For four decades, Imagine Entertainment has been virtually synonymous with the company’s Oscar-winning co-founders, Brian Grazer and Ron Howard. As he continues to lead the media company he founded, he will empower a team of young executives to continue growing the film and television business, while also expanding more aggressively into documentaries and branded content.
“We are really proud of this next generation of leadership,” says Justin Wilkes, who was named president of Imagine Entertainment in 2023.
The group includes Imagine Features President Jeb Brody, who joined the company in 2024 from Amblin. Imagine Documentary President Sarah Bernstein came over from HBO in 2018 to help launch the division. Mark Gilber, President of Imagine Brands, Intellectual Property and Partnerships, and Amanda Ferland, Executive Vice President of Brands and Business Development, joined the company in 2018 and 2023, respectively, as the company strengthens its relationships with top companies looking for innovative ways to increase their visibility. They are tasked with navigating the changed landscape of Hollywood, where streaming services have become the dominant way people watch movies and shows, and where new tools like AI threaten to upend the way entertainment is produced and monetized.
“There’s always new technology, right?” Wilkes said. “Digital cinema, DVD, and all kinds of disruptors have arrived. But the power of great stories, that’s what everyone will point out from now on. We want to make films, TV shows, and documentaries that bring people together, celebrate the underdog, and celebrate brotherhood and sisterhood. And we want to make films, TV shows, and documentaries that leave you feeling a little better than when you started watching the movie.”
Imagine first made a name for itself by producing a wide range of humanistic films, many of which were directed by Howard and produced by Glazer. A collection of all your favorite movies, from Cocoon to A Beautiful Mind, Parenthood to Backdraft, American Gangster to How the Grinch Stole Christmas. The two remain closely involved in running the company and producing new films (they spoke about their long-time partnership in a Q&A with Variety). We are also passionate about finding and developing stories that reach large audiences in a fragmented media ecosystem.
“Audiences have evolved,” Howard said. “But we want to know where they’re headed and how we can help with that. Central to what we’re all about is engaging the viewer on an emotional journey.”
In television, Imagine supports a wide range of original programming, as well as reboots of its biggest hits and talk shows such as “My Next Guest Needs No Introduction with David Letterman.” At Peacock, the company is reimagining the cult comedy “The ‘Burbs,” starring KiKi Palmer and Jack Whitehall as a married couple who move to a family-friendly neighborhood and discover there’s something sinister behind the well-kept facade.
“This work is told through the perspective of a black woman,” Wilkes says. “So it’s a similar storyline to a Tom Hanks movie, but we flip it on its head.”
Imagine also convinced Peter Berg and Jason Katims to return to the world of high school sports in the Friday Night Lights reboot.
“This new version is set in a Texas town that was destroyed by a tornado, and the community must rebuild,” Wilkes said. “Those are all very relevant themes today. You know, look at the flooding that happened in Texas not too long ago. We felt like that was a reason to go back to the IP and come up with a new story.”
And Wilkes believes the time is right to reprise “24,” the propulsive thriller that became a sensation in the early ’20s.
“It’s a little unofficial at the moment, but if you look at Russia, Ukraine and now the European stage, the world needs Jack Bauer,” he says.
Justin Wilkes arrives at Amazon MGM Studios’ Los Angeles special screening of “After the Hunt” held at the David Geffen Theater at the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures on October 4, 2025 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Kevin Winter/WireImage)
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It’s unclear whether Bauer will fight the villain in the series or in the movie. If he goes the full-length route, it could be his biggest risk yet. The movie business faces severe headwinds. Box office revenues have yet to return to pre-pandemic levels, with studios focusing most of their resources on comic book movies and video game adaptations. These aren’t the kinds of movies that Imagine specializes in (the company’s films tend to be aimed at adults and cost $50 million to $70 million). However, the company has an active development pipeline with nearly six films in various stages of production. Brody says finding stories with compelling hooks has kept him busy.
“It has to be unique,” Brody says. “They have to be different. They have to do something no one has seen before. They have to disrupt the cluster with something they can market.”
In the case of their upcoming film, an adaptation of Daniel Krauss’ novel “Whalefall,” the “clusterbuster” angle has a premise that sounds like a cross between “Pinocchio” and “127 Hours.” A diver is swallowed by a sperm whale and has just 60 minutes to escape.
“The majority of the movie takes place inside the whale’s belly,” Brody says. “I don’t know if we could have made that movie 15 years ago. But we can at this point, because this movie is unlike anything anyone has ever seen before.”
There’s also a Snoop Dogg biopic from the makers of 8 Mile, and a new heist thriller How to Rob a Bank starring Nicholas Hoult, Anna Sawai, Pete Davidson and Zoe Kravitz. Howard’s war film Alone at Dawn, starring Adam Driver, and Spaceballs 2, a sequel to Mel Brooks’ cult favorite. “‘Spaceballs’ is all about joy and silliness,” Brody says.
Unlike “Mosquito Bowl,” which depicts a football game that took place on the eve of the invasion of Okinawa and featured former football players who joined the Marines after the attack on Pearl Harbor, all of these movies will be released theatrically. The film will debut on Netflix. “This is a deep version of a war movie,” Brody says.
The Imagine team is also considering revisiting past hits.
“There are discussions going on about what to do with ‘The Grinch,'” Brody says. “There are conversations about ‘Liar, Liar.’ There are conversations about a lot of this IP that we own.”
Imagine has also expanded into the documentary field, producing acclaimed films about cultural icons such as Julia Child, Judy Blume, Barbara Walters and Luciano Pavarotti. Bernstein said Howard and Glaser used the rolodex to encourage people to participate in an intimate exploration of their lives and careers.
“We’re very diligent about access, and we don’t really tend to do unauthorized personality projects,” Bernstein says. “I don’t think we think of it like, ‘This is an exposure.’ It’s, ‘You tell us your story.'”
Imagine is working on several documentaries, including a sequel to Rory Kennedy’s Downfall: The Case Against Boeing and a project based on Jonathan Haidt’s Anxious Generation, which examined the rising rates of mental illness in children. However, the company was not immune to the challenges faced by its nonfiction business. Streamers have invested heavily in the space, but are cutting back as the media industry shrinks. Bernstein says it’s not just that he’s commissioning fewer films. They also claim they can be manufactured at a lower cost.
“For us, it’s always been about what are the opportunities within this consolidation,” Bernstein says.
The collapse of cable television and the decline of the theatrical film business have made it even more difficult for companies like Imagine to turn a profit. As a result, Imagine has to work hard to find new sources of income. The company is a pioneer in the branded content space, working with companies such as Coca-Cola, P&G, and Ford. Projects range from short films aimed at playing on social media to feature-length documentaries such as “The Day Sports Stood Still,” produced with Nike about the global shutdown of professional sports due to the coronavirus, and “Dads,” a Bryce Dallas Howard exploration of fatherhood produced in collaboration with Unilever. In both cases, the brands benefited from their investments as the films were sold to HBO and Apple TV+.
Companies are also considering turning their products into narrative features.
“Since ‘Barbie,’ more and more brands are interested in making a big foray into scripted films,” says Gilber.
To reach big customers, it helps Imagine to have its own brand identity.
“We are a media company with a mission to tell inspiring stories about humanity,” says Farrand.
For more than 40 years, Howard and Glaser have helped Imagine stay relevant by finding and developing those types of movies and shows.
“They both bring different superpowers to the partnership,” said Michael Rosenberg, former Imagine co-chairman. “Let’s use a sports analogy: Kareem and Magic were great on their own, but when they came together, they were a unique combination. The same goes for Ron and Brian.”
