Empowering Creatives: Networking and Collaboration in Entertainment and Media with Raquel Bruno

Catharine O'Leary: Hey everyone. Welcome back to kickstart the conversation. I'm your host, Catharine O'Leary and I am here with Raquel Bruno who is an amazing, not only talent manager, but also DJ on Twitch. She has this incredible career in business and entertainment. In particular, she's worked with Nickelodeon, where she helped launch TV Land. She's managed strategic partnerships with Viacom, and the Museum of television radio. She's actually coordinated talent for major MTV groups like the MV N, or sorry, the VMAs, and Movie Awards. And in 2006, she founded Dr. Entertainment Group, focusing on booking and managing high profile events, such as Spike TV guys Choice Awards, and Jay Z's MTV awards parties. She's got all the parties, let me tell you, her company has produced TV shows films and digital content. For major brands, like one of my favorite, of course, Pepsi, Google, and ABC, Raquel has, you know, her achievements include a Daytime Emmy, People's Choice nomination and is a proud member of the Producers Guild of America and a RAS. So Raquel, welcome to kick start the conversation. And what we talked about, and what I'd love for you to share a little bit about is a little bit about your history, but also about the pivot that you're making? And about how to how do people, you know, really kind of embrace new areas, so like getting out of your comfort zone and getting into those new spaces? And, you know, being okay with that, because I think that a lot of people are trying to do that right now.

Well, first of all, thank you for inviting me to be on here, Catharine, I really I know, we met through some groups, and I just I love your energy. And I thank you for doing this. Because I think it's super important for people to understand in business, whether you work for a network and you're an employee or on your own as a solopreneur. Just understanding that there was always options out there, as tough as it is even in a downturn. So for me, you know, I was I was a Viacom kid, I was there for a long time I and I loved I still go back, I just did my 24th VMA, I'll probably go back again this year, to help run their red carpets, there's a shorthand and comfort zone and working with a talent departments, because they know that we're there to really support them, and then be an extension of them. But I've noticed, you know, as a mom of two young kids now under seven, and I just realized, you know, our industry has been through a lot. I mean, pandemic alone, we were as live television, I was working as part of American Idol. I've worked on a lot of different network shows and documentaries, you know, we are human beings, and especially in the talent space, we're used to all being together. And so that really was a huge hindrance for those that work in the live space, whether it's events, red carpets, production. And so I was able to pivot there when I was working with Syfy wire, and we were able to do a lot of our content creation from zoom and a lot of other virtual spaces. But lately, and I just got back from Japan, I worked on Crunchyroll, the Anime Awards, which was amazing, it was a life altering trip. For me, being a mom, as I mentioned, and also running my business now for 18 years, you have to stay refreshed, and you have to always learn new skills, and you have to always find what's next for you. And while I'm I love talent producing and executive producing, and that's what I do, I also realize is a lot of folks in my industry, and folks that are colleagues of mine, that kind of get stuck and say, Wow, I, you know, I feel like I'm moving towards a dead end. What's next, and I'm in it right now I'm creating a brand new area of my company. It's called Thrive With Dr. And it's really working with seasoned vets, aspiring actors, anywhere you are in that space, whether it's technology, music, or entertainment, and figuring our media and figuring out okay, I might have done this for a long time, but maybe I can take a pause and figure out another direction, because creators and I love working with creators and creatives, no matter what, creativity is always going to be the kind of your North Star. So how do you make that fit in another space?

Catharine O'Leary: Which is, you know, so important when you get into that comfort zone, you stop growing a little bit and you know, you got to almost be uncomfortable a bit to to keep going so, and when the industry is I mean especially, you know, entertainment, the way that people are consuming media, the way that you know that with the streaming and Netflix and you know, the kind of traditional, you know, TV and cable and, and networks and so on. And that's all kind of flipped flopped. thing. So, you know, I think it's important for people to maybe take the reins a little bit, because I know that you've worked with a lot of people that, you know, have either been behind the scenes or kind of behind the camera and getting them to be in front of the camera and speak about their, their experiences and their truths and their what's going on in their businesses. That's what that's what you're helping people do? Absolutely,

because I've worked with some of the best of the best in this business, creatives, people that have built something out of nothing, because what we do is literally take an idea, and then how do we manifest that into form. And that's not an easy thing to do. It's almost like, you know, when realtors have to stage a house so that you can see the potential of what that house is, it's working with talent, it's working with networks, and, you know, as producers in between those streams, it's how are we creating it, happy to have it be the vision and we are, you know, we mold that clay as best as possible. But a lot of those folks behind the scenes, I mean, I and I worked a lot with my interns and I was a mentor to a lot of folks at Viacom because I feel that it's super important that people understand the entire piece of of the of the puzzle. And and I think that I had amazing bosses at Nickelodeon. Nick, at night, I had really some of the best mentors you could have asked for, and I want to help the next generation really find their voice and within it, and especially for women, I mean, we I'm IN THE Producers Guild, as mentioned, I'm also part of the Narrows, which is, you know, the National Association of recording musicians, I want women to feel strong in their power and what they do. And right now, the backdrop is a little messy, and what's happening, that's a whole other conversation I want to get into, but it's women feeling okay. And their voices, more female directors, more female producers, more female editors, I mean, I want to see that space shift a little bit more, because there's still a disparity, whether it's opportunities, or even in fee. And I think the conversation needs to still be expanded upon. So if wherever I can help the underserved, the under voiced, that's also a big driving factor for me at drive and why I do what I do.

Catharine O'Leary: And the disparity is, it, there's really big imbalance in the entertainment field, as far as I know, I don't know a lot about it, but from what I understand the like, you know, the amount of female directors or producers or, you know, people in those kind of decision making roles is, we could do better, I think

we can always do better Exactly. And I want you know, a lot of the times I don't always like to go in and gender base, but you know, women or women that present as such, you know, we need to have productive, we need to have protection, in general. And there's been a lot of, you know, exposure as to toxicity in the workplace. And there's just, you know, we also got hit with the strikes, which I'm glad we were able to, you know, we need to reset across the board. But when you said, you know, it kind of pushes things back, like the, you know, budgets aren't as as well versed, and people are kind of holding on to their money a little bit more. So there isn't as much of the creative. You know, we're just not in a very creative space right now. Because there's a lot of people are working out of fear. And when you work out of fear, you can't really grow and thrive. So that's why I went inward and went, Okay, well, I know if I'm going through this, and I know that if I feel a little bit isolated, I know there's a lot of brilliant other colleagues out there that are also going through this. So I write when I had a situation two weeks ago, and I said, You know what, I need to create a safe space for creatives to really meet one another that may not know each other. That's one thing I'm really good at is connecting people finding the through line cutting through the clutter, like how do we get people to feel connected, I built it on Twitch through my DJing. And I've done it through years with Dr. And it's been great because I've been able to connect people with Oh, whether you need headshots or you need someone to help with a credit list. There's people out there that have a skill set for all of it. And also going back and always be hungry. I read like three books a week. I love reading. A lot of people you know, love listen to podcasts, which I'm glad so many folks have access to creating their own podcasts. I think it's important. And right now, like from when I started working young professional very early on, we didn't have the tools that are available now which I think is amazing for young professionals to tap into podcasts such as this and and other tools of getting information to make decisions to help them on their journey.

Catharine O'Leary: And it's it's so important to have those mentorships and those those conversations. So so as you're helping people kind of get those sound bites that they need to have because you as you said That's how The industry talks, it's kind of in sound bites, and be confident, you know, you're coaching people to have that speaking skills and have that kind of, you know, those those, you know, competence skills and those presentation skills. Tell me a little bit more about in the mix, because I know this is a new thing. And I know that you have a, you know, an invite for us, but I wanted to, because it's brilliant, by the way, and I can't wait to actually participate. But tell us a little bit more, because it's very organic. And I think that's really interesting and important that this has kind of just created itself almost threw you. Absolutely.

So in the mix. As I was mentioning, I had a situation where a project kind of fell through and I could and I allowed myself to ugly cry that day, because it was something that I was, you know, as a freelancer and a solopreneur, you go job to job to job, I'm trying to shift that. So it's you know, I've said this for years, where it's like, I would like to just finally be in a space where I don't have to keep jumping vine to vine. And it's just like, it's more of a consistent flow. That's one thing I miss about working within an organization that you don't have to always, you know, as you're working on a project, you're onto trying to find the next project. That's one thing that's really tough, and you have to be as agile as possible. And it's not easy. Some days, if you don't hustle, you don't work so that I allowed myself that morning to completely have an ugly cry and be upset and be frustrated and go, Why is this happening? And work on my deepest fear of scarcity, which is something that you you know, a lot of us work through, like, oh, it's the rainy day fund that I have to tap into, and what's going to happen if you do think about that, when you're even when you've starting a business, you're like I have to make a jump. And that's a scary thing. So I said, Okay, I can either sit in this and wallow in this, or I can actually pull people together and see how you know feel that good energy that I feel when I work on a production set. So literally, I was sitting here and how I Oh, same way a creative drive. I thought of my personality. I thought of how I DJ and how people come together. And in the mix came out from the ether. And I said, Wow, that's it right there. Let me create a zoom monthly, get together a mixer of sorts. And the first one we did funny enough, I know you you're the queen of quizzes. I started with people. So I basically had the logo done that night by an amazing friend Sam Jennings who used to work with prints he created for me, he does a lot of my twitch emotes. He's just a brilliant designer. He had it to me that night. And the next day, once I had the logo, I put it on LinkedIn. And I said, Listen, if you're a creator, or creative, and it doesn't have to only be an entertainment creators, and creatives live everywhere, whether it's finance or what have you, if you're interested, let's get together on this Friday. Give me your information, I'm going to send you some information to think about, and I had over 100 people reach out and we ended up having 55 people on that call. And what that call was was everyone did their elevator pitch on what they're doing what they'd like to go into really fast. It was a long one, but we made it happen. But what I did with that was I said, which is why I love that you do quizzes, I sent them a five, one of them was a bonus question. I asked them questions. You know, what's your elevator pitch? What skill would you like to learn? What would you like to leapfrog into? Is there anything else you want to get out of this? And what is what song as inspires you? And of course, being a music head, that's a tough one to answer. So I said, Okay, what's living rent free in your head? Right now, if that helps. And so people did the work, they answered the questions back to me, and they got on there. And they pitched and it was a beautiful room of people from all walks of my life. But then people that got to be connected. And that connective tissue, I went okay, then we're on to something here. Yeah, that was in the mix.

And I love just how,

Catharine O'Leary: like, if they just kind of came together in like an hour, kind of thing. Like, I don't mean to, to minimize it at all. But like when it's just so divine, almost, that it just comes together that easily. That is like, I need to talk with people that are, you know, good energy smart, pick myself up. And you didn't just, you know, call a couple of friends, you you've kind of said, well, how do I help other people that might be feeling the same way and created a space in a container for that. And I think that's brilliant, and it's just so organic that I love it, you know that it just kind of happened that way and you had people from like, you know, executives that at media companies to, you know, people that are looking for maybe, you know, their next project or you know, trying to help each other and I think that that like that's that's pretty powerful. Cool, it was

I got choked up towards the end zone, our mutual friend Vinnie POTUS table was on there. And he's like you had, I mean, people were just so excited to be there. And they really got something out of it. And I, you know, if, if I'm anything, I'm authentic. And so people know that in my space. And I feel like I was so happy because those authentic voices showed up. And these are it was underemployed, unemployed and employed all came. One of them was a friend of mine, who's the head of development for Brian Greene and Dave mace, he wanted to see what was out there. And, you know, he also knew that it's always great to be in the mix with people, no pun intended, that may have ideas that could come out of it. I mean, he was utilizing that as a resource himself. And people felt hope, like, wow, here's an executive who's working on new shows, and I could potentially, you know, work with him, and he put himself out there to do that. And that is, one thing about production, I will say is that you tend to have your family and you move from show to show. And we love helping each other out. Because you really are in a space together that you have no idea what's going to come out of it anything can happen. And yet you have this like moment in time, especially when you're doing a live show that you have got to have each other's backs, or it just is going to fail, it has to work. So there, there's that, you know, we're we're confident together. And it's important for me to also create a safe space. Because we've all been you know, we all have stories to tell one way or another. And I want people to you know, when you go through this process, especially since COVID, people feel very isolated. And that is a feeling that I was trying to say, look, you're not alone, you've got people behind you that can work with you.

Even a conversation you have as a gift, you actually

Catharine O'Leary: have an invite for people

I do I have an invite for people. So we're aiming to do in the mix once a month, it is a really great opportunity to be with other industry folks, mostly in entertainment and media, but it expands out. So don't feel that you're not included in that. And what we do is we also not only do we provide a toolkit at the end of every one of our calls, but we also have a discord channel that we've set up where people in real time can go in there, say, Hey, I've heard of this job or what have you. And we're building that up as we speak as well. But it's a really good place for folks to connect with one another in there as well. And we're also in the middle of providing the contact sheet for folks that are on there. So you can actually reach out on your own and say, Hey, I see that you're a graphic designer or you do social media or you can help me like Vinnie was Devo, with with chat GPT. So it's a great resource tool.

Catharine O'Leary: Excellent. And everyone here are listening is invited. And you just need to email Raquel, and the email will be in the show notes. Raquel, thank you so much for being on with me today. This has been very powerful. And I hope that the listeners know that. You know what, yeah, we've gone through some isolation. And we've gone through some tough times, but you're not alone. And you know, in the mix is just like a really special project that just kind of came very naturally and organically. And I cannot wait to go to the next in the mix. So we're here any final last minute, you know, kind of words of wisdom.

I would just say I've been I'm in it. And I've been in a situation where you think like, oh boy, this is this is the end of a career. I don't know where I'm headed next. There's always hope. You just have to be willing to pivot, you have to be willing to learn. We're in a space right now where there's a lot of technology, so take the time to learn it. And don't be afraid to reach out to people because one thing that someone said to me many years ago and I say this to those that are listening, you know more people than you realize, and especially on LinkedIn, one degree of someone two degrees of someone you never know, or that one person can actually change your world. So make sure you reach out and it's okay to be vulnerable. We've all been there.

Catharine O'Leary: Awesome. Thank you so much for kill. And to everyone out there listening. Thank you for tuning in yet again. And remember just to keep asking questions and keep those conversations going