Thoma Kikis is an American film producer,

designer A designer is a person who plans the form or structure of something before it is made, by preparing drawings or plans. In practice, anyone who creates tangible or intangible objects, products, processes, laws, games, graphics, services, or exp ...

and

entrepreneur Entrepreneurship is the creation or extraction of economic value. With this definition, entrepreneurship is viewed as change, generally entailing risk beyond what is normally encountered in starting a business, which may include other values t ...

best known for founding KannaLife Sciences. He was also a founder of

Ovie Entertainment Ovie Entertainment is an American independent film motion picture production company based in New York City. Founded by Thoma Kikis, Christopher Kikis, Nicholas Levis, Cherise Wolas, and Alan Zelenetz in 2003 to produce independent and commerci ...

. His work as a feature film producer began with '' Darkon'' (2006), the award-winning feature-length

documentary film A documentary film or documentary is a non-fictional motion-picture intended to "document reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction, education or maintaining a historical record". Bill Nichols has characterized the documentary in te ...

that follows the real-life adventures of a group of fantasy live-action role-playing (LARP) gamers which won the Best Documentary Audience Award at the 2006 South By Southwest (SXSW) Film Festival. His next film, the award-winning ''

Alps The Alps () ; german: Alpen ; it, Alpi ; rm, Alps ; sl, Alpe . are the highest and most extensive mountain range system that lies entirely in Europe, stretching approximately across seven Alpine countries (from west to east): France, Swi ...

'' (2011), was the fourth feature of Greek born Oscar nominated director

Yorgos Lanthimos Georgios "Yorgos" Lanthimos ( el, Γιώργος Λάνθιμος, Giórgos Lánthimos, ; born 23 September 1973) is a Greek film director, film producer, screenwriter, photographer, theatre director and former professional basketball player. Sin ...

, which won the Osella Award for Best Screenplay (Yorgos Lanthimos and Efthimis Filippou) at the

68th Venice International Film Festival The 68th annual Venice International Film Festival was held in Venice, Italy between 31 August and 10 September 2011. American film director Darren Aronofsky was announced as the Head of the Jury. American actor and film director Al Pacino was p ...

. Most recently was the art-house

black comedy Black comedy, also known as dark comedy, morbid humor, or gallows humor, is a style of comedy that makes light of subject matter that is generally considered taboo, particularly subjects that are normally considered serious or painful to discu ...

film ''

It's A Disaster ''It's a Disaster'' is a 2012 American art-house black comedy film written and directed by Todd Berger. The film was made by Los Angeles-based comedy group The Vacationeers and stars Rachel Boston, David Cross, America Ferrera, Jeff Grace, Erinn ...

'' (2012) written and directed by

Todd Berger Todd Berger (born April 5, 1979) is an American film director, screenwriter, actor, and novelist most prominently known for writing and directing the feature films ''It's a Disaster'', ''Cover Versions'', ''The Scenesters'', and the documentary ' ...

and stars

Julia Stiles Julia O'Hara Stiles (born March 28, 1981) is an American actress. Born and raised in New York City, Stiles began acting at the age of 11 as part of New York's La MaMa Experimental Theatre Club. Her film debut was a small role in ''I'' ''Love Yo ...

David Cross David Cross (born April 4, 1964) is an American stand-up comedian, actor, director, and writer known for his stand-up performances, the HBO sketch comedy series '' Mr. Show'' (1995–1998), and his role as Tobias Fünke in the Fox/Netflix si ...

Rachel Boston Rachel Elizabeth Boston (born May 9, 1982) is an American actress and producer. Boston has had leading roles in a number of independent films, and was a regular cast member in several television series. She starred in the NBC drama series, ''Amer ...

Jeff Grace Jeff Grace is a comedian, screenwriter, film producer, film director, and actor. Grace serves as the director of '' Folk Hero & Funny Guy'', an independent film starring Wyatt Russell, Alex Karpovsky, Hannah Simone, Heather Morris, Meredith Ha ...

and

America Ferrera America Georgina Ferrera (; born April 18, 1984) is an American actress. Born in Los Angeles to Honduran parents, Ferrera developed an interest in acting at a young age, performing in several stage productions at her school. She made her featu ...

. In 2014, he was a guest on

Bloomberg TV Bloomberg Television (on-air as Bloomberg) is an American-based pay television network focusing on business and capital market programming, owned by Bloomberg L.P. It is distributed globally, reaching over 310 million homes worldwide. It is hea ...

's '' Taking Stock'' with

Pimm Fox Pimm Fox is the news anchor of ''Taking Stock'', a program of business interviews and financial news analysis broadcast daily on Bloomberg Radio. The program was previously also broadcast on Bloomberg Television. He discusses industry and mark ...

discussing forming KannaLife,

cannabinoid Cannabinoids () are several structural classes of compounds found in the cannabis plant primarily and most animal organisms (although insects lack such receptors) or as synthetic compounds. The most notable cannabinoid is the phytocannabinoid tet ...

research and regulating the growing Medical cannabis industry in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

. He was also featured in

Sports Illustrated ''Sports Illustrated'' (''SI'') is an American sports magazine first published in August 1954. Founded by Stuart Scheftel, it was the first magazine with circulation over one million to win the National Magazine Award for General Excellence twi ...

article on founding KannaLife and using cannabinoids to treat CTE.

Selected filmography

*'' Darkon'' (2006) (producer, executive producer;) *''The Funeral Party'' (2007) (co-producer) *''

'' (2011) (co-producer) *''

'' (2012) (executive producer)

References

External links

*
KannaLife Sciences Website

Official Website
American film producers Year of birth missing (living people) Living people {{US-film-producer-stub