Kirsten Arongino has joined ArtClass as its executive producer and managing director. As an agency producer for 25-plus years, she scaled revenue and built brands at shops like Deutsch and Ogilvy & Mather and later served as VP and executive producer at Publicis.
Arongino thrives on building partnerships with brands and agencies and managing multidisciplinary teams. Her prowess as a producer is reflected in digital and traditional media campaigns for major brands like Honda, Campari, Walmart, Tiffany & Co., and several culture-forward work music-driven campaigns for The Gap and McDonald’s. Arongino was also formerly the director of production at Yard NYC and managing director at Ammolite Inc.
Recent notable projects from ArtClass include the first ever brand campaign for Lilly Pulitzer, directed by Matvey Fiks and made in partnership with Yard NYC, using AI to marry the brand’s rich heritage with the industry’s newest technology; the new original show Bedtime Stories with Ryan, directed by Vincent Peone and starring Ryan Reynolds for streamer Fubo; and Charlie Kaufman’s dreamy short film Jackals & Fireflies, produced in partnership with Likely Story and shot by Chayse Irvin.
“I was fortunate enough to walk into so many great projects within my first month at ArtClass,” said Arongino. “Every director on their roster is wildly inventive and inspiring to work with. I think it’s a testament to ArtClass taking risks on new talent and supporting them as they grow as commercial filmmakers and its inclination to tackle projects with a diverse range of budgets. I look forward to adding my leadership skills and creative guidance into the mix as ArtClass continues to produce amazing work.”
Geno Imbriale, managing partner of ArtClass, added, “You can’t teach what experience gives you, and Kirsten has that in spades. She’s worked on every side of branded filmmaking and created every iteration of content you can imagine. She’s a joy to work with and the missing ingredient we needed as a company.”
ArtClass partner/director Peone said, “We brought Kirsten on under the pretext of executive producer, but quickly realized that her skills were completely off the charts, not to mention a perfect fit for our shared vision of future growth. I still regret waiting ten full days to promote her to managing director.”
James Earl Jones, Lauded Actor and Voice of Darth Vader, Dies At 93
James Earl Jones, who overcame racial prejudice and a severe stutter to become a celebrated icon of stage and screen — eventually lending his deep, commanding voice to CNN, "The Lion King" and Darth Vader — has died. He was 93.
His agent, Barry McPherson, confirmed Jones died Monday morning at home in New York's Hudson Valley region. The cause was not immediately clear.
The pioneering Jones, who was one of the first African American actors in a continuing role on a daytime drama and worked deep into his 80s, won two Emmys, a Golden Globe, two Tony Awards, a Grammy, the National Medal of Arts, the Kennedy Center Honors and was given an honorary Oscar and a special Tony for lifetime achievement. In 2022, a Broadway theater was renamed in his honor.
He cut an elegant figure late in life, with a wry sense of humor and a ferocious work habit. In 2015, he arrived at rehearsals for a Broadway run of "The Gin Game" having already memorized the play and with notebooks filled with comments from the creative team. He said he was always in service of the work.
"The need to storytell has always been with us," he told The Associated Press then. "I think it first happened around campfires when the man came home and told his family he got the bear, the bear didn't get him."
Jones created such memorable film roles as the reclusive writer coaxed back into the spotlight in "Field of Dreams," the boxer Jack Johnson in the stage and screen hit "The Great White Hope," the writer Alex Haley in "Roots: The Next Generation" and a South African minister in "Cry, the Beloved Country."
He was also a sought-after voice actor, expressing the villainy of Darth Vader ("No, I am your father," commonly misremembered as "Luke, I am your father"), as... Read More