EXCLUSIVE: After six years as a manager at More/Medavoy, Stephen Belden is going it alone, having launched his own management and production company, Death Wish Entertainment.
“The dream,” Belden said, “has always been to work with a core group of clients that I absolutely adore as artists and as human beings and to be able to produce projects with and for those clients. With this company I get to focus on exactly that and I couldn’t be more excited.”
Belden explained that the name Death Wish is “a tongue-in-cheek nod to the fact that it’s harder than ever to be working in the entertainment industry right now,” underscoring at the same time that he “couldn’t be more optimistic about what the future holds for the up and coming generation of actors, writers, directors, and producers that I work with.”
Additionally, he expressed his gratitude to those at his former company. “The years I spent learning from Brian Medavoy and Erwin More were incredibly formative for me as a manager and as a person,” he said. “I’ll always have nothing but love and respect for them, the way they do business, and their brilliant list of clients.”
Clients joining Belden at his new shop include Gavin Leatherwood (Chilling Adventures of Sabrina, The Sex Lives of College Girls), Blu Hunt (New Mutants, Sherlock & Daughter), Lovi Poe (Seasons, Bad Man), Russell Dennis Lewis (Godless, The Queen’s Gambit), Melanie Stone (Deadstream, V/H/S/99), Louie Chapman (The Dresden Sun), Tomi Ade (Hollyoaks), Ezana Alem (Snowfall), actor-filmmaker Chasen Parker (Everyone Is Doing Great), Sophia Esperanza, Sophia Tatum (Riverdale, Samaritan), Brenna Monet, writer-musician duo Geordie Kieffer and Mitch Toler, writer Ian Kieffer, and producer Montgomery Blencowe (Heist).
He’ll also be joined by his most recent signing, writer-producer Kate Andrews, who produced It’s What’s Inside, the horror thriller which snagged the top sale of Sundance 2024 when Netflix purchased worldwide rights for around $17 million, as we were first to report.
Prior to his time at More/Medavoy, Belden was a manager at ATN Entertainment. He began his entertainment career as an agent at Sovereign Talent Group.