Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti has appointed former AMPAS president and studio executive Tom Sherak as senior advisor and director of the Mayor’s Entertainment Industry and Production Office. Sherak will lead the Mayor’s efforts to support the entertainment industry and increase local production. He will earn $1 per year.
“The entertainment industry generates more than 500,000 local jobs. Protecting and expanding it is an absolute necessity,” Garcetti said. “Tom will lead our campaign for production incentives in Sacramento and is empowered to work across city departments to make L.A. the best possible location for production.”
“The entertainment industry has a true champion in Mayor Garcetti, and I’m honored to work with him to make sure L.A. is always the entertainment capital of the world,” Sherak said. “I look forward to helping Mayor Garcetti stop runaway production, increase state production credits, and cut City Hall red tape.”
Film L.A. recently reported that Los Angeles has seen significant declines in the most economically important production categories including on-location feature production and television dramas. The average feature film or television series spends $100,000 to $250,000 per day during production and each entertainment industry job generates 2.7 additional jobs, according to Film L.A.
“This isn’t about the stars you see on the screen. It’s about carpenters, electricians, caterers and the stores they shop in,” said Garcetti.
Sherak was previously president of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and currently consults for Skydance Productions, One Three Media, and other entertainment entities. As a partner at Revolution Films, Sherak helped lead the release of 47 films including Black Hawk Down, and he consulted for Marvel Studios on films including Iron Man. His experience includes serving as chairman of Twentieth Century Fox Domestic Film Group, senior executive vice president of Fox Filmed Entertainment, and president of domestic distribution and marketing for Twentieth Century Fox.
He is currently chairman of the MS Hope Foundation, which he helped create, and is a former chairman of the Will Rogers Motion Picture Pioneers Foundation and a former board member of the Motion Picture and Television Fund. He presently serves on the boards of the Fulfillment Fund, an inner city college access organization and the Vision to Learn organization that supplies free glasses to L.A. city students. He and his wife, Madeleine, received the 2010 Visionary Honor from the Lighthouse International board of directors for their philanthropic work.
Sherak received an honorary doctorate in the arts from the Academy of Art University and holds a degree in marketing from New York City Community College. He has also served on the faculty of the UCLA Producers Program.
