Fourth Wall Studios creates content that crosses the traditional barrier between audience and onscreen action, resulting in entertainment experiences that feel more connected, immersive and real.

Founded in 2007 by three award-winning next-generation storytellers, the Culver City-based company develops a wide range of Alternate Reality Entertainment™ properties, delivered via Internet browsers, smartphones, game consoles, TVs, movie screens and in the physical world.

In early 2011, Fourth Wall Studios finalized a $15 million round of financing from visionary Los Angeles-based investor Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong, with access to a fund of up to $200 million to finance individual properties.


Founders

JIM STEWARTSON, CEO & Founder

As the CEO and Founder of Fourth Wall Studios, Jim Stewartson provides the vision, strategy, and business execution for the company.

Stewartson has twenty years’ experience in the innovative development of technology and interactive entertainment.  Prior to Fourth Wall, Stewartson was a founder of 42 Entertainment where he designed, developed and delivered solutions for massive branded entertainment projects including the pioneering alternate reality game, I Love Bees for Halo 2, Vanishing Point for Windows Vista, and Year Zero for Nine Inch Nails.  These projects garnered him a number of prestigious awards including an Innovation Award at the Game Developers Conference, the Grand Prix at the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity, as well as two Webbys. 

Previously, as the President and Founder of Shout Interactive, Stewartson also invented the first commercial 3D game to be delivered over the Web for Star Trek:First Contact, and has headed numerous award-winning online experiences for notable properties including, TitanicLost in Space and Starship Troopers, CNN, Sony, IBM, France Telecom, NBC and the Olympics.

ELAN LEE, Founder & Chief Creative Officer

Elan Lee is the Chief Creative Officer and Founder of Fourth Wall Studios.  Lee heads the studio’s creative concepts from product development to brand identity.

Lee began his career at the Microsoft Game Studio as the lead designer for the Xbox launch portfolio where he also directed the world’s first alternate reality game, The Beast for Steven Spielberg’s thriller A.I.: Artificial Intelligence.  Today, he is considered one of the creators of the ARG genre, and he continues to influence next-generation entertainment as he speaks all over the world.  As a co-founder and Vice President of Design for 42 Entertainment, Lee championed some of the most influential titles intransmedia entertainment such as I Love Bees for Halo 2, and Year Zero for Nine Inch Nails.  

Lee has won awards for Best Web Game of the Year, Best Advertising Campaign of the Year, and Best Idea of the Year.

SEAN STEWART, Founder & Head Writer

As the Head Writer and Founder of Fourth Wall Studios, Sean Stewart is the creative advisor and author of all content-related ideas on projects. 

Prior to Fourth Wall, Stewart was the lead writer on The Beast for Steven Spielberg’s A.I.: Artificial Intelligence.  The revolutionary project was hailed by critics as “the Citizen Kane of online entertainment” and was named Entertainment Weekly’s #1 Website of 2001.  A founder of 42 Entertainment, Stewart has been the head writer on numerous groundbreaking projects in entertainment media, including the Halo 2’s I Love Beescampaign, Nine Inch Nails’ Year Zero and Eagle Eye:Free Fall.  Beyond his distinguished work in online media, Stewart is an award-winning fantasy sci-fi writer with twelve novels to his credit, and is co-author of the New York Times best-selling young adult transmedia novel Cathy’s Book, which was published in twenty countries and spawned two successful sequels. 

For his literary work, Stewart was named the World Fantasy Award-winner for Galveston (2001) and received New York Times Notable Book of the Year selections for both Mockingbird and Resurrection Man

PATRICK SOON-SHIONG M.D., Executive Chairman

Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong has been Executive Chairman of Fourth Wall Studios since February 2011. Through his principal company, NantWorks LLC, Dr. Soon-Shiong holds interests in a wide range of communications, augmented reality, advanced computing and network technologies. The mission of NantWorks is to converge technologies to transform how we work, play and live. Dr. Soon-Shiong, who comes from a medical background, has pioneered revolutionary new therapies for both cancer and diabetes by means of combining medical with engineering and other disciplines. He is passionate about the innovative potential of converging disparate technologies and creative talents. In 2010 he inaugurated the Patrick Soon-Shiong Innovation Awards, a competition open to companies in the Los Angeles area, which he believes is a fount of innovation of all kinds. An enthusiastic Angeleno for over thirty years, Dr. Soon-Shiong is now a part owner of the LA Lakers. The Los Angeles Business Journal recognized him as their 2010 Business Person of the Year.