Creative agency, commercial and branded content production company Stun Creative has hired Galen Newton as its first director of digital and social media. The new position was created in response to overwhelming demand by Stun clients for comprehensive digital and social media services. Newton will report directly to Stun founding partners/principals Brad Roth and Mark Feldstein.
“Galen will give Stun the opportunity to greatly expand its services in the social marketing and digital space,” said Feldstein. “He’s an experienced digital and social pro who will work with the Stun team to guarantee that our content thrives in a multi-platform world, as we continue to expand and enrich our capabilities.”
Newton has enjoyed a distinguished career leading short-form video strategy for the Special Ops department at FOX television where he helped develop new, innovative ways to exploit the explosion of social video as a marketing tool. Newton also helped the team re-imagine different techniques to capture promotional content in the field and in real-time.
Newton led creative on FOX’s first digital and affiliate after-show for Empire, as well as the network’s first skippable ad campaign on YouTube (Grandfathered), FOX’s first custom video ads on Snapchat (Scream Queens, Brooklyn Nine-Nine, Last Man on Earth and Grease Live!), and the first custom video ads for Instagram (Empire).
Before joining FOX, Newton oversaw video production and distribution for Bravo Digital Media from 2005 to 2013. There he was part of the Emmy Award-winning team behind the network’s ambitious transmedia initiative, Top Chef: Last Chance Kitchen. Through strategic planning, he helped drive seven consecutive years of double-digit growth in digital video streams for the network. Earlier in his career, before joining Bravo, Newton worked at Stun as a project coordinator.
After 20 Years of Acting, Megan Park Finds Her Groove In The Director’s Chair On “My Old Ass”
Megan Park feels a little bad that her movie is making so many people cry. It's not just a single tear either — more like full body sobs.
She didn't set out to make a tearjerker with "My Old Ass," now streaming on Prime Video. She just wanted to tell a story about a young woman in conversation with her older self. The film is quite funny (the dialogue between 18-year-old and almost 40-year-old Elliott happens because of a mushroom trip that includes a Justin Bieber cover), but it packs an emotional punch, too.
Writing, Park said, is often her way of working through things. When she put pen to paper on "My Old Ass," she was a new mom and staying in her childhood bedroom during the pandemic. One night, she and her whole nuclear family slept under the same roof. She didn't know it then, but it would be the last time, and she started wondering what it would be like to have known that.
In the film, older Elliott ( Aubrey Plaza ) advises younger Elliott ( Maisy Stella ) to not be so eager to leave her provincial town, her younger brothers and her parents and to slow down and appreciate things as they are. She also tells her to stay away from a guy named Chad who she meets the next day and discovers that, unfortunately, he's quite cute.
At 38, Park is just getting started as a filmmaker. Her first, "The Fallout," in which Jenna Ortega plays a teen in the aftermath of a school shooting, had one of those pandemic releases that didn't even feel real. But it did get the attention of Margot Robbie 's production company LuckyChap Entertainment, who reached out to Park to see what other ideas she had brewing.
"They were very instrumental in encouraging me to go with it," Park said. "They're just really even-keeled, good people, which makes... Read More