Taking a Look at 2025: Transactional Entertainment Law Year-in-Review

Ms. Smizer advises clients ranging from independent video game developers to leading AAA publishers, offering legal support across a wide array of transactional matters. Her practice is dedicated to supporting clients throughout the entire game production lifecycle, from initial development through post-launch. She frequently supports clients in intellectual property licensing, advertising, co-branding, monetization, and publishing and distribution matters. In her role, Ms. Smizer also works closely with attorneys in traditional entertainment and data privacy to provide holistic legal solutions for the complex demands of the interactive entertainment industry.

Ms. Smizer earned her J.D. from LMU Loyola Law School in Los Angeles. As a law student, Ms. Smizer co-founded the Legal Name & Gender Marker Change Project, a pro bono clinic that provides legal services to the transgender and non-binary communities in the Greater Los Angeles area. During the start of the Covid-19 pandemic, she volunteered with the Small Businesses Law Student Support Program of the Berkeley Center for Law and Business, assisting small businesses seeking to access CARES Act benefits. Ms. Smizer also served as President of OUTLaw and the Entertainment and Sports Law Society.

Ms. Smizer is a member of the Association of Media & Entertainment Counsel, where she serves on the Emerging Leaders Board. She is admitted to practice in California.

Ann Brigid Clark focuses her practice on transactional entertainment, media and intellectual property matters, including the representation of independent motion picture and scripted and unscripted television production companies, multinational entertainment companies, digital media companies, financiers, independent producers, showrunners, writers, directors, artists, musicians and on-screen talent in connection with all aspects of development, production, distribution, promotion and exploitation of motion picture, television, new media, print and music projects.

In addition, Ann advises fashion and retail brands and individual celebrities on the intricacies of advertising and promotional campaigns, including structuring and negotiating influencer and endorsement deals.

Ann brings a unique and comprehensive perspective to her practice, having begun her career as an entertainment litigator, and, later, as production counsel for motion picture studios. She often acts in the capacity of an outside business affairs advisor for her clients, structuring and negotiating financing and production agreements, the acquisition of rights, first look agreements, merchandising, music licensing, and book publishing agreements and ensuring clients stay ahead of the curve as the industry evolves, including advising on growth of AI and the latest contingent compensation formulae.

Ann counsels clients on union and guild matters, licensing, intellectual property rights, complex clearance issues, and has provided wide-ranging guidance regarding the engagement of minors in the entertainment industry. With over 20 years of experience serving as production counsel for numerous independent motion pictures with budgets ranging from $2 million to $200 million, scripted and unscripted television projects including game shows, competition-based shows, docu-dramas and dramatic series, and live stage (including augmented reality) productions, Ann has drafted and negotiated hundreds of agreements with above and below-the-line talent, financiers, bond companies, unions and guilds.

Jonathan Handel is an attorney, journalist, and commentator whose career bridges entertainment, technology, and media. At Feig/Finkel in Los Angeles and in his independent practice, he represents talent, producers, production companies, authors, software developers, and other industry professionals in a range of entertainment and technology transactions, as well as in matters involving unions, guilds, and business affairs. As a journalist and media analyst, he has written extensively on entertainment guilds, unions, and law for publications including The Hollywood Reporter, Variety, and the Los Angeles Times, and has appeared over 1,600 times across international, national, and local media outlets to provide expert commentary.

A magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College and a cum laude graduate of Harvard Law School, Handel previously served as associate counsel at the Writers Guild, Special Counsel to SAG-AFTRA, and adjunct professor at UCLA, USC, and Southwestern Law Schools. He is the author of several books, including Hollywood on Strike! and The New Zealand Hobbit Crisis, and his work has been recognized with honors such as inclusion in the Daily Journal’s Top 100 Lawyers in California and repeated designation as a Southern California Super Lawyer. A member of the Television Academy and a Rutgers University research fellow, Handel continues to influence the intersection of law, technology, and entertainment through his practice, writing, and thought leadership.

David Shraga is a private mediator specializing in entertainment, media & intellectual property. Having worked on all sides of the Hollywood ecosystem for more than 20 years, David offers rare experience and insight as a neutral.   

For the first dozen years of his career, he was a trial lawyer focused on cases involving talent, entrepreneurs, and bet-the-company litigation in entertainment and media.  He trained as a Senior Associate at the prominent law firm Alschuler Grossman Stein & Kahan LLP before founding his own firm KSW LLP. David then pivoted and for the next decade worked in-house as a studio executive, where he advised studio presidents, top tier producers, and other senior leadership.  His roles have included SVP and Head of Global Television Business & Legal Affairs for Miramax, VP of Business & Legal Affairs for NBCUniversal’s International Television Studio, and Senior Counsel for Legal Affairs at Universal Pictures.  

David is an expert in all aspects of domestic and international development, financing, production and distribution; has overseen billions in deals and budgets, and has negotiated with the top agents, lawyers, talent, studios, and distributors in the global television and film industries. With his uncommon background as both a litigator and in-house dealmaker, David offers a unique understanding of the complex considerations studios, sophisticated parties and their representatives must balance while making deals, while in litigation, and while mediating.  

David was on the Law Review while at the University of Southern California School of Law, externed for the Hon. Dean D. Pregerson (C.D. of Cal.) and received his BA from Yale.

David is also a member of the Executive Committee of the Entertainment Law Section of the Beverly Hills Bar Association; is the Outreach Coordinator and a Co-Host for the Will Work For Food Project – a webinar series which raises donations for food banks around the world; serves as a volunteer mediator for the Los Angeles Superior Court; is a member of the Southern California Mediation Association; is on the volunteer mediation panel for California Lawyers For The Arts; and volunteers with the Western Center on Law & Poverty to train high school peer mediators.