TEAM
Neil J. Patel, Executive Producer
Neil Patel comes with over 20 years of experience as an executive and an entrepreneur in the advertising, media and entertainment industries. In all his work, Neil looks for ways to connect content and commerce to empower people to take positive action in their lives.
Over his career, Neil’s work has consisted of various roles at blue chip ad agencies, an entertainment executive on the Disney corporate staff and as a co-founder of a firm that was subsequently acquired by a unit of Interpublic Group.
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Neil has served in several capacities, including high-level business development roles, as a marketing strategist, a media entrepreneur and most recently as Executive Producer of the television series Legacy List with Matt Paxton by VPM I PBS.
In a prior years, Neil has served at award winning The Martin Agency in successive roles as SVP of Content Strategy where he and his team overhauled the content strategy of The Walmart Smart Network (140 million weekly audience) and as SVP Business Strategy and Innovation, where Neil led and advised on the business strategy of the agency and its F500 clients. Neil’s last role at Martin was as Managing Director of Business and Engagement Planning and oversaw nearly $150M in client media commitments and a staff of forty.
Before Martin, Neil focused on developing ad supported, digital media platforms with an emphasis on mobile content and applications as a consultant for Disney Imagineering’s Research and Development arm and other units of The Walt Disney Company
Neil grew up in Africa, India, Canada and California and now lives with his wife and two young children in Richmond, VA.
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Ellie Hannibal, President
With over 20 years of entertainment industry experience, Ellie Hannibal is a trusted expert in broadcast and cable television story development and production. Her expertise is concentrated in television drama and comedy development, pitching and producing high quality television — a set of skills developed through her development and production of various industry projects.
Ellie’s career in entertainment began with her work as an actor in New York City, trained by the famed Broadway actress, Uta Hagen. During her time in NY, Ellie worked at the Off-Broadway theater Classic Stage Company and worked for the entertainment magazine, PREMIERE. Eventually, her career took her to Los Angeles to work for The Jim Henson Company. There, Ellie rose through various development roles to become VP, Creative Affairs, working on the Fox Family Channel series “The Fearing Mind” and Sci Fi’s “Farscape.”
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Eventually, Ellie left to work for Danny DeVito’s Jersey Television as Senior VP alongside John Landgraf (the now Chairman of FX Networks). There, she developed a number of TV shows including Comedy Central’s “RENO 911!” and ABC's "Karen Sisco.” At Jersey, Ellie developed a reputation for discovering new writers that went on to major careers with directors such as Steven Spielberg.
After her time at Jersey Television, Ellie went on to be Senior VP of Rick Berman Productions at Paramount to lead development and production of cable and network series programming with Rick Berman, the EP and showrunner of the Star Trek TV franchise. Eventually, she moved to BluePrint Productions as Senior VP to develop Canadian and US content for cable and broadcast networks.
Most recently, Ellie has served as Consulting Producer for VPM/PBS and as SVP Creative Development for Shipyard Entertainment. Ellie now lives in Richmond, Virginia with her husband and two children.