Brian Robbins is President and Chief Executive Officer of Paramount Pictures and Nickelodeon. As President & CEO of Paramount Pictures, Robbins oversees the filmed entertainment division’s creative strategy and worldwide business operations including Paramount Pictures, Paramount Animation, Paramount Home Entertainment, Paramount Pictures International, Paramount Licensing Inc., and Paramount Studio Group. In this role, he is focused on driving Paramount’s multi-platform strategy and theatrical success through a diversified portfolio of films. Robbins is also at the forefront of securing strategic filmmaker partnerships to expand the studio’s global franchise business across live-action features, animation, consumer products and themed entertainment.
Since taking the helm of the studio in 2021, Robbins has expanded and reinvigorated beloved franchises like Sonic the Hedgehog, A Quiet Place, Transformers, Scream, PAW Patrol and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, with the latter two earning a combined $2.5B in consumer products revenue in 2023 alone. Under Robbins’ tenure, Paramount Pictures has to-date earned nearly $5B in worldwide box office gross, and boasted thirteen #1 hits including Top Gun: Maverick, the studio’s biggest film ever. Also among these are Smile and Mean Girls, which were both originally slated for streaming debuts before Robbins moved them to highly successful theatrical releases. Smile went on to be the #1 original horror film of 2022, and Mean Girls has surpassed $100M in worldwide box office. Most recently, Robbins oversaw the release of the music biopic Bob Marley: One Love, which opened to #1 at the domestic box office, holds the record for the biggest-ever Valentine’s Day mid-week opening, and crossed $100M at the worldwide box office in only ten days of release.
Under Robbins’ leadership, 2022 saw Paramount Pictures most successful year in more than a decade. With more than $2.6B at the global box office and nine Oscar® nominations, the studio celebrated six No. 1 hits across genres; its biggest film ever and the highest-grossing film of the year, Top Gun: Maverick; the No. 1 original horror movie of the year in Smile, which earned more than $217M in worldwide box office gross; as well as the highest-grossing movie ever based on a video game with Sonic the Hedgehog 2. Through Robbins’ stewardship, Paramount Pictures also emerged from the pandemic as an industry leader, sticking to its theatrical release dates and demonstrating that success at the box office leads to a stronger performance in streaming.
As President & CEO of Nickelodeon, Robbins has global oversight of all creative, strategic, and business operations for Paramount Global’s kids and young-adult focused brands, where he has overseen the continued growth of SpongeBob SquarePants into a full multiplatform franchise spanning television, theatricals and consumer products; the similar strategic expansion of PAW Patrol; plus a wealth of original series and specials across animation, live action and digital drawing from Nickelodeon’s storied history of premier and groundbreaking kids’ content.
As Chief Content Officer, Movies & Kids & Family, Paramount+, Robbins is responsible for growing the service’s global portfolio of live-action and animated kids and family programming, both episodic and film. These programs include PAW Patrol, SpongeBob SquarePants, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Monster High.
Robbins first joined the organization in 2017 as the first President of Paramount Players, after which he became President of Nickelodeon in 2018, and then President, Kids & Family Entertainment, for ViacomCBS (now Paramount). Prior to establishing Paramount Players, Robbins was the Founder & CEO of the multiplatform media company Awesomeness, which developed such unprecedented influence among Gen Z viewers that it was acquired, first, by DreamWorks Animation in 2013, and then by Viacom, in 2018.
Robbins began his career as a prolific producer of television, film, and digital media, and is best known for executive producing popular and critical television hits aimed at teens and young audiences, including the long-running CW series Smallville and One Tree Hill; Nickelodeon’s “All That” and “Kenan and Kel”; Disney Channel’s “So Random”; and Spike TV’s “Blue Mountain State”. He also produced the popular WB series “What I Like About You” and HBO’s “Arli$$”. In the feature film world, his directing and producing credits include Varsity Blues, Hardball and Coach Carter, among many others.
Robbins is a board member of the Motion Picture Association; a member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences; sits on the board of trustees for the AFI and is the recipient of a Directors Guild Award, a Peabody Award, and the Pioneer Prize from the International Academy of Television Arts and Sciences.