The Cortez Brothers, Inc., a multicultural, woman-owned production company under the aegis of president/EP Bernadette Rivero, has added directors Mickey Finnegan and Devon Ferguson to its roster.
Finnegan was most recently with the L.A.-based BestFriend, while Ferguson’s signing is his first with a U.S. commercial production company. He’s represented by Suneeva in Canada, Birth in the U.K. and Wunderfilm in Germany.
Finnegan’s reel includes spots for such brands as Beats, Dish Network, Fox Sports, Pepsi, Tapout, Intel, PlayStation, Nike and Kia, as well as upbeat, music-driven promos for TV shows like American Idol, X-Factor, Blackish and Scream Queens. He’s shot work for a wide range of programming networks, including MTV, FOX, ABC and HGTV, among others.
His music videos span genres and styles, featuring such artists as LMFAO, Cee Lo Green, Lil Jon, Bella Thorne, Tyga and Soulja Boy. Finnegan’s work has been featured on MTV, BET, VH1, FUSE and E!, taking number one spots on various countdowns and amassing over two billion views online.
Finnegan said that once he started talking to Cortez managing director Ed Rivero, they discovered lots of serendipitous connections. “Ed was at RSA back when I was doing videos through Black Dog,” the director recalled. Finnegan signed with Cortez, he explained, to boost his profile and expand his client base. “Having a production company like Cortez backing me will help me spread the word. My work has a style that’s fun and passionate, and I think we can bring that to a wider marketing world. I’m hoping they can bridge the gap and connect me with agencies and brands that are looking for that vision and sensibility.”
As a director, Finnegan’s been honing his narrative chops, going beyond his music credentials into more dramatic filmmaking. “It’s all part of your repertoire of skills,” he stated. “It’s about telling stories, which is why all of us got into this in the first place. I’m looking for opportunities to do just that, and hoping Cortez can help show me the way.”
Devon Ferguson
Ferguson grew up in Ottawa and is currently based in Vancouver. He’s a graduate of the Humber Acting for Film/Television Program in Toronto and has trained at Second City, the Upright Citizens Brigade’s School of Improv and The Groundlings in Los Angeles. While training as an actor and working his side gigs, he also bought his own video gear and began writing and editing his own comedy shorts, which is what drew his attention to the production side of filmmaking.
He wrote and acted in several comedy web series, and started shooting parody commercials when he learned that he could participate in various brands’ contests for user-generated commercial content. The spots he wrote and directed went on to win over a dozen such competitions, allowing Ferguson to lend his style of humor to ads for brands as such as Lays, Doritos, Kraft and Shell, just to name a few. He was even a finalist in a recent Dorito’s Crash the Super Bowl ad contest.
But it was his spec spot for Monster.com, titled “Stare,” that put him over the top when it was a Silver winner for “Best Use of Humor” at the 2021 Cannes Young Directors Award. The deadpan comedy was also a “Top 10” selection at the Berlin Commercial Awards and made the Kinsale Shark Awards’ shortlist for Best New Director.
Ed Rivero saw Ferguson’s work after he won the YDA Award and was impressed. “He’s clearly very funny, and his background in comedy, improv and acting gives him a great sense of timing which translates to his work. We’ve been looking for a comedy director who would both shoot and write, which fits with a lot of the kinds of comedy content brands are looking for now.”
Ferguson said he was attracted to Cortez by the opportunity to build his presence in the U.S. and by the fact that he fills a comedy niche on their roster. “They don’t have anyone like me right now, which means they can focus on boosting my career while I add a different twist to their talent offering.”
