Sally Antonacchio Gets Her Moment to Shine
Long a behind-the-scenes power at The Artists Company, now she's the owner and is setting a new course for this venerable production company.
The Artists Company's Sally Antonacchio
Gets Her Moment To Shine
Long a behind-the-scenes power, the recipient of the AICP's
Jay Eisenstat Award is now the owner, and she's setting
a new course for this venerable production company.
By Anthony Vagnoni
The Jay B. Eisenstat Award, established in 1990, is the AICP's equivalent of the Irving Thalberg Award. Named in honor of one of the founders of the organization, it's presented, as AICP CEO Matt Miller said at the AICP Show this past June, to "people who've helped define this industry through their individual accomplishments and through their work in this organization."
The list of recipients is impressive: Dick Kerns, Jon Kamen, Frank Stiefel, Barney Melsky and Ted Goetz. They're the titans of the commercial production industry in the US, legends in their own right. And to this lofty boy's club you can now add yet another name, more a "Jenny from the block" variety than a Mount Rushmore: Sally Antonacchio, from Little Italy. (And we mean the real Little Italy, the one in the Bronx, not that tourist attraction in Manhattan.)
In setting up the surprise presentation last June, Miller told the audience that previous recipients were "some of the more 'famous,' out-front folks" in the business, while others were "the ones in the engine room, rolling up their sleeves and getting the work done." Antonacchio fits the latter designation-at least she used to. The resident mentor, den mother, tough-as-nails negotiator and overall 'fixer' for The Artists Company for the past 22 years, she's now the company's Owner, Executive Producer and Visionary in Chief.
In her elevation from a below-decks role to the bridge, she's now set to chart her own course for this respected production house, one that's helped launch or build the careers of so many top directors and worked with countless agencies and brands.
Antonacchio took over the company this summer after the surprise announcement, coming right after she was presented with the Eisenstat Award, that Roberto Cecchini, its founder, Executive Producer and one of those 'out-front' boldfaces Miller was talking about, was going to retire. She says Cecchini and she had talked about just such a succession for some time, but his timing still came as a shock, as did the way he made it – by announcing it in an article in SHOOT, and saying that he wasn't merely leaving the company, but that it was going to shut down.
That turned out to be premature, as Antonacchio quickly put together a plan to acquire the company and move it in a new direction. The postmodern, Antonacchio-led Artists Company is a more streamlined affair, she tells SourceEcreative. Gone is the L.A. office; the shop is now run out of its base in New York and will take space anywhere it's to service productions. The directorial roster has been massaged, too, with a number of talents moving over to other shops. The repping line-up is different as well, as is the company's web site and its branding.
The Artists Company roster currently includes John Alper, Zach Borst (a rising talent who wrote and directed a spot for Chevy that won a consumer-generated content comeptition last year and aired on the Super Bowl in 2012), Michael Cuesta, Paolo Monico, the directing team of Palladino/Neri, David Ramser and Leonardo Ricagni. They continue to work with the longtime East Coast reps Mary Eiff and Michelle Stuart, who've gone independent as Hello Tomorrow and who also handle Texas, and have hired a full-time staff rep assistant named Brittany Ciera Ortiz. Antonacchio has also named new reps for other US territories, including Nathan Skillicorn of Heart, Brains & Nerve, who handles the Midwest, and Laure Scott, The Artists Company's former music video rep, who's handling agencies in the West.
The latter hire is an example of Antonacchio's tendency to zig while others might zag: while admitting that Scott is new to the commercials side of the business, Antonacchio is impressed by the fact that she's been able to build a career out of the bare-bones world of music videos. "She's a hard worker, and I think agencies will like her creativity, candor and honesty," she notes.
If all Antonacchio did was put her mark on the AICP East chapter, that would have been an accomplishment in and of itself. But there's more to her career achievements than just that. She spent 21 years on the East board, including two years as President, and also served on the National Labor Committee, helping negotiate some thorny contract issues with a variety of union wallflowers during contentious times in the industry.
And, with her background as a CFO to guide her, she helped establish a Business Affairs Policy for the organization, setting up a means for AICP members to deal effectively with their counterparts on the broadcast business side of agency production departments.
On top of that, Miller notes, Antonacchio spent more than a decade as an instructor in the AICP East's Production Seminar Program, where she helped train dozens of up-and-coming junior producers. "She truly embodies the spirit in which the Jay Eisenstat Award was established," he said last June.
Contacted later, Miller explains that Antonacchio had been suggested for the honor numerous times, but because sitting national board members aren't eligible for the Eisenstat prize, she couldn't be considered. This was the first year she was eligible, he notes, and she got in as easily as Derek Jeter will make it into Cooperstown.
Of her being selected, Miller believes it's not only well-deserved but fitting that someone from Antonacchio's background has been recognized with this trophy. "Our industry has always been full of these outsized personalities, so it's very appropriate that someone who's contributed so much, both to her company and to the industry, and who's done it working in the shadow of one of these characters, gets the accolades they deserve."
Her background is an interesting study in going outside your comfort zone. Born in Italy, Antonacchio came to the US as an infant and actually grew up on Spring Street in Manhattan's Little Italy, where her parents owned a pastry shop. (The neighborhood still talks about their jelly donuts, she says.)
In 1970 they moved to the Bronx, where she still lives today, surrounded by her extended Italian-American family. Working as a bookkeeper at a company in Yonkers, she answered an ad in The New York Times to work in the accounting department of a production company called Michael Daniel Productions, owned by Michael Romersa and the late Dan Nichol, where she was persuaded to take the job by Jack Cohn, who went on to run his own storied production company. From there she moved to Gerard Hameline Productions, and in 1990 joined a company called The Artists Company, which had got its start as Bill Hudson Films in the mid '70s.
She rose steadily, eventually becoming CFO, then VP, then President. During this time she kept one foot in the frantic world of commercial production and one on her Old Country upbringing in the Bronx. She met and married her husband, Henry, over 30 years ago. On their first date, she recalls, he took her to a family wedding, then to a bar. Years later the two of them would buy the joint; Henry ran it during the week, while his wife was riding herd on multi-million dollar shoots for global ad agencies and gigantic brands. On weekends, she'd join him at the bar, catering parties in the back room for up to 50 people.
While the picture of the modern working woman, Antonacchio is an interesting mix of old school and new age, according to the director Øtis Mass, who started directing while at The Artists Company and is now with Accomplice. "She's got a great combination of street-smarts and elegance," he observes. "And she's had a hand in everything at The Artists Company. If it was Roberto's problem, then Sally was a part of solving it. And trust me, she's seen every production problem under the sun."
Mass believes that Antonacchio is going to be a huge success as a company owner, and for lots of reasons. "She's a tough cookie, but also one of the sweetest women I know, very warm," he says. He also believes her contemporary outlook on where the ad business is going – highly informed by her awareness of trends in fashion, culture, style and entertainment – will be a boon to the new Artists Company going forward.
"Sally is going to be a bridge between the way things used to be done and how they need to be done going forward," says Mass. "She understands that we need to approach things in a different way – that we need to talk to new consumers and do things that are immediate and exciting. She's an industry veteran, yet she's got a great, fresh perspective on things. It's part of the dichotomy of her personality that makes her so interesting."
Antonacchio says taking over the company has been a more challenging transition than she expected. There's been countless meetings with reps, directors, agencies, etc. She's also now handling all of the contact with the director corps, on everything from pitches and bids to helping shape, manage and promote their careers.
So how will the new Artists Company be different than its previous iteration? Well, for one thing, you can expect a burst of color – fittingly, in that the business is now woman-owned (and has already applied for its WBENC and New York State status). Antonacchio has been playing with the logo's color scheme, changing it to match the season, the month or even her mood.
All of this is part of her desire to make the new Artists Company a place she says "feels like my home." Aside from eating well, what does that mean? "I want our office to be open, casual and creative," she says. "A place where people can just walk in, where there's a sense of transparency, no games, where you're unencumbered and free to pursue your visions."
Antonacchio says that during her time with Cecchini she never thought about opening her own shop. And while her taking over was always on the back burner, she says her initial reaction when he called to tell her was, "I'm too young to retire! I want to take it over." For her, things like continuity, commitment and dedication are big deals. She's been married to the same man for over 30 years, she likes to point out, and has lived in the same house (slightly battered by Hurricane Sandy but otherwise untouched) in the Throgs Neck section of the Bronx for over two decades.
Reaction to her move has been uniformly great, Antonacchio adds. "Honestly, so many friends I've made over the years have just walked into the office or called to ask, 'what can I do to help?' It's remarkable!"
Miller believes Antonacchio's new role as owner and EP represents an interesting shift taking place in the industry. In the past, he points out, many production company principals with EP titles came up via one of two routes: either through the ranks of production or via sales and representation. "It seems fitting, in this age of procurement and things like client-approved vendor lists, that we're now getting people running production companies who have solid business and financial backgrounds," he notes. "It's the beginning of a new era."
Published 4 December, 2012
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