Led by Danielle Peretz, Wondros' new Executive Producer of the commercial/branded content division, the company has welcomed the multi-disciplinary commercial and film Director Stephan Malik.
For Peretz, who is currently working on expanding Wondros’ Directorial roster for the New Year, Stephan is a true artist, a craftsman who prides himself on perfection and the quality of his work, which is both soulful and visionary. “Stephan is a real explorer of all things creative,” she notes. “He is a filmmaker, a photographer and a designer. Additionally, he is wonderful to collaborate with, a Director who is thoughtful, kind, and a great listener.”
Malik’s visual perspective stems from his upbringing with his deaf mother who challenged him to communicate imaginatively. His past shines through in the imagery he creates. Malik studied sound and music in Los Angeles before cutting his teeth in the editing room early in his career. Since then, he has directed campaigns for Apple, Facebook, AT&T, Toyota, Red Bull, Samsung, NASA, Google, and others. Stephan has collaborated with ad agency creatives from TBWA/Media Arts Lab, BBDO, Arnold, Leo Burnett, & 72&Sunny to name just a few. To date, Stephan’s work has aired on the Olympics, the Academy Awards, the Super Bowl, and won accolades from prestigious organizations such as AICP, Cannes, and others.
“I have a strong photographic influence,” explains Malik. “When I am developing an approach for a project, I often begin with a wall littered with visual references. My office quickly starts to look like a teenager’s bedroom. I’m always sketching up frames and cobbling together scrapbooks of imagery that we could feed into the project. I think that stems from my childhood growing up with a mother who can’t hear you. It was hard for her to understand me, so I found myself presenting these wild ideas to her on paper in order to illustrate something I wanted...and with a lot of waving arms and pantomime.”
Malik’s approach on-set is similar: “I quite enjoy hammering out the possibilities, brainstorming and work-shopping an idea until you’ve broken through to the other side,” he enthuses. “I like to get behind a big idea and see what we can do with it — how far we can push it.”
Although Malik shoots films as well, he has a great passion for the art of advertising. “The beauty of making advertising is that we get the opportunity to affect millions of people with our work,” he concludes. “But we need to provide audiences a form of entertainment through our spots, so they will be less likely to skip and more open to engage with the product. There always has to be a balanced exchange of sugar and sustenance for viewers to empathize with the work.”