Jessica Navas will join agency Erwin Penland in the newly created role of chief planning officer, effective December 1. An award-winning planner, Navas will lead strategic planning and work to enhance brand stories across all clients, including Denny’s Diner, Verizon and L.L. Bean. Navas will report to president Joe Erwin and will sit in the agency’s New York City office.
Navas joins Erwin Penland from JWT where she was group planning director and worked with clients including PUMA and Lean Cuisine, as well as handling both internal and external communications. Most notably during her tenure at JWT, Navas helped bring JetBlue’s mission to life with core brand and product strategy work. Navas began her career at Merkley Newman Harty and continued on at Cliff Freeman and Partners before joining JWT in 2007. She has worked with many other leading brands during her career, including Rolex, Snapple, DSW, T. Rowe Price and Champion.
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