Inside the Ankler Invitational: Where Hollywood Took the Court (and Who Won)
I hosted a fierce, fun tourney with Propagate’s Howard Owens as Dan Lin, Joel McHale, Fox Entertainment CEO Rob Wade and more came out swinging
I cover TV and host Ankler Agenda. I wrote about film schools scrambling to address industry disruption and reported on agents’ concerns about a Netflix-Warner Bros. deal. Email me at elaine@theankler.com
“Tennis is both a collegial and competitive sport. It’s kind of like our business,” Netflix film chief Dan Lin said at our first-ever Ankler Invitational tennis tournament in L.A. “Sometimes you can be colleagues with someone; sometimes you can get really competitive.”
The line landed because it felt like it captured the entire afternoon. While some of you may be nursing Golden Globes hangovers, I’m dealing with the tennis equivalent — a pleasant, full-body fatigue that had me chugging electrolytes for breakfast.
On Saturday, more than 50 top executives, creatives and power brokers gathered at the historic Los Angeles Tennis Club in Hancock Park for the Ankler Invitational, co-hosted with Propagate CEO Howard Owens. Under idyllic mid-60s sunshine, aka perfect tennis weather, the industry showed up not just to socialize, but to compete, with match play facilitated by Guy Logan and the coaches at liveball organizer LVBL.
Among the heavy hitters on the scene: several Netflix leaders (film chief Lin, animated series head John Derderian and docs chief Adam Del Deo), Fox Entertainment CEO Rob Wade, The Pitt star Shawn Hatosy, Paramount TV Studios pres Matt Thunell, Omaha Productions pres Jamie Horowitz, Blumhouse pres Abhijay Prakash, documentary filmmakers Rory Kennedy and Mark Bailey, producer Conor Welch, Broadway Video head of TV development Hilary Marx, Universal Content Productions EVP Jen Gwartz, Brillstein co-CEO Jon Liebman, UTA motion picture agent and partner Rich Klubeck, Nikola Todorovic, CEO of Autodesk’s Wonder Dynamics, Weil attorney Tom Ara, Johnson Slewett Shapiro & Kole partner Matt Johnson, former pro and Indian Wells tournament director Tommy Haas and our event partner Blake Saunders, CEO of Core Advisors, a boutique investment bank focused on consumer and media M&A. (Even more names below.)
“It was a very good competition. I don’t play a lot of the liveball, and so I had a short cardiac arrest which they revived me from and I was able to play,” quipped Animal Control star Joel McHale, who was in the advanced group. “The playing level out here is ridiculous, and as a 54-year-old man, I’m thoroughly embarrassed.”
So why a tennis tournament? For starters, you’ve all heard me talk about the sport enough (“I feel like you talk about tennis on the pod, like, every week,” one studio exec told me at the event), plus I’ve written about the intersection of the entertainment business and tennis, from Netflix’s live-sport ambitions with 2024’s Rafael Nadal-Carlos Alcaraz battle at the Netflix Slam in Vegas to Hollywood’s historic relationship with the sport. (Groucho Marx and Charlie Chaplin were among the founding members of the Beverly Hills Tennis Club.)
My short video of the day and who was there:
A lot of players there, like Velvet Hammer Media co-founder Rebecca Quinn, told us they’ve found connective tissue between the sport and the business. Nicole Emanuele, head of development and production at Kaley Cuoco’s Yes, Norman Productions, likened tennis to a development process that usually involves hearing a lot of “no’s” before a “yes.”: “You have to get good at losing in tennis. Even if you win Wimbledon, you lose a lot of points.”
We took over six courts at the club, half for intermediate players (rated 3.5 and below in USTA parlance) and the other half for advanced (4.0-and-up players plus a few former semi-pros). The game was liveball, which welcomes eight or nine people on a court at a time and nixes serving in favor of king-of-the-court style doubles play that keeps competitors running.
Like this business, there’s a rowdy scrappiness to liveball that encourages a little casual trash talk and friendly competition.
“Tennis is therapy for me. I’ll be out there instead of a driving range,” said Lin. “A lot of people play golf. I like to serve by myself, just practice as I do it, and I’m smashing the ball and thinking through some of the business problems I’m dealing with.”
Other players? Devil in Disguise: John Wayne Gacy showrunner Patrick Macmanus, actor Decker Sadowski, Universal TV head of development Vivian Cannon, 20th Television VP of drama development Cort Cass, writer-producer David Nickoll, Netflix head of awards marketing Stacey Browning, Wiip’s Mark Roybal, Embassy Row CEO Michael Davies, writer and producer Amy Chozick (Girls on the Bus), writer-director Stephen Gaghan (Traffic, Syriana), Searchlight Pics publicity SVP Melissa Holloway and media strategy SVP Rob Wilkinson and former Imagine Entertainment and Picturestart exec Samie Falvey.
For The Pitt’s Hatosy, “Tennis is my, like, going to the bar. I stopped drinking 15 years ago, and I didn’t plan on tennis being my addiction, but I’m glad I found it because it’s my only way of really being able to decompress. So I love it. Honestly, if I don’t get a couple hours in a week, I start to go crazy.”
The sport is not all that different from performing, Hatosy said. “It’s high pressure — you’re having to make decisions in the moment. Same thing with acting, just sort of being open to what’s in front of you, watching it, and being able to just adapt as things come your way.”
The court is also a place where professional relationships are cultivated and deals made.
Actor and Angel City FC in-stadium host Natalia Bilbao, who believes that both entertainment and tennis require the understanding that “failure is part of the process,” said that “I actually got a development deal with someone that I started playing tennis with. So tennis has a great networking component.”
Her pal, apparel designer, actor and former Swedish pro Sophie Angner has also found herself talking shop on the court.
“A lot of actors and producers actually play tennis,” said Angner. “I connected with some people in the industry on a tennis court, and then they connected me to get auditions for Netflix shows.”
Not that I doubt this crowd wouldn’t have played to win just for the sake of it, but we also had major prizes: a two-night stay at the Four Seasons Tamarindo resort (special thanks to The Friedman Group’s Julie Friedman), Prince racquets and backpacks (thanks to Authentic Studios president Colin Smeeton) and annual subscriptions to the Tennis Channel.
So Who Won?
Bilbao took home the grand prize with Angner a close runner-up in the 4.0-and-up bracket, while Jury Duty and Wrecked writer Chris Kula topped the 3.5-and-under bracket. I, uh, happened to be the runner-up in the 3.5-and-under bracket — I swear I did not rig the match; it turns out that desperately trying not to embarrass yourself in a professional setting will do wonders for your game — but since it’s poor form to win prizes at your own tourney, Fox chief Wade officially took home the trophy in that category as next in line to the throne.
We also raffled off more than a dozen Prince racquets and backpacks, six pairs of Meta AI Ray-Bans, a sweet little leather KILLSPENCER tote, and a gift basket full of tennis-junkie must-haves like David Foster Wallace’s String Theory, W. Timothy Gallwey’s Inner Game of Tennis, a Vacation x Prince tennis-ball scented candle and a Racket Doctor gift card. (Support your local pro shops!)
Massive thanks to the Los Angeles Tennis Club, Logan and his LVBL team and additional partners who offered up killer prizes including Meta, Wilson, Tennis Channel, Racket Doctor, and luxury leather goods brand KILLSPENCER.
And a major, major shoutout to the incredible Ankler sales and events dynamic duo that is London Sanders and Hanna Hensler, for turning a passing “Wouldn’t it be fun if we hosted a tennis tournament?” into a star-studded reality.
Rematch: Do It Again, Shall We?
By the end of the afternoon — after six courts of liveball, dozens of rallies and more than a little friendly trash talk — the parallels between tennis and the entertainment business felt unmistakable. Both reward preparation, adaptability and the ability to recover quickly from failure.
In an industry that rarely slows down long enough to connect without an agenda, the Ankler Invitational offered something increasingly rare: real competition, real conversation and no script at all.
As for everyone asking when the next Ankler Invitational will be? Stay tuned.
Follow us on socials @theankler to see me more video and photos from the tourney. And, as ever, hit me up if you want to rally and talk shop: elaine@theankler.com.
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Jealous! Hopefully I’ll make it into the bracket next year 😂