Apple TV+ snags former WB Pictures exec JP Richards as movie marketing boss

Apple TV+ Apple TV interface
Apple TV+ Apple TV interface (Image credit: Joseph Keller / iMore)

What you need to know

  • Apple TV+ has hired former Warner Bros. Pictures executive JP Richards as its new movie marketing chief.

Apple TV+ has a new movie marketing head after it picked up former Warner Bros. Pictures exec JP Richards, according to a new report.

According to Deadline, Richards will start his new job next month once his exit from his former role is official.

Richards will help spearhead the growing ambitions of Apple's original film slates. Richards spent six years at Warner Bros, starting as EVP of WW Digital Marketing, and then elevated to EVP of WW Marketing and Chief Digital Strategist. He was appointed to the Co-Head post in 2019. He came to Warner Bros after 12 years at Universal, and held the title SVP of Digital Marketing when he left.

Richards has a history of working on campaigns for some huge movies, including Joker, Wonder Woman, and more. Apple TV+ will be hoping that he will be able to add a similarly impressive collection of titles to his resume.

Among the areas he helped steer were Digital Marketing & Media, Strategy & Integrated Marketing, Promotional Partnerships & Alliances, Creative Content, Multi-Cultural Marketing, Branded Content & Media and Marketing/Creative Services. While there, he oversaw campaigns for Wonder Woman, Aquaman, Joker, A Star is Born, IT Chapter 1 and 2, They Shall Not Grow Old, The Lego Movies, The Conjuring Series, Creed and Creed 2. In his dozen years at Universal, he hatched digital campaigns for The Bourne Identity, Fast & Furious and Despicable Me franchises, among other films.

Apple TV+ continues to grow its Apple Originals movie collection and it will have Richards pegged as the man to help promote those new titles. You'll need an Apple TV+ subscription to check out whatever he works on, unless you're an Apple One subscriber.

Oliver Haslam
Contributor

Oliver Haslam has written about Apple and the wider technology business for more than a decade with bylines on How-To Geek, PC Mag, iDownloadBlog, and many more. He has also been published in print for Macworld, including cover stories. At iMore, Oliver is involved in daily news coverage and, not being short of opinions, has been known to 'explain' those thoughts in more detail, too. Having grown up using PCs and spending far too much money on graphics card and flashy RAM, Oliver switched to the Mac with a G5 iMac and hasn't looked back. Since then he's seen the growth of the smartphone world, backed by iPhone, and new product categories come and go. Current expertise includes iOS, macOS, streaming services, and pretty much anything that has a battery or plugs into a wall. Oliver also covers mobile gaming for iMore, with Apple Arcade a particular focus. He's been gaming since the Atari 2600 days and still struggles to comprehend the fact he can play console quality titles on his pocket computer.