It is generally perceived that the entertainment industry deems people “washed up” at practically the first sign of a gray hair. While this may be true for actors and actresses, according to many of the executives in the business side of the industry youth is rarely an advantage and at times a lack of experience can even prove to be a hindrance. Yet with this experience their inevitably comes a growing detachment from cutting edge trends and the ideal 18-34 marketing demographic. However, many entertainment executives believe that staying relevant is quite possible for anyone in the industry, provided that they continually make a concerted effort to educate themselves of the rapidly changing entertainment landscape. And this year’s crop of 40 Under 40 honorees seem to have done just that. Jason Hall is an archetypal example of an early achiever. By the age of 23, he had already been a marine, a stockbroker and a musician/composer before deciding to co-found video game development studio Monolith Productions. By the age of 32, he had sold his company to Warner Bros. Entertainment and was named senior vice president of Warner Bros.’ video game division, Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment. If anything one would assume that Hall’s youth would have played an instrumental role in allowing him to cater to the traditionally younger-skewing video game-playing audiences. But according to Hall, his youth may have been a detriment in his business dealings. “My youth worked against me constantly in terms of trying to run a business,” Hall said. “I was young and didn’t know very much about business dealings and the people I was trying to raise money from certainly weren’t my age. I didn’t see my youth as any sort of advantage.” Hall is not alone in finding his rapid success to have not been a distinct advantage. Diane Nelson, Warner Bros.’ executive vice president of global brand management, also believes that her youth may have worked against her at first. “There’s probably a certain bias against youth because you don’t have those years of experience,” the 38-year old Nelson said. “There’s always going to be the natural question of whether or not you have enough breadth and depth if you’re too young. There’s a lot to be said about experience. Young people have to work just as hard if not harder to prove that they are capable of taking on greater responsibilities.” Entertainment industry analyst Dennis McAlpine, agrees with Nelson’s thoughts about the benefits of experience. “I think it’s harder to succeed in the entertainment business if you’re young,” McAlpine said. “You need to have an extensive set of knowledge that would seem to benefit veterans. Besides, they say that you need less sleep each night as you get older, and than you have people like Jeffrey Katzenberg who reputedly sleep three hours night. Being older can turn out to be a real advantage.” While capitalizing on one’s youth may not be essential to climbing the entertainment industry corporate ladder, almost everyone involved in the business has dealt with people who have felt the pressure to “make it” by a certain age or else they risk obsolescence. “Even though I haven’t been as focused on age, many people feel that you need to be known and make your mark by a certain age to be seen as a serious contender,” John Savage, the president of Chatsworth-based CGI animation film studio, GigaPix Inc. said. “That said, you are only as good as your last work. You need to be sure that your work, regardless of the medium you use, is strong and relevant.” Indeed relevancy is an issue that everyone involved in the industry is forced to confront at one time or another. However, most industry insiders believe that staying on top is possible, if one has the desire and composition. While Hall remains six years shy of 40, he doesn’t anticipate seeing much disconnect with the generations below him. “I think it comes down to your nature. Personally, I don’t think it will be hard for me to do,” Hall said. “I have difficulty growing up. I still play video games. I watch cartoons. I don’t think that I’m going to be one of those out of touch guys.” For Stella Schwartz, the 33-year old program director for KOST-103.5 FM, staying relevant and current is something that she consciously works at. “It’s definitely important to stay on top of the trends. I always ask kids what their favorite artists are,” Schwartz said. “I always talk to people. And besides just talking to people, I order every woman’s magazine on the earth, One needs to always know who their audience is and what they want.” And as Generation X ages and starts to turn 40, it might actually become easier for them to stay on top of the trends, with the glut of information readily available on the Internet, as well as from the proliferation of new media that has cropped up in the last five years. “I think it’s going to become easier to stay on top of the trends due to the ease in which we communicate via e-mail and the Internet,” Betty Gower, the 33-year old vice president of marketing for the Telemundo Station Group, said. “I can get all sorts of information from search engines and read more stuff readily. I can find out anything I want from Google.” But Gower believes that while technology might improve one’s ability to compile data, ultimately it will require a great deal of ability to parse all the information. “We’re going to have make decisions as to what is the most relevant. We’re going to have to be savvier in terms of how to cross-reference information. We’re going to have to dig a little deeper,” Gower said.