Passionate Professionals

Longtime Disney marketing executive Damon Whiteside ’96 (B.A. communications-public relations) said his experience working on campus as publicity director for ASI Productions gave him his start in the music and entertainment business.

“I became really involved in this business and was very attracted to it,” Whiteside recalled. “It allowed me to get into marketing, publicity and introduced me to all the artists who came to campus.” During his Disney career, he has worked with legendary artists such as Phil Collins, Kelly Clarkson, Carrie Underwood, Sheryl Crow and Rob Thomas, to name a few.

Caption: Danielle Bisutti

In order to be a successful actress in Hollywood, said Danielle Bisutti ’98 (B.A. theatre arts), one needs to be prepared to do 100 auditions to get the first “yes.”

“It’s not the kind of courage a doctor has to have to do open-heart surgery, but you need to believe in what you’re doing,” Bisutti said. She stars in the Nickelodeon series, “True Jackson V.P.,” and has just finished an album of her own music, “I Will Cover You.”

Now editing “Puss ’n Boots” for DreamWorks, due out in November 2011, film editor Eric Dapkewicz 94 (B.A. communications-radio/TV/film) credits his time at Cal State Fullerton with teaching him the nuts-and-bolts.

“Even though the technology has changed quite a bit since I went to CSUF, the basics are always the same,” Dapkewicz said, “everything from editing, to storytelling, to visual composition, to pre-production, production and post-production.” He completed “Monsters Vs. Aliens” in 2009 and is now directing and writing “Paradox Alice,” an independent science fiction film.

Nicole Wohland Block ’99 (M.A. communications-radio/TV/film) found her passion in Communications 411, where she experienced hands-on production while making her own film in class.

“I found that I had a knack for producing,” Block remembered. “It helped me decide which ladder to climb, and really helped me in real life.”

After more than 10 years creating popular nonfiction, reality, variety and lifestyle series in broadcast, cable and Internet television, Block recently launched her own production company, Highlighting Entertainment, with longtime colleague and friend Alessandra Ascoli.

“If you don’t have passion, you’ll give up,” Block warned. “The people who find the most success are the ones with the most love for what they do.”

A passion for programming likewise motivated Jennifer Miles ’93 (B.A. communications-radio/TV/film), director of marketing for U-verse Television. Miles markets HBO, Showtime and Starz; prior to her work for U-verse, she spent more than 15 years as a writer and producer for ABC-TV.

She recalled that a lecture by then-CSUF Professor Edward Whetmore about Marshall McLuhan’s “medium is the message” theory particularly resonated. In-class discussions included one in which it was predicted that entertainment would someday be available on-demand through telephone.

“The whole concept seemed foreign, but I loved the idea of getting entertainment when you wanted it via any medium,” Miles said. “And now here I am, 20 years later, working for AT&T bringing content into people’s homes and bringing them entertainment on demand.”

She credits an internship at ABC for launching her career. Once hired on full-time, she remembers looking around one day and realizing that the people working with her went to places like USC Film School and UCLA. “They are still paying off student loans, and I’m buying a house,” Miles remembered thinking. “I just felt so proud that I got such a great education and this great job without mortgaging my future.”