People moves: Warner Bros. Animation appoints exec trio

October 13, 2009 by Emily Claire Afan

There’s been some restructuring over at Warner Bros. animation under the WB Television president Peter Roth, as a senior exec team shuffle has just been announced.

Peter Girardi steps into the newly created role of SVP of series & alternative animation. He’ll be working closely with WBA’s EVP of creative affairs, Sam Register, spearheading development and production of animated programming for non-traditional animation markets and mediums, including emerging digital platforms (DCBeyond.com and KidsWB.com), as well as direct-to-DVD releases with Warner Premiere. Girardi spent 13 years as executive creative director of interactive company Funny Garbage, which he founded in 1995, and has recently been involved in TV production as an executive producer and production designer.

Ex-Cartoon Network exec Jay Bastian comes on board as VP, series to manage daily production activities for WBA’s current TV series. He’ll be focusing on developing animated comedy and traditional TV programming for kids six to 11. Bastian has spent the last 11 years in the original series department at CN, where he was executive in charge of production, supervising initial development and production of such series as The Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy and Chowder.

And Girardi has appointed Ed Adams as VP of business & legal affairs and administration. He’ll be directing day-to-day activities of the company’s business affairs, legal affairs, finance, planning and admin as well as overseeing negotiations of WBA’s deals with producers, writers and performers for its television series, direct-to-DVD releases and content for digital platforms, and will supervise the division’s business and legal affairs staff. He comes from DreamWorks Animation as its head of legal affairs, also having spent time at Cookie Jar Entertainment spearheading sales and handling business affairs.