Banff/FOX
exclusive: Fox Entertainment CEO Rob Wade is reorganizing the company's content and business operations into three groups: Fox Television Networks, Fox Entertainment Studios, and sales division Fox Entertainment Global.
The reorganization includes new senior leadership roles for Michael Thorne, who has been named president of Fox Television Networks, and Fernando Sheu, who will become head of Fox Entertainment Studios. They will lead two of his three departments and will continue to report to Wade. Fox's unscripted president Alison Wallach will join Szew's team on the studio side.
This change streamlined the separation of network, studio, and distribution operations under different leaders, as opposed to the previous setup in which both network and studio scripted and unscripted productions were overseen by the same executive. A structure will be created.
“Under this new structure, each division of Fox Entertainment is poised for growth and creative excellence while best serving viewers wherever they are,” Wade said. “Now, let's get to work.”
Fox Entertainment is consolidating all of its studio businesses around the world under Szew, who was founding partner and CEO of MarVista Entertainment and most recently CEO of Fox Entertainment Global. The new Fox Entertainment Studios will consist of Bento Box Entertainment, the Emmy Award-winning animation studio that produces animated series for Fox. Crapopolis, Grimsburg, Bob's Burgers Series for third-party platforms.Home of Fox Alternative Entertainment masked singer; Fox scripted studio produces network's first live-action comedy property animal control; prolific platform film producer MarVista Entertainment; Studio Ramsay Global was launched in partnership with Gordon Ramsay. and Harvey Levin's entertainment studio TMZ.
Mr. Thorne, who most recently served as president of scripted programming for Fox Entertainment, will also oversee the network's unscripted programming, including hits such as: masked singer And the Gordon Ramsay show.
He will manage the network's scripted, unscripted and casting teams, led by Brooke Bowman, vice president of drama programming and development. Cheryl Dolins, Senior Vice President of Programming and Development, Comedy and Animation; Yasmin Rawji, EVP, Unscripted. and Britteny Roberts, SVP of Casting, respectively. Mr. Thorne, who has been a driving force behind Fox's animation efforts over the past few years, will remain a member of the Bent Box Entertainment steering committee.
Mr. Thorne, who previously oversaw Fox's scriptwriting studio, will work closely with Mr. Siu on script development and production.
Alison Wallach, who previously served as president of unscripted programming at Fox, will join Szew's team as head of global unscripted programming for Fox Entertainment Studios, which includes worldwide formats owned and produced by FAE. He will lead all creative and production efforts for the department's unscripted entertainment.include beat my minimes (TF1/France), marriage market (ProSieben/Germany); and celebrity masterpiece (Work Point/Tie) etc.
The change means Wallach will run Fox Alternative Entertainment from 2020 until the end of 2022 before returning to the studio side. For the past year and a half, she also served as an unscripted director on the Fox network.
Wallach's move does not affect John Hessling, who took over the reins of Fox Alternative Entertainment in March 2023. He plans to remain at the studio.
As Szew moves on to a new role at the studio, the company will seek to replace him as head of Fox Entertainment Global, Fox Entertainment's worldwide content sales arm. The company will be led on an interim basis by FEG Vice President Tony Vasiliadis, who reports directly to Wade.
Thorne, a popular veteran development executive who previously led 20th Century Fox Television's drama division, joined Fox as president of entertainment more than six and a half years ago. He has led the network's scripted operations since the network transitioned from a vertically integrated broadcast network to an independent broadcast network following Disney's acquisition of 21st Century Fox assets in 2019.
In recent years, he has revamped Fox's development model, largely abandoning pilots (with the exception of rare comedy presentations) in favor of more cost-effective direct-to-series orders.
Most recently, we have been at the forefront of international content expansion, working with local English-speaking creators and studios to develop and produce scripted series. This strategy brought the Canadian psychological crime drama series to prominence. A murder in a small town, Order British comedy presentations Meet the Kumars.
Szew's new role comes two years after Fox acquired his MarVista Entertainment company. Szew founded the company in 2003 with Michael Jacobs, initially as a distribution company and then branching out into original series and TV movies.
The company has a library of approximately 2,500 hours of content, including approximately 80 new movies per year. The company is a major supplier to Fox's own ad-free streaming service, Tubi.Recent tiles include: bride's daughter Marcia Gay Harden and Christmas is canceled Starring Dermot Mulroney and Chrissy Metz stay up.
In his most recent role as CEO of Fox Entertainment Global, he oversees international sales of Fox-owned series (scripted and unscripted), including live-action comedies. animal control and animated Crapopolis.