Emerson College and WERS will recognize five alumni during Alumni Weekend in October, whose achievements span industries including nonprofits, music, television, radio, and academia.
Alumni Weekend will take place from October 23-25, and the Extraordinary Together: Alumni Awards Celebration is on Saturday, October 24, from 6:00-11:00 p.m. at the Ritz-Carlton, Boston. Tickets to the awards celebration are available and include cocktails, dinner, dancing and the opportunity to honor these exceptional alumni. Register for Alumni Weekend and purchase tickets.
Two Distinguished Alumni Award Winners
The Emerson Alumni Association has presented The Distinguished Alumni Award for nearly 50 years, and the accolade is the most prestigious honor Emersonians can receive from their alma mater. In addition to recognizing an individual’s professional achievements and contributions to their industry and community, the award also highlights people who exemplify the mission of the college.
Michael Cyril Creighton ’01 is an award-winning actor, beloved by fans and critics for his television, film, and stage performances. Creighton is best known for playing Howard Morris opposite Steve Martin, Martin Short, and Selena Gomez on the Hulu series Only Murders in the Building, which earned him a SAG Award in the Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble category. He was also featured as a recurring character on the final season of the Amazon Prime Video series The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, and on other popular television shows, including 30 Rock, Bob’s Burgers, Dexter: New Blood, and Dash & Lily.
Creighton portrayed Joe Crowley in the 2016 Academy Award-winning film Spotlight, for which he also won the Robert Altman Award at the Independent Spirit Awards as part of its ensemble. His other film credits include the Oscar-nominated films American Fiction and The Post, as well as Game Night, Paper Spiders, The Outside Story, and more.
On stage, Creighton has appeared in The Adding Machine alongside Jennifer Tilly, Sarita Choudry and Daphne Rubin-Vega; Sarah Ruhl’s Stage Kiss; Jordan Harrison’s The Amateurs; and more. In December, he can also be seen in the holiday movie The Man with the Bag, starring Arnold Schwarzenegger.
As part of the Emerson College Master Classes program, Creighton will present a master class to the Emerson Community on Thursday, October 22, 2026 at 6:30 p.m. on the Robert J. Orchard Stage in the Paramount Center.
Esi Yankah ’09 is an independent creative communications consultant who has dedicated her career to aiding the advancement of her home country, Ghana, across its education, public health, and environmental sectors. Yankah’s work has included acting as dean of international programs at the African University College of Communications, and as a communications specialist for the United States Agency for International Development’s (USAID) Feed the Future initiative in Ghana, a global effort to fight food insecurity.
She spearheaded the She Grows Conference, which brought together 500 women farmers across Ghana, in part, to give them resources to grow and improve their businesses. Additionally, Yankah is the founder of the Esi Yankah Foundation, an initiative that has distributed approximately 4,000 backpacks, children’s books, safe delivery birth kits, and adolescent youth conference kits to more than 5,000 families across 24 marginalized communities.
Yankah has also made a significant impact in Ghana’s media space, hosting the country’s first television talk show focused on childhood development, and has received several accolades for her work, including being named Most Promising Woman of the Year at the Ghana Women Awards.
Young Alumni Achievement Award
Emerson’s Young Alumni Achievement Award was established in 2003 and is given each year to an alum that has graduated in the past decade and made a significant impact on their industry or community.
This year’s recipient is Pablo Feldman ’18, a Grammy Award-winning writer, director, and producer of films, commercials, and music videos. At 31, he has established himself as a prominent voice in the independent film and music industry, where his work is known for its emotionally resonant style and bold visual storytelling.
Earlier this year, Feldman won a Grammy Award in recognition of those sensibilities for producing Doechii’s Best Music Video-winning “Anxiety.” A producing partner at More Avenue, he has also helped develop and produce several well received independent films, including Ugly Cry, which premiered at the 2026 SXSW Film Festival.
After graduating from Emerson, Feldman launched his career by writing and directing independent short films like You’re Going to Save the World and Unscripted. In 2023, he made his feature writing and directorial debut with the film Edge of Everything, which premiered at the Munich International Film Festival and later won the Panavision Spirit Award for Independent Cinema at the Santa Barbara International Film Festival.
Feldman is currently in pre-production on his next feature, Sugar Toes, which he is writing and directing with his longtime collaborator Sophia Sabella, in addition to having several other projects in the works.
WERS Hall of Fame Winners
The WERS Hall of Fame Award honors alumni and faculty who have contributed to the Emerson College radio station’s success or established themselves as leaders in the industry.
This year’s first WERS Hall of Fame honoree is entertainment executive and businessman Michael Jay Solomon ’60, LLD ’91. As an Emerson student, Solomon started the WERS radio show “Good Morning, Emersonians.” Over his career, Solomon has founded, chaired, and led several publicly and privately held companies. He is also a dedicated philanthropist, and has founded and sat on the boards of several philanthropic organizations benefitting education, public health, and the arts.
Solomon began his career in entertainment with United Artists (UA), and got his start with the company loading its trucks bound for New York and New Jersey theaters while he was a business student at New York University. When he was 21, UA sent him to Panama to open its Central American territory for American films, and he spent years traveling the world managing its foreign divisions. Solomon was then hired by MCA (now Comcast, Universal, and NBC), to start its Latin American TV division, and ultimately became its vice president at 30 years old.
In 1978, he founded Telepictures Corporation, helping it to become the largest U.S. television syndication company at that time as its chairman and CEO. Through several mergers in the following decade, Solomon also served as president of the Lorimar-Telepictures Corporation and Warner Bros. International Television, expanding both to become successful global companies. He later founded other influential companies across the world, including the first satellite-delivered television channel in Scandinavia, international independent television distributor Solomon Entertainment Enterprises, Truli Media Group Inc., and Digital Content International.
In 2018, he founded the corporate consultancy firm Involvy AB, and currently wears several hats in the entertainment industry, including acting as senior advisor to UK animation company GFM Animation and executive producer of a Lionsgate documentary in production about the co-founder of SpaceX. He also acts as executive vice president and chairman of the board of advisors of Phantom Space, and serves on the Emerson College Board of Advisors.
The second WERS Hall of Fame inductee is Tami (Tamarah) Heide ’81, a beloved American radio personality known as “the girl with two first names.” She began her foray into radio in 1977 as a disc jockey on WERS, and later served as music director of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology radio station WMBR. She continued her career in Boston radio from 1984 to 1991, before moving on to KROQ-FM in Los Angeles, where she has continued to grow her fan base.
In 2005, she transitioned from KROQ-FM to KCBS-FM (Jack FM) in L.A., where in addition to acting as one of the station’s on-air voices, she also wrote dialogue to be read over the airwaves. While there, she also hosted “JACK-tivities,” a well-known on-air daily segment. She left the station in November 2016, and the following June joined the Soul of Southern California, 94.7 the WAVE KTWV. She is also host and executive producer of the public affairs program Open Line, which airs weekends on the 4 Audacy FM stations across Southern California. She has also hosted KROQ Flashback Sunday since August 2023.
