Pacific Council Board Co-Chairs, Robert W. Lovelace and Arthur J. Ochoa, invite you to an extraordinary evening celebrating 30 years of Pacific Council’s global engagement and the power of storytelling to shape our world.

This year, we proudly recognize fellow Board Director Teddy Schwarzman, the visionary President and CEO of Black Bear Pictures, and Ailsa Chang, the award-winning host of NPR’s All Things Considered, for their outstanding contributions to media and global affairs. Through their storytelling and leadership, they have informed, inspired, and ignited vital conversations on the most pressing issues of our time.

Gather with fellow members, thought leaders, and our Interim President and CEO, Dr. Jerrold D. Green, for an evening of inspiration, critical dialogue, and recognition of exceptional contributions to global discourse. In today’s rapidly evolving world, the Pacific Council’s mission is more essential than ever—creating space for meaningful conversations and expert insights that drive change.

Don’t miss this extraordinary night of celebration and impact!

PURCHASE TICKETS OR DONATE

Honoree and Guest Speaker

Teddy Schwarzman serves as CEO of Black Bear Pictures, the award-winning, multi-faceted media company. Under Schwarzman’s leadership, Black Bear produces, finances, and distributes film and television content around the world, including in the UK and Canada where Black Bear releases films directly. Black Bear also represents select clients through its bespoke management arm and produces premium documentary content via joint venture Double Agent.

A driving creative force behind more than forty feature films, Schwarzman’s producing credits include such acclaimed films as The Imitation Game, starring Benedict Cumberbatch, nominated for eight Academy Awards including Best Picture, Mudbound, nominated for four Academy Awards, Sing Sing, starring Colman Domingo, nominated this year for three Academy Awards, and Nyad, starring Annette Bening and Jodie Foster, nominated last year for two Academy Awards. Schwarzman also produced I Care A Lot, which won the Golden Globe for Best Actress, Comedy/Musical, and All Is Lost, which earned a Golden Globe nomination for Best Actor.

Other releases include GameStop short squeeze biopic Dumb Money; horror sensation Longlegs; and WWII action-comedy The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare. Schwarzman is also an executive producer on the documentary October 8, currently in release, that examines the explosion of antisemitism on college campuses, social media, and in the streets of America beginning the day after the October 7, 2023 attack on Israel by Hamas.

Schwarzman oversees Black Bear’s distribution capacities across Canada and the UK where it has released over 400 titles, including such recent films as Best Picture winners Anora, Everything Everywhere All At Once and Moonlight, BAFTA Best Picture winner Conclave, and Academy Award nominees Sing Sing and The Brutalist.

A past recipient of Variety’s V500, highlighting the 500 most influential business leaders shaping the global media industry, Schwarzman is a member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, the British Academy of Film and Television Arts, and the Producers Guild of America. In addition to serving on the Board of the Pacific Council on International Policy, Schwarzman serves on the Board of the Schwarzman Scholars – a one-year, fully-funded master’s program based at Tsinghua University in Beijing, the Leadership Cabinet of Cedars-Sinai’s Board of Governors, the Board of the Gotham Film & Media Institute, and is an honorary Board of Visitors member at Duke University School of Law, where Schwarzman earned his Juris Doctor.

Honoree and Guest Speaker

Ailsa Chang is an award-winning journalist who hosts All Things Considered along with Ari Shapiro, Mary Louise Kelly and Juana Summers. She landed in public radio after practicing law for a few years. Chang is a former Planet Money correspondent, where she got to geek out on the law while covering the underground asylum industry in the largest Chinatown in America, privacy rights in the cell phone age, the government's doomed fight to stop racist trademarks, and the money laundering case federal agents built against one of President Trump's top campaign advisers.

Previously, she was a congressional correspondent with NPR's Washington Desk. She covered battles over healthcare, immigration, gun control, executive branch appointments, and the federal budget. Chang started out as a radio reporter in 2009, and has since earned a string of national awards for her work. In 2012, she was honored with the Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University Silver Baton for her investigation into the New York City Police Department's "stop-and-frisk" policy and allegations of unlawful marijuana arrests by officers. The series also earned honors from Investigative Reporters and Editors and the Society of Professional Journalists.

She was also the recipient of the Daniel Schorr Journalism Award, a National Headliner Award, and an honor from Investigative Reporters and Editors for her investigation on how Detroit's broken public defender system leaves lawyers with insufficient resources to effectively represent their clients.

In 2011, the New York State Associated Press Broadcasters Association named Chang as the winner of the Art Athens Award for General Excellence in Individual Reporting for radio. In 2015, she won a National Journalism Award from the Asian American Journalists Association for her coverage of Capitol Hill.

Prior to coming to NPR, Chang was an investigative reporter at NPR Member station WNYC from 2009 to 2012 in New York City, focusing on criminal justice and legal affairs. She was a Kroc fellow at NPR from 2008 to 2009, as well as a reporter and producer for NPR Member station KQED in San Francisco.

The former lawyer served as a law clerk to Judge John T. Noonan Jr. on the United States Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit in San Francisco.

Chang graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Stanford University where she received her bachelor's degree.

She earned her law degree with distinction from Stanford Law School, where she won the Irving Hellman Jr. Special Award for the best piece written by a student in the Stanford Law Review in 2001.

Chang was also a Fulbright Scholar at Oxford University, where she received a master's degree in media law. She also has a master's degree in journalism from Columbia University.

She grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area, where she never got to have a dog. But now she's the proud mama of Mickey Chang, a shih tzu who enjoys slapping high-fives and mingling with senators.

PURCHASE TICKETS OR DONATE