Dominic Ianno, John Baldecchi, Alex Dundas and Griffin Gmelich Launch Multi-Platform Production and Distribution Label Roundtable Entertainment with Company Backing from Klingenstein Fields Advisors and Production Backing from Ingenious Media
First Projects Include Feature Film “Sacrament” Directed by Gary Fleder, and TV Series “Fame & Misfortune” Starring Jane Seymour, and E.A.T. with Gavin Rossdale
February 3, 2022 – Leading figures from the entertainment industry Dominic Ianno, John Baldecchi, Alex Dundas and Griffin Gmelich have partnered to launch Roundtable Entertainment - a powerhouse, multi-genre content creator and multi-platform production company.
Ianno (“Soul Surfer,” “Whistleblower,” “Crash Pad”), who has had stints as a topper/partner at Team Whistle, Indomitable Entertainment and Outlaw Productions, brought the team together and will lead Roundtable Entertainment as CEO and executive produce across the slate. Baldecchi (“Point Break 2,” “Happy Death Day (1&2),” “The Mexican”) serves as Roundtable Entertainment’s Head of Film and Scripted Content, focusing on developing IP for streaming and theatrical movies, episodic shows and podcasts. Dundas (“Big Brother,” “The Contender”), formerly Head of Entertainment of ITV, Mark Burnett Productions and MGM, leads Roundtable Entertainment’s unscripted initiatives.
Roundtable Entertainment is partnering with Foundation Sales and Consulting on the distribution side. Led by Griffin Gmelich, formerly of Hulu, Warner Bros and Universal/Vivendi. Foundation Sales and Consulting will bring Roundtable Entertainment’s content offerings to a multitude of digital platforms.
Robert Norton, the former Chief Business Officer of Animal Logic and COO of Scott Free and who is also a co-founder of Roundtable Entertainment, will sit on the company’s Board. Having worked together previously, the team brings together experts from across the entertainment industry with over 150 years of combined experience in media and entertainment, bringing to the table an exceptional mix of knowledge, high profile relationships, access to quality IP and financial structuring acumen.
Klingenstein Fields Advisors is leading the first round of investment. Ingenious Media is backing the company’s initial movie slate, which includes “Sacrament”, directed by Gary Fleder (“Homefront,” “Runaway Jury,” “Kiss the Girls”) and written by P.G. Cuschieri (“Cut Throat City”). “Sacrament” tracks an ex-military father who travels to Mexico to exact revenge on the drug cartel which brutally murdered his son.
On the TV side, Roundtable Entertainment is producing “Fame & Misfortune,” a comedy starring Jane Seymour, written by Sean M. Flynn and developed by Tim Gibbons (“Curb Your Enthusiasm”). Based on a fictionalized version of Sean’s life, “Fame & Misfortune” tells the tale of a successful artist who falls for a former teen idol who is forced by her publicist to break up with him for not being famous. Desperate to win her back, Tom decides embrace his identity as the son of Jane Seymour and become what he hates most, famous. Instantly regretting it, he does everything he can to get cancelled but instead becomes more famous and destroys his mother’s life and career. Executive producers are Sean M. Flynn, Tim Gibbons, Jane Seymour, James Gibb, Dominic Ianno, John Baldecchi and Alex Dundas. ICM is handling worldwide sales.
Headlining our unscripted TV slate, Roundtable Entertainment is producing “E.A.T. with Gavin Rossdale”, a premium production value, intimate conversation series in which artist, musician, and actor Gavin Rossdale invites big name celebrity guests to his home in the Hollywood Hills, where he designs, prepares and serves them a sumptuous three course meal. While they relax, eat, converse and even jam, they cast aside their constructed celebrity personas to reveal what really makes them tick.
Roundtable Entertainment will capitalize on this unprecedented opportunity by developing and licensing premium IP that will attract studios, streamers and networks, and that has potential for synergistic multi-platform exploitation across three core focus areas:
Scripted Content (film, episodic and podcast): Compelling stories, packaged with global talent
Unscripted Content: Buzzworthy episodic shows and podcasts: highly commercial propositions with major talent
Distribution: Distribution of 3rd party & owned content into channels and windows including FAST channel distribution, content licensing into all windows and audio distribution.
Ianno stated “Epic content spending tailwinds, voracious consumer appetite for quality content, and the explosion of the markets in unscripted content, FAST channels, and podcasting compelled us to launch the company. This powerful team of highly seasoned experts has enabled us to go to market with a full slate of packaged IP, strategic partners, capital and top-tier distribution partners and launch with velocity and traction.”
James Fields of Klingenstein Fields Advisors added, “The Roundtable Entertainment team brings deep industry experience, longstanding relationships with top-tier talent, agencies and distribution channels. Their diversified revenue model, with multiple channels of exploitation, was too good to pass up. We are proud to back Dom and his team.”
Peter Touche of Ingenious Media said: “Dom has assembled a great team of executives, each with a solid track record, to select and execute highly commercial projects for the worldwide marketplace. Most importantly, they are being very smart in navigating the digital distribution world that we are all coming to grips with. We are proud to be supporting their vision in forming Roundtable Entertainment.”
Handler Thayer, LLP, served as counsel on the transaction and Steven J. Thayer joined the company’s advisory board. The company is based in Los Angeles, CA.
About the Partners
Dominic Ianno is an entrepreneur and a senior media and entertainment executive with 33 years of experience in entrepreneurial endeavors, strategy/business development, and executive production. His specialty/expertise is in high profile content finance and distribution within filmed entertainment, unscripted TV and digital media. He has been a key ground-floor player on six separate launch teams in established companies and startups and raised financing for 3 companies as principal and over 20 entertainment projects.
Ianno has consistently been involved with high quality IP, including hit movie “Soul Surfer” ($44MM domestic / $105MM worldwide), video games “Matrix II & III” and “Terminator III” and the Broadway production of “Breakfast at Tiffany’s.”
As the founder of Indomitable Entertainment, Ianno established a niche for executive producing independent feature films. Ianno has financed movies starring Dennis Quaid, Emilia Clarke, Rachel Weisz, Billy Bob Thornton, Monica Bellucci, Christina Applegate, Luke Wilson, Helen Hunt, James Marsden, Carrie Underwood, and AnnaSophia Robb among others. Most recently while an EVP at Team Whistle, he was a key mover on deals including the Aser relationship; acquisitions including New Form and Tiny Horse; and projects including “Legacy,” “Benedicts Men” and Whistle’s OTT channel, Whistle TV.
John Baldecchi is a content producer, executive and trusted media consultant for private equity and technology companies, with a focus on developing IP for streaming and theatrical movies and episodic shows. John’s long-standing relationships run deep into the major media companies, agencies, and management firms and tech companies. He has produced or developed movies, miniseries and series with Paramount, AMC, Warner Bros., MGM, Fox 2000, ABC, Sony Pictures Animation, New Regency and Dimension. Baldecchi was President of Production for Laurence Mark when the company produced “Jerry Maguire” and “As Good As it Gets.”
Baldecchi has comprehensive knowledge of financing for film and television as well as foreign distribution. John’s ability to bridge the different business cultures from technology and new media to television, movies and video games as well as bridging the gap between Hollywood to Silicon Valley have served to make him a trusted consultant. He has successfully negotiated IP deals with tech companies such as Valve, id Software and Activision in addition to negotiating a first-ever all-rights deal with Mattel for their premium brand – Hot Wheels.
Baldecchi’s producing highlights include “The Mexican,” “Conan the Barbarian,” “Point Break,” “Happy Death Day,” “Happy Death Day 2U” and “Odd Thomas,” among many others.
Alex Dundas is an experienced unscripted content creator and producer with a 24-year career spanning both the US and the UK. He’s a highly experienced development executive with a proven track record of selling shows to streamers, networks and cable-nets and an extensive track record as a show runner managing big budget projects from conception through to delivery.
Dundas worked in the UK broadcast industry for seventeen years, producing hit TV shows for all the major broadcasters including “Big Brother,” “Ant and Dec’s Saturday Night Takeaway” and “Dancing on Ice.”
In 2013, Dundas was recruited by Mark Burnett to set up his UK office. In 2015, Burnett invited Dundas to relocate to Los Angeles, where he was a senior executive in the team that created and sold “Steve Harvey’s Funderdome”, “Beat Shazam With Jamie Foxx”, “TKO: Total Knockout with Kevin Hart” and “The Contender”. He was then recruited to become Head of ITV Entertainment, which sold “Love Island” to CBS and created “Swipe Swap” with Sarah Jessica Parker as Executive Producer.
Griffin Gmelich is a seasoned executive who has held multiple positions during his 22-year career in the entertainment industry, focusing on digital and physical distribution. Prior to the partnership with Roundtable, he held the EVP position for Content Licensing and Programming for Whistle Sports. He launched Whistle’s OTT channel, WHISTLE TV, as well as generated new revenue opportunities by managing the entire Team Whistle syndication business.
Prior to Team Whistle, Griffin held the SVP of Business Development and Sales for the Nacelle Company (d.b.a Comedy Dynamics) where he built their distribution arm, launched their OTT network, and worked on sponsor-backed productions as an executive producer. He also stood as SVP of Business Development and Sales for Gravitas Ventures, while launching Gravitas’ first OTT channels. One of his most pivotal career experiences was held at Hulu where he helped cultivate their SVOD & AVOD service by leading their film and comedy verticals for several years.
Prior to Hulu, Griffin has served as Vice President of Sales for Entertainment One and Vice President of Sales for Universal-Vivendi over his tenure. Hired in 1998 from the packaged goods business, Warner Home Video brought Griffin into the entertainment industry to help launch the DVD. At Warner Home Video he held many roles over the course of eight years which broadened his experiences to make him the strategic executive he is today.
About INGENIOUS MEDIA:
For 22 years, Ingenious has been at the forefront of investing in the global creative economy and in that time has raised and deployed over $10 billion. Ingenious has been involved in the production of a diverse slate of films, including the Academy Award® winning “Judy,” “Life of Pi,” “Avatar,” “Selma,” Academy Award® nominated “Carol,” “Brooklyn” and “At Eternity’s Gate,” five films in the successful “X-Men” franchise, “Rise of the Planet of the Apes” and “Dawn of the Planet of the Apes,” breakout British hits “Military Wives,” “Blinded by the Light,” “Suffragette” and “The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel,” as well as acclaimed television programs such as “The Fall,” “Dr. Foster” and “Watership Down.” Titles currently on release or coming soon include Roger Michell’s “The Duke” starring Helen Mirren and Jim Broadbent and Craig Roberts’ “The Phantom of the Open” starring Mark Rylance.
About Klingenstein Fields Advisors
Klingenstein Fields Advisors provides personalized wealth and investment management to address the complex needs of individuals, families, and non-profit institutions and help them fulfill their legacies and financial goals. Klingenstein Fields Advisors manages over $4 billion in assets across a wide variety of asset classes including bespoke equity (public and private) portfolios and working with best of breed managers globally on diversifying and hedging strategies.
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