Production company Where The Buffalo Roam (WTBR) has signed director Azsa West who’s turned out work for such clients as Nike, Shiseido and Beautiful People, among others. At WTBR, she has already directed a number of shorts for Nike as part of the brand’s “Hands On” and “Proof of Concept” series.
In addition to directing, West is an award-winning creative director at Wieden+Kennedy in Portland, Ore., a role she continues to hold. Over the course of a decade, she has led creative out of four global Wieden + Kennedy offices, plus a brief detour to Hollywood as an entertainment marketing agent at CAA. She has worked on projects for such brands as Instagram, Coca-Cola, Google, Disney, Target, LAIKA Studios, and Airbnb.
Originally from a small surf town in California, West was always destined for a path in creativity, inspired by her painter mom and skater dad. She studied photography and illustration at California College of Arts before transferring to W+K 12, Wieden+Kennedy’s experimental school, with an emphasis on film, ideation, art direction, and writing. An artist in her own right, West’s drawings have been published into a book called “Nature Study on Lonesome Island.” She has also exhibited works at galleries and venues in Paris, Tokyo, Los Angeles, Portland, New York City, Rio de Janeiro, and Sydney.
Whether she’s creative directing on entertainment marketing for the stop-motion animated horror feature Coraline or co-creating a documentary on NBA All-Star Carmelo Anthony, West brings her artistic, scrappy DIY aesthetic with her. She is currently working on a screenplay for an episodic series about her mother, as well as another short for the Nike “Hands On” campaign. As a queer-identified person of color, West strives to create films in the spirit of authenticity and experimentation.
“We love Azsa’s sensibility, heart, and dedication to her work,” said Tim Pries, WTBR co-founder/executive producer.
“The Where the Buffalo Roam team has created a truly welcoming space where people can show up and be their most authentic selves–something that is very important to me,” adds West. “This type of environment is crucial to creating great work, so I’m excited to be their new friend.”
West concluded, “I’ve always been interested in how visual expression can elevate your message. Creating work for underrepresented communities is especially exciting for me. It’s an opportunity to bring my point of view into that space; one that’s very personal for me.”
Carrie Coon Relishes Being Part Of An Ensemble–From “The Gilded Age” To “His Three Daughters”
It can be hard to catch Carrie Coon on her own.
She is far more likely to be found in the thick of an ensemble. That could be on TV, in "The Gilded Age," for which she was just Emmy nominated, or in the upcoming season of "The White Lotus," which she recently shot in Thailand. Or it could be in films, most relevantly, Azazel Jacobs' new drama, "His Three Daughters," in which Coon stars alongside Natasha Lyonne and Elizabeth Olsen as sisters caring for their dying father.
But on a recent, bright late-summer morning, Coon is sitting on a bench in the bucolic northeast Westchester town of Pound Ridge. A few years back, she and her husband, the playwright Tracy Letts, moved near here with their two young children, drawn by the long rows of stone walls and a particularly good BLT from a nearby cafe that Letts, after biting into, declared must be within 15 miles of where they lived.
In a few days, they would both fly to Los Angeles for the Emmys (Letts was nominated for his performance in "Winning Time" ). But Coon, 43, was then largely enmeshed in the day-to-day life of raising a family, along with their nightly movie viewings, which Letts pulls from his extensive DVD collection. The previous night's choice: "Once Around," with Holly Hunter and Richard Dreyfus.
Coon met Letts during her breakthrough performance in "Who's Afraid of Virginia Wolfe?" on Broadway in 2012. She played the heavy-drinking housewife Honey. It was the first role that Coon read and knew, viscerally, she had to play. Immediately after saying this, Coon sighs.
"It sounds like something some diva would say in a movie from the '50s," Coon says. "I just walked around in my apartment in my slip and I had pearls and a little brandy. I made a grocery list and I just did... Read More