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AAPRC Weekly: Marcy DeVeaux

Marcy DeVeaux
President and CEO
DVG Communications
Los Angeles CA

Marcy DeVeaux is, to put it in the vernacular, "all that." The public relations veteran is also fairly modest, so she'd probably argue the point. It's an argument she'd likely win because, in addition to being president and CEO of her own West Coast public relations firm, DeVeaux is also working on her doctorate in philosophy and depth psychology. That combination of PR salesmanship and academic profundity would win the argument, but it wouldn't change the facts. She has twice been elected to the board of governors of the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences, representing more than 300 public relations professionals. As head of DVG Communications, the public relations firm she founded in Los Angeles 11 years ago, DeVeaux has shaped campaigns for most of the world's largest entertainment media brands, from Disney and Touchstone Television to CBS, ABC and HBO.

Amazingly enough, DeVeaux's long list of accomplishments started with, as she puts it, a complete fluke. "I would love to say I had this great plan and had this incredible desire to be a publicist and work in television, but none of that was true," says DeVeaux. "My undergraduate degree is in art history and philosophy."

Throughout her college career at a small, multidisciplinary school in Massachusetts, Bradford College (the 197-year-old school went out of business in 2000), DeVeaux's family regularly asked, "What the hell are you going to do with that?" whenever the topic turned to her major. DeVeaux considered both photography and short story writing, but in the end, could not decide. By the time she graduated, she wanted to know what the hell she was going to do too. Luckily, she landed a position as an assistant at a notinsignificant public television station in Boston––WGBH.

DeVeaux's boss was the vicepresident and general manager of the station and took an interest in her career path. He suggested she might be interested in producing, but she disagreed. "He said 'well, I think you need to be exposed to television. So if you agree to spend a year as my assistant I will expose you to every aspect of television and then in a year come back and tell me what it is you don't want to do,'" DeVeaux says recalling that first conversation with the man who would become her mentor. "At the end of the year as the assistant I went in and said 'David, I really like the public relations team.'"

Her boss was incredulous. He knew nothing about public relations other than it was a line item in his production budget. Still he supported DeVeaux's decision and she applied for a job in publicity. She was told her chances were slim, that there was rarely turnover in the department. "About two months later they started a new series on the Vietnam War ['Vietnam: A Television History']," says DeVeaux. "I interviewed and got the job and immediately following that they started a new series called 'Frontline.'"

DeVeaux spent seven years working on national campaigns for the documentaries of "Frontline," one of the nation's most respected news programs and winner of countless awards over its 20-plus-year run, including some 29 Emmys and a Pulitzer Prize. "It was a great, great time to cut your teeth, to really learn about down-in-the-gutter publicity because we had no money," says DeVeaux. "When I took the job in publicity, I knew I had a lot to learn but I knew it was right and I could do it and it was going to be a big transition and stepping stone for me."

Her intuition proved correct. Starting as a publicity assistant at WGBH in 1982, DeVeaux worked her way through the ranks––to publicity associate, junior publicist and senior publicist. Along the way she ran the gauntlet. "I think the biggest challenge for me was learning the politics," she remembers. "We were working on a show that had an enormous spotlight on it…Because investigative journalism had kind of left television and was only being done with print, to start a new series of investigative pieces was pretty wild."

She also had to acclimate herself to pitching. "I was very green but I was always a good talker…That part of it wasn't so difficult once you make those first couple of cold calls and you get a really grumpy journalist on the other side and you just keep talking and they don't hang up. Then you think, okay, I can do this."

In 1986, in the midst of her tenure at WGBH, DeVeaux was handed a project of historic proportions, one of her career highpoints––"Eyes On the Prize." WGBH was the presenting station for the acclaimed 14-part series on the American Civil Rights movement, but the project was being produced by Blackside, Inc., one of the country's oldest minority-owned film and television production companies. Producer Henry Hampton and the team at Blackside worked on the series for 12 years, and when it was time for the publicity campaign for "Eyes On the Prize" to get underway, WGBH and "Frontline" loaned DeVeaux to the project. She spent a year with Blackside leading up to the program's 1987 television debut.

DeVeaux recalls the biggest moment for her on the campaign, during the television critics' press tour in Los Angeles: "There was this big dinner with Julian Bond and all of these high powered people…all these civil rights people and people who had been out on the front lines and on the streets and the journalists who had covered it and I thought 'Wow! This is amazing.' That was probably one pivotal moment when I was struck, absolutely struck by the great fortune I had to be in the room."

"Eyes on the Prize" went on to make history as well as document it, receiving more than 23 awards, including two Emmys. By the time DeVeaux left WGBH in 1988, she'd worked with everyone from astronauts to legendary New York Times journalist Seymour Hersh. She loved the work, but the weather in Boston had worn her down. After one particularly brutal winter––she recounts shoveling her car out of the snow four times in one day––she applied for a position at KQED, the PBS station in San Francisco.

DeVeaux had fallen in love with San Francisco during a business trip the previous winter, and happily moved to the West Coast. In her new, warmer, life, she was public relations manager for two television stations (KQED had a VHF and a UHF station), a radio station (KQED-FM) and a monthly magazine called San Francisco Focus. "I only stayed there a year, but it was an incredible year," says DeVeaux. "I learned a lot, mostly about myself and grace under pressure. San Francisco was a wild town in that it's probably the only town I know where a group or an organization can pull a picket line together at lunchtime. Literally, every day we had pickets."

DeVeaux enjoyed her stint in San Francisco but the station was having financial issues and when an opportunity arose for her to work directly for PBS, she took it. DeVeaux moved to Los Angeles as director of corporate communications for PBS' West Coast office. For five years she directed campaigns for just about everything PBS aired, from "Masterpiece Theatre" to the fuzzy animals of "Sesame Street." There was also a good deal of corporate messaging and rubbing elbows with Hollywood. After five years, DeVeaux realized she was comfortable––too comfortable. "Everyone I reported to was on the East Coast. I pretty much had carte blanche to do what I wanted. I had a budget. It was so comfortable it was scary," says DeVeaux of the decision to start her own firm. "I was afraid that I would wake up one day and realize I hadn't had any new experiences…that I wouldn't grow professionally or personally without the challenge."

In 1993, with her first client in hand, the Walt Disney Company, DeVeaux gave notice and struck out on her own with DVG Communications. "I didn't know anything about running a business, but I have really good instincts," says DeVeaux. "Those first couple of years, while they were a little dicey, it was very challenging and an enormous amount of fun. It was also very successful."

From that first project for Disney, a television series called "Where I Live," DeVeaux and DVG went on to build a world-class client roster: Columbia Tristar Television; "Moesha;" ABC; CBS; UPN; The WB; HBO; Lifetime; PBS and many more. DVG launched the first season of the popular drama "Soul Food," and corporate projects included Nike, UNCF and the opening of the first Magic Johnson Starbuck's in Los Angeles. Currently, DeVeaux is most excited about DVG's work with a staff diversity initiative started by the networks.

After 11 years, though, DeVeaux is preparing for the next thing. She is a full-time doctoral student at Pacifica Graduate Institute, and eventually hopes to teach and work as a diversity trainer. Not only does DeVeaux feel the pull of academia, she also feels the strain of certain economic realities. "The television industry has changed dramatically…There are so many companies now that have absorbed each other…There's still X amount of PR companies but not a lot of work," DeVeaux points out. "I did not marry and did not have children. I consider this company as my baby, and I'm about to send it off to college."

DeVeaux, who remains close with her parents and a sister and brother, lives in Los Angeles and relishes the time she spends traveling with close friends. "We travel together. We go to exotic locations and hang out. I have a great life and I truly enjoy it."


AAPRC's Mission
The African-American Public Relations Collective (AAPRC) is an assemblage of professionals who provide communication conduits among clients, journalists, media and our communities. We come together as a collective because we recognize the importance of building those same conduits amongst ourselves.

A great deal of what we do is professional development––updating our skills, keeping pace with technology, refining and streamlining processes, providing a forum to tackle the issues that impact our work environment––but we believe our professional lives benefit most from the forging of effective alliances. Connected to one another, we possess the power of a nationwide body of committed, knowledgeable practitioners with an eye on the future.

As we move into the 21st century at lightning speed, mass media and its potent messages occupy an ever-larger part of our daily lives and our collective psyche. The AAPRC is focused on helping our members gain a deeper understanding of media's force and supporting their growth as powerful participants in the global communications network.

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