the team
Stephen S. Monas
Steve Monas graduated from Columbia University School of Law in 1981, and like many of his classmates headed to Wall Street, where he spent the first two years of his career drafting deals for municipal bonds and mortgage-backed securities at the law firm of Brown, Wood, Ivey, Mitchell & Petty. In 1983, Steve abandoned the world of high finance for the prospect of a career in entertainment law, and spent the next three years at New York law firms Frankfurt Garbus Klein & Selz and Pavia & Harcourt.
Steve’s big break into the film industry came in 1986, when he was offered an in-house Business Affairs position at Stamford, Connecticut-based Vestron Video, at the time the largest home video distributor in the world. Vestron’s chairman Austin Furst was in the process of converting the company into an independent studio powerhouse, with its own production, theatrical distribution, and international reach. Vestron’s first production was a modestly budgeted period drama that became the largest-grossing independent picture of its time: Dirty Dancing, starring Patrick Swayze and Jennifer Grey.
The success of Dirty Dancing ultimately led Steve to move his family to Los Angeles, where he served as Vestron Pictures’ Vice President of Business Affairs. Following Vestron’s untimely demise in 1989, Steve joined international sales agency Vision International, ultimately rising to the position of President, and also serving as Executive Vice President of Business Affairs for Vision’s affiliate MDP Worldwide. While at MDP, Steve also enjoyed a brief but colorful acting career, starring as the Karaoke Guy in Trey Parker and Matt Stone’s Orgazmo (1998).
Steve returned to the practice of law in 1999, founding Business Affairs, Inc. with partner Jenna Sanz-Agero, and with their former employer MDP Worldwide as their sole client. BAI’s client list has since grown to include some of the most respected names in the motion picture and television industries, and Steve has represented producers, distributors and financiers in every aspect of the entertainment business. Attorneys trained by Steve occupy posts as creative, legal and Business Affairs executives at the highest levels of major studios, streamers and entertainment law firms.
Not content to rest on his laurels, Steve currently advises clients on deals large and small, focusing on film financing, production and distribution. He has served as production counsel on numerous films for Lucasfilm, Netflix, Paramount and many others; has supervised the acquisition and delivery of over 1,000 features for Lionsgate subsidiary Grindstone Entertainment; and represents clients as diverse as Will Smith’s Westbrook Entertainment, Charles King’s MACRO, and Jeffrey Soros’ Los Angeles Media Fund on development of new pictures and projects. Steve is co-author of The Essential Guide to Entertainment Law, and is a frequent speaker at Loyola Law School, Southwestern Law School, the Beverly Hills Bar Association, South by Southwest Film Festival and other venues.
Rob McEntegart
Rob McEntegart has over 25 years of experience in content production and exploitation, specializing in the business affairs of development, production, financing, and distribution for features, television series, and digital content. Rob served as Senior Executive Vice President, Motion Picture Group, for Lionsgate during the development, production and release of The Hunger Games, and was responsible for overseeing the division’s business and legal affairs. Prior to Lionsgate, Rob was Executive Vice President of Business Affairs for Mandate Pictures and Ghost House Pictures, Mandate’s joint venture with Sam Raimi. At Mandate, Rob was responsible for development and production business and legal affairs, and he negotiated distribution and production deals with Universal, New Line, the CW, Fox Searchlight, Miramax, Summit, as well as a four-picture deal with Sony.
Rob has proven expertise with deals for rights, talent, production personnel, and financing and distribution of entertainment content, especially for feature films and television/SVOD series. At BAI, Rob negotiates on behalf of producers and content companies for rights and the services of major talent, including film directors and TV showrunners, applying his years of experience to the successful acquisition of rights in screenplays, fiction and non-fiction books, comic books, video games, and remake and life story rights. He has been the architect of many very complex rights and talent deal structures and profit participation arrangements tailored to suit different business models.
The over 100 feature films and TV projects which Rob has worked on include productions directed or produced by Ridley Scott, Terrence Malick, Sam Raimi, Tim Burton, David Fincher and the Coen Brothers. A partial (and non-chronological) list includes Calls (TV), The Last Full Measure, Shirley, Pitch Perfect 2, Tales of the City (TV), Juno, Stranger Than Fiction, Harold & Kumar, The Grudge, The Lincoln Lawyer, The Thin Red Line, Barton Fink, Alien 3, Die Hard 2, Edward Scissorhands, The Apostle, Home Alone, and many more. See IMDb for a more complete list.
Rob has been a speaker or guest lecturer at UCLA, the L.A. County Bar Association, Film Independent and Chapman University, focusing on the development, packaging and financing of feature films and TV series, profit participation structures for different business models, and content distribution deals.
Jenna Sanz-Agero
Jenna Sanz-Agero is an experienced business affairs executive, broad-based advisor, and legal strategist helping companies scale by doing more with less. With almost thirty years in the entertainment business, Jenna has a “30,000-foot view” that shapes her approach to dealmaking. Jenna’s strengths include negotiating complex talent, rights and backend deals, and bridging the communication divide between legal professionals and their cross-functional partners.
As the head of Strategic Knowledge Management at Netflix, Jenna worked with Business and Legal Affairs teams in all Content verticals, including film, series, animation, nonfiction/documentary, music, marketing and gaming. Jenna also drove dealmaking policies and helped distill complex subject-matter expertise from internal partners (e.g., litigation, labor, employment, regulatory compliance, privacy, etc.) into usable guidance for deal negotiations. Prior to Netflix, Jenna was the Chief Operating Officer and EVP of Business & Legal Affairs for global startup The H Collective, Inc. She has held a variety of senior business affairs and legal positions throughout the past few decades. Jenna has launched start-ups, and negotiated M&A transactions within the entertainment media space, representing major corporate clients and independent film producers, distributors, sales agents, and financiers in a broad range relating to motion picture and television acquisition, development, production, finance and worldwide distribution of projects at every budget level.
In the midst of all that corporate stuff, Jenna also recorded three albums, toured the world as the lead singer of all-female rock band Vixen, authored and published a dessert cookbook, and executive produced a couple of feature films. Jenna is thrilled to be Of Counsel to BAI, a firm she co-founded with Steve Monas in 1999.
Rachel Monas
Rachel Monas officially joined Business Affairs, Inc. as a first-year associate in 2020, though her career at BAI began long before that. In 2001, Rachel’s first-ever job was answering phones at BAI’s original offices on Sunset Plaza. Convinced that she would never be an attorney like her father (see Steve Monas, above), Rachel soon set off for college at UCLA before transferring to Wesleyan University in Connecticut, where she received a Bachelor of Arts in Art History in 2007. Post-college, Rachel began working at nonprofit organizations supporting arts and education, fighting human trafficking, and educating and counseling growing families. Later, Rachel started her own business supporting new parents as a birth and postpartum doula in Berkeley, California. It was at that time that she became interested in advocacy and decided to shift her career to law.
Rachel returned to BAI/IW in 2017 as a Film Delivery Intern at IndieWorks, LLC, hoping to better understand the entertainment law business. She enrolled at Loyola Law School of Los Angeles that fall, where she combined entertainment and business law courses with her passion for public interest work. Rachel had several valuable internships during law school, including at the LevittQuinn Nonprofit Family Law Center in Los Angeles, the National Center for Youth Law in Oakland, and (of course) BAI. In addition, she felt privileged to spend a semester as an extern for the Honorable R. Gary Klausner, U.S. District Court, Central District of California. On campus, Rachel served as Co-Chair of the Public Interest Law Foundation and participated in legal aid clinics, including Loyola’s Youth Justice Education Clinic. Upon graduation, Rachel happily rejoined BAI as an associate where, in addition to learning the business and servicing clients, Rachel channels her public interest spirit into expanding BAI’s pro bono program.
Max Newman
Max Newman is a third-year associate at Business Affairs, Inc., where he works with producers, distributors, and financiers throughout the lifecycles of motion picture and television projects. Max first joined the BAI team in 2017 as a contracts administrator, during which time he reviewed motion picture legal delivery on behalf of various film distributors. Max briefly left the firm to attend law school, receiving his J.D. from Loyola Law School in 2021. At Loyola, Max was an Entertainment Law Fellow, served as a staffer on the Entertainment Law Review Journal, and was a research assistant for Professor Jay Dougherty. During law school Max interned in the business and legal affairs departments of FilmNation Entertainment, The H Collective, Stampede Entertainment, and at BAI’s affiliate IndieWorks, LLC. Max received his B.A. in Economics and a Minor in Communications from Hamilton College. Max’s hobbies include playing basketball, traveling, watching films and television series, playing videogames, hiking, and searching for the best ice cream shop in Los Angeles.
Austen Au
Austen Au joined Business Affairs, Inc. as a first-year associate in 2021. He represents a variety of clients in the development, financing, production, and distribution of audiovisual projects, and also assists clients in the formation and dissolution of their corporate entities.
Austen graduated from the University of California, Riverside with a B.A. in English before obtaining his J.D. from Loyola Law School. During law school, Austen interned at Glaser Weil, Universal Pictures, The H Collective, and two small private firms where he handled several entertainment and intellectual property matters. He also served as a technical editor on the Loyola of Los Angeles Law Review, research assistant to Barbara M. Rubin, and Vice President of the Intellectual Property & Cybersecurity Law Society. Additionally, with an interest in giving back to the community, Austen served as a mock trial coach and mentor to students in primary and secondary schools through the Prime Time Trials Program and Young Lawyers Program, respectively.
Austen enjoys spending his free time watching and playing all kinds of sports, including basketball, tennis, snowboarding and mixed martial arts, watching newly released films and television series, and trying new restaurants.
the management team
Maggie Megaw
Executive Vice President of Business Affairs, Inc., Maggie was there at the start in 1999 and has run the business side of BAI as it has grown from a backyard operation to its current stature as a nationally-recognized entertainment law firm. Maggie spearheaded the creation of the IndieWorks division of BAI in 2010, nurtured its development over the past decade, and coordinated its 2020 transition from division to stand-alone company, of which she is very proud. Maggie’s focus today is on shepherding BAI as it transitions to being a fully remote operation and preparing it for the challenges ahead.
Imelda “Imeeh” Candido
Imeeh started at Business Affairs Inc. in November 2015 after three decades in real estate, and quickly made herself indispensable to the operations of the company. Hers is the voice you are likely to hear when you call our offices, and Imeeh is unfailingly friendly and helpful. She also keeps everyone in the company in line! Imeeh received her Paralegal Certificate in 2013, and on behalf of our clients she annually handles the filings of hundreds of UCC-1s, Copyright Registrations, Copyright Recordations, Articles of Organization, Statements of Information, and more. The lights of Imeeh’s life are her grandsons Aiden, Bryant, and Asher and Imeeh’s family, friends, and church are her anchors.
Caroline Clements
Caroline Clements joined Business Affairs, Inc. as CFO in September 2020. Caroline began her career on Wall Street, but has long since discovered how much more she prefers harnessing her financial expertise to power enterprises she believes in. She now has 20 years of experience working with large, small, and non-profit companies. Caroline brings a deep knowledge of financial best practices to BAI and IndieWorks, a well-rounded set of finance skills, and a commitment to transparency.
When she’s not crunching numbers, Caroline enjoys spending time with her husband — usually playing backgammon — or working in the garden. She can also be found meditating, coloring or chatting with her children as they navigate college and the art of adulting.
Anna Monas
Anna’s time at Business Affairs started back in the early days, filling in answering phones on Sunset Plaza followed by a stint creating LLC binders in the Westwood office. For most of her professional career, she worked in education both as a museum teacher and then for 14 years in classrooms. After a challenging but rewarding 9 years of working as a special education teacher she joined Business Affairs in September of 2022. She is thrilled to be part of the family business and to finally understand what Steve, Maggie, and Rachel have been talking about at the dinner table all these years.
