Of course, the Academy, alongside NBC, is hoping to create another one of those moments this September. We recently announced that Jesse Collins Entertainment will return to produce the Emmy Awards telecast. Jesse, Dionne and Jeannae know how to bring audiences together in real time, and our focus together is on delivering a broadcast that feels creative, culturally resonant and reflective of where the industry is today.
Most of us in this business spend a lot of time thinking about how to create moments that really work. You see a similar focus with the creators featured in this issue — three YouTube pioneers who have built studio-quality campuses to meet the demand for their content. Among them is Dhar Mann, whose 125,000-square-foot space in Burbank, in-house agency and high-volume output of scripted, socially driven stories rival what we have traditionally associated with legacy studios.
A few years ago, that kind of scale coming from a creator would have been hard to imagine. Now it is happening more and more, and it is changing expectations across the board. We are also starting to see collaboration between once seemingly separate worlds — for example, Fox Entertainment CEO Rob Wade’s investment in a slate of vertical microdramas with Dhar Mann. It is a bet by a legacy studio on a genre that is growing, with a partner that understands how culture moves.
A lot may have changed in our industry, but I believe that, for the most part, the moments that break through still come down to the strength of the idea and the vision behind it. And at the end of the day, this is still a collaborative business. The best work comes from teams that are aligned early, clear about what they are trying to say and willing to push each other to get there. That belief — in the work and in delivering for each other — is what carries a project from concept to something people care about, whether it is a new series, a new kind of studio or something as ambitious as Artemis.
Today, there are more ways than ever to reach people and definitely a lot more noise once you get there. That raises the bar for all of us, but it also makes the work incredibly interesting and, at its best, more rewarding.
This chair letter originally appeared in emmy magazine, issue #7, 2026.
