Terry Press Named President of Strategy & Communications at Steven Spielberg’s Amblin Partners (Exclusive)

Pamela McClintock
·3 min read
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Terry Press is officially reuniting with Steven Spielberg.

Amblin Partners has tapped the veteran and widely regarded Hollywood studio executive in the newly created role of president of strategy and communications. The announcement was made jointly by Amblin founder Spielberg and CEO Jeff Small.

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In the newly created role, Press will join the executive team and will oversee the strategy and execution of all elements of marketing, publicity, consumer products and communication strategy for the film and television divisions of Amblin Partners and Spielberg. She is not filling the job vacated recently by top corporate communications exec Dan Berger.

Press — known for her wit and sharp eye — served as head of marketing for a decade at DreamWorks SKG, the now-defunct studio launched by Spielberg, David Geffen and Jeffrey Katzenberg. She oversaw the campaigns for Saving Private Ryan and best picture winners American Beauty, Gladiator and Universal’s A Beautiful Mind. She also worked on Shrek, which won the first Oscar for best animated feature.

Press has held several jobs since the DreamWorks era, including launching her own consulting company and then running CBS Films. Yet she has remained close to Spielberg and is his go-to consultant on his films, including The Fabelmans, West Side Story and Lincoln. She also has a close relationship with Sam Mendes and consulted on 1917.

Currently, Press is a consultant at Turner Classic Movies, where Spielberg — along with Martin Scorsese and Paul Thomas Anderson — are advisers to the channel. She will continue in this role. She also recently executive produced the Joan Baez documentary Joan Baez: I Am Noise.

“Since the earliest days of DreamWorks, Terry has been a vital part of our DNA, championing our films with her marketing expertise and passion for film. Her reputation in the industry for excellence is well known and we have a long-shared history of great experiences together,” Spielberg said. At Amblin, she’ll work closely with producer Kristie Macosko Krieger, Small, Holly Bario, Darryl Frank and Justin Falvey.

Added Press in a statement, “Simply put, Steven Spielberg is the most influential and successful director/producer of our times, a remarkable human being, and a fervent believer in the power of film and television to be both entertainment and art.”

And, underscoring her keen wit, Press said, “it is also very important to me to work with people who do not look at me with a blank stare when I mention THE BEST YEARS OF OUR LIVES”.

At CBS, Press — who is among only a handful of women who have run a Hollywood movie studio — oversaw the production and marketing of such titles as the acclaimed Salmon Fishing in the Yemen, The Woman in Black, The Duff, Patriots Day and Last Vegas, among others. She also worked closely on the distribution of CBS titles with partner Liosngate, which released the movies on behalf of CBS.

Press began her career at Disney, where she spent nine years. Her marketing acumen saw her rise quickly through the ranks of the movie studio and catch the attention of Katzenberg. In later years, she was well-known for her marketing class at UCLA (her alma mater) and more recently was a guest instructor at Chapman University’s Dodge College alongside Scott Feinberg, The Hollywood Reporter‘s executive editor, awards.

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