Charles Roven's Atlas Entertainment Signs Creator Pact With Culture Genesis

Charles Roven's Atlas Entertainment has struck a development deal with Culture Genesis, the Santa Monica firm that packages content from creator-economy stars for sale to mainstream buyers.

The pact calls for the two companies to jointly develop film, TV and short-form titles drawn from Culture Genesis' archive of talent and content. The company operates the CG Collective, billed as 190 of YouTube's top creators, including IShowSpeed, Kai Cenat, REACT, AMP, People vs Food and V10's America's Funniest Home Videos. Atlas will also work with Culture Genesis to develop and package new properties beyond the existing archive.

The deal reflects crosscurrents in media and advertising, where the momentum sits with social media creators and marketers' demand for social video.

Roven is one of the industry's most respected film producers. His credits span some of the biggest films of the past few decades, including "Oppenheimer," "The Dark Knight," "The Dark Knight Rises," "Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice" and "Wonder Woman." Culture Genesis represents Gen Z stars including sports influencer IShowSpeed, whose feed has been described as "ESPN for Gen Z."

"Great film and television has always been driven by the best and brightest filmmakers and storytellers," Roven said. "Today's creators are visionaries in their own right and audiences have clearly taken notice. We're excited to collaborate with Culture Genesis to redefine the path from digital to film and television and introduce audiences to the next generation of talent."

Culture Genesis has grown rapidly as an exemplar of attention-economy representation firms that reap the rewards of social media while forging new pathways for promising creators. Launched in 2018, the company is led by founder and CEO Shaun Newsum and president Fred Coates.

"Culture isn't a demographic to target. It's where attention is born — and creators are its authors," Newsum said. "The most valuable attention in media now lives with creators, not channels. Through our collaboration with Atlas, we're giving creators exposure to potential economics that have historically been closed to digital-native talent."

Coates argued that traditional Hollywood and creators have more in common than surface appearances suggest.

"Atlas saw what Culture Genesis built — a collective of 190 creators with broadcast-scale, independently measured audiences — and understood immediately that this is infrastructure, not inventory," Coates said. "We're bringing two proven engines together: their ability to develop and sell world-class film and television, and our ability to reach an audience that already shows up. That's real upside on both sides of the table."

Culture Genesis says its portfolio reaches more than 43 million U.S. households each month, generates 9.5 billion monthly impressions and draws 60% of its viewing on the living-room screen.

Atlas Entertainment is headed by Roven and producing partner Alex Gartner. The firm's upcoming projects include Michael B. Jordan's redo of "The Thomas Crown Affair" for Amazon MGM Studios and "Road House 2" for Amazon Prime Video. It is also finishing production on the Imax documentary "Frontier," about the work of photographer Anouk Masson Krantz.

The agreement signals how far creator-driven content has moved toward the center of Hollywood's development pipeline, with a producer of Roven's stature betting that digital-native audiences can translate into film and television franchises.