Creative marketing agency Compadre is on a hiring spree to keep pace with business. The company welcomes two seasoned senior producers, Wynt Curliano and Federico Jimenez, as well as rising producers Tatiana Hithe and Tucker Rhodes. Compadre is also upping Kevin Volz to the role of sr. producer.
Joining as a senior producer, Curliano has spearheaded everything from full-scale video productions to bespoke AR experiences, working with such agencies as Media.Monks, RPA, and SuperBloom. While in-house at Media.Monks, he partnered closely with Meta and produced Facebook Connect 2020, the brand’s first-ever live on-platform conference. He also worked to develop and execute social-first campaigns for Instagram, WhatsApp, Oculus, LinkedIn, and TikTok’s 2020 Pride Celebration. His career took off as a digital producer on the Honda account at RPA, helming ads, animated videos, and most notably, a long-form documentary about its first automobile imported into the United States.
Jimenez is an experienced producer, specializing in A/V trailers for video games, genre film, and television. He first got immersed in working on game trailers for Destiny, Call of Duty, and Assassin’s Creed at Ant Farm, and then cut his teeth at Trailer Park producing trailers for WB, Lionsgate, and Fox. He aksi spent invaluable time as copywriter and on-air content producer for Robert Rodriguez’s El Rey Network. There, Jimenez really flexed his creative muscles, helping to curate promotions for the Grindhouse, Lucha Underground, and The Shaw Brothers Kung Fu properties, while enjoying the channel’s “Flying Five Fingers One Armed Eight Pole Exploding Death Touch Thursdays' marathons that curate these kung fu films.
Producer Hithe brings experience on both the client and post house sides. Most recently, she produced the finishing for The Big Conn, a true crime docu-series exclusive to Apple TV+. Her prolific commercial production career began at Fox Sports, where she produced on-air spots for the Premier Boxing Champions brand campaign, as well as the big Pacquiao vs Thurman bout. Hithe also produced the BIG3 launch, which won a Silver Promax Award for “Best Use Of An Athlete–Sports.”
Rounding out Compadre’s team of newcomers is producer Rhodes, whose commercial production credits include campaigns for Pizza Hut, starring comedian Craig Robinson, health food meal kit Amazing Grass, and ESPN’s MLB: Home Run Derby. He also maintains his own production company, Peacoat Productions through which he creates short films focusing on gritty narratives and dark comedy.
First-Time Feature Directors Make Major Splash At AFI Fest, Generate Oscar Buzz
Two first-time feature directors who are generating Oscar buzz this awards season were front and center this past weekend at AFI Fest in Hollywood. Rachel Morrison, who made history as the first woman nominated for a Best Cinematography Oscar---on the strength of Mudbound in 2018--brought her feature directorial debut, The Fire Inside (Amazon MGM Studios), to the festival on Sunday (10/27), and shared insights into the film during a conversation session immediately following the screening. This came a day after William Goldenberg, an Oscar-winning editor for Argo in 2013, had his initial foray into feature directing, Unstoppable (Amazon MGM Studios), showcased at the AFI proceedings. He too spoke after the screening during a panel discussion. The Fire Inside--which made its world premiere at this year’s Toronto International Film Festival--tells the story of Claressa “T-Rex” Shields (portrayed by Ryan Destiny), a Black boxer from Flint, Mich., who trained to become the first woman in U.S. history to win an Olympic Gold Medal in the sport. She achieved this feat--with the help of coach Jason Crutchfield (Brian Tyree Henry)--only to find that her victory at the Summer Games came with relatively little fanfare and no endorsement deals. So much for the hope that the historic accomplishment would be a ticket out of socioeconomic purgatory for Shields and her family. It seemed like yet another setback in a cycle of adversity throughout Shields’ life but she persevered, going on to win her second Gold Medal at the next Olympics and becoming a champion for gender equality and equitable pay for women in sports. Shields has served as a source of inspiration for woman athletes worldwide--as well as to the community of... Read More