From entertainment reporting to first Black woman director at Atlanta film production company

Meet Wendy Schofield, who has just been appointed director of Operations at West End Production Park Film and TV Studios in Atlanta.

Schofield has a background in broadcasting as a result of her past role as an entertainment reporter. While reporting for the Tom Joyner Morning Show, she built a niche for herself and also interviewed top celebrities in Dallas.

She went on to have her own radio morning drive show. She became the radio host of Matchmaker Wendy and also a reporter for NBC Universal for the evening and afternoon news, according to 11Alive.

The latest appointment makes her the first Black woman to lead an Atlanta film production company. Across the U.S, women make up some 25% of people working in key positions in the entertainment industry like directors, writers, executive producers, producers, editors and cinematographers.

“It feels awesome to be the first Black woman in this role as director of operations at the West Production Park. What I do is negotiate contracts. I make sure that the day-to-day operations are going smoothly and everything’s working the way it should and everything’s going the way it should. So it’s just basically the day-to-day,” Schofield told 11Alive.

The Atlanta-based company has been behind some awesome projects such as Ozark, Stranger Things and Avengers: Endgame.

Prior to joining West End Production Park Film and TV Studios (WEPP studios), Schofield managed her own marketing and production company. Interestingly, WEPP studios was one of her clients before she was hired.

Schofield recalled being given an offer to become the director of WEPP studios during a conversation with some of the company’s top executives. “We were just talking and they just said, ‘Hey, you know what? We need somebody to be over the WEPP. You’ve got a great history, a background in broadcasting and in production. We’d love for you to take this position,’ and so that’s how it happened,” she said.

According to Schofield, starting her own production company was born out of the idea of creating her own TV shows while working as a reporter.

Now at WEPP, she hopes to continue with some of the exciting projects the company has been doing. “Our goals are to produce great content and to house great productions and to get our name out there as one of the top production studios in Atlanta and in the world,” Schofield said.