Sony Pictures Promotes Tahra Grant to Chief Communications Officer

Sony Pictures Entertainment has promoted Tahra Grant to EVP and chief communications officer.

She will take the place of Bob Lawson, who is moving to Tokyo after being promoted to lead corporate communications for all of Sony Group in February. Grant joined SPE in 2016 as head of corporate communications for the company’s motion picture group, reporting to Lawson.

“With her strong relationships and partnership with [motion picture group chairman/CEO] Tom Rothman and our MPG leadership, Tahra has strengthened the narrative around the vitality, sustainability and forward-looking strategies of our motion picture business, while navigating some of the most complicated industry events of our time, including the COVID pandemic and the historic double strikes last year,” Sony Pictures chairman/CEO Tony Vinciquerra said in a memo announcing the promotion on Monday.

Grant previously worked with Lawson at the New York-based PR firm Rubenstein Communications before being brought over to Sony by him. At Rubenstein, Grant represented prominent New York institutions and clients across film, television, arts and culture in corporate communications, publicity and broad strategic counsel capacities including the Tribeca Film Festival, Tribeca Enterprises, the Metropolitan Opera, the “Hunger Games” franchise and many others.

Over the past eight years, she has overseen the communications strategy for a variety of hit films for Sony Pictures, including Quentin Tarantino’s “Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood,” the “Jumanji” revival series and a plethora of “Spider-Man” films and spin-offs, from the Marvel Studios-produced trilogy starring Tom Holland to the animated “Spider-Verse” saga.

Grant and Lawson’s promotions come as Sony’s entertainment division has become the biggest moneymaker in the conglomerate’s portfolio. That division — which includes Columbia Pictures, Sony Pictures Television, Crunchyroll and Playstation, among others — now comprises more than 50% of the corporation’s annual revenue after reporting a $719 million loss in 2016.

Vinciquerra also wrote that while Lawson will be moving to Japan, he and Grant will continue to work closely together “creating more opportunities for Sony Group Corporation and Sony Pictures Entertainment to align and collaborate at a time when Sony’s entertainment division [is] becoming an even greater part of SGC’s overall business.”

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