2023 TPEC Awards Winners Announced

TPEC announced today the winners for the inaugural television publicity campaign competition, the 2023 TPEC AWARDS, along with the Ben Halpern Lifetime Achievement Award recipient. The announcement was made by TPEC Co-Chairs Dustin Smith, Founder, SMITHHOUSE and Wendy Zocks, Founder, Wendy Zocks PR.

This new television publicity campaign competition accepted submissions across nearly every genre and platform to recognize excellence for all programming publicity campaigns. Additionally, the late Howard Bragman was awarded the Ben Halpern Lifetime Achievement Award, an award named after one of the founders of TPEC, for his dedication and illustrious career in publicity. A celebration honoring the winners will be announced at a later date.

“All these winners exemplify the creativity, hard work and relentless dedication to raising awareness of the exciting content available to viewers,” said Smith and Zocks. “These awards extend TPEC’s mission to elevate and celebrate our talented members behind these publicity campaigns. In addition, we are honored to present our first Lifetime Achievement Award to Howard Bragman, whose legacy transcends television to include impactfully helping the LGBTQ+ community.”

The winners of the 2023 TPEC Awards are:

• Outstanding Campaign for an Animated Series: The Proud Family: Louder and Prouder, Disney+

• • Chris Albert – Disney Branded Television Publicity
  • Morgan Di Stefano – Disney Branded Television Publicity
  • Cecilia Johnson – Disney Branded Television Publicity
  • Carol Kirksey – Disney Branded Television Publicity
  • Steven Beydler – Disney Branded Television Publicity

• Outstanding Campaign for a Children’s Series: Gabby’s Dollhouse, DreamWorks Animation

• • Courtenay Palaski – DreamWorks Animation
  • Seth Fowler – DreamWorks Animation
  • Aashna Moitra Serrao  – DreamWorks Animation
  • Katelyn Gearan – DreamWorks Animation
  • Nayiri Nazarian – DreamWorks Animation

• Outstanding Campaign for a New Comedy: The Bear, FX/Hulu

• • Kristy Silvernail – FX
  • Zoe Raynor – FX
  • Justin Sutton – FX

• Outstanding Campaign for a New Drama: The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power, Amazon Studios

• • Courtney Brown – Amazon Studios
  • Ellen Hughes – Amazon Studios
  • Derek Schauer – Amazon Studios
  • Holly Ollis – Amazon Studios
  • Ali Branch – Amazon Studios
  • Lorenzo Grajales – Amazon Studios
  • Lyndsey Miller – Amazon Studios
  • Mike Costello – Amazon Studios
  • Cooper Hagedorn – Amazon Studios
  • Taylor Kane – Amazon Studios
  • Maha Samad – Amazon Studios
  • Nick Gregorio – Amazon Studios

• Outstanding Campaign for a New Unscripted Series: Welcome to Wrexham, FX

• • Robyn Harney – FX
  • Roslyn Bibby – FX
  • Zoe Raynor – FX
  • Steve Brener – BZA PR
  • Alyssa Hankins – BZA PR

• Outstanding Campaign for a Returning Comedy: Abbott Elementary, Warner Bros. Television/ 20th Television/ABC

• • Grace Park – Warner Bros. Television Publicity
  • Celia Sacks – Warner Bros. Television Publicity
  • Sarah Teicher – Warner Bros. Television Publicity
  • Nicole Crawford – Disney Television Studios/20th Television Awards
  • Rachel Villegas – ABC Publicity
  • Michaela Zukowski – ABC Publicity

• Outstanding Campaign for a Returning Drama: This Is Us, 20th Television/ NBC

• • Chris Kaspers – Disney Television Studios/20th Television Studios
  • Natalia Desrosiers – NBC

• Outstanding Campaign for a Returning Unscripted Series: RuPaul’s Drag Race All-Stars, Paramount+

• • Michael Fabiani – MTV Entertainment Studios
  • Patrick Santiago – MTV Entertainment Studios
  • Justin Permenter  – MTV Entertainment Studios
  • Mariana Garces – MTV Entertainment Studios
  • Brian Bahr – Paramount+
  • Joe Regan – Paramount+

• Outstanding Multicultural Campaign: La Reina del Sur, Telemundo/NBC

• • Claudia Franklin – Telemundo
  • Adriana Nunez-Cox – Telemundo
  • Etienne Hernandez-Medina – H+M Communications
  • Jennifer Beccera – H+M Communications
  • Aimee Thompson – H+M Communications
  • Daniella Villegas – H+M Communications
  • Samantha Moore – H+M Communications
  • Ana Lucia Bustamante – H+M Communications
  • Emily Bruno – H+M Communications
  • Maria Cardona – H+M Communications
  • Alexandra Correa Crespo – H+M Communications

• Outstanding Campaign for a Docuseries/Docu-special: Limitless With Chris Hemsworth – Disney+/National Geographic 

• • Chris Albert – National Geographic
  • Jennifer DeGuzman – National Geographic
  • Jennifer Driscoll – National Geographic
  • Nadia Aziz – National Geographic

• Outstanding Campaign for a Television Movie, Limited or Anthology Series: The Dropout, 20th Television/Hulu

• • Shari Rosenblum – Disney Television Studios/20th Television
  • Lauren Burnett – Hulu

The TPEC Award committee conducted this year’s judging, evaluating the submissions with an eye on fully-realized, innovative and creative campaigns that made a cultural  impact. The committee also considered work that thoughtfully embraced diversity and inclusion, overcame unexpected roadblocks and ultimately achieved press hits that met the goals and strategies. The committee was comprised of:

• Ryan Aguirre, Searchlight/ Freelance
• Gabriella Alaimo, Sony Pictures Television
• Brian Eley, Crunchyroll
• Kristen J. Hall, CBS Studios
• Ryan McCormick, NBCUniversal
• Amy Prenner, The Prenner Group
• Shari Rosenblum, Disney Television Studios
• Aashna Moitra Serrao, DreamWorks Animation
• Dustin Smith, SMITHHOUSE
• Lakeitcha Thomas, Disney Television Studios
• Lynn Weiss, SMITHHOUSE
• Wendy Zocks, Wendy Zocks PR

About TPEC 

TPEC (The Television Publicity Executives Committee) was created in the 1990s to foster collaboration among senior communications professionals across the television industry as they faced shared challenges, including changing technology and redefinition of media ownership regulations. Members are involved in all forms of programming publicity from networks, studios, streamers and agencies. TPEC is co-chaired by Dustin Smith and Wendy Zocks and executive committee members include Todd Beck, Julie Holland, Amy Prenner, Eileen Quast and Joe Schlosser. Decades later, as the industry evolves at an unprecedented pace, TPEC continues to serve that purpose while fostering mutual understanding and positive working relationships between publicists and the media who cover the TV business and elevating the next generation of communications talent. The Los Angeles-based non-profit publishes the annual TPEC Guide, an invaluable resource that TV publicists use everywhere. For more information on TPEC membership or the Guide, please visit www.tpec.tv. Follow TPEC on FACEBOOK and TWITTER.