The blooloop 50 Immersive Influencer List 2024

Julie Freeland is Mattel's vice president for global live events and attractions. In this role, she leads the creation and implementation of live events and attractions that bring Mattel's beloved brands and characters to life through engaging interactions. Her work plays a key role in expanding the presence of Mattel’s brand portfolio beyond conventional toys, transforming it into memorable and immersive experiences for audiences of all ages around the globe.

Freeland manages partnerships and develops large-scale attractions, such as theme parks, immersive installations, and live events centred on cherished Mattel brands. She collaborates closely with creative and operational teams to guarantee that each experience reflects Mattel’s brand values and connects with fans in various regions.

She has brought Mattel’s live experiences to global markets, enabling fans worldwide to enjoy immersive attractions regardless of location.

One of the flagship projects under Freeland’s leadership is the Mattel Adventure Park in Glendale, Arizona, showcasing attractions themed around Hot Wheels, Barbie, Masters of the Universe, and Thomas & Friends. This development represents a significant step for Mattel in the theme park sector.

Freeland has established partnerships with top players in the entertainment and attractions sectors to enhance Mattel’s brands. This involves collaboration with firms focusing on theme park design, interactive exhibits, and family-oriented events. Her strategy emphasises bringing Mattel’s intellectual properties to life, enriching fan engagement and fostering brand loyalty.

Freeland has extensive experience in the entertainment and attractions sector, specialising in event planning, brand management, and strategic partnerships. This background equips her to spearhead Mattel’s growth in live experiences, a domain that demands a grasp of creative storytelling alongside operational execution.

Julie Freeland has played a vital part in turning Mattel’s renowned brands into engaging, interactive experiences for fans. Her guidance actively enhances Mattel’s footprint in live events, boosting the company’s growth and connection with its worldwide audience.

David Ruzicka is a freelance creative director and writer based in Los Angeles. He focuses on themed entertainment, which involves crafting immersive experiences, live performances, and attractions for theme parks. He has worked on projects for attractions such as Disney’s theme parks and Stranger Things: The Experience. He has also directed haunted attractions, blending his passion for family-oriented and darker immersive themes.

For the past two decades, he has been at the forefront of immersive entertainment and has worked on dozens of immersive experiences as a creative director, show director, and/or writer for companies like Mycotoo, Walt Disney Imagineering, Weta Workshop, Universal Creative, Giant Spoon, Magnopus, Marvel, Paramount, and more. His work includes experiences based on Stranger Things, House of the Dragon, Uncharted, Lore, and many more.

David Ruzicka is an evangelist for immersive entertainment and is a frequent speaker at conferences.

Roman Sick leads Holoplot, a science-based immersive audio company. Holoplot creates hardware and software products that push the boundaries of conventional audio and speaker technology, a radical new approach to generating high-quality audio. The company has created immersive sound experiences for Area15, Illuminarium and Sphere in Las Vegas.

‘Sphere Immersive Sound’ is the world’s largest concert-grade audio system creating an unparalleled listening experience for 20,000 people. Comprising around 1,600 permanently installed Holoplot X1 Matrix Array loudspeaker modules, totalling 167,000 individually amplified loudspeaker drivers, the system uses Holoplot’s 3D Audio-Beamforming and Wave Field Synthesis technology to transform how audio is delivered in large-scale venues. The result is controlled, consistent, crystal-clear audio.

“The beauty and the beast of our technology is that it sounds too good on paper to be true,” Sick told Headliner in 2023. “This is a next generation, software-driven audio technology that allows you to use sound with an extremely high degree of flexibility and fidelity. In general, we provide a completely new level of control over sound propagation by creating custom soundwaves, which are perfectly tailored via software to target the desired audience area only and hardly lose energy over distance.

“On the functional side, we thereby enable people to achieve significantly better results wherever they want to use sound, because all the negative effects of sound bouncing off objects, travelling in all directions and level attenuation are removed. On the more creative side, we offer sound designers, show producers and mixing engineers another layer of access to their creative content and experience creation.

"It’s not just sound reproduction anymore, it’s a new toolbox that allows you to paint creatively with sound output as opposed to just sound input. That completely enables a new level of creativity that simply wasn’t there before."

Randy Weiner is a playwright, producer, and theatre owner.He has been called “the leading impresario of nontraditional theatre in New York” by the New York Times and “a mad genius of nightlife” by the Wall Street Journal. Weiner is a partner in OTBA, which manages and produces unique experiences by integrating world-class entertainment, bespoke hospitality and innovative design.

Weiner’s recent projects with OTBA include ‘Come Alive!: The Greatest Showman Circus Spectacular’ and Usher’s sold-out My Way residency in Las Vegas.

Additionally, with Emursive Productions, Randy Weiner produced the Drama Desk Award-winning New York premiere of Punchdrunk’s ‘Sleep No More’ theatrical experience.Weiner is co-owner of The Box venues in New York and London, billed as the “theatre of varieties”. He’s also the co-owner and co-creator of The Stranger, a nightclub in New York offering “quite possibly the weirdest night of your life”.

One nominator said: “It is hard to understate Randy’s impact as an influencer in immersive. He was one of the original pioneers.”

Jeb Terry is CEO and president of Cosm, a global technology company that builds end-to-end solutions for immersive experiences. In 2024, he led several projects to solidify Cosm’s position as a leader in immersive technology and experiential entertainment.

To begin with, Cosm opened its first experiential venues in summer 2024, including a major location at Grandscape in The Colony, Texas, and another in Los Angeles’ premier sports and entertainment district, Hollywood Park. With an overwhelmingly positive response from visitors, these venues feature 87-foot LED domes designed for friendly immersive experiences, bringing audiences closer to live sports, artistic performances and other events in shared reality. Cosm’s third venue is set to open in Atlanta in the coming years.

When the LA venue debuted, Terry said: “This isn’t just about opening our doors – it’s about unlocking access to the world’s most coveted sports and entertainment events. This is our first venue opening, but it is not our last. We are excited to usher in this new category of entertainment and introduce shared reality to fans around the world.”

In addition to opening new sites in 2024, Terry and the Cosm team secured partnerships with major sports organisations like the UFC, NBC Sports, Fox Sports and ESPN. These collaborations brought live sports broadcasts from around the world, including UFC pay-per-view events and English Premier League matches, into Cosm’s venue in Los Angeles.

Under Terry’s leadership, Cosm raised more than $250 million in 2024 to expand its operations. “These achievements underscore Terry’s role in transforming how audiences experience live events through cutting-edge immersive technologies. Cosm is here and it is powering the immersive future,” said one nominator.

Jenny Nicholson is one of the most popular and respected YouTube influencers in the world, especially when it comes to immersive entertainment. Her four-hour video covering Disney World’s Star Wars: Galactic Starcruiser has more than 10 million views and received worldwide coverage, including an article in the New York Times.

The Galactic Starcruiser hotel experience opened in March 2022 and closed in September 2023. The ambitious attraction offered a cruise-style itinerary on the luxurious Halcyon starcruiser. The all-inclusive voyage, which received a Thea Award, cost approximately $1,200 per person, per day.

“This video is one of the most brilliant, compelling and entertaining pieces of content produced over the past year,” said one nominator. “It cast a bright light on the creation and operation of immersive entertainment, showing millions of people the complexity of such attractions, and what makes for a great (and not-so-great) experience.”

Nicholson has covered a variety of immersive attractions, including another four-hour video on Evermore Park, a fantasy theme park in Utah that closed in 2024. This video has more than 11 million views on YouTube.

Her nominator said they would argue that “no one has had more impact and influence on a broad audience in and out of the industry over the past year than Jenny Nicholson”.

Ann Morrow Johnson is an industry leader in entertainment design, currently heading Gensler's global entertainment and experience design practice. She is an experience architect who creates compelling, meaningful spaces and experiences, blending design and placemaking expertise with strategic and operational knowledge to find opportunities that matter.

As an accomplished creative and design director, Johnson combines a deep understanding of architecture, world-building, and design with business acumen to envision and create unique experiences that immerse, engage, and excite guests worldwide.

Known for her innovative work in immersive environments, Johnson previously held a significant role as the global head of creative development at Walt Disney Imagineering, where she worked on projects like the ambitious Star Wars: Galactic Starcruiser. This immersive experience combined role-play and detailed environments to offer guests a unique two-day Star Wars experience.

At Gensler, Ann Morrow Johnson is helping to push boundaries in immersive design by integrating her extensive experience in architecture, storytelling, and entertainment. Her move to Gensler also reunites her with former Disney Imagineering president Bob Weis, bringing together two seasoned experts in experiential entertainment.

“Ann Morrow Johnson is the creative leader the Gensler entertainment practice needs at this moment as we continue to see exciting growth and momentum,” said Weis, speaking after her appointment. “Her extensive global experience in immersive experience design and storytelling, coupled with a solid foundation in development strategy and architecture makes her one of the industry’s most sought-after leaders."

Johnson’s background spans over 60 major projects in the US, Europe, and Asia, and her insights are expected to drive Gensler's strategies in blending physical and digital environments for urban spaces, hospitality, and entertainment ventures globally. In addition to her architectural expertise, Johnson has collaborated with high-profile cultural institutions like National Geographic and the Royal Shakespeare Company, blending traditional engagement with cutting-edge experience design to innovate within urban and commercial spaces worldwide.

Thomas Mack gained experience in the parks and attractions industry from an early age, growing up in the grounds of Europa-Park, his family’s famous theme park resort in Germany. In addition to work experience at other parks including Italy's Gardaland, Busch Gardens Williamsburg in the US, and Australia’s Warner Bros. Movie World, he studied at a renowned Swiss hotel management school in Lucerne. 

The latter proved a great foundation for Mack's present role at Europa-Park, where he is responsible for its expansive hotel resort, F&B division, operations and services, as well as the entertainment and ‘confertainment’ division. A recent project for Mack was Eatrenalin, an eight-course fine dining experience on a dark-ride vehicle.

Mack is in talks with developers to take the innovative Eatrenalin restaurant to major cities around the world including London, New York, Los Angeles and Las Vegas. In September 2024, Mack was voted ‘Restaurateur of the Year’ at the Rolling Pin Awards, the largest industry award in Germany.

On the Eatrenalin concept, he told blooloop: “I’m a great fan of travelling and experiencing different foods and cultures. But why does the wine taste better when you are in Italy on a sunny day, for example? I wanted to create a restaurant where all your senses are touched.”

He added: “We always wanted Eatrenalin to be recognised as a restaurant. For people to come for the food, not only the experience. The food is very fine dining. We didn’t want to offer a kids’ menu because that would somewhat destroy the concept.”

One nominator said: "As the founder and managing partner of Eatrenalin, Mack has redefined the immersive dining experience, creating a groundbreaking fusion of haute cuisine and sensory exploration. His visionary leadership and innovative approach have positioned Eatrenalin as the pinnacle of immersive dining experiences, where guests embark on a multi-sensory journey unlike anything else in the world."

Margaret Kerrison is currently a senior creative director at TAIT, aglobal leader in the live entertainment industry.She previously served as Walt Disney Imagineering's managing story editor forStar Wars: Galaxy’s Edge. In 2019, she successfully opened the expansion at Disneyland and Disney’s Hollywood Studios. Imagineering and Lucasfilm used films, novels, and comic books to create the backstory for the Black Spire Outpost and Batuu.

“This is part of our way of creating that history,” Kerrison said. “We want to give the impression that this planet has always been around. We’re coming into it as travellers for the first time. There are layers and layers of history and all these familiar and new characters who have come and gone to this planet.”

After working with museums and in corporate branding and themed entertainment, Margaret Kerrison applied for a writing position at Walt Disney Imagineering. She joined WDI in 2014 and developed stories and details for a number of projects.

“What’s most important to me, as a storyteller, is how people feel when they walk into the land,” she said. “We want our guests to feel encouraged to explore and discover every corner of Black Spire Outpost.”

She has written two books on immersive entertainment: Immersive Storytelling for Real and Imagined Worlds: A Writer’s Guide and Reimagined Worlds: Narrative Placemaking for People, Play, and Purpose.

“The idea for this book came about from a question that someone asked me during one of my presentations,” she told blooloop about her second publication. “That question was, ‘It’s great that you had IP like Star Wars to work on. But what about the rest of us who are building public places: town squares, libraries, malls, theatres? How can we apply the tools and insights on telling immersive stories and narrative placemaking to ordinary places?’

Winston Fisher is chief executive officer of Area15, a collaborative venture between real estate development firm Fisher Brothers and creative agency Beneville Studios. Prior to joining Fisher Brothers in 2000, Fisher worked as an analyst at JP Morgan Chase. After completing his tenure at JP Morgan Chase, he joined Heller Financial.

Area15 is an experiential art and entertainment complex in Las Vegas, home to immersive activations, art installations, state-of-the-art technology, retail and F&B. Experiences include a permanent gallery that showcases artwork inspired by festivals, an ever-changing Japanese maple tree and canopy with more than 5,000 LED lights, and an interactive giant skull covered in 3D projection mapping. It’s also home to Meow Wolf’s Omega Mart.

“It’s a cool space; it’s entertainment, it’s amusement,” Fisher told blooloop. “We are a storytelling company. It’s a word that you hear a lot, though only a few people actually do it with authenticity.”

Opened in 2020, Area15 is already expanding by 20 acres. The anchor tenant will be a year-round eerie experience from Universal Destinations & Experiences inspired by Halloween Horror Nights. In an interview with blooloop, Fisher said the attraction is going to be “incredible and standout”. Halloween Horror Nights, he said, is a “30-year concept that has incredible brand awareness… it’s edgy, it’s cool, it’s fun”. He added: “It’s the right concept to be part of the Area15 district. It’s exciting”.

“We are very strategic about working with really strong partners and delivering on what we promise them and then building from there,” said Fisher. “We couldn’t be happier that Universal chose Area15. And it’s going to drive traffic. Our goal is that everybody who’s in the Area15 ecosystem prospers. We want everyone to be wildly economically successful.”

Fisher is serving as a judge for the 2024 blooloop Innovation Awards. Speaking about the awards in previous years, he said: “This collaboration is rooted in a shared philosophy; to celebrate the projects shaping the future of visitor attractions and immersive experiences.”