Peter Liguori
President/CEO
Chris Carlisle
Executive vice president, marketing & promotion
The cops on The Shield and the docs on Nip/Tuck are no strangers to blood, gore, and in-your-face-confrontation. That's why the promo campaigns for FX's out-of-the-box original drama series match the programming's provocative style.
"We wanted to raise the bar to the level of making the series seem like major cinematic and theatrical events, with marketing designed to stop and make you think," says President and CEO Peter Liguori, crediting Executive Vice President of Marketing and Promotion Chris Carlisle with being "as bold with his marketing as we are with our shows."
Says Carlisle, "We don't bring out 15 new shows a year, and that allows us to have more hand-crafted and fully baked ideas."
FX has basic cable's top two original series of 2003 in its target demo of adults 18-49 in Nip/Tuck and Emmy- and Golden Globe-winning drama The Shield. Both series have the highest average delivery of adults 18-49 of any scripted series in basic-cable history, according to FX.
Carlisle supervises the creation and implementation of all marketing and promotional campaigns, including print and electronic advertising for FX and Fox Movie Channel.
"Chris is an outstanding talent and has been key in shaping the brand and identity of FX and Fox Movie Channel," says Liguori. "Every campaign he creates has the quality of a theatrical-film event. He played an integral role in the successful launch of The Shield, and his campaign was a driver to get viewers to their sets."
The opening-week success of The Shield, for example, prompted Carlisle to develop a media plan to increase awareness of the show in the top 30 markets with outdoor, print, radio, and TV.
Carlisle's efforts have not gone unnoticed: He has won virtually every major honor for TV advertising. His mantel holds awards received from Clio, Art Directors Club of Los Angeles, Broadcast Designers Association, and Chicago International Film Festival.
Carlisle's background includes stints at Warner Bros. Studios as senior vice president of worldwide creative advertising and at ABC Entertainment, first as vice president of special projects and then as vice president of marketing. He began his career in 1979 at NBC, where he served as a writer/producer in on-air promotion for nearly 10 years before becoming vice president of special projects, advertising and promotion.
"I admire Chris's courage. There can be nothing worse for an employee than to take the job that his boss once did, knowing how high the bar was going to be and the volume we wanted to put on creativity," says Liguori, who joined FX Networks in 1996 as senior vice president of marketing and became president in 1998. "That can be daunting."
