Access: The hands-on investor with a Hollywood side-hustle
"Their products terrify me so much, I had to invest." - Ryan Reynolds
Hello reader,
Welcome to the 11th edition of Access, a day later than usual as we had a company off-site yesterday.
In honour of the growing Oscars buzz, this week’s Access is unashamedly star-struck, featuring a curated selection of interviews from acting royalty, as well as everyone’s favourite actor-turned-investor (and co-owner of Wrexham AFC), Ryan Reynolds.
Deadpool star Reynolds needs no introduction - he’s a superstar on the big screen and a box-office favourite. But off-camera, Reynolds is also an investor and entrepreneur with a portfolio that spans alcoholic spirits, mobile network operations, marketing, production, technology, investment management services, and with fellow actor Rob McElhenny, a Welsh football team.⚽
On the surface, it’s a mixed bag of investments - disparate enough that it made us curious about the guy who seems to take more than a passing interest in the businesses he invests in (and right now, can do no wrong). What we realised when we took a closer look, is that Reynolds brings an impressive energy, creativity, and passion to all his projects, on-screen and off.
Until next time -
Liz & Melissa
In case you missed it…
Last week’s newsletter included our favourite responses in celebration of Thanksgiving.
Our In-Depth section featured Robin Saluoks, the climate entrepreneur transforming agriculture technology.
FEATURING:
This week's best interviews
After 40-years making movies, Michelle Yeoh on realising she’s “finally” cool at 60
The AV Club talks to Janelle Monáe about Glass Onion, Grace Jones, and 'forecasting what the culture needs'
Everyone’s favourite comeback king Brendan Fraser, and star of critically acclaimed drama The Whale, on trauma & transformation.
In-depth: Ryan Reynolds is the entrepreneur and angel investor who also happens to be a Hollywood actor.
IN BRIEF
"…I’ve learned some things over the years, and I’m more clever and smarter in how I can sustain my stamina. I’m as fit as I was before, because I know how to look after myself much better than when I was younger."
After 40-years making movies, Michelle Yeoh on realising she’s “finally” cool at 60.
***
“As the actor, you have to own this role. You have to live with the role. You have to breathe it. You have to dream it. You have to have an intimate relationship with the character that you’re playing."
The AV Club talks to Janelle Monáe about Glass Onion, Grace Jones, and 'forecasting what the culture needs'.
[Janelle Monáe commands attention]
***
“When we finished, I felt like, “If this doesn’t land with an audience, then I don’t know what I’m doing.” Because I don’t have any other moves. I gave everything that I thought I knew how to do.”
Everyone’s favourite comeback king, and star of critically acclaimed drama The Whale, on trauma & transformation.
[Brendan Fraser talks to Freddie Prinze Jr.]
IN-DEPTH
“I love constraint. I love doing more with less. It forces your imagination to expand. It forces you to tell stories in different ways.”
Without doubt, Ryan Reynolds is best known for his role as mercenary and anti-hero, Deadpool. Fans of the franchise will know that the road to its creation was not a straightforward one. Reynolds tried to get the movie made for a decade before he was finally given budget, and even then resources were limited. When Twentieth Century Fox expressed reservations about the movie’s box-office potential, Reynolds partnered with studio marketing exec George Dewey to shoot a series of headline-grabbing promotional materials (remember the bearskin rug?) and Deadpool ended up becoming the biggest R-rated film of all time.
“They finally reluctantly agreed to make the movie at a budget that was just kind of almost impossible to do a proper, modern-day comic book film. So, we had to think outside the box. We had to really kind of find ways to make each dollar look like ten, and that extended right through to marketing, which is sort of how I fell in love with marketing.”
Reynolds and Dewey co-founded production company and digital marketing agency Maximum Effort in 2018 and early ad campaigns included promotions particularly for Deadpool 2. But Reynolds didn’t stop investing there. Year on year, his investment portfolio has grown. He bought a stake in Aviation Gin (a spirits company) in 2018, ownership stake in Mint Mobile (a wireless company) in 2019, and partnered with fellow actor Rob McElhenney to purchase Wrexham Association Football Club in 2020. In 2021, Reynolds was part of an investor group led by Greylock Partners that invested in Wealthsimple, an investment management service. After the marketing arm of Maximum Effort was acquired by MNTN software, Reynolds invested in tech start-up Bended Spoon and took an equity stake in FuboTV, announcing a partnership to launch Maximum Effort Network.
Reynolds sits in a very interesting intersection between culture and business. His interest and passion in marketing has seemingly stemmed from necessity - promoting the Deadpool movies - and evolved into a collection of businesses and a new avenue of creativity for the actor.
“Before Deadpool, I had never looked at promotion as anything other than obligatory. But what I realized was that it can actually be creatively satisfying. And a lot of fun—not just for me, but for the audience.”
On storytelling
“Whether you're talking about the unexpected nature of sports, low-cost wireless, gin, connected TV marketing, ad tech… the connective tissue between each one of those things is, ironically, storytelling, the same way it is with movies. That's the thing I love about these businesses and the variety of them.”
On audience impact
“Deadpool 1 never would’ve been made if it wasn’t for the outpouring of demand from audiences across all social media platforms and that’s quite legitimately what got the movie greenlighted. There’s authorship there, and ownership over that triumph."
“Necessity is truly the mother of invention and Deadpool is I think one of the most interesting IP’s out there because it really meets that intersection of viral marketing and traditional fan-favourite superheroes”
On diverse perspectives
“The folks that are behind the camera are a huge engine, a huge part of storytelling and how we tell stories. And the more diverse the perspective is, the more complicated and interesting, and the more variety we have in that wellspring of talent we have behind the camera, the better stories we tell.”
On access to opportunities
“I want to make the marketing industry better. I want to make it more diverse with creatives. There are so many young people out there who come from overlooked, marginalized, or historically discriminated against communities that haven't been offered, or even knew, that there was a chance to work in marketing or showbiz or… much less a path to get there.”
“Do I want to be the best at what I do? Absolutely. I won't know if I'm the best at what I do unless everybody is allowed to play.”
On Maximum Effort
“[W]e have a lot of fun – half the time we’re sitting in our creative little think circles and we’re just laughing ourselves to death… We want to lead innovation in the marketing space, tech space, and product growth, and will scale to a certain degree to get there, but feel quite strongly about staying scrappy.”
On creating adverts
“There’s something fascinating to me about creating a piece of content that’s shareable and acknowledges quite nakedly that it’s an ad. And it’s certainly more honest.”
“I was a kid who had a lot of anxiety, a lot of phobias and issues I had to work through. It took me a long time to recognise those things as assets as opposed to liabilities.”
On building his career
“It was very slow and steady… I’m grateful for that kind of momentum being very sort of snail’s pace as opposed to like a rocket ship…I was able to assimilate in way that most people aren’t really offered. Everything is all or nothing in Hollywood. I got lucky and somehow managed to find that middle ground where I was able to slowly build my career.”
On getting older
“The great gift about getting older is you become more and more comfortable with sucking at something. If I’m looking through the lens of: this has to have perfection right off the bat, it becomes a law of diminishing returns. When you allow yourself to be bad at something, it really gives yourself permission to be good at it as well.”
“I'm not an innovator in that way. You know, I don't invent gin. I didn't invent low-cost wireless. These are companies that had tremendous potential and really just needed awareness.”
On leadership
“I believe in film and any endeavour to be a process of collaboration. I think you always have to listen and always ask for help. The best leaders are the people who hire the best people – hire the people you connect with, the people you love, the people that you can learn from.”
On resonating with his investment
“Having skin in the game leads to authenticity and authorship over what you do and creates a level of care that you would have if you worked for a company, rather than just being told what to do.”
“I think everything that I'm involved in, I'm red-lining the engine in terms of passion. I mean, every part of me is invested.”
On acquiring Wrexham AFC
“It's an emotional investment so much more than a business investment. I mean, that's not a business you get into if you're looking to create insane EBITDA or something. You know, like, it's much more emotional than that. And it's been an incredible ride.”
On his passion for football
“Sports is storytelling and storytelling is what makes sports so compelling, you don’t just care about your team, you care about that player that overcame this and that incredibly adverse and difficult challenge in order to be standing on that field that day. I’m really interested in that aspect of storytelling through the lens of sports.”
On his investment strategy
“I think you have to have an authentic connection. I don’t want to just be the guy who is acquiring crap just to acquire crap. Otherwise the consumers of that product are going to know that I don’t have the same sort of fluency with whatever the product is. I have to have a connection with it, if I don’t, there’s no point… I think it’s got to be about quality and also to some degree, something that is also inspiring and entertaining and fun and doesn’t take itself too seriously.”
Sources
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