TV Exec Hopes to Channel Programs Toward Women

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‘‘Reality” didn’t hit for TV development executive Emily Mayer until she was out of college and working in the mailroom at Beverly Hills’ United Talent Agency.

“I realized that reality wasn’t what I thought it was,” said Mayer, who had moved to Los Angeles in 2004 after graduating from Baltimore’s Johns Hopkins University, where she majored in film and media. “An agent explained to me that unscripted, or alternative, is sort of a banner, and underneath it (are the genres) reality, documentary, game and talk.”

Mayer used her stint at UTA as a launching pad into TV development, jumping to one of the agency’s clients, Fox. She later moved to production company 44 Blue, and then helped launch an unscripted division in Los Angeles for British company Alchemy.

In November, she joined GRB Entertainment, a Sherman Oaks-based producer and distributor of reality programming, as vice president of development. Part of Mayer’s mandate is to increase GRB’s connection to women viewers.

“I came in and looked at their whole slate and saw lots of A&E, History and Discovery (channels), and Spike, a lot of the male networks,” she said. “I thought I can really come in here and broaden them out to Lifetime, Oxygen and VH1.”

A big draw of working in TV development for Mayer is the variety of channels that require a wide range of content.

“You could be working on a show about black-box plane crashes one day and the next meeting with the women who used to be on ‘Baywatch’ who want to do a reality show,” she said. “Every day is so completely different.”

When Mayer needs a break from the business, the Philadelphia native heads to Hollywood’s Cirque School L.A., which offers classes in such circus arts as trapeze and tightrope walking, all presented in a Cirque du Soleil style. Mayer is a regular at the school and has performed in student showcases.

Mayer, 28, lives with her boyfriend, actor Cory Blair, in Westwood. Her favorite reality show to watch – on which she didn’t work – is “Intervention.” Her favorite nonreality series is “Frasier.”

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