Tony Papa(IV)
- Executive
- Producer
- Production Manager
An experienced executive and Emmy-award-winning producer with success in creative, tech, and business endeavors. Tony's multi-platform approach and tens of millions of content views indicate he speaks just as fluently to creative vision as to technical and budgetary matters. Tony advanced from consultant to KVCR Director of Operations for the PBS/NPR station in San Bernardino, Calif., and First Nations Experience (FNX), the only national TV network devoted to Native American & World Indigenous content. Executive Producing Learn with Me, an animated and live-action children's literacy television program recorded in English and Spanish. Inland Edition A weekly public affairs program with California elected officials and community leaders. Native Shorts: Season Four presented by Sundance Institute's Native American and Indigenous television program. NPR Radio Program IE Latino Voices a weekly five-minute segment where Latino-led and serving organizations share stories of how they impact the community. After proving his capabilities as a post-production supervisor to leadership, he became the project lead for a $16M station remodel, which he delivered on time and $170K under budget. Tony's responsibilities expanded to daily oversight and planning of a $11M annual budget, including multi-year forecasting and cash-flow management for three business units and a nonprofit foundation. Under his purview, digital and streaming solutions for four broadcast channels have been designed and implemented.
Before joining KVCR, Tony served as assistant editor on the National Geographic documentary film, Science Fair, which won a National Emmy, the SXSW prize for Festival Favorite in 2019, and a dozen more festival awards. While collaborating with SoulPancake, he was responsible for the technical delivery of TV content to Disney Television and their ABC digital unit. As producer and editor for The Terry Kath Experience, Tony and his team premiered a feature film documentary about the storied Chicago band member at the 2016 Toronto International Film Festival (selling it to FilmRise for worldwide distribution). In his role as lead editor or producer on more than 200 ads and videos, his work appeared on MTV, Sony, Honda Music, Uproxx Media, Vogue Italia, and Vanity Fair. Among his favorite producing experiences is an ad campaign for eyewear giant Oliver Peoples starring the late, great producer Robert Evans...that was filmed at the mogul's legendary Hollywood estate. Fresh out of college, Tony joined an LA start-up, Dental Advantage, engineering a CRM software solution that enabled a membership marketing database to communicate with over 100K dentists. He helped secure nearly $900K of sponsorship and membership sales for Dental Advantage Publishing and Continuing Education courses in a single quarter. From there, Tony landed the enviable position as Employee No. Three at CarsDirect.com an Idealab eCommerce company. Drawing on grit and grace, he co-created the business plan, site wireframes, and presentation materials that helped to secure $350M in Series C funding.