Making Creativity Profitable in entertainment-news-today-live-updates-on-july-4-2026-taylor-swifts-wedding-look-decoded-dior-couture-bride-eras-tour-nod-and-more-heres-what-we-know-so-far/” title=”Entertainment News Today LIVE Updates on July 4, 2026: Taylor Swift's wedding look decoded: Dior Couture bride, Eras Tour nod and more, here's what we know so far”>Entertainment Technology
Making Creativity Profitable in Entertainment Technology
UCLA Anderson course teaches students long-term scenario planning
byPaul Feinberg
- Entertainment industry veteran Brian Frons teaches UCLA Anderson courses that give students an understanding of the creative, economic and technological sides of the business
- Frons’ class puts students closer to “the room where it happens” in real entertainment companies
- He isn’t training future executives how to greenlight projects, he’s teaching them to understand how decisions get made when the usual models might not anticipate what comes next
Brian Frons, an entertainment industry veteran and adjunct professor at UCLA Anderson, wants his students to move beyond the consumer view of entertainment. The trade press, streaming headlines and box office numbers tell part of the story. In his course Making Creativity Profitable in Entertainment Technology, Frons puts students closer to “the room where it happens,” where executives weigh creative risk, business models, technology platforms and the interests of artists, producers, distributors and audiences.
The course grew out of a problem Frons had seen first hand in the entertainment business: MBAs may understand strategy, finance and markets, but they do not always understand how creative ambition, talent relationships and technology collide inside a media company
The course asks students to think across an industry being reshaped by streaming, AI, the creator economy, gaming, digital marketing and evolving audience behavior. Through guest speakers, current examples and scenario-planning exercises, students examine how entertainment companies make decisions when the usual models do not fully anticipate what comes next
What are the goals of Making Creativity Profitable in Entertainment Technology? What do you want students to take away from the course?
The course began with a question from Professor Sanjay Sood. He asked if there was something bothering me at Disney that could make a good class
I said yes. MBAs often don’t understand the intersection between creativity, business and technology inside an entertainment company. If we could create a class that helped them manage through those conflicts, that would be really useful
The idea is to take students into the room where it happens. We all consume content. We watch movies and television, read consumer press and, if we’re interested in entertainment, maybe read the trades. But those are not great
The course gives students a framework for thinking about entertainment businesses and the future of entertainment. I want them to think not just about things as they are, but about how they can be
You talk about the intersection of creativity, business and technology. What does that mean in practice?
A lot of business decisions assume that if you make the best decision for the company, employees will buy in and follow along. In entertainment, that assumption can get you into trouble
If I’m dealing with a director, I have to understand that he is not really an employee. He is my business partner. I have to understand how he makes money, what kind of experience he wants for his audience and what matters to him as an artist
A company may decide that streaming is the future and that putting movies on a streaming service makes business sense. But if you don’t understand how that decision affects the talent, the economics of the deal and the creative person’s sense of the work, you can damage the relationship
Talent needs to be heard. Before you make decisions, you need to talk to the talent and understand what is important to them
But the course is not just about understanding creative people. It is called Making Creativity Profitable. Students also have to understand what the business requires, what technology makes possible, and how those forces come together in production, distribution and marketing
In the course, we talk about creative executives, business executives and technology executives, as well as buyers, sellers and makers. They all approach the business differently. If you want to run a division, run a company or build your own company, you have to become comfortable talking about all three: creativity, business and technology
How does the course help students think about decisions that do not fit neatly into existing models?
That is one of the main challenges in entertainment. The model and the comparables do not always anticipate what is going to happen
You might have a financial model that tells you what a horror movie should cost based on historical comparables. But then someone like Ryan Coogler comes in and says, “I need a lot more money than that, and I think this could be bigger than you think.” What is your framework for evaluating that?
So, we try to give students a framework for evaluating those decisions. What are the marketing opportunities? What are the monetization opportunities? What are the talent relations opportunities? How does the decision fit the creative, business and technology realities of that project?
This is not a class where students are learning how to greenlight projects. It is a class about understanding how decisions get made
What kinds of cases and assignments do students work with?
We use examples that force students to think from the perspective of the people making the decisions
One example is Shondaland. Shonda Rhimes is deciding whether to leave Disney and take a deal at Netflix. How do you advise her? How does she make her money? How does ABC make money? Are you paying for the talent’s achievements today, or are you paying for the talent’s achievements to come?
We also do what I call face-offs. I look for things happening in the marketplace and build assignments around them. One example is from the music business: You are at RCA Records. Do you want to re-sign SZA for $10 million, or would you rather develop five AI artists? If you develop the AI artists, how would you do it? And how would you handle the living people?
The point is not that there is one right answer. Students can get an A arguing either side. What matters is the argument and the data points supporting it
What is the final project in Making Creativity Profitable?
The final project focuses on long-term scenario planning
Students work in groups and think about what the entertainment landscape is going to look like 10 years from now. Then they are assigned a company — Netflix, Paramount, Disney, Spotify or another company — and they ask: If that is the future, what does this company have to do to be ready?
What I like about that assignment is that it pushes students out of the day-to-day headlines. The deeper issue is how these companies need to be positioned going forward
The exercise asks students to think about the future in terms of content, marketing, technology, audience behavior and business models
The entertainment business changes quickly. How do you keep the course current?
The weird thing is that, with the exception of AI, we were talking about many of these issues 12 or 13 years ago
The way you stay current is by being in the business, talking to alumni, talking to colleagues and talking to people who used to work for you. But more important, you have to think conceptually
That is more important than chasing the problem of the day. At Disney, people were talking about streaming in 2005. The internet was going to be the best thing ever. But it took many more years to launch Disney+. We talk about that in class because it is a basic disruptive technology discussion
If something looks disruptive to businesses that are making money now, and the new technology does not yet look like a great experience, it is easy to dismiss it. What students are learning is: don’t
You also teach Entertainment Marketing. How is that course different?
Entertainment Marketing has a very simple promise: Take this class, get real-life marketing assignments from studios and streamers, and come back with real-life solutions to real-life marketing problems for the executives who are marketing those properties
The goal is to give students the most up-to-date feeling for what is happening in entertainment marketing. That is one of the great things about Anderson’s entertainment classes. We try to bring in people who are dealing with these issues in the moment
The point is not just to hear from guest speakers. It is to understand how different companies make marketing decisions based on their business models, their platforms and the audiences they are trying to reach
What kinds of careers do these courses prepare students for?
I do not think any one class qualifies you for a job. But if you want to have a long career as an executive in entertainment, you need to be comfortable understanding the creative side of the business, the economics of the business and the technology
Technology is not new in entertainment. Without copper wire, you could not have networks. Without satellite delivery, HBO could not have expanded with boxing and multiplex channels. Without high-speed internet, you would not have streaming. Technology has always been there
Students go into financial planning and analysis, content strategy, content analysis, digital marketing, social marketing, marketing strategy, consulting and related jobs. Some are trying to grow within entertainment. Some are trying to pivot into entertainment
The idea is to build a portfolio of knowledge and expertise as you go through your career — and to learn how to think outside the box that your company puts you into
