AIE Champions

Britton Payne is an attorney at Nickelodeon/Paramount focusing on animation, talent, Artificial Intelligence and DEI matters. He regularly presents at Comic Cons across the country, including his panel “Autism in Comic Books” at the Los Angeles Comic Con in December. He is an active community member of the inclusion model WISH Elementary School in Westchester, the award-winning non-profit charter school that believes important academic, social and ethical skills and attitudes are developed when students with various strengths, needs, and backgrounds learn together.

Connect with Britton: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brittonpayne/

Chuck Peil is a founding member of Reel FX, a leading force in the animation industry for over 30 years. The studio has grown into a powerhouse of creativity, employing over 400 team members across its state-of-the-art 75,000 square foot Montreal facility, a 15,000 square foot studio in Dallas and its latest footprint in Hollywood. Reel FX specializes in animated content from theatrical and series to shorts and immersive experiences including The Book of Life in collaboration with director Jorge R. Gutierrez and producer Guillermo Del Toro. The studio is on the forefront of incorporating technology like real time production for enhanced storytelling and efficiencies in production.

A respective innovator in entertainment, Peil has contributed to over 50 theatrical, TV and location-based projects. Recent credits include SpongeBob 4, The Monkey King (Netflix), Back to the Outback (Netflix), The Book of Life (20th Century Fox), Free Birds (Relativity Media), Rise of the Guardians (DreamWorks Animation), the Despicable Me ride (Universal Studios/Illumination), and Cirque du Soleil’s Worlds Away. He’s also worked on Ferrari Dark Ride (Abu Dhabi), The Simpsons Ride (Universal Studios) and Looney Tunes CG shorts.

Genna Rosenberg is the CEO and founder of GennComm, a global agency focused on toys, licensing, consumer products, and entertainment. With more than 30 years of industry experience, she has worked with leading toy companies, entertainment studios, gaming companies, and major consumer brands. Inside the Valley

Genna is known for connecting business strategy, creativity, and social impact, with a particular focus on empowerment, diversity, inclusion, and purpose-driven innovation. She has also played a significant role in mentoring and developing the next generation of professionals through industry education and workforce-development initiatives.

Hillary Bibicoff is an experienced transactional entertainment attorney specializing in talent deals. In addition to writer, director, producer, actor, and host deals, she negotiates book, screenplay, and life story agreements, as well as various film finance, production, and distribution deals. She also handles licensing, merchandising, endorsement, sponsorship, and spokesperson deals for talent as well as both traditional entertainment companies and those whose main business is outside the entertainment Industry. She has been involved with audits of major studios conducted on behalf of talent with profit participations.

She is currently named as one of America’s Most Honored Lawyers by the American Registry, an honor granted to the top 1% of lawyers. These honors include current selection as a “Best Lawyer in America in the field of Entertainment Law” by the U.S News and World Report and inclusion in Who’s Who Legal – Telecoms, Media and Entertainment 2023. She has been named a “Southern California Super Lawyer” for the past 20 years, was chosen as one of Hollywood’s top new generation deal makers by the Los Angeles Business Journal and received a Woman of Achievement Award from the Century City Women’s Business Council. Hiliary currently serves as a Governor of the Television Academy, as well as on Advisory Boards for the UCLA Entertainment Law Symposium and the Alliance of Women Directors. She is a past Board Member of Women in Film and Co-Chair Emeritus of the Women’s Entertainment Network. She has authored articles on acquisition of rights for film and TV and profit participations and often gives lectures or serves as a panelist regarding various aspects of entertainment law.

Hillary began her career at Cooper, Epstein and Hurewitz. Later she was an equity partner at Greenberg Glusker for a dozen years. Between those positions, her time as an executive at motion picture production and distribution companies gave her a practical business perspective that provides a strategic advantage in negotiations. Before joining Feig Finkel, Hillary spent a decade as of counsel for Holmes Weinberg, a boutique entertainment as well as a brief stint at Pierce Law Group. She received her undergraduate degree from UCLA and her law degree from Loyola Law School, which she attended as the Burns Scholar, Loyola’s highest academic scholarship. She received the National Association of Women Lawyers Award as the outstanding female graduate and went on to serve on Loyola Law School’s Board of Governors for many years.

When she isn’t working, Hiliary’s happy place is on the flying trapeze. She also loves live music, tennis, poker, and playing with her dog and her cats. She is licensed to practice law in California and New York.

John Frizzell is an autistic Hollywood Music in Media Award (HMMA) -winning film and TV composer. He was born in New York City and began in his music career early by singing in the chorus of the Paris Opera Company and the Metropolitan Opera Company. This experience led to his formal musical education at the University of Southern California Thorton School of Music and the Manhattan School of Music.

After college, Frizzell collaborated with renowned composers including Ryuichi Sakamoto and James Newton Howard before branching out on his own. Many of his credits include Jean Pierre Jeunet’s Alien Resurrection, Mark Rydell’s James Dean and Mike Judge’s cult classic Office Space. His collaboration with Judge has spanned around 25 years including the 1997 smash hit Beavis and Butt-head Do America and Beavis and Butt-head Do the Universe. His TV credits include King of the Hill, The Following, Tell Me a Story and Season 2 of Netflix’s ongoing series Space Force.

Johnna Cho is a former Senior Vice President of Business and Legal Affairs at Warner Bros. Home Entertainment. She retired from Warner Bros. after 24 years and now enjoys working on projects to advance the autism and disabilities community. She is the Vice Chair of Asians and Pacific Islanders with Disabilities of California (APIDC) and has served on its Board of Directors since 2009. Johnna is married and the proud mom of an adult son with autism. She has a BA degree from Wellesley College and a JD from UCLA School of Law. Johnna is also a certified yoga instructor (RYT-500) and yoga therapist (C-IAYT).

Marlene Sharp is a creative and business-savvy entertainment multi-hyphenate who originally hails from New Orleans and moved to San Fernado Valley. Firmly ensconced in LA life, she is top dawg at Pink Poodle Productions. She serves as producer, story editor, and writer on the forthcoming animated TV series Mongly Syndrome: K-Pop Odd Couple from ENPIX Animation Studio and Educational Broadcast System in Korea. Noteworthy media consulting clients and co-conspirators include Autism in Entertainment, God’s Gang, Autism Society Orange County, GameU, Spectrum Laboratory, Rubber Ninja, Katamaco and more. Prior to Pink Poodle Productions, she was director, production at Level 5 abby, home of Yokai Watch and other Japanese hit video game-based franchises. She even worked with the Sonic the Hedgehog franchise at SEGA as well.

Marlene is a 5+ year ally of the autism community, and she grows more enthusiastic each day. This passion started with a consulting role at The Center for Learning Unlimited and companion animation studio Brainstorm Productions and swelled to collaborations with multiple artists on the spectrum including the bunch of performers whom she represents via Sandstone Artists Management. She is exceptionally proud of the ongoing Laugh Factory neurodivergent comedy nights which she established alongside Rob Kutner, Mike Rotman, Judi Uttal, Maja Watkins, Autism in Entertainment, the Miracle Project and Spectrum Laboratory.

Paul Hemstreet is an experienced and accomplished creative leader with a proven history of planning and executing high-profile, globally distributed projects for major Hollywood productions that have included the Harry Potter, Matrix, and Lord of the Rings franchises. He has served as Executive Producer and Head of Production on initiatives to create special features to accompany home entertainment releases. His experience includes the development and production of short and long-form documentaries, as well as story-driven content to support and promote major film and original series releases. He currently serves as an adjunct instructor at Exceptional Minds Academy, where his courses include video production, editing, voice acting for animation, and career readiness.

Susette Hsiung is happily retired after 28 years with The Walt Disney Company.  She was the executive vice president of Studio Production and Network Programming Operations at Disney Branded Television. In this role, she led the productions for premium original content for kids and families on Disney+, Disney Channel, and Disney Junior, including the Emmy Award-winning music special, Elton John Live: Farewell from Dodger Stadium, and the hit Descendants and Zombies franchises. She has worked on iconic Disney titles like High School Musical, Hannah Montana and Phineas and Ferb, and championed diversity and inclusion efforts across Disney, serving on the Diversity and Inclusion Council and supporting initiatives for women and underrepresented groups. In addition to her work at Disney, Susette also served for three years on the board of the Greater Los Angeles chapter of Girls, Inc. She holds a bachelor’s degree in economics from Cornell University and an MBA from New York University’s Stern School of Business, residing in Los Angeles with her family.

Connect with Susette: https://www.linkedin.com/in/susette-hsiung-30890411/

Zhara Astra is a film and television writer and producer as well as a professor where she developed the first course in the world on understanding neurodivergent women at Arizona State University. After discovering in adulthood that she had ADHD, Zhara set out on a mission to change the way women are viewed, treated and diagnosed in the medical world (as well as how they’re depicted in film and TV) while aiming to help women and girls better understand their own brains.

She is an international public speaker and has written articles about this for Scientific American as well as other publications that have helped change the game for women worldwide.