Endemol Shine North America Hires for Business & Legal Affairs

LOS ANGELES: Endemol Shine North America (ESNA) has appointed Viacom’s Michael Gifford and Marjorie Williams and Mattel’s Ed Prince to the company’s business and legal affairs team.

Gifford has become senior VP of business and legal affairs. In that role, he will serve as a negotiator and legal advisor to the company, working mainly with the scripted division, Endemol Shine Studios. Previously, Gifford was the VP of business and legal affairs at Viacom. Earlier in his career, he was associate principal counsel for legal affairs at ABC Studios.

Williams, who was named VP of business and legal affairs, will manage development for ESNA’s unscripted programming team and collaborate with the company’s digital arm, Endemol Shine Beyond. She will also support John Farrell, ESNA’s general counsel, on day-to-day corporate and litigation matters. Prior to this appointment, Williams was senior counsel for business and legal affairs at Viacom.

Prince also becomes VP of business and legal affairs, charged with providing advice, counsel and comprehensive business and legal services to ESNA’s Digital, Brand & Audience Development group. He previously worked for Mattel, where he served as lead production counsel for all of the company’s entertainment projects, live events and strategic entertainment partners. Before that, Prince was VP of legal and business affairs for NBCUniversal Television’s consumer products division.

All three executives will work out of Los Angeles under Farrell, who remarked: “With our across-the-board growth over the last year, we’ve ramped up our in-house legal and business affairs team and attracted three very accomplished attorneys. Michael, Ed and Marjorie all bring with them a wealth of entertainment-related experience and each has expertise in specialized fields that will surely benefit many of our divisions here internally.”