Meet the New NYWIFT Member: Cathy Perifimos
Meet NYWIFT new member Cathy Perifimos! Cathy is an entertainment attorney, Of Counsel at Thompson LLC, consulting with the firm on entertainment and media transactions. Previously, she was Vice President at Paramount Global, where she managed the business and legal affairs of Smithsonian Channel and worked on documentaries and unscripted projects across the MTV Entertainment Group brands. Prior to joining Smithsonian Channel in 2014, Cathy was an Associate at the boutique entertainment law firm of Dembitzer & Dembitzer LLP. She was also an Associate Agent in the dramatic rights department of the Curtis Brown literary agency. She is a graduate of Barnard College and the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law. Cathy is a founding board member of Barnard Women in Entertainment, and at Cardozo is a member of the Filmmakers Legal Clinic Board and the FAME Advisory Board. Cathy resides in New Jersey with her husband and their cat. Recently, we asked Cathy about her impressive legal career in the entertainment industry.
READ MOREMeet the New NYWIFT Member Gabrielle Schonder
A warm welcome to new NYWIFT member Gabrielle Schonder! Gabrielle is a multi- Emmy Award-winning documentary director who has covered politics, national security, and foreign policy for over a decade at 60 Minutes and FRONTLINE about insider trading by members of Congress led to the passage of The STOCK Act. She had her directorial debut in 2020 with NRA: Under Fire and was a member of the FRONTLINE team that covered the insurrection on January 6th in America After 9/11. Gabrielle is a member of the Directors Guild of America and the Writers Guild of America, East, and a 2022 Nieman Fellow at Harvard University. We asked Gabrielle to tell us more about what it’s like to work as a journalist, producer, and director for some of the most respected news programs in the country.
READ MOREMeet the New NYWIFT Member: Willette Murphy Klausner
If you’ve seen a great Broadway show recently, chances are Willette Murphy Klausner had something to do with it. As the founder and owner of WMK Productions in Los Angeles she has produced or co-produced dozens of award-winning theatrical and film projects, including MJ the Musical, Hadestown, Stereophonic, The Wiz. Porgy and Bess, Three Mo’ Tenors, Caroline or Change and Cabaret, just to name a few. For film, she’s co-producing the documentary Liza, which just premiered at the Tribeca Festival. Previous films include Radium Girls and Wakefield with several film and TV projects in development. In 2022 she was awarded the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Drama League. She has served on the Boards of Directors of the Los Angeles Music Center and the Women in Film Foundation, is a member of the League of Professional Theatre Women, the National Women’s Forum, and NYWIFT. She is currently on the board of Coalition for African Americans in the Performing Arts.
READ MOREMeet the New NYWIFT Member: Genevieve Skehan
Welcome, Genevieve Skehan! It was a love of the outdoors that propelled Genevieve Skehan into filmmaking. After earning her BA in drama in the UK at the University of Exeter, she went on to work for years as a performer and even won awards as a director. But she grew tired of sitting in dark rehearsal spaces. So, she embarked on a career in film and television. Several years later she was working regularly in Boston and New York as a producer, writer, and director for commercials and films. Lately she has begun to write and direct more passion projects. Here she shares how her background in theater informs her directing and how producing gave her the practical experience she needed to realize her own work. Plus, a bit about why she adores filming outside in natural light.
READ MORE
