Tuesday, November 12th, 2019

1:30 PM – 2:30 PM, Film-TV-Production Track - Herscher, Guerin A, Webcast

The Hollywood Masterclass: TV, Film and Video - Packaging - Producing - Bundling - Distributing in a Cross-Platform World

Lidia Porto, co-star, GET SHORTY

Adam Kolbrenner, Manager, Producer and Founder, Lit Entertainment Group (“Prisoners”, “Deadfall”, “Atlantic Wall”, “Free Guy”, “The Christmas Chronicles”, “Ghost Draft”

Don Handfield, CEO/President, Motor, Producer, “The Founder” & “Kill The Messenger”

Tim Zajaros, Producer and Co-Founder, Armory Films, Producer, "The Peanut Butter Falcon" & "Arctic"

Moderator, Catherine Clinch, TV Writer, TV veteran, Hunter, Jake & The Fat Man, Knight Rider, Love Boat, Hart to Hart

Adam Kolbrenner, manager, producer and founder of Lit Entertainment Group: He has several projects being released or are in production this year. He is the founder of Lit Entertainment Group, a newly launched literary management and production company based in Century City, CA.  Previously Kolbrenner co-founded Madhouse Entertainment, and as the top representative (manager or agent) of all Black List screenwriters cumulative in the history of the annual Black List and has distinguished himself in discovering new voices. He produced

the Oscar-nominated film, Prisoners, for Warner Bros/Alcon Entertainment, written by Lit client Aaron Guzikowski. Kolbrenner also executive produced Netflix’s recent holiday film, Christmas Chronicles starring Kurt Russell, written by Lit client Matt Lieberman based on an original idea by Designated Survivor creator David Guggenheim, another Lit client who also served as an executive producer on the film. In film, Kolbrenner next is producing Fox’s Free Guy, along with Greg Berlanti and Sarah Schechter. The film, starring Ryan Reynolds and directed by Shawn Levy, is an original spec from Lit client Matt Lieberman that was sold in competitive situation. Kolbrenner is also producing Skydance’s Ghost Draft, an original sci-fi tentpole film written by Lit client Zach Dean, with David Goyer also producing. Kolbrenner also will serve as executive producer on the recently ordered TNT/Scott Free sci-fi series, Raised by Wolves, with its first two episodes helmed by Ridley Scott. The original series hails from Lit client Aaron Guzikowski, who will serve as creator and showrunner. On the Lit management side, Kolbrenner reps top creators and filmmakers in the industry, including Dave Andron (Snowfall); Josh Campbell & Matt Stuecken (10 Cloverfield Lane); Mikki Daughtry & Tobias Iaconis (the upcoming The Children from New Line, and CBS Films’ Five Feet Apart); Craig Doyle (Grown-ish); Liz Garcia (Disney’s Princess Diaries 3, writer/director of One Percent More Humid); Aaron Guzikowski (Prisoners, Raised by Wolves); David Guggenheim (Safe House, Designated Survivor); Matt Lieberman (the upcoming Addams Family and Playing with Fire); Justin Marks (Disney’s Jungle Book, Top Gun 2 and Starz’s Counterpart); Sascha Penn (Creed 2); Nicole Perlman (Guardians of the Galaxy, Captain Marvel and writer/director of The Slows); Justin Rhodes (the upcoming Terminator film from Tim Miller; and Robocop from Neil Blomkamp); Ed Ricourt (Now You See Mefranchise); Greg Russo (Mortal Kombat); Hayley Schore & Dr. Roshan Sethi (The Resident); Kerem Sanga (First Girl I Loved, upcoming The Violent Heart); Jason Smilovic & Todd Katzberg (Condor, War Dogs); Gaia Violo (Absentia).

Don Handfield is a filmmaker, screenwriter, comic book creator, producer and novelist. He is the co-creator of History Channel's drama series Knightfall. The series was one of the top cable drama launches of 2017, with Season 2 airing now with Mark Hamill (Star Wars) co-starring. Handfield co-wrote the comic book series THE RIFT and also penned the TV adaptation which was picked up by Steven Spielberg and Amblin Entertainment for the first episode of the reboot of Amazing Stories anthology. The show will debut on Apple’s new streaming network in 2019. Handfield is currently producing along with Marc Platt (LA LA LAND), the adaptation of SWITCHED ON, the critically-acclaimed book from John Elder Robison at Focus Features with Emma Frost (White Queen) adapting. Handfield is also producing the US-remake of top grossing Vietnamese horror film, HOUSEMAID, with CJ Entertainment (SNOWPIERCER, PARASITE) that was adapted for the US market by Academy-Award winning writer Geoffrey Fletcher.  Handfield developed and produced The Founder starring Michael Keaton and Kill The Messenger starring two-time academy award nominated actor Jeremy Renner, with whom Handfield co-founded production company The Combine. Handfield wrote and directed the Saturn Award winning film Touchback starring Kurt Russell and Christine Lahti. Handfield also wrote the novel, which was a top seller on Amazon and received a starred review from Publisher’s Weekly.  Handfield recently became a partner and part owner of Scout Comics & Entertainment, one of the top up-and-coming indie publishers of the current age. Roth/Kirschenbaum (MALIFICENT) recently optioned HENCHGIRL, and Amazon is currently developing the series LONG LOST. Handfield’s comic book series THE MALL was optioned by Ivan Reitman’s Montecito Pictures. Handfield also behind best-selling comic series THE SOURCE and THE DARK AGE, both named top ten comics Cvrprice.com and Key Collector Comics. His short film My Name Is starring French Stewart won best short at several film festivals including the top prize at the Atlanta Film Festival, qualifying it for entry into the Academy Awards. He was named one of the top new faces of independent film by Filmmaker Magazine in 2005 and has written screenplays for Warner Brothers, DreamWorks, Paramount and Lionsgate, among others.

Lidia Porto is best known for her role as Cartel Queenpin Amara de Escalones in Epix’ Original Series “Get Shorty” now in it’s third season. He has Guest Starred on shows like American Housewife, Superstore, Jack Ryan, Arrested Development, Fresh Off the Boat, LA’s Finest and the hit series Vida on Starz. She stood out as “Maria” in Scary Movie 5, and is known also for roles in Horrible Bosses 2, Idiocracy and Dope. In 2016, she won best actress for the short film “Doris” at the Festival de Cine Social in Toledo, Spain. She began her career in entertainment as a fundraiser for PBS, going on to create Producciones Mosaico, a Houston based Spanish language production company, and remained there as a consultant for bilingual production, as well as was an actress and voiceover talent, for 22 years. She served as Board Member and Instructor at Mercury Acting Studio, Theatre director and active member of the local film and theatre communities. Her production work for clients in the medical center integrated dramatic story telling with health education, including an early concept “choose your own adventure” web-novella called “Sugar, Heart and Life” and innovative use live interactive, community based theatre to promote cancer prevention. Once back in LA, she served as a Diversity Committee Member for SagAftra in 2015, and has been a panelist at Digital Hollywood and NALIP. .She has also worked with the Youth Cinema Project and Creating Creators, both LA based organizations that give Public School Students the opportunity to write and create original films. Last summer she directed and co-wrote the short film, “Bonita” with actress and producer Margarita Reyes., which premiered at the California Women’s Film Festival this year. Lidia’s career was recognized in September with a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Gulf Coast Film and TV Festival in Texas.

Tim Zajaros is a producer and co-founder of Armory Films, a film finance and production company that creates, develops, produces, and finances high concept and commercially viable content. With the ability to finance projects from initial creative inception through production and release, Armory has amassed an impressive slate spanning numerous genres and styles, nurturing distinctive stories into groundbreaking films. The Los Angeles based company was created with partner Christopher Lemole in 2013. Armory recently wrapped production in Los Angeles on Charlie Day’s directorial debut El Tonto starring Day, Kate Beckinsale, Jason Sudeikis, John Malkovich, Edie Falco, Jillian Bell, Ken Jeong, Adrien Brody, Ray Liotta and Travis Fimmel, and produced The Peanut Butter Falcon, starring Shia LaBeouf, Jon Bernthal, Dakota Johnson and Bruce Dern, which received rave reviews and the Narrative Spotlight Audience Award out of its SXSW premiere. The film was acquired by Roadside Attractions and has a 95% score on Rotten Tomatoes and has made over $16million at the box office so far. Up next, they are currently in pre-production on Raja Gosnell’s live-action family film Santa: The Adventure Begins and will be teaming with Don Handfield on the sci-fi comic book series The Dark Age. Zajaros produced Joe Penna’s Arctic, starring Mads Mikkelsen which made its world premiere at the 2018 Cannes Film Festival where it was acquired by Bleeker Street for North American distribution and released earlier this year. He also produced and financed Dee Rees’ lauded feature Mudbound, starring Carey Mulligan and Garrett Hedlund, which rose to critical success since its premiere at the Sundance Film Festival in 2017. After being acquired by Netflix, the film went on to receive a record breaking four Academy Award Nominations, making the film a milestone in Netflix’s history in the awards race. Zajaros’ previous work with Armory Films includes producing the horror comedy Zombeavers with Benderspink and the Cabin Fever reboot with Eli Roth and Cassian Elwes. Prior to launching Armory Films, Zajaros produced Restitution starring Mena Suvari and Tom Arnold, and From the Head starring Matthew Lillard. He earlier wrote and produced the documentary Building for Life, an inspirational story about three poverty stricken individuals in Northern Thailand who are diagnosed with HIV/AIDS. Zajaros presented Building for Life at the session for the Commission on the Status of Women at the United Nations Headquarters in New York City. Zajaros graduated Magna Cum Laude from Western Michigan University with a Bachelors of Business Administration, emphasis in Finance. He began his professional career with an automotive marketing company based out of Detroit, and soon after left to work in the Agent Training Program for United Talent Agency (UTA).

Catherine Clinch’s produced writing credits include: HUNTER, JAKE & THE FATMAN, KNIGHT RIDER, LOVE BOAT, HART TO HART, FOUL PLAY, TRUE CONFESSIONS and, most recently, RESCUE BOTS. She has served for nearly two decades as an Adjunct Assistant Professor, teaching Advanced Video Production, Screenwriting, Communication Theory and Social Media Strategy & Content Marketing at California State University Dominguez Hills. She has written, produced and presented more than 250 hours of LIVE interactive broadcast. She was Associate Publisher of Creative Screenwriting Magazine and was a key organizer of the first five years of Screenwriting Expo. In addition, she has written for Cultural Weekly, Studio System News, Film News Briefs and The Huffington Post. Catherine serves as a media strategy and content advisor to companies through her consultancy Clinch Digital Media. She has moderated panels and / or spoken at numerous conferences in Los Angeles, Nashville and Orlando. Catherine has also been awarded three US Patents for inventing a mobile platform and a new form of mobile entertainment. Catherine is currently writing and developing a project with new IP for Stan Lee’s POW Entertainment.