Longtime Disney Publicity Head Michelle Sewell Announces Her Retirement
The Walt Disney Studios will have a notable changeup at the top of their publicity team soon, as Michelle Sewell has announced her retirement, in the process leaving the company after 33 years.
What’s Happening:
- The news was broken by Deadline, who revealed Sewell had shared her decision to retire in a note to her team. There will be no sudden departure though, as Sewell will remain at the company until April, when the next movie awards season concludes following the Academy Awards. In the meantime, she will work with her boss, Asad Ayaz (Chief Brand Officer of the Walt Disney Company and President of Disney Entertainment Marketing) and her colleagues on the PR team to figure out a transition plan. Her replacement has not been chosen as yet.
- As Deadline notes, Sewell’s role had her overseeing the worldwide PR strategy for huge titles from across Disney, which included those from Marvel Studios, Lucasfilm and 20th Century Studios. That meant she was spearheading the campaigns for many of the biggest movies of all time, including the Frozen films, Avatar: The Way of Water, Avengers: Endgame, Inside Out 2, Star Wars: The Force Awakens and many more. 11 of the films Sewell ran campaigns for at Disney are in the top 20 highest grossing films of all time. Her role also included streaming titles.
- Sewell first joined Disney in 1982 and was the head of their European and international publicity until 2007, when she became SVP International Publicity, working out of their main office in Burbank, CA.
- Sewell’s full note to her team is below.
After 33 amazing years and exponentially more emails written, I’m writing this one today to share the news that I’m going to be retiring from Disney after we wrap up this awards season in April.
While it’s not happening anytime soon, I’ve started having some conversations internally to prepare for it, and we know better than anyone that news always gets out. I’ll be working closely with Asad and the PR team on our transition plan over the next few months, but I wanted you to hear it directly from me as soon as possible.
That said, it’s a bit surreal to be typing this! It’s truly astonishing when I look back on my time here. To quote Bob Iger himself, it’s been “the ride of a lifetime" – and that’s not only because of the many, many pinch-me experiences I’ve had here, but primarily because of the exceptionally talented and passionate team of incredible people I’ve been fortunate to lead and to work amongst. I know I’ve developed a reputation for my long emails, but trying to encapsulate all that we’ve accomplished together would be longer than most novels so I will save you from that (for now)!
I am so thankful to each and every one of you for making this the absolute best place to spend so much of my life. I’m also deeply grateful to Bob, Alan and Asad for their constant leadership and support through the years – I could not have asked for better bosses. The decision to move on is one of the hardest I’ve ever had to make, yet I’m excited to unplug from the grid when the time comes and see what’s next.
So, it’s not goodbye yet, of course – no rest for the wicked as we have several more big films this year (along with their globe-spanning press tours), and awards season just beginning. Let’s have a great time with it.
Thank you again for everything.
Michelle