Industry veterans David Mitchell and Tomer DeVito have founded creative collective Wild Gift, a production company working across all formats with a highly curated talent roster. Mitchell will serve as Wild Gift managing director, running the company’s day-to-day business, with DeVito as a collaborating EP.
A producer at Ridley Scott’s RSA Films for over two decades, Mitchell most recently served as the company’s managing director. He’s collaborated with many A-list directors, artists and celebrities over the years, producing high-profile global campaigns, commercials and branded content. His work includes Jake Scott’s “Gentleman’s Wager” films for Johnnie Walker and Nike’s Emmy-winning commercial “Awake,” along with Tony Scott’s iconic “Beat The Devil” for BMW Films starring Clive Owen, Gary Oldman and James Brown. DeVito has a storied production background as well, coming up the ranks at RSA Films before founding independent creative boutique Native Content in 2010, where he also remains as managing director, managing the company’s day to day business.
Mitchell and DeVito saw founding Wild Gift as an opportunity to push one another to do what they hadn’t yet done in their collective experience. Their mission is to foster a diverse, tightly knit creative community of genuinely good people with direct access to leadership. Wild Gift’s eclectic roster so far includes award-winning film, television, commercial and music video directors Tobias Granstrรถm, Tomas Skoging, Michael Mann, Tate Taylor, Alfonso Gomez-Rejon, Ewan McGregor, Duncan Jones, Kaz Firpo, DJ Caruso, รcean Vashti Jude and Arielle Pytka.
“Our focus is on filmmakers who are not only great at their jobs, but also collaborative and passionate in their approach,” Mitchell said. “Our roster so far is a clear reflection of that, and we’ll have even more exciting news to share soon.”
“Wild Gift will genuinely be a partner to our clients,” DeVito added. “We will always deliver at a very high level creatively and collaborate to solve any challenges, like an extension of an agency’s own in-house production team.”
“As an MD at RSA over the last three years, helping to run their busy global business shifted my focus away from what I love most, which is producing,” Mitchell said. “Wild Gift lets me get back to working closely with talent while getting my hands dirty once again with the crew in production. Not to sound all kumbaya … but if there’s a team effort with no rigid hierarchy, you bring everyone along and they work hard and give you blood. You walk away with a fantastic product, and everyone has a good time doing it.”
Wild Gift is represented by Pop-Arts on the West Coast, The House of Representatives in the Midwest and MilkToast on the East Coast.
Writers of “Conclave,” “Say Nothing” Win Scripter Awards
The authors and screenwriters behind the film โConclaveโ and the series โSay Nothingโ won the 37th-annual USC Libraries Scripter Awards during a black-tie ceremony at USCโs Town and Gown ballroom on Saturday evening (2/22).
The Scripter Awards recognize the yearโs most accomplished adaptations of the written word for the screen, including both feature-length films and episodic series.
Novelist Robert Harris and screenwriter Peter Straughan took home the award for โConclave.โ
In accepting the award, Straughan said, โAdaptation is a really strange process, youโre very much the servant of two masters. In a way itโs an act of betrayal of one master for the other.โ He joked that โYou start off with a book that you love, you read it again and again, and then you end up throwing it over your shoulder,โ crediting author Robert Harris for being โso kind, so generous, so open throughout.โ
In the episodic series category, Joshua Zetumer and Patrick Radden Keefe won for the episode โThe People in the Dirtโ from the limited series โSay Nothing,โ which Zetumer adapted from Keefeโs nonfiction book about the Troubles in Ireland.
Zetumer referenced this yearโs extraordinary group of Scripter finalists, saying โprojects like these reminded me of why I wanted to become a writer when I was sitting in USCโs Leavey Library dreaming of becoming a screenwriter. If you fell in love with movies, or fell in love with TV, chances are you fell in love with something dangerous.โ
Special guest for the evening, actress and producer Jennifer Beals, shared her thoughts on the impact of libraries. โIf ever you are at a loss wondering if there is good in the world,โ she said, โyou have only to go to a... Read More