Creative advertising and marketing agency Ant Farm, known for its high-profile entertainment and brand campaigns, has named longtime entertainment marketing executive Cary Sachs as president, television and streaming, a newly created post at the company. He will be responsible for growing and maintaining the TV and streaming division, overseeing Ant Farm’s staff of creative editors, graphics artists and production professionals.
Most recently, Sachs had been the chief marketing officer and sr. VP at Pongo, a television marketing agency in Hollywood. His clients include Freeform, Twentieth Television, Disney Channel, National Geographic Channel, NatGeo Wild, Disney XD, GSN and Freemantle, as well as the FOX, ABC and CBS television networks.
Melissa Palazzo Hart, Ant Farm president, said, “Cary has tremendous experience in entertainment marketing across all channels. He joins us at a perfect time, as we are expanding and developing immersive content for streaming channels and services.”
Sachs stated, “Ant Farm is a great fit for me. I have admired their work for many years. I’m looking forward to being able to offer my clients all services from this incredible agency, including social and experiential marketing campaigns.”
Over the years, Sachs has earned eight Telly Awards, four Mobius Advertising Awards, two Key Art Award nominations, and 10 PROMAX International Gold Medallion Awards.
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