Veteran agency and creative producer Kimberly Abels has come aboard the staff of Charlotte-based production company Wondersmith as sr. producer.
For more than five years, Abels has held the position of broadcast producer for Trone Brand Energy, where she has managed productions for the North Carolina Education Lottery and numerous national and regional accounts. Through this role, Kimberly has worked with Wondersmith founder/EP Joe Murray and creative director Thom Blackburn time and again, including several collaborations on the NC Lottery and Greenies, as well as the award-winning campaign for North State Communications.
Prior to joining Trone, Abels was senior producer for bicoastal production company Thornberg and Forester in New York for two years, and that position followed previous stints as a producer for eyeball and J. Walter Thompson Worldwide, also in NYC.
“Since we’ve worked very closely with Kimberly over the past five years, we know that we are adding an all-star in terms of production and client management,” said Murray. “Her experience has been earned on the agency side, but also inside very high profile design and production companies, both in New York and in North Carolina. Her skillset aligns with our trajectory perfectly.”
Jennifer Kent On Why Her Feature Directing Debut, “The Babadook,” Continues To Haunt Us
"The Babadook," when it was released 10 years ago, didn't seem to portend a cultural sensation.
It was the first film by a little-known Australian filmmaker, Jennifer Kent. It had that strange name. On opening weekend, it played in two theaters.
But with time, the long shadows of "The Babadook" continued to envelop moviegoers. Its rerelease this weekend in theaters, a decade later, is less of a reminder of a sleeper 2014 indie hit than it is a chance to revisit a horror milestone that continues to cast a dark spell.
Not many small-budget, first-feature films can be fairly said to have shifted cinema but Kent's directorial debut may be one of them. It was at the nexus of that much-debated term "elevated horror." But regardless of that label, it helped kicked off a wave of challenging, filmmaker-driven genre movies like "It Follows," "Get Out" and "Hereditary."
Kent, 55, has watched all of this — and those many "Babadook" memes — unfold over the years with a mix of elation and confusion. Her film was inspired in part by the death of her father, and its horror elements likewise arise out of the suppression of emotions. A single mother (Essie Davis) is struggling with raising her young son (Noah Wiseman) years after the tragic death of her husband. A figure from a pop-up children's book begins to appear. As things grow more intense, his name is drawn out in three chilling syllables — "Bah-Bah-Doooook" — an incantation of unprocessed grief.
Kent recently spoke from her native Australia to reflect on the origins and continuing life of "The Babadook."
Q: Given that you didn't set out to in any way "change" horror, how have you regarded the unique afterlife of "The... Read More