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RiTE Media expands leadership bench and roster
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The Atlanta-based creative production and technology house adds Halie Graham as Partner, signs director Xander Bartole, and taps East Coast, Midwest representation.
RiTE Media, the creative production and technology house built for inventive storytellers, announced a slate of moves that sharpen its offering to ad agencies and brands.
Halie Graham joins the company as Partner/Executive Producer of Commercial & Experiential, tabletop/live-action director Xander Bartole signs on to the roster, and Minerva has been tapped as RiTE's East Coast representation along with Marguerite Juliasson in the Midwest.
The three announcements are strategic linchpins in RiTE’s plan to pull high-caliber commercial and experiential work back to Atlanta by combining Georgia's 30 percent entertainment tax credit with what Rite leadership calls "the coalition" a collaboration of local stages, gear partners, and crew.
With a background in innovation and technology in the tabletop space, Graham joins RiTE to lead commercial and Experiential projects, oversee client partnerships, and help steer the company's growth strategy alongside founder/CEO Paris Schulman. She brings a career spent moving between creative direction and the operational reality of production.
"Halie is the kind of producer every studio wants and almost nobody gets," said Schulman. "She understands creative ambition and what it actually takes to make it happen. Bringing her in as a partner was the easiest decision we've made in a long time."
Graham moves from New York back home to Atlanta to take the role, and she brings with her years of industry relationships, chief among them director Bartole and Minerva reps Mary Knox, Shauna Seresin, and Victoria Venantini.
“What Paris has built at RiTE is the kind of environment you don't see often: a family of highly skilled filmmakers, producers, editors, and technologists who operate at the highest level and bring the best out of each other,” said Graham. “My job is simple: Widen the door for clients to see what RiTE has built over the last 16 years.”
Bartole joins RiTE's director roster alongside director/photographer Nika Tabidze and feature film director Ryan Monolopolus. Bartole’s work combines food craveability with strong live-action and performance direction, a pairing that's extremely hard to find in one filmmaker, according to Graham. His recent clients have included Panera and 72andsunny as well as Doritos direct with Pepsico.
Minerva will represent RiTE across the East Coast, connecting the company with agencies and brands in New York and throughout the region as RiTE scales its commercial practice. “I've worked with Minerva for years. There's no one better to stand alongside you as a true partner in growth and expansion,” said Graham.
And through a relationship built upon several shared clients, Knox recently introduced Graham to Juliasson in Chicago. "We're making bold moves at RiTE to bring on the best partners for this next big chapter of growth. Marguerite was an immediate yes,” Explained Graham. “She's exactly the kind of partner we want alongside us."
After 16 years in Georgia, RiTE is leaning into a moment during which commercial production is rediscovering the state, drawn by a mature crew base, the 30 percent transferable entertainment tax credit, and RiTE's own proprietary infrastructure across real-time virtual production stages, motion control, and copyright-safe generative AI workflows.
