Belinda Blacklock Appointed As VP Of Animation At Modern Magic

Rodney Rothman and Adam Rosenberg’s Modern Magic has appointed Belinda Blacklock as its vice president of animation.

Blacklock’s remit will include finding, developing, and producing animated productions for film and tv. More immediately, she will be representing Modern Magic at this year’s Annecy.

Blacklock started her animation career working at Passion Animation Studios in London before relocating to the U.S. in 2009, where she set up the company’s New York studio, helming the location for seven years. In 2016, she headed west and joined Electric Theatre Collective in Los Angeles where she set up and ran its sister company, Friends Electric.

Blacklock’s credits include work on documentaries including Black Sun and In the Shadow of the Moon, music videos for Paul McCartney and The Beatles, and the Creative Arts Emmy-winning Game of Thrones 360 main title.

Modern Magic was founded by Into the Spider-Verse director Rothman and former MGM co-president of production Rosenberg in 2021, and quickly secured first-look deals with Fox for animation and Sony for live-action projects.

The company boasts an expansive and ambitious development slate and Rothman told Cartoon Brew they already had 20 titles at some stage of development when the studio launched. Since then, Modern Magic has worked, and continues to work, with numerous Hollywood heavyweights including Colombia Pictures, Fox, Sony Pictures Animation, Illumination, Warner Bros., Skydance, and 20th Television.

Of Blacklock’s appointment, Rothman said: “I was introduced to Belinda years ago by Angela Petrella, and immediately recognized an animation soul mate. She’s not just committed to animation as a medium with vast untapped creative and commercial potential; she also possesses the skills, experience, and vision to build it at scale, without waiting for permission. She’s scrappy, bold, brilliant, she’s worked on some of my favorite recent stuff and she’s dang likable to boot. We’re happy she’s helping guide the way from here. If you’re excited about where we’re going and joining up, it’s a perfect time to reach out – we’ll need your help too.”

Modern Magic is represented by UTA.