Michael Donkis Leaves Rogers & Cowan PMK To Launch Aloft Strategic Communications PR Firm

EXCLUSIVE: Veteran Hollywood publicist Michael Donkis, most recently Co-President of Entertainment Strategies at Rogers & Cowan PMK, has launched Aloft Strategic Communications, a boutique entertainment publicity firm headquartered in Los Angeles. Joining Donkis at Aloft are publicists Amy Zack and Stephanie Baum, both directors at Rogers & Cowan PMK.

Donkis has spent the last 21 years in entertainment. For eight years, he headed communications for pre-WME Endeavor talent agency. He then launched a new PR company, Prime, with good friend and colleague Joy Fehily, which was absorbed by PMK-BNC five years ago last week. Donkis transitioned to PMK-BNC which in late 2019 merged with Rogers & Cowan. He served as Co-President of Entertainment Strategies at the combined entity, Rogers & Cowan PMK, part of the IPG family, for five years, until leaving recently to launch Aloft. Prior to Endeavor, Donkis did stints at The Washington Post, in addition to international trade and nonprofit work.

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As a personal publicist, Donkis has worked with filmmakers, independent studios, production companies, television creators and showrunners, and select festivals, non-profits and brands, including screenwriters and producers Anthony McCarten, Ed Solomon, Lucinda Coxon and Terence Winter; creators/showrunners/producers Josh Schwartz, Stephanie Savage, Marti Noxon, Sarah Treem, Janine Sherman Barrois, Scott Gimple, Patrick Somerville, Elwood Reid, Howard Gordon and Andrew Hinderaker; and studios/production companies Media Res, Carnival Films, Nutopia, Pulse Films and Monarch Media.

Zack and Baum each bring more than a decade of experience in the entertainment industry to Aloft with an emphasis in talent and television publicity. In addition to working with creators, showrunners and production companies, including many of those mentioned above, they have launched and led awards campaigns—both above and below-the-line—for multiple networks and streaming services including Amazon, Netflix, the CW, Paramount Network and truTV.

Counterbalance Entertainment, the production company behind the hit Netflix series Cobra Kai, will join Baum at Aloft. Zack began her career as a Page at NBCUniversal and went on to work at 42West and Universal Cable Productions prior to joining R&C PMK, while Baum joined the company from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

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