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Disney Promotes Iger, Forms Exec Committee. On January 24, 2000, Robert A. Iger was named president and chief operating officer of The Walt Disney Co. as well as a member of its board of directors. Previously, Iger served as chairman of the Disney-owned ABC Group and president of Walt Disney International, Disney's overseas business division. Michael Eisner, Walt Disney's chairman and CEO, also announced the promotion of Chief Strategic Officer Peter E. Murphy and Chief Financial Officer Thomas O. Staggs, to the positions of senior executive vice presidents, and said that he is forming an Executive Management Committee made up of himself, Iger, Vice Chairman Sanford M. Litvack, Murphy, Staggs and the company's business-unit heads. The Executive Management Committee will help provide a more efficient communication line among Disney's executive-staff members and will serve as a nucleus to generate new ideas. Joining ABC in 1974, Iger started as a studio supervisor and rose through a series of increasingly responsible management positions. He spent 12 years with ABC Sports, where he became VP of programming. Later, Iger became president of ABC Entertainment in Los Angeles and then president of the ABC Television Network Group. In 1994, he was elected president, COO and board member of Capital Cities/ABC. In that position, he was responsible for all operating divisions. At the time of the ABC/Disney merger, he had been named the next CEO of Capital Cities/ABC. "Bob Iger is recognized as a leader in the communications and entertainment industries," Eisner said. "Bob not only helped build the ABC television network into a market leader, but was also instrumental in the company's expansion into cable programming, with such initiatives as ESPN, A&E, E!, The History Channel and Lifetime. As a result, when Disney acquired Capital Cities/ABC, we added a collection of assets that strengthened Disney and which continue to increase in value and contribute to the growth of the company. Since the acquisition, Bob has played a key role in guiding the integration of ABC into the Disney organization. In the past year, he has overseen the ABC Television Network's turnaround, powered by such breakthrough programming as Who Wants To Be A Millionaire, ABC 2000, The Drew Carey Show and The Practice, and the implementation of new business strategies." Murphy has served as executive vice president and chief strategic officer since May 1998. His responsibilities were strategic analysis, business development and long-term planning for the growth of Disney's global businesses. He joined Disney's Strategic Planning department in 1988 as a senior planning analyst and advanced through a series of positions with increasing responsibilities, becoming a senior vice president of strategic planning and development in 1995. In 1997, he became senior vice president and chief financial officer for ABC Inc., after having been one of the key players in Disney's acquisition of Capital Cities/ABC and the integration of the two companies. Since May 1998, Staggs has served as executive vice president and chief financial officer, with responsibility for the company's worldwide finance organization, investor relations, treasury activities, information systems and taxes. Joining Disney in 1990 as a manager of strategic planning, Staggs soon advanced through a series of positions, becoming senior vice president of strategic planning and development in 1995. He played a key role in various Disney strategic joint ventures and corporate transactions, including the acquisition of Capital Cities/ABC. Staggs also served as the chief architect of Disney's Internet strategy, engineering Disney's acquisition of Starwave and its investment in Infoseek, and structuring and negotiating the combination of Disney's Internet business with Infoseek under a new class of Disney tracking stock.

Mary Kay Bergman.

Letter Campaign To Honor Bergman At Oscars. Husband of the late Mary Kay Bergman, Dino Andrade, has put out a call to South Park and Mary Kay Bergman fans to write to the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences in an effort to have Mrs. Bergman included in the "In Memoriam" segment of the 2000 Oscar ceremony. Typically, the Academy only honors higher profile talent who have passed away in the past year. As reported [AF 11/23/99], Mrs. Bergman took her own life on November 11, 1999 in her West Los Angeles home. The reason for her suicide was attributed to a deep-lying mental illness. She was a prolific artist, who provided the voice for Daphne Blake in the two most recent Scooby-Doo direct-to-video films; Batgirl/Barbara Gordon in Batman: Subzero; and all but one of the female voices on Comedy Central's South Park. She had also been the "official" voice of Disney's Snow White since 1989, and played numerous characters in animation shows ranging from The Family Guy to Toy Story 2. If you wish to participate in the letter writing campaign please send your letters of support to Mr. Robert Rehme, President of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences at 8949 Wilshire Blvd., Beverly Hills, CA 90211.

Musical Chairs: Pacific Data Images promoted Denise Minter to vice president of production. Minter will now oversee all of Pacific Data Images' production efforts around the world. Most recently, she was been senior producer on PDI commercials for Sega Dreamcast and Coca-Cola. Since joining the company in 1993, Minter has also served as production manager on the DreamWorks and PDI feature Antz. . . .CINAR Entertainment has filled the newly created seat of president with Peter Moss. In his position effective March 1, Moss will focus on developing CINAR's entertainment business in North America, Latin America and Asia. Before joining CINAR, Moss served as programming and production VP for YTV, Canada's youth network. Moss has regularly worked in pre-school programming with the Children's Television Network and the CBC. . . .Edward Adler has stepped up to the position of senior VP of corporate communications at Time Warner. Adler will oversee all aspects of development and implementation of the media conglomerate's global corporate strategies. Since 1997, he has been a VP of corporate communications and will continue to serve as the company's chief spokesman. . . .Hamberg, Germany-based Igel Media AG, an independent distributor of family programming, has announced Ed Galton as their new head of distribution. Galton will head worldwide distribution for the company focusing on strengthening its operations outside of Germany. Previously at Gaumont as VP/Head of Television and Video Sales, Galton organized the pre-sales and distribution for such titles as Oggy And The Cockroaches, Space Goofs and Highlander, The Raven. . . .Ring Of Fire expands its flames with six new artists. Joining the Hollywood, California-based visual effects and design studio are Infero artists Ali Laventhol and Alan Latteri, visual effects/digital composite artist Jeremy Alcock, CGI artist John Jenkins and producers Jill Heinrich and Kimberly Evans. Before Ring of Fire, Laventhol was a freelance Flame artist working at Rhythm & Hues. Latteri comes to Ring of Fire with credits on X-Files: The Movie, Star Trek IX: Insurrection and GODZILLA. Coming from Pittard Sullivan, Alcock served as a digital artist on spots for ABC's TGIF, ABC movie opens, Fox Family, VH1 "Music First" and FX Channel. Previously a freelancer for the company, Jenkins will bring his specialties in Maya to Ring of Fire full-time. From August 1989-July 1999, Jenkins was the lead animator at Los Angeles-based Visual Magic Images. At San Francisco-based Attik, Heinrich served as associate producer on projects for UPN, Adidas and Columbia Tri-Star. Re-locating from Atlanta, Evans brings production experience from Turner Broadcasting, Big Mouth Productions and iXL. . . .

Alix Eglis.

Jonathan Whitehead.

Claus Hansen.

Mark Holmes.

Riot, a digital effect house, breaks out with the naming of a new visual effects producer Alix Eglis and visual effects artist Claus Hansen. As a freelancer, Eglis has produced commercials for Santa Monica, California-based Crew Cuts and Lost Planet. For Culver City, California-based Mars Media, she produced the R&B group, TLC's "Unpretty" video and Will Smith's "Wild, Wild West" video. Eglis will oversee projects for Riot, acting as a liaison from the client to the artists. Prior to Riot, Hansen created visual effects for feature films, television, commercials and music videos at Hollywood, California-based Encore. His credits include the titles for Comedy Central's Frank Leaves For The Orient, CNBC's In Profile, Disturbing Behavior and The White River Kid. He also worked on the visual effects for the Puffy Daddy video "Been Around The World," and television series Ally Mcbeal, Charmed and the X-Files. . . . Radium has expanded its Santa Monica office roster with a new head of production Jonathan Whitehead and visual effects artists Mark Holmes and Christine Rivard. Whitehead will oversee the daily operation of the Santa Monica branch including client relations, bidding, marketing, personnel and line producing. For the last six years, Whitehead was an executive producer at Saatchi & Saatchi, primarily working on ads for Toyota. Whitehead's feature film producing credits include Ghostbusters II, The Abyss, Steel Magnolias, Lethal Weapon II and Batman. Holmes comes to Radium from Sony Pictures Imageworks where he holds visual effects credits on such films as Contact, Ghost In The Darkness, Phenomenon, The Craft and City Of Angels. Previously of Post Logic Studios, Rivard specializes in 2D compositing via the Discreet Flame/Inferno platform. In addition to his commercial work, Rivard has feature films credits on Fight Club, Blade and Armageddon. . . .AtomFilms, a leader in next-generation entertainment, announced that John Marcom, former President of Time Inc. International, will join as the new senior VP of worldwide revenue and media strategies. In his new role, Marcom will coordinate worldwide on-line and off-line sales of AtomFilms' growing library of short-form entertainment. During his stint at Time Inc., Marcom oversaw a catalog of more than a dozen national and international news, business and lifestyle publications. Joining Time Inc. in 1993, Marcom first served as development director in Japan, where he led a team exploring the Japanese market for news magazines. Within 2 years, Marcom rose to the position of publisher of Time magazine's Asian edition and was president of Time Inc. Asia by 1998. For eleven years before Time Inc., Marcom worked as a business journalist in Tokyo, New York and London, working first for The Wall Street Journal and then Forbes magazine. . . .Stephen L. Brain, former senior VP and general manager at Fox Animation Studios has joined Stan Lee Media, Inc. as their new executive VP of Production. In his new post, Brain will create Stan Lee Media's new digital animation studio dedicated to developing Internet entertainment. Brain will supervise the production team of storyboard artists, digital artists and Flash animators as well as increasing Stan Lee's roster of 50 artists to 100 artists within the next 90 days. Beginning his career in 1977, Brain worked as an assistant to Glen Larson at Universal Studios. Several years later, he became an associate producer at NBC. In 1981, Brain became an executive at Financial Network News, which he co-created. In 1991, Brain joined Silver Pictures at Warner Bros. where he was eventually promoted to executive VP with responsibility for day-to-day operations. . . .Lylle Breier was promoted to the newly created position of senior vice president, special events, for The Walt Disney Studios. Breier will be responsible for developing and overseeing a vast array of worldwide special events relating to the domestic and international releases of the studio's motion-picture and video product. Over her ten year career at Disney, Breier has helped to stage some of Disney's major events, including the 1995 premiere of Pocahontas in Central Park, the 1997 "Hercules Premiere Weekend" in Manhattan and the live worldwide concert tour for Fantasia/2000. She has been responsible for many of the special activities at Hollywood's legendary El Capitan Theater and the recent construction of a temporary IMAX theater in Los Angeles to screen Fantasia/2000. For two years, she served as director of special events then rose to VP, special events, for Buena Vista Pictures Distribution, which she has held for the past four years. . . .Lucas Licensing has appointed Kerry Phelan in the new executive position of director of domestic licensing & marketing. In her new role, Phelan will oversee all aspects of the Star Wars licensing business for the U.S. Before coming to Lucas Licensing, she was a long time marketing executive at LEGO toys, where she was responsible for developing the LEGO brand among young families. "The Star Wars licensing program has always been about creating quality, innovative product that is responsive to the demands of our fans," said Howard Roffman, President of Lucas Licensing. "With Episode II just around the corner, Kerry's talents and experience will help us do an even better job, particularly as we take a more integrated view of our key categories of toys, video games and publishing."