The Glamorous Life of an Entertainment Intern

Hey there,

I’m Ethan – a junior advertising major and I’m spending my semester with Allied Integrated Marketing. Allied is a national PR and Marketing firm with offices in all major markets across the nation. Allied’s clients in the Philadelphia office are typically entertainment clients across the nation. This semester, I was given the opportunity to work on accounts for Fox Searchlight, Open Road Films, Lionsgate, Sony Films, and Universal Films. With these, I was given a very wide variety of tasks to complete for the semester. Some were much more entertaining than the others.

One of the tasks that I was given consistently was outreach for upcoming films in the Philadelphia and Pittsburgh markets. This mainly consisted of researching relevant retailers and groups that would be interested in seeing a screening for an upcoming film, reaching out to them via phone or email and then sending them tickets either virtually or through FedEx. One of my favorite things that I got to do with my time at Allied was attend press screenings for upcoming films. I would be sent to a local theater and would meet people from local publications, watch the film with them and then would receive their opinions on the way out. My favorite film that I got to do this for was Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri – it was an incredibly interesting film and given the opportunity to see it a month before release and talk to the press about it was pretty neat.

Also, I never realized how far movies go with promotional items. Another one of my main tasks was to send out promotional items to relevant groups and retailers as well as brainstorm potential ideas and events for the upcoming films on which I was tasked to work. Occasionally, I would have to go to local places with the promotional items to set-up displays for customers and visitors. Pictures of displays were sent back to the studio to show our promotional efforts for the film. I met some really interesting people while venturing around Center City completing these tasks, and not having to sit in the office for hours on end was nice too. Interns were also given the opportunity to take promotional items if we wanted – so I got some cool items from past and current films too.

My time with Allied is quickly coming to a close, and looking back it was a pretty interesting internship, especially for my first one. It was cool to learn about what goes into creating a campaign for the entertainment industry. I appreciate what I have learned, and plan to use these skills with whatever path life takes me.