stepped back from his focus on civil rights advocacy. His first industry job was at CAA, where he worked in the mail room and then as an assistant in business affairs under Keith Sears. “I figured I’d shoot my shot,” he says of working at the agency. Glosson then landed at Columbia Law School and later at Gang, Tyre, where he now works on transactions for creative heavyweights Stephen King and Michael Mann while guiding the careers of young talents like Mulvaney. When not in the office, he’s playing tennis or doing civil rights pro bono work, including for activist-journalist Myrlie Evers-Williams: “It’s my chance to give back and do things in the vein of what initially got me interested in the law.”

MOST HOLLYWOOD EXPERIENCE “Getting an unsolicited call from a TMZ reporter looking for an inside scoop. … I didn’t take it.”

THE PERSON I’D LOVE TO SWITCH PLACES WITH FOR A DAY “Any person that gets to greenlight documentaries.”

FICTIONAL CHARACTER I IDENTIFY WITH “Maxine Shaw fromLiving Singlebecause she’s a quick-witted, ambitious lawyer (with a voracious appetite). Like me, she values authenticity and shows deep care and support for friends.”

Abby Glusker, 34

Lit Agent, UTA

LOGLINE Making deals for a wide range of female talent, from Call Her Daddy host Alex Cooper to actress Kirsten Dunst.

THE ARC The 2000s Fox teen drama The O.C. is partly to thank for pushing Glusker into the business. As a high schooler, the native Angeleno used some budding agent skills (pulling strings, following up, etc.) to get a set visit to the series that was then her obsession. There, she met creator Josh Schwartz and executive producer Stephanie Savage. “I loved how it all came together. And I knew that I wanted to be a part of it,” Glusker says. “The rest is history.” Before she even went to college at George Washington University, she interned at UTA. Now an agent, Glusker’s clients include Paris Hilton and female creatives like Aftersun director Charlotte Wells and Happy Face creator Jen Cacicio. For Glusker, who lives in the Rancho Park neighborhood with her husband (2023 Next Gen honoree Andrew Schneider), their seven-month-old, and a dog, the most fun part of the job is being an advocate: “The answer is always no,” she says, so she tries to get people to say “yes.”

FICTIONAL CHARACTER I IDENTIFY WITH “Harriet the Spy because I will find out.”

MY FIRST JOB IN HOLLYWOOD ENTAILED … “Making posters and going to a Sea Shepherd protest in Downtown LA to save the dolphins with my boss.”

Faisal Kanaan, 31

Manager, Untitled Entertainment

LOGLINE Helps clients like Alex Convery (Air) and Alan Fox (Spike Lee’s High and Low) get their projects made.

THE ARC With Arabic as his first language, Kanaan lived in three countries all before the age of 16. As a teen, he spent summers in the Middle East reading Hemingway in his grandmother’s library before returning to the U.S. in time to play football in the fall. “It was two halves of an identity,” he says now. A coach at Bentley University introduced him to the sports agency world. After a brief stint at Paradigm, he joined Grandview (now Untitled), where he signed his first client while still an assistant. That client? Convery, who would go on to earn a WGA Award nomination for 2023’s Air. His second client, Fox, co-wrote Lee’s upcoming A24 thriller that stars Denzel Washington. This year, Kanaan also signed Oscar-nominated Ramin Bahrani and helped Eric Carrasco launch a Netflix animated series co-created with Zack Snyder.

BUZZWORD I WISH WOULD GO AWAY “I’m still not sure which Hollywood scenario calls for the term ‘triangulate.’ “

MOST HOLLYWOOD EXPERIENCE “Bumping into a client in the Equinox steam room, and proceeding to run through one final ‘practice pitch’ ahead of their studio meeting later that day.They got the job. I got some serious exfoliation. A rare ‘win-win’.”

Carver Karaszewski, 31

President, Super Frog

LOGLINE Recently tapped to run buzzy filmmaker Hiro Murai’s company, the exec has a slate including Katie Dippold’s Widow’s Bay at Apple TV+ and Amazon’s Mr. & Mrs. Smith.

THE ARC Karaszewski was predestined for her new gig. Back when she was studying architecture at Barnard College — “basically gluing in a basement for four years,” she says — the Los Angeles native and daughter of acclaimed writer-producer Larry Karaszewski (The People vs. Larry Flint) fashioned a side hustle as a music video producer. She cold-called labels and managers, quickly booking jobs with Mac DeMarco, Sampha and Joey Bada$$. “It was very much a fake-it-till-you-make-it situation,” she says, though any faking it ended there. On her way to working for Murai, the lauded producer-director who also got his start making music videos, Karaszewski spent a decade at Michael Ellenberg’s Media Res. She went from being The Morning Show producer’s first hire to one of 50, an instant rising star who developed Boots Riley’s I’m a Virgo for Amazon and Scenes From A Marriage at HBO. Since joining Murai ( The Bear, Station Eleven, Atlanta) in July, filling one of the most-coveted job postings of 2024, she’s back in building mode — soon adding Katie Dippold’s Widow’s Bay at Apple TV+ to a growing company portfolio that already includes Mr. & Mrs. Smith. “We want to be a filmmaker’s company for filmmakers,” says the Nichols Canyon resident. “I love making the impossible possible. At Media Res, we made an anti-capitalist, surrealist and expensive art piece [I’m a Virgo]… for Amazon. That’s incredible.”

I WISH HOLLYWOOD STILL … “Had martinis at lunch.”

THE TALENT I’D KILL TO WORK WITH … My dad.

Jacqueline Kim, 33

Talent Agent, UTA

LOGLINE Daniel Dae Kim and Ke Huy Quan look to Kim to close deals for streaming series and Oscar-winning films.

THE ARC During the pandemic, Kim found herself reevaluating the impact she could make in a shifting industry. When she left Innovative Artists for UTA in the summer of 2021, the San Diego native was determined not to limit herself to working solely with actors. Now, she counts multihyphenate talent Richard Gadd, whose Netflix series Baby Reindeer won the Scot three Emmys, as a client. She marvels, “It really was a word-of-mouth sensation.” Kim also is proud to have been part of longtime client Quan’s career reinvention, having put him in Everything Everywhere All at Once, which netted Quan a best supporting actor Oscar. Now, she can’t wait for the world to see the Oscar winner in Universal’s Love Hurts, hitting theaters in February and marking his first project at the top of the call sheet. When she’s not working, Kim loves golfing and hiking with friends who aren’t in Hollywood: “I have all these hobbies that are so far removed from the job but allow me to maintain and build new relationships with people who are the everyday audience base.”

FICTIONAL CHARACTER I IDENTIFY WITH “Monica, from Friends.”

I WISH HOLLYWOOD STILL …“Used paper scripts.”

MOST HOLLYWOOD EXPERIENCE “The mailroom used to deliver me beautiful hand-drawn cards addressed to me every year around my birthday from some guy in Ohio. For years Ithought I had a long-distance stalker until I realized there was an actress named Jacqueline Kim also born in March who used to be a client of that agency!”

Chelsea Kujawa, 33

Senior VP Production, Lionsgate

LOGLINE The exec moves seamlessly between action pics (John Wick), faith-based films (The Best Christmas Pageant Ever) and female-forward thrillers (The Housemaid).

THE ARC Growing up in a family of medical professionals, the San Antonio-reared Kujawa assumed she would be a doctor until, as she puts it, “I had a quarter-life crisis at 18, which is hilarious in hindsight.” The University of Texas at Austin grad pivoted to entertainment, working as the assistant to then SXSW festival head Janet Pierson before heading to California where she made stopovers at ICM, Skydance, and Paramount, eventually landing at Lionsgate. At the studio she’s worked on everything from Jesus Revolution to the Judy Blume adaptation Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret to the John Wick franchise. Most recently, she brought in the thriller The Housemaid, attaching Sydney Sweeney and Amanda Seyfried and director Paul Feig. “At Lionsgate, we don’t have the luxury to go back to our library from 1932. We have to find original stuff,” says Kujawa, who is expecting her first child in February. “I want to keep proving theatrical is a thing and that is doesn’t have to be a sequel or a huge rebooted IP. It doesn’t have to be 100 million plus dollars.”

BUZZWORD I WISH WOULD GO AWAY “High concept.”

MOST HOLLYWOOD EXPERIENCE“A famous singer casually hotboxing a screening room while anxious execs sat there not knowing what to do.”

Clint LaVigne, 35

VP Drama Programming, HBO

LOGLINE A key member of HBO’s small but mighty drama department, where his purview includes projects like buzzy hit The Gilded Age.

THE ARC LaVigne had not been at Netflix very long when he got a note from an old colleague, Francesca Orsi, asking if he’d consider “coming home.” Home, in this instance, was HBO, where LaVigne had been an assistant early on in his career, before putting in time at Amblin, where he spent seven years working on shows like The Haunting of Hill House, and later at Netflix. “Opportunities like that never fall into your lap, so you’ve got to run to them,” recounts the Downey, Calif. native, who was raised by a high school English teacher/football coach dad and forensic biologist mom. In the three years since, LaVigne has worked on everything from The Gilded Age, which he took over and refocused from period soap to prestige TV, to Richard Gadd’s upcoming limited series. He describes the latter, for which he was just in London for a read through, as “a queer, coming-of-age meditation on toxic masculinity, which is just hitting me everywhere.” More recently, LaVigne added “dad” to his responsibilities. He and his husband, A League of Their Own showrunner Will Graham, welcomed a baby boy a little over a year ago. The family shuttles between L.A. and Ojai.

I STILL CAN’T BELIEVE MY FIRST JOB IN HOLLYWOOD ENTAILED Curating a bespoke trail mix with the perfect ratio of yogurt-covered almonds AND chauffeuring my boss’ sick dog to chemo treatment. Sad!

HOLLYWOOD DREAM JOB “Whatever Netflix department pumps out those perfect Lindsay Lohan holiday movies!”

Emily Levitan, 35

Director, Original Series, Netflix

LOGLINE Netflix’s resident Shonda whisperer, she oversees the streamer’s in-house talent stable behind Shondaland’s Bridgerton franchise.

THE ARC Yes, her father’s name is Steve. No, she’s not the scion of a famed sitcom writer. The New Jersey-reared Levitan arrived in Los Angeles to attend USC without a single Hollywood connection. She managed to snag an internship at HBO, where she worked upon graduation, before moving over to FX. Creative roles at Stacey Sher’s Shiny Penny Productions and Activision Blizzard Studios followed, then to Netflix in 2018. In her role at the streamer, Levitan oversees the most high-profile (and expensive) overall deal in TV: Shondaland. Anchored by Bridgerton, whose first three seasons each rank among Netflix’s 10-most watched English-language efforts of all time, Rhimes’ shingle has The Residence coming at the top of 2025. When Levitan’s not managing other deals — Josh Pate, Jonas Pate and Shannon Burke (Outer Banks); and Gloria Sanchez Productions (Dead to Me, No Good Deed) — she partners with the American Red Cross, CAA and The Groundlings every March on national blood drive Blood for Breck in honor of her late fiancé: actor, writer and comic Breck Denny.

I’D LOVE TO SWITCH PLACES WITH “Andy Cohen.”

FICTIONAL CHARACTER I MOST IDENTIFY WITH “Charlotte York (Sex and the City) because I am a romantic with a Cavalier King Charles Spaniel.”

J.D. Lifshitz, 32

Co-Founder & Producer, BoulderLight Pictures

LOGLINE One-half of the producer wunderkinds behind Barbarian and a splashy New Line slate.

THE ARC Lifshitz had moved out to Los Angeles at 19 and landed his first job as director Adam Wingard’s production assistant when childhood friend (and fellow 2024 Next Gen-er) Raphael Margules asked, “Can we make a movie for $60,000?” That year, the duo made their first feature, Contracted, selling it to IFC with a deal for a sequel. (The film came in under budget at $55,000.) Under their BoulderLight production banner, the horror aficionados navigated the world of film markets and foreign investors to ammas a long list of credits — The Wrath of Becky, Dementia — that belied their young ages. “I wore blazers to set to look older,” laughs Lifshitz. It was their 2022 horror Barbarian from Zach Cregger that wowed the industry. But, says Lifshitz, “No one wanted to make that movie. It was like Pulp Fiction or Scream in that, yes, it is out of the box and unconventional, but it is never not entertaining.” The film ultimately earned $45 million at the box office and landed them a deal at New Line, where they next will release the genre title Companion and Cregger’s Weapons. Says Lifshitz, a father of two, “I don’t make movies for the SoHo House. I make movies for twelve-year-old me.”

BEST ADVICE I’VE GOTTEN “You don’t have to join their circle. You just have to make your circle bigger.” IT WAS FROM “Jason Blum.”

TALENT I’D KILL TO WORK WITH “Adam Sandler.”

MOST HOLLYWOOD EXPERIENCE “Being escorted backstage at a concert… and meeting Adam Sandler.”

HOLLYWOOD DREAM JOB“Friend of Adam Sandler.”

Raphael Margules, 32

Co-Founder & Producer, BoulderLight Pictures

LOGLINE One half of the engine behind prolific prod outfit with credits like Netflix’s Woman of the Hour and A24’s Friendship.

THE ARC It was after making his 13th film, 2019’s The Vigil, that Margules, then only in his mid-20s, got a massive co-sign from horror maestro Jason Blum. “I get asked a lot, ‘Who will be the next Blumhouse? Who is a good example of someone on the path to success in Hollywood today?'” Blum wrote on social media, saying that the answer is Margules and his BoulderLight partner, J.D. Lifshitz. BoulderLight now finds itself in a lucrative pact with New Line, a sentimental move for Margules, who says he has seen the studio release The Mask more than any other movie. The company sold Anna Kendrick’s directorial debut to Netflix mid-strike and will soon release Tim Robinson and Paul Rudd comedy Friendship via A24. Margules, a dad to two daughters, is a big believer in theatrical: “On a purely business level, there is no way to establish yourself other than on a theatrical film. It’s also the most satisfying way to see things that you spend years of your life on.”

TALENT I WOULD LOVE TO WORK WITH “Jim Carrey.”

WHY ISN’T HOLLYWOOD TALKING ABOUT … “The fact that collapsed theatrical windows will change audience habits and further depreciate the theatrical box office.”

Will Maxfield, 33

Partner, WME Independent

LOGLINE Helps get films from John Carney, Mike Flanagan and Ali Abbasi in front of audiences.

THE ARC The independent film business is hard; it’s even harder when Donald Trump’s camp publicly threatens legal action after your film’s Cannes premiere but before the ink dries on the (official) reviews. “It was like a triple black diamond of a film sale,” says Maxfield of The Apprentice, the Abbasi movie about a young Trump and political fixer Roy Cohn. After months of intense negotiations, Maxfield helped the film finally make its way to theaters in October. The New Jersey native attended Columbia University thinking he would be a film major but pivoted to political science (Maxfield was a one-time intern for Senator Chuck Schumer) and got his film education on the side at the Lincoln Square AMC. Three days after graduation, he landed in the mail room at WME and made his way to the independent film group where he worked his way up to partner. Festivals are always a busy time for Maxfield. At Sundance in 2023, he closed deals for three films over three consecutive nights, including a roughly $20 million sale to Apple for Carney’s Flora and Son. At Toronto earlier this year, he premiered Mike Flanagan’s Stephen King adaptation The Life of Chuck, landing distribution at Neon. He says, “My job comes down to how can you get this movie off the ground and how can you get it made.”

MY FIRST JOB IN HOLLYWOOD ENTAILED … “Being a human basketball hoop for a company video when I was an intern at WME.”

BEST ADVICE I’VE GOTTEN“I was lucky enough to sit with the late Mike Nichols, and he told me: ‘Whatever you try in this industry, you’ll be embarrassed at first. Don’t worry, just keep going.'”

I WISH HOLLYWOOD STILL … “Gave more young filmmakers the canvas and resources to make bold films like we saw in the 70s and 90s.”

Courtney Mock, 33

Senior VP Scripted TV Development, Lionsgate

LOGLINE The exec is spearheading the buzzy Seth Rogen comedy The Studio for Apple TV+ and the first-ever Twilight TV series for Netflix.

THE ARC Mock’s early experience with large-scale theater productions came as a teenager, when the Anaheim native began writing and performing in plays for an audience of some 3,000 through her Megachurch. “A big part of growing up in the church for me was realizing that stories impact people,” she says, “and that doesn’t have to just be contained in this thing called religion.” In time, Mock parlayed her passion for storytelling into a degree from Chapman and some early gigs at companies like Brillstein and Temple Hill. It was at Tomorrow Studios, however, that she cut her teeth as an executive, helping to build an independent studio from the ground up. These days, Mock is a top TV exec at Lionsgate, where she’s intimately involved in everything from the CBS breakout Ghosts to the new Twilight animated series based on Stephenie Meyer’s novel Midnight Sun. Looking ahead, she’s also eager to add some faith-based fare to her slate. And while there isn’t much time left in the day for the married mom of three, Mock has been teaching herself to play the piano in the evenings. “It’s been really nice learning something new,” she says, “just having something that has nothing to do with work and nobody here to judge it.”

INDUSTRY BUZZWORD I WISH WOULD GO AWAY “Prestige-urals.”

THE DREAM JOB IN HOLLYWOOD Someone who has greenlight power.

Nicky Mohebbi, 34

Literary Agent, Verve

LOGLINE Guides writers like Zeb Wells (Deadpool & Wolverine) and Troy Quane (Nimona).

THE ARC Mohebbi grew up in a small town in West Virginia, where his parents run an IT company. Movies wormed their way into his brain over the course of numerous summers when he and his twin brother spent their days two doors down from his parents’ office at an old classic theatre. “It was either hang out at their office or go to the movies,” he recalls. After graduating from West Virginia University with a degree in biochemistry, Mohebbi nabbed a job at a Claim Jumper steakhouse outside the Warner Bros. lot in the hopes of running into any executive he could convince to give him a job in Hollywood. That didn’t work, but he did meet a writer who was repped by Verve, which got him into the agency world. Now at Verve for over 11 years, Mohebbi has been assisting the careers of in-demand scribes like Jason Shuman and Ben Queen, who in September set up Cola Wars with Judd Apatow directing and Steven Spielberg producing, and Peter Cameron, a Marvel go-to who worked on the latest Fantastic Four movie.

FICTIONAL CHARACTER I IDENTIFY WITH “Wolverine. He’s a complex dude.”

TALENT I WOULD LOVE TO WORK WITH “Tim Robinson. He has everything.”

BEST ADVICE I’VE GOTTEN“‘This job is joy on line 1 and pain on line 2. You must learn to celebrate the wins and move past the losses.’ Bryan Besser told me that my first month on the job.”

Taylor Morgan, 34

VP Drama Development, 20th Television

LOGLINE Oversees a dizzying number of Disney overall deals for producers like Jenni Konner, Jon M. Chu and Warren Littlefield.

THE ARC Plans to pursue “something practical, like management or marketing” were swiftly dashed once Morgan enrolled in a book-to-film course at The University of Michigan. Upon graduating, the New Jersey native headed to Los Angeles and quickly moved from the WME mailroom to the assistant desk of one of the most powerful executives in Hollywood: Ari Emanuel. After getting a B.A. in Hollywood from Emanuel, she earned a master’s from Peter Rice, for whom she worked while he was president at 21st Century Fox. “It was such an education, but it also let me reevaluate why I was here,” says Morgan. “What am I passionate about?” From there, she became a creative affairs exec at Fox 21 and, after the Disney acquisition, ultimately found herself at 20th TV, where she’s worked on high-profile projects like Percy Jackson & the Olympians (Disney+), We Were the Lucky Ones (Hulu) and the upcoming Amanda Knox limited series Amanda (also at Hulu). She and her husband, producer Scott Morgan (The Walk-Up Company) have a toddler son and a dog, Cowboy, who Morgan says “very much wishes he was still an only child.”

MOST HOLLYWOOD EXPERIENCE “Air Force One calling the office line and profusely sweating while hunting down my boss at the time, Ari Emanuel, only for the call to drop (and my life to flash before my eyes).”

Ethan Neale, 32

Lit Agent, Paradigm

LOGLINE Navigates the careers of rising writing talent like Qui Nguyen (Raya and the Last Dragon) and Migizi Pensoneau (Reservation Dogs).

THE ARC Neale’s lucky break came in a buffet line, where he happened to strike up a conversation with the chief financial officer of Paradigm as they waited for food at an L.A. event. Neale persistently followed up and ultimately was extended a mailroom job offer. From there, he moved his way up the agency ranks and now represents an array of lit talent like Ross Evans, who penned How to Save a Marriage, set to star Robert Pattinson. “One of the most fulfilling things for me is reading a script and just seeing it, knowing it and starting to put together a game plan of what I’m going to do with it,” says Neale, who met his wife while they were both Paradigm assistants.

I’D LOVE TO TRADE PLACES WITH FOR A DAY “Rich Paul.”

MY FIRST HOLLYWOOD JOB ENTAILED … “Meeting my now wife when we were assistants.”

HOLLYWOOD DREAM JOB “Jeff Probst’s”

Danielle Pistotnik, 29

Manager, Select Management Group

LOGLINE Turned her Mormon mom influencer clients into full-fledged reality stars.

THE ARC “At first, everyone said, ‘No.’ I think there was still an uneasiness between the influencer and traditional space,” says Pistotnik of initially pitching the now breakout reality hit The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives. Four years ago, the manager, who lives in Marina del Rey with her wife and corgi, signed a cadre of Utah-based influencer Mormon moms who were popular on TikTok — Taylor Frankie Paul and Mayci Neeley, among others — and quickly saw the potential for a show. After that initial hesitation, the cast’s popularity (and virality) was undeniable, and the L.A.-born and -raised rep, whose roster also included YouTuber and podcaster Fernanda Ramirez, got a green light from Hulu. Says Pistotnik of when she knew the swiftly renewed show would be a hit: “Reality TV is for the girls and the gays. All of my friends were texting me about clips that were on their [Instagram] ‘For You’ page. And that was just from the two-minute trailer.” Pistotnik sees potential for the Secret Lives model to expand to other groups of women — from different religions, backgrounds and cultures — throughout the country. “I hope we can continue to remove the barrier to entry for entertainers through social media,” says Pistotnik. “In five years from now, I don’t think there will be a ‘traditional’ and ‘digital’.”

FICTIONAL CHARACTER I MOST IDENTIFY WITH “Rhaenyra Targaryen. She broke the traditional mold and carved her own path.”

BEST ADVICE I’VE GOTTEN “Don’t wait for permission.” IT CAME FROM “A movie producer sitting at the bar I was bartending at when I was21.”

Kirsten Polley, 34

Senior VP Business Operations, WWE

LOGLINE A key player in major deals brokered by WWE, including the one to bring SmackDown back to NBCUniversal’s USA Network and NXT to The CW.

THE ARC The UCLA grad has been key to giant deals designed to bring WWE to new audiences, including the $5 billion pact to move Raw to Netflix in January after its 31-year run on linear television. She also orchestrated a five-day immersive fan experience during WrestleMania XL Week in Philadelphia, with mainstage appearances from WWE stars and live podcast recordings. Before joining WWE, she worked as an agent at CAA alongside then-co-head of TV Nick Khan, who joined WWE in 2020 as president and almost immediately recruited Polley. “With WWE,” she says, “we have the opportunity to sit across so many different business areas, including content creation, live events, talent and licensing.”

BEST ADVICE I’VE GOTTEN “Don’t lie to your boss.” IT CAME FROM “The assistant I was hired to replace.”

I WISH HOLLYWOOD STILL … “Had great parties.”

Michael D. Ratner, 35

Founder & CEO, OBB Media

LOGLINE As CEO of the fast-growing, vertically integrated OBB Media, he’s responsible for high-profile projects with stars like Demi Lovato, Sabrina Carpenter, Kevin Hart and Justin Bieber.

THE ARC The Long Island native’s earliest recollections behind his father’s video camera came during Hebrew school, when a still elementary-school-aged Ratner would reenact that week’s lesson with his buddies. By high school, he was turning his essays into films. “Part of that was truly how I wanted to express myself, but also I loved getting the response of my friends,” says Ratner. He did his undergrad at UPenn before making his way to NYU Tisch for grad school, where he got his MFA and began producing for anybody and everybody. By 26, he’d founded his own outfit, OBB Media, where he initially made his name doing high-profile projects with Kevin Hart and Justin Bieber. In the years since, Ratner’s built out a booming multimedia production company and studio, responsible for everything from a Demi Lovato Hulu documentary to a forthcoming Sabrina Carpenter holiday Netflix special to an Everest doc with Oscar aspirations. The married entrepreneur is also the founding partner behind Hailey Bieber’s successful beauty brand company Rhode.

MY FIRST HOLLYWOOD JOB ENTAILED … “Picking up a broken-down van in Pittsburgh on my first day as a PA and driving it 67 miles to Johnstown, Pennsylvania, for a shot the next day … for a pilot that never aired.”

Matt Sadeghian, 35

Manager, Brillstein Entertainment

LOGLINE From clubs to arenas, Sadeghian’s stand-up clients, including Jeff Arcuri and Morgan Jay, have already sold 500,000 tickets this year.

THE ARC After a few years in his father’s native Iran, Sadeghian’s parents spilt, and he returned to the U.S. to live with his mother in a studio apartment in Panorama City. While still in high school, he began working in home lending to help pay the bills, but, after the sudden death of his mom and the collapse of the housing market, he decided to pursue a career in entertainment, his longtime passion. As he puts it, “The most catastrophic thing has happened to you, so I figured it could make me weaker or stronger.” He forwent college and landed jobs at management outfits Principato-Young and Avalon, where he found a passion for comedy. Now at Brillstein, he’s earned a reputation for finding stand-up talent like internet-savvy comics Arcuri, Jay and Trevor Wallace, along with comedian and Emmy-winning Ted Lasso writer Jamie Lee. Assesses Sadeghian, “Generally speaking, an absent father and a loving mother is what makes a funny person. I connect to that voice. It’s one thing to sympathize with people, it’s another to empathize.” Next up for the rep is the arrival of his first child, a daughter.

MY FIRST JOB IN HOLLYWOOD ENTAILED … “Pretending to call from the White House to score a dinner resy. It actually worked.”

I’D LOVE TO SWITCH PLACES WITH “Lorne. It’s Saturday night in New York, what’s better than that?”

Adam Segal, 34

Founder, Strig Artist Management

LOGLINE After helping longtime client Quinta Brunson go from internet comedian to Emmy winner, Segal launched his own company.

THE ARC “At one point, I just woke up and realized that starting my own business was the only way to be true to myself and my clients,” says Segal. This nagging dream was the reason he left Authentic Talent to launch Strig in April, and he proudly notes that his company became profitable in its first month. In college at Temple University, Segal would produce sketches with friend and actor Benjamin Norris (now Segal’s longest-standing client), and it was through him that Segal began working with Brunson long before she was the creator and star of ABC’s Abbott Elementary. Other clients include SNL featured player Emil Wakim and Abbott co-producers Kate Peterman and Justin Tan. He adds, “Everybody whom I asked to come with me on this big change came with me, and that is not lost on me.”

I WISH HOLLYWOOD STILL … “Trusted in its own taste without relying on an algorithm.”

BEST ADVICE I’VE GOTTEN “Treat others how you’d want to be treated.” IT CAME FROM “My parents, Robyn and John Segal.”

Vishaal Sharma, 34

Associate, Grubman Shire

LOGLINE Sharma helps LeBron James and son, Bronny, with endorsement deals, and assists Lady Gaga and Robert De Niro on film and TV efforts.

THE ARC When he was 15, Sharma shot a short film that almost got him arrested. “We were filming this scene where someone was being held up at gunpoint,” he says, “and someone thought it was actually a robbery and called the police.” Undeterred, Sharma made a beeline straight for the entertainment industry. In college, he conducted audience surveys and analyzed box office results as an intern at Fox. After law school and a career in mergers and acquisitions, he pivoted to dealmaking for talent like James, Bruce Springsteen and De Niro. Sharma also represents his childhood friend turned actor George H. Xanthis, who stars in the popular faith-based series The Chosen. “I avoid the legalese with my clients,” he says. “I bring a real-world perspective to the issues I deal with.”

I’D LOVE TO TRADE PLACES WITH FOR A DAY “Lorne Michaels, circa 1992.”

I WISH HOLLYWOOD STILL … “Made money from VHS tapes and DVDs. Friday nights at Blockbuster was where it was at!”

TALENT I’D KILL TO WORK WITH“Christopher Nolan and Tom Cruise.”

Tovah Silbermann, 34

Manager, Mosaic

LOGLINE Represents Ghosts stars Richie Moriarty and Brandon Scott Jones, along with writers on FX hits What We Do in the Shadows and Reservation Dogs.

THE ARC Silbermann grew up in an ultra-Orthodox Jewish community, and “comedy was kind of the second language” in her home thanks to her parents’ interest in Andy Kaufman, Mystery Science Theater and more. She got pulled further into the comedy world after going to college in New York, where she’d attend comedy shows and then start producing them for friends as a side gig while working at the ACLU. From there, she got a job as a touring agent for comedians at Gersh, before moving to Mosaic as a manager and starting their New York office, with a particular interest in writer-performers. At the management company, her clients include on-and offscreen comedy talent like comedian and playwright Michael Cruz Kayne and writers on nearly every show in late night, from The Daily Show to Saturday Night Live. Touring still holds particular importance for her standup clients, she said, but so does social media, as clients are prioritizing building up their own fanbases, rather than waiting on a big break. In her spare time, Silbermann still attends comedy shows.

WHY ISN’T HOLLYWOOD TALKING ABOUT … “The power of Gen Z’s influence on culture.”

FICTIONAL CHARACTER I IDENTIFY WITH “Liz Lemon.”

BUZZWORD I WISH WOULD GO AWAY “Baby client. Experience and talent are two completely different barometers for success.”

Christopher Slager, 35

Head of Film, Fifth Season

LOGLINE With credits like the Book Club films and the Nicolas Cage starrer Pig, the exec now heads film operations at one of the industry’s biggest indie outfits.

THE ARC “I had no idea that people sold movies. I knew people sold houses,” says Slager, who grew up in Utah in a family of real estate developers. Joining WME at the tender age of 21, Slager headed to the agency’s film finance group, learning the ins and outs of getting movies financed, produced and distributed. When the division was spun out of the agency, acquired and eventually became Fifth Season, Slager left his WME home and now heads film operations, where he has had in productions like Jane Fonda and Lily Tomlin movie 80 for Brady and John Carney’s Flora and Son. Fifth Season most recently sold the Vince Vaughn starrer Nonnas to Netflix. Says Slager, who got married in October, “With the consolidation that our industry has gone through over the past decade, it has created a more critical role for independent film studios.”

I’D LOVE TO TRADE PLACES WITH FOR A DAY “Ina Garten.”

I WISH HOLLYWOOD STILL … “Had unpaved roads.”

Ryan Tunick, 34

Manager, Entertainment 360

LOGLINE Pilots the careers of actors Maika Monroe (Longlegs) and Alana Haim (Licorice Pizza).

THE ARC Tunick was expected to follow a path in finance or medicine like other members of his large extended family, but at the age of 6, his stockbroker father allowed him to watch Tim Burton’s Mars Attacks. “That movie changed the course of my life. It was just magic,” he says. He later landed an assistant job at WME, where he first met Monroe. When he transitioned to management a few years later, the actress became his first client. Tunick has been guiding her career ever since, with Monroe reaching new heights this year by starring in Longlegs, the biggest indie hit of the year ($125 million worldwide). he says on Monroe, “Her career has reached new heights and she can meet filmmakers she had never met before.” The rep also helped Brian Jordan Alvarez transition from digital personality to creating and starring in the FX breakout The English Teacher and Haim from music superstar to indie-film darling, next starring in The Drama with Zendaya and Robert Pattinson.

MY FIRST JOB IN HOLLYWOOD ENTAILED … “On my third day in the mailroom, The Hollywood Reporter took a picture for ‘Secrets of the Hollywood Mailroom.’ “

FICTIONAL CHARACTER I IDENTIFY WITH “Trinity for her fashion and Inigo Montoya because he defends his family….and also the fashion.”

Will Watkins, 34

Books Agent, CAA

LOGLINE A books-focused dealmaker trusted by top authors like Fleishman Is in Trouble‘s Taffy Brodesser-Akner, Crazy Rich Asians‘ Kevin Kwan and Three Women‘s Lisa Taddeo.

THE ARC Watkins credits the Landmark Theatre in Bethesda, Maryland, with helping him fall in love with independent cinema as a high schooler inside the Beltway. “I got particularly inspired by the idea that people were writing [these films], which I thought was really cool,” says Watkins. He threw himself into networking over Facebook at Boston College that landed him an internship at CAA in 2012. He ultimately settled at ICM, but after its 2022 CAA acquisition, he was back at his initial Hollywood home. Now, when he’s not running or concert-going, he’s scouting new material. Says Watkins about his job, “You read a novel and it completely takes your breath away. And then I have the privilege of getting to share that work with directors and screenwriters and producers who are making things that I love.”

FICTIONAL CHARACTER I IDENTIFY WITH “Jimmy on Hacks.”

I’D LOVE TO SWITCH PLACES WITH“Jimmy Iovine. Before I wanted to work in film, I wanted to work in music.”

Brian Williams, 35

Executive VP Film & TV, Dylan Clark Productions

LOGLINE The producer behind Amazon series The Wilds, Netflix’s Bird Box Barcelona, the upcoming Taron Egerton thriller Carry On.

THE ARC Despite growing up in Los Angeles, Williams had no interest in movies until a friend snuck him into the Aero Theatre to see On the Waterfront. “That is where it all started,” he says. “I had never been moved by a story and a performance in such a way.” While studying journalism at NYU, where he also produced black box theater plays, he interned at Saturday Night Live, Focus Features, and The Tonight Show. “I wanted to see the business from as many vantage points as I could,” he says of his prolific internship period. He landed at CAA, which led to a job at Scott Stuber and Dylan Clark’s Bluegrass Films. After Stuber went to head film at Netflix, Williams continued with Clark at what became Dylan Clark Productions, working on a slate both in film (Scarface) and TV (the secret Batman Universe project, an adaptation of the best-selling YA book series Scythe). He says of producing, “There is something about having a vision for a story, and then working to maintain its creative integrity and viability as a business at the same time. I never had an interest in doing anything else.”

MOST HOLLYWOOD EXPERIENCE “Getting emails meant for news anchor Brian Williams.”

FICTIONAL CHARACTER I IDENTIFY WITH “It’s always been Baloo.”

INDUSTRY BUZZWORDI WISH WOULD GO AWAY“Grounded could use a break.”

I’D LOVE TO TRADE PLACES WITH FOR A DAY Jerry Bruckheimer

This story appeared in the Nov. 20 issue of The Hollywood Reporter magazine. Click here to subscribe.