A graduate of USC’s perennially top-ranked business school and passing the grueling multi-day CPA  test (aka the Bar exam of finance), Sampson was actively recruited by then coveted Big 8 international accounting firm, Coopers & Lybrand (now PriceWaterhouseCoopers).  As Coopers audit manager, his assigned clients ranged from entertainment to tech to banking.  And it was Sampson’s work with entertainment clients that led him to officially launch his exclusively entertainment finance career at EMI Music, as the Director of Audit for both North America and Latin America. He subsequently became CFO for a division of Warner Music.

 

Eventually, Sampson segued to film & TV adding three CFO positions for two boutique production houses and a division of Disney.  That experience led him to interact with major studios and networks, as well as streamers. 

 

Then armed with his knowledge of production and development, he augmented his career as a producer or executive producer (“EP”) for stage, digital or film/TV projects under either his JESIII Productions banner or MoSamp Productions with his producing partner, J.M. Morris.

 

He executive produced two award-winning AFI shorts: Stone Mansion (which was also one of four films selected to air on Showtime’s acclaimed "Black Filmmakers Showcase", and aired periodically on PBS); as well as Hope (official selection in over 15 film festivals, and aired in an NBC special short film showcase).  He also produced the short, One Second at a Time starring Spirit Award nominee, Haaz Sleiman of acclaimed film, The Visitor. Sleiman also performed in MoSamp Productions projects at Santa Monica’s renowned Highways Performance Space (“Highways”), that were written by Morris.

 

In fact, Sampson’s EP stage credits include several original projects at Highways with Morris, also written by her and most directed by legendary filmmaker Charles Burnett.  Projects such as: “Broken Willow” about late renowned author, Iris Chang; “The Content Of Their Character” stage series; “MLK: A Tribute in Song”; and the “Creative Provocateurs” stage series, that featured original work by Morris, as well as, other artists, including award-winning writer-directors, Tina Andrews (Why Do Fools Fall in Love, Sally Hemings:  An American Scandal, etc.) and Antwone Fisher (Antwone Fisher starring Denzel Washington). Sampson also re-staged a limited run of Kenneth Lonergan's acclaimed Tony-nominated play, “This Is Our Youth” at LA’s historic El Centro Theatre.

 

While the pandemic interrupted Sampson’s continued producing/EP works on the heels of having produced with Morris a special weekend retrospective of two key films by Burnett, Nightjohn and The Glass Shield (featuring respective film panels with Carl Lumbly, Lori Petty, Michael Boatman, and others), post-pandemic he was able to expand his digital/filmed producing credits with the multimedia project, “Black Man on a Mission” by performance/visual artist, Derek Shields, and “The Word”—a multimedia project with Morris, that included her original work and curated speeches/essays by Black women of import from the 17th – 20th Centuries.

 

In addition to “From Emmett Till to SNCC & Beyond: Words + Music + Art”, Sampson also has several projects in development across diverse media.