Collider is thrilled to announce that award-winning filmmaker, journalist, and editor Rocco Castoro has joined the Collider team as Creative Director of Collider Studios, effective immediately. Castoro will take point on Collider Studios’ mission to develop, license, and distribute premium content. Collider Studios’ initial slate of feature-length documentaries will be announced soon, and this move into the realm of premium content marks yet another expansion of the Collider brand that also includes Collider Video, Collider Games, Collider Sports, and more.

Castoro holds a B.S. in journalism from the University of Florida. He joined VICE Media in 2006 as an editorial assistant and was appointed editor-in-chief in early 2011, a position in which he served until his resignation in 2015. During his tenure, the company received its first National Magazine Award nominations in 2012 (including a nomination in the top category of general excellence), and was granted the PEN Foundation's 2014 Award of Honor for editorial and literary excellence.

Rocco has also hosted, produced, and executive produced a wide variety of content, and has been a featured speaker at Der Spiegel’s Reporterforum, the University of Chicago’s Institute of Politics, Columbia University’s CORE entrepreneurial society, and many other engagements. Stories and films of note include his documentary about the Ku Klux Klan and Crips squaring off over a Confederate statue in Memphis, an investigation of bio-piracy on an infamous Brazilian island that’s home to the most venomous snakes in the world, and a trip to the far reaches of Siberia to meet a man whose thousands of followers believe he is the Second Coming.

“I’m ecstatic to be joining forces with Collider,” Castoro said. “To be part of a team that understands the true meanings of independence and disruption—and how crucial both will be to the success of media and entertainment moving forward—is all I could ever want."

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