Gianluca Chakra is the visionary founder and managing director of Front Row Filmed Entertainment, the leading independent film distributor & producer in the MENA region. Marianna and Gianluca chat about how fragmented the film industry is in the Middle East, and the challenges of the region when it comes to film distribution. Gianluca shares insights into building a film distribution company, why everyone needs to watch Robbie Williams ​as an ape​, and how​ George Clooney is one of the most fun Hollywood celebs he has met. 

Brenden Hubbard is an award-winning filmmaker, producer, and film festival strategist. Marianna and Brenden worked together on two film marketing projects - ‘Before I Disappear’ & ‘Last night in Rozzie’.  Brenden chats his passion for producing, how his career has evolved from film to podcast producing, and how producing American Hostage Podcast with Jon Hamm ended up being so special. He gives valuable film festival advice to up-and- coming filmmakers, and shares why Logan Lerman is his favourite Hollywood actor. 

Patriek Karayil is a C-suite advisor, White House Presidential Innovation Fellow & Board Member of the American Education Board. Marianna chats to Patriek about the serendipitous nature of his career, digital transformation for the US government, & what it was really like working at The White House. Marianna and Patriek debate the merits of an European education vs the concerning state of US education, and the alarming rise of AI startups.

Pauline Li is the co-managing partner of Madonna Capital (https://www.madonna-capital.com), with over 15 years of experience across a variety of sectors. From high school to KPMG, from Christian Dior to the UK startup scene, from working in finance AND fashion in Sydney to supporting female founders in the UK, there is little Pauline hasn't done in her illustrious career. Marianna chats to Pauline about meeting over sushi, some of the cultural differences of working in Australia vs the UK, how to navigate tech bros, and why you 'can't hate a hustler'.

Justin Butlion is the founder of projectBI, an analytics agency that specializes in helping eCommerce businesses unlock growth using data. Marianna chats to Justin about his digital nomad lifestyle, and his all time favourite city to work from (hint: it’s in Thailand). Justin talks about emerging digital trends, his BI consultancy, and why niche is best. He also has some words of wisdom for budding business analysts.

Ard Matthews is the front man of South African band Just Jinjer, with their debut album title ‘All Comes Round’, becoming one of the biggest selling rock genre albums of all time in South Africa. Marianna chats to Ard about her memory of working with him (and how he is the nicest celebrity), the creative process, and how much he loves touring in Dubai. Ard shares if he is a Swiftie, and talks a little about his upcoming new music.

Talia Savva is the co-founder of The Pilates Course (https://www.thepilatescourse.com/). Marianna and Talia reminisce about relay races at primary school, discuss New Zealand contract opportunities and their shared love for Auckland, along with delving deeper into Talia’s career trajectory and her passion for Pilates. Talia chats emerging Pilates trends and shares how she & her sister are taking The Pilates Course global, first in Miami and now in Dubai at FitRepublik. 

Alla Boguslavsky is Head of Global Projects at an EdTech giant (2U). She has 17 years experience, across three continents and 300+ projects, successfully implementing complex global projects. Marianna chats to Alla about work cultures in New Zealand vs US vs Singapore vs South Africa along with AI trends in Project Management. Alla also imparts some wisdom for budding project managers including why 'competent is better than confident'.

Josh Stirling is an American living in France. He's a talented content creative and video marketer who's currently working at a French B2B telecoms organisation where Marianna and Josh worked together circa 2022/2023. Marianna and Josh share their reflections on the French working culture, and answer the inevitable question of 'Is it anything like Emily in Paris?' along with discussing the current state of video marketing for B2B SaaS brands. Josh also shares his insights on AI tools for video marketing. (Podcast not sponsored by Ringover although we do say some very nice things about the company).

Interviewed ⁠Seb Pelan⁠ - a talented videographer I had the pleasure of working with back in 2018 when I was heading up the marketing team for a tech startup in Ljubljana. We chatted about AI's impact on the video content industry, why he is cautiously pessimistic about the rise of AI in relation to videography, & a few AI tools he can recommend for budding videographers.

He recommended the following AI video generation tools:

Pictory - a cool video generation solution - ⁠https://pictory.ai/⁠

Synthesia & Deepbrain AI Studios - Text to (video) avatar - ⁠https://www.synthesia.io/⁠ & ⁠https://www.deepbrain.io/aistudios⁠

Intro to Adobe Firefly - a good starting point to dive deep into Adobe's AI tools: ⁠https://blog.adobe.com/en/publish/2023/03/21/bringing-gen-ai-to-creative-cloud-adobe-firefly