NATPE has named the recipients of the 17th annual Brandon Tartikoff Legacy Award.
The winners include actress Christine Baranski; ABC Entertainment president Karey Burke; Lionsgate/STARZ producer Courtney Kemp; Marcos Santana, president of NBCUniversal’s Telemundo Global Studios; and Jeff Zucker, chairman, WarnerMedia News and Sports and president, CNN Worldwide.
Honorees will be celebrated during a gala dinner, which will benefit the NATPE Educational Foundation, at NATPE Miami 2020 on Jan. 22. Profiles of Baranski, Burke, Kemp, Santana, and Zucker will appear in the Jan. 20 issue of B&C.
The award's namesake Brandon Tartikoff was a longtime NBC programming executive who helped transform the network and TV landscape in the 1980s. Brandon Tartikoff Legacy Award recipients are recognized for exhibiting passion, leadership, independence and vision through their diverse work.
Christine Baranski is an Emmy, two-time Tony, Screen Actors Guild, Drama Desk and American Comedy Award winner. Baranski currently stars as Diane Lockhart in the CBS All Access original series The Good Fight, a role she originated on CBS' The Good Wife. Other television credits include her Emmy-winning role on Cybill, The Big Bang Theory and Frasier. Film credits include: Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again, A Bad Moms Christmas, Mamma Mia!, Trolls, Miss Sloane, Into the Woods, Chicago, How the Grinch Stole Christmas, Bowfinger, Bulworth, Cruel Intentions and The Birdcage, among others. She will next be seen in the Netflix feature Christmas on the Square. A graduate of the Juilliard School, Baranski received her big break in Tom Stoppard’s hit Broadway comedy “The Real Thing,” directed by Mike Nichols, for which she won a Tony Award and Drama Desk Award.
Karey Burke is responsible for all development, programming, casting, marketing, business affairs and scheduling operations for ABC primetime and late-night. She reports to Dana Walden, chairman, Disney Television Studios and ABC Entertainment. Burke was named executive vice president, programming and development at Freeform in October 2014, where she was charged with overseeing all scripted and unscripted development and current original programming, in addition to casting and talent development. Burke was also responsible for creating and executing a cohesive programming strategy for multiplatform distribution, and accelerating and amplifying the high-quality, brand-defining content for which Freeform is known. During her tenure, she had great success building on Freeform’s strong foundation, delivering the No. 1 new cable comedy and No. 1 new cable drama of 2018 for the network’s target audience of W18-34 with grown-ish and Siren. She also continued Freeform’s dominance as the No. 1 most social cable channel with buzz-worthy shows like The Bold Type and Marvel’s Cloak & Dagger.
Courtney A. Kemp is a television industry creator, showrunner, and producer. Kemp is the mind behind Starz’ gritty New York drama Power, which premiered its sixth and final season this summer. The series marks her debut as a creator and showrunner and follows the complex character James “Ghost” St. Patrick and his empire. Under Kemp’s leadership, the show remains Starz’ most watched original series to date. It currently has an average weekly viewership of over 10 million, when considering multiplatform and delayed viewing, making it the second-most-watched series on premium cable only after HBO’s Game of Thrones.
Marcos Santana is the president of NBCUniversal Telemundo Enterprises’ Telemundo Global Studios. In this role, Santana leads the division’s domestic and international scripted production units including Telemundo Studios, Telemundo International Studios and Telemundo International, as well as all of the division’s co-production partnerships. Under his direction, each entity produces its own unique brand of content geared to reach distinctive audiences.
Jeff Zucker was named chairman, WarnerMedia News and Sports in March 2019. He has also served as president of CNN Worldwide since 2013. Zucker oversees all of WarnerMedia’s live programming, including all divisions of CNN Worldwide and Turner Sports. At CNN, that includes the U.S. television network, CNN International, HLN, all of CNN’s digital properties, and Great Big Story. His sports portfolio includes Turner Sports, Bleacher Report, and the AT&T Regional Sports Networks.
