Bicoastal agency/production house hybrid Stun Creative has opened under the aegis of creative partners/ executive producers/VPs Mark Feldstein and Brad Roth. The company is part of television personality Maury Povich’s bicoastal MoPo Entertainment Group.
Both Feldstein and Roth have extensive experience in broadcast and promos. As director of advertising and promotion at The Travel Channel, Roth wrote and was the executive producer for the " … Or was I watching The Travel Channel?" station promos featuring John O’Hurley (Seinfeld’s Peterman). Previously, Roth was the director of on-air promotions at ESPN Classic.
As MoPo Entertainment’s VP of creative affairs, Feldstein launched the company’s promo production division in ’97. That division was dissolved with the formation of Stun. Prior to joining MoPo, Feldstein was a senior writer/producer at Showtime Networks, where he wrote and produced the campaign for Showtime’s "No Limits" brand. He also wrote and directed Karaoke Knight, a short film shown regularly on Showtime.
While Stun Creative is primarily an advertising agency, the company can also produce and edit some work in-house. Feldstein and Roth expect that the clients requiring both creative and production and/or editorial expertise will be smaller cable stations. These stations will need station IDs, promos and "squeezebacks" or interstitials, short form fare that runs between network programs. Feldstein estimated that about half of Stun’s work will be these broadcast and cable projects, while the remainder will be spots.
The combination of services allows Stun Creative to work for clients of various sizes—and with various budgets. As Roth explained, "A lot of our clients may have production needs that we can fulfill on a quick shoot," for which the company would hire freelance directors who would work "under the Stun banner," according to Roth. Stun’s office also boasts six Avid suites and two staff editors. However, Feldstein maintained, "The bulk of the work that we’re going to be doing is at the agency level, coming up with the creative, concepting and writing the spots," said Feldstein.
Feldstein and Roth met in ’98, when Roth was at the Travel Channel and Feldstein was at MoPo Entertainment. At the time, Feldstein was posting the series launch promo for Linc’s, a Showtime comedy series starring Steven Williams and Pam Grier. And Roth was posting the "…Or was I watching the Travel Channel?" promos.
Feldstein recalled, "We were editing at the same facility."
"We were literally adjacent to each other," Roth agreed. "And we kept popping into each other’s rooms."
"We were there for about a week, just doing these edits, and we hit it off and became friendly," said Roth. "Mark told me what he was doing over at MoPo. … So I called him about two weeks later, and we started working with each other on a regular basis—me at Travel Channel, Mark at MoPo." Roth became a client of Feldstein, producing The Travel Channel’s Lonely Planet image promo. But towards the end of ’99, "Mark and I started to think, ‘We have a similar vision; there’s an opportunity in the market right now; maybe we can do something as a team." In May ’00, they approached MoPo Entertainment chairman Povich about starting a company under MoPo’s aegis. Povich "green-lighted it within a few days," reported Roth.
Feldstein had just moved to MoPo’s Los Angeles office, while Roth was at The Travel Channel’s Bethesda, Md., headquarters. Roth promptly relocated to Los Angeles to join his partner. Stun Creative also has a New York office, headed by creative director Garrett Wagner.
Stun Creative is currently developing spots for Cityfeet. com, an online commercial real estate source. Roth noted, "We’re hoping to award the job [which will go to a director at a separate production company] soon. That’s going to be a big job." Feldstein pointed out, "We’re also the agency and perhaps the production company for the new-season launch of ESPN Classic’s Reel Classics [a sports film series]."
Stun Creative’s staff includes writers/producers Michele Manning and Steve Hunt, editors Ron Baslow and John Perno, associate producer Rachele Gonzales and production assistant Justin Reichman.
