Publicis Seattle has hired Jason Tarantino as EVP, executive strategy director. He will work on Publicis Seattle’s T-Mobile business and report directly to EVP, managing partner Melissa Nelson.
In this new role for the agency, Tarantino will be responsible for directing strategy for the T-Mobile business, leading a team of seven strategy executives to identify and execute on the best decisions for the brand.
Tarantino’s addition to the T-Mobile team comes as Publicis Seattle is bolstering its senior leadership on the business by adding a number of new strategy executives. Most recently, Publicis Seattle welcomed Lisa Baldini as communications strategy director, who will work closely with Tarantino.
Before joining Publicis Seattle, Tarantino served as VP, planning director at RPA where he handled traditional, digital, social, and content strategy for Intuit’s QuickBooks and Apartments.com. Other agency experience includes stints at R/GA and Wieden+Kennedy, where he worked across a number of accounts, including Verizon, Levi’s, Electronic Arts and Target.
Tarantino has been honored with a number of awards including a Clio for working on Electronic Arts’ “Dante’s Inferno,” a Jay Chiat Award for Research Innovation for his work on Nike ID, and both a Cannes Silver Lion and Webby for his work with Verizon while at R/GA.
Before working in the advertising industry, Tarantino was commissioned by MIT to develop and direct an interactive theater piece that played across the Gertrude Stein Repertory Theater, MIT’s List Center for the Visual Arts and the internet using experimental technology developed by Bell Labs.
Is “Glicked” The New “Barbenheimer”? “Wicked” and “Gladiator II” Hit Theater Screens
"Barbenheimer" was a phenomenon impossible to manufacture. But, more than a year later, that hasn't stopped people from trying to make "Glicked" — or even "Babyratu" — happen.
The counterprogramming of "Barbie" and "Oppenheimer" in July 2023 hit a nerve culturally and had the receipts to back it up. Unlike so many things that begin as memes, it transcended its online beginnings. Instead of an either-or, the two movies ultimately complemented and boosted one another at the box office.
And ever since, moviegoers, marketers and meme makers have been trying to recreate that moment, searching the movie release schedule for odd mashups and sending candidates off into the social media void. Most attempts have fizzled (sorry, "Saw Patrol" ).
This weekend is perhaps the closest approximation yet as the Broadway musical adaptation "Wicked" opens Friday against the chest-thumping sword-and-sandals epic "Gladiator II." Two big studio releases (Universal and Paramount), with one-name titles, opposite tones and aesthetics and big blockbuster energy — it was already halfway there before the name game began: "Wickiator," "Wadiator," "Gladwick" and even the eyebrow raising "Gladicked" have all been suggested.
"'Glicked' rolls off the tongue a little bit more," actor Fred Hechinger said at the New York screening of "Gladiator II" this week. "I think we should all band around 'Glicked.' It gets too confusing if you have four or five different names for it."
As with "Barbenheimer," as reductive as it might seem, "Glicked" also has the male/female divide that make the fan art extra silly. One is pink and bright and awash in sparkles, tulle, Broadway bangers and brand tie-ins; The other is all sweat and sand, blood and bulging... Read More