Tulane hosts national entertainment law competition

More than 30 entertainment industry executives, including many Tulane Law School alumni, will serve as judges for the second annual Tulane Entertainment Negotiation Competition (TENC), a two-day event (Nov. 13-14, 2025) that kick off today on the Tulane Law School campus and host law students from across the country.

For the judges, TENC has recruited executives from leading organizations such as Sony, Apple, NBC Universal, Motion Pictures, among other major film studios, production companies, music labels, and law firms. This year’s student-run competition will host 16 teams from nine schools from as far as New York, Boston, Texas, and California, and include local teams from the host Tulane University Law School’s Entertainment & Arts Law Society (TEALS) and Loyola University New Orleans College of Law’s Sports and Entertainment Law Society (SELS).

Negotiating disputes involving music, film/TV, and other entertainment-facing topics, students from top entertainment law programs will showcase their legal skillsets in front of industry professionals from around the country. The competition consists of four rounds of high-stakes negotiations based on scenarios tailored to mirror current, real-world deals.

“TENC is where classroom doctrine meets market reality,” said Daevon J. Adams, a 3L at Tulane Law School, TEALS President, and co-director of the TENC. “Our competitors sit across the table from the very attorneys and executives who cut these deals every day, and they leave with constructive feedback to take forward in their careers, not just hypotheticals.”

Law students also leave the competition with a direct pipeline connecting ambitious law students to the very leaders who can launch their careers. Adams is a perfect example. During law school and through the connections he has made, Adams has been afforded the opportunities to intern at NBCUniversal, Create Music Group, SSP America, and with the entertainment law firm of Arrington & Phillips, LLP, in Atlanta.

Through these internships, Adams has assisted attorneys in negotiations, helped draft agreements and contracts, and researched music rights for film, TV, and streaming projects. Earlier this month, Adams was honored with the Black Entertainment and Sports Lawyers Association’s Ultimate Achiever award and scholarship.

“Tulane Law has an amazing alumni network in which our students can tap into in the entertainment and music industry,” said Adams. “Through our annual competition and the year-round work of our society, they provide a critical pipeline from the classroom to the corporate world to get in front of industry titans and dealmakers. I have been blessed to have those opportunities to set me up for a career after law school.”

Seventeen of this year’s 35 TENC judges graduated from Tulane Law School, including the likes of Patrick Teague (’11) – associate general counsel of brands and technology for SSP America; David Boyle (’90) – head of business and legal affairs for Motion Pictures and credited for The Wolf of Wall Street; Aaron Reuter (’10) – senior counsel for Apple; Beverley Gordon (’94) – CEO and founder of BrownBag Pictures, and formerly with Warner Bros. Studios; Jim Nelson (’95) – co-chair of the technology, media, and commercial practice group for Venable LLP; Jennifer Lewis (’98) – general counsel for the Los Angeles Clippers; Kimberly Haynes (’00) – founder and CEO of OMBI Group; and Ashlye Keaton (’03) – co-founder of The Ella Project.

“TENC brilliantly bridges the gap between academic theory and real-world practice,” said Jeff Frost (’84), founder of Bristol Circle Entertainment and former president of Sony Pictures Television. For the second consecutive year, Frost will return to his alma mater to serve as a TENC judge. “The quality of the negotiations and the sophistication of the strategies used by the competitors blew me away. This competition is exactly what the next generation of entertainment lawyers need.”

Additional industry executives scheduled to participate as judges include local sports and entertainment attorney Dominique Davillier, who has represented the likes of Odell Beckham; Kristen Johnson, senior counsel for legal affairs at Universal Pictures; Kai Bowe, an Emmy-nominated, award-winning executive producer and network, currently with The Oprah Winfrey Network (OWN); and Tanya Perara, executive vice president and chief legal officer of NBCUniversal, among others. (Click here for a complete list of TENC judges)

“We invite decision-makers who hire, green-light, and negotiate. Their feedback calibrates students to real-world timelines, leverage, and risk,” said Francesqa Kaggwa, a 3L at Tulane Law School, TEALS Vice President, and TENC Co-Director.

Kaggwa is the lead GrammyU Ambassador for the Memphis Chapter of the Recording Academy and the only student on the chapter’s Advocacy Committee. She also previously interned for the entertainment and intellectual property law firm of Wells Kappel. “We thank all our judges and industry executives who are passionate about giving back to the industry and those who have created internships to give law students real-world insights into the industry.”

For competing teams at last year’s inaugural TENC, problem sets included a label acquisition, a film acquisition agreement, and an innovative NIL/joint-venture negotiation intersecting music and gaming – such as the championship round’s deal involving the City Girls, Motown Records, and Rockstar Games for Grand Theft Auto VI. These problem sets all require law students to master the legal and business strategies that define the modern entertainment landscape.

“TENC’s format and deal scenarios mirror the types of high stakes negotiations that happen every day in the entertainment industry,” said Edgar “Dino” Gankendorff (’90), co-managing partner at the law firm of New Orleans-based Provosty & Gankendorff, and one of the judges at the 2025 competition.

The TENC was founded by Seamus Blair, an emerging music attorney and trained pianist who graduated in May 2025 from Tulane Law School. Blair is an associate at the law firm of Mark Music & Media Law, and he will return to his alma mater on Thursday as one of the judges at this year’s TENC competition. He said the foundation of TENC was inspired by the success of the nationally recognized Tulane Sports Law Society Competitions.

In 2024, Blair also helped revive the TEALS program at Tulane, which went on hiatus for eight years. TEALS connects Tulane law students with the entertainment, media, and arts sectors through practical training, mentorship, and national convenings, and mobilizes Tulane’s entertainment and arts law alumni network to deliver hands-on training and industry access.

Launched in November 2024 by TEALS, the TENC was the first student-led entertainment negotiation competition in the country open to teams nationwide. In 2025, TEALS secured new backing, including a donation from alumnus Jim Nelson and sponsorships from Davillier Law Group, Provosty & Gankendorff, and the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Foundation.

“There are so many similarities between sports law and entertainment law that it made sense for us to grow our entertainment law program by becoming leaders in another competition,” said Blair. “I definitely knew I wanted to do an event like this and build it up to the level of success that the sports law competitions have had.”