Short Video App Rizzle Hires CollegeHumor Alum Thom Woodley As Head of Creative and Content Development

SAN FRANCISCO, Oct. 29, 2020 /PRNewswire-PRWeb/ -- Short video platform Rizzle, which empowers anybody to make their own original series in minutes, has tapped webseries industry vet and CollegeHumor alum Thom Woodley as its first-ever Head of Creative and Content Development. Woodley has served as creative director for work spanning digital, traditional, social, branded, and experiential channels, and has created award-winning work through agencies, digital publishing, and independent television.

At Rizzle, he will oversee Rizzle Studios, where he aims to green-light both scripted and unscripted content, and will develop the company's mentorship program and educational resources for creators. More than one million videos have been created on the Rizzle platform since it officially launched in October 2019. The app's functionality allows the Rizzle community, which is over 10 million strong across the United States and India, to produce episodic content and create a microseries on a smartphone. Its features -- from in-app design tools to licensed background music and sound effects and more -- elevate smartphone videos to finished products that rival professionally-produced footage. Its users range from actors and producers to celebrities, bloggers, DJs, and everyday people -- and the vast majority of the app's user base are organic, unpaid creators.

"A lot of companies are trying to tell more interesting stories digitally, but Rizzle is really opening up the funnel," Woodley said. "The economics of Hollywood are changing: there's an emerging recognition that everyone has the capacity to tell a story, both emotionally and technically. Rizzle allows them to do that on one platform. This is an automatic blank slate -- and I couldn't be more excited to widen the aperture of what people view and do on the app."

Prior to joining Rizzle, Woodley served as Executive Creative Director at CHMedia/Electus, a Los Angeles-based digital television studio and publisher and owner of digital channels CollegeHumor, Dorkly, and Drawfee. He led a team of 12 in generating original branded IP for brands and client partners including Netflix, MillerCoors, Amazon, Coke, EA, and Sabra. Woodley's CV also includes creative director stints at Momentum Worldwide (where he led experiential creative on activations around major music and sporting events for American Express), McCann (where he conceived and produced work for client Microsoft on the largest account in advertising history), and the Barbarian Group (where he led digital and social creative for Pepsi's campaigns in the Super Bowl Halftime Show). Woodley has also served as a copywriter for some of the most well-known advertising campaigns, including Dos Equis' "Most Interesting Man In The World" campaign.

"Thom's hiring underscores Rizzle's commitment to fostering a robust community of web series creators: he produced some of the very first web series ever to be made (and to go viral), and he's a veteran advertiser who wrote some of the world's most well-known campaigns," said Vidya Narayanan, Rizzle's chief executive officer and co-founder. "He has devoted his professional career to creating engaging episodic and short series content, and we are thrilled to welcome him to the Rizzle community."

Woodley is a founding member of the International Academy of Web Television and developed the New York Conservatory for the Dramatic Arts's web series program, which teaches actors to shoot a series and pitch their idea. He also sits on the board of Catalyst Storieroad and the Catalyst Content Festival, which helps independent creators and beginning filmmakers make narrative-driven, cinematic-quality work. Woodley holds a double Bachelor's of Arts in Film and Theatre Arts (Writing) from Pennsylvania State University.

ABOUT RIZZLE
Rizzle is the short-form vertical video platform that allows anybody to make their own original series - in minutes.

SOURCE Rizzle