Billy Poveda

Partners Billy Poveda and John Stewart started Oil Factory Films in 1985. At that time, Billy was producing videos for the Eurythmics, and John was an executive at the British Film Institute. The Eurythmics were ready to film their Australian tour and Dave Stewart, a principal in the band and John's brother, arranged for Billy and John to meet. Needless to say, the production went so well that the two set up offices in North London. After recruiting directors-such as Philippe Gautier and Sophie Muller, who at that time was just a film student-Oil Factory proceeded to produce clips for the Eurythmics, Sade, Sinead O'Connor and Lenny Kravitz all in its first few years. In 1989, Oil Factory branched out and Billy, a Los Angeles native, set up US offices on the West Coast.

Since then, Oil Factory has become one of the industry's premier International production companies continuing to produce award winning music videos, music longforms and commercials. Oil Factory has also made inroads into feature films with it's first release being a feature documentary Deep Blues, which received critical acclaim and a rave soundtrack review from Rolling Stone. The film was released on home video in 1994 after a national tour of art house cinemas in 1993.

Oil Factory currently represents some of the music video industry's most respected directors such as Sophie Muller, Dom & Nic, Frank Sacramento, Ellen von Unwerth, WIZ, and Pedro Romhanyi to name only a few. Recent music video projects include videos for Madonna, Garbage, Marilyn Manson, Blondie, Tom Petty, No Doubt, Blur, David Bowie & Trent Reznor, Missy Elliot, Dru Hill and Bush as well as a home videos for No Doubt , Annie Lennox, Sade, Sinead O'Connor, Sarah McLachlan and Tom Petty. In 1998 Oil Factory was a top winner at the MTV Music Video Awards, their music video for Madonna's "Ray of Light" received 9 awards.

Recent commercials include Saturn, Diet Coke, Nike, Virgin Megastore, Volvo, and the Fall 1999 campaign for The Gap. On the feature film front, Oil Factory has recently produced The Low Down in association with Film 4. The film has received much attention and is currently in theaters in the U.K. and will be released this spring in the U.S. The film debuted at the Edinburgh Film Festival in August and made its American debut at the 2001 Sundance Film Festival.

For more information, please check out our website or contact Heidi Herzon, Executive Producer for Music Videos or Billy Poveda, Executive Producer, Feature Film/Commercial production.