Richard L. Plepler is founder and CEO of EDEN Productions, a film and TV production company that was announced in January 2020 with the signing of a multiyear exclusive content deal with Apple TV+. Previously, Plepler was chairman and CEO of Home Box Office, Inc. (HBO) from 2013 to 2019, culminating twenty-eight years at the company. Under his leadership, HBO came to be associated with some of the most critically acclaimed programming on television. A particular focus of Plepler’s was documentaries; projects he commissioned include A World in Disarray, Cries from Syria, Panic: The Untold Story of the 2008 Financial Crisis, and The Diplomat.

He was inducted into the Cable Hall of Fame in 2018, was named Media Person of the Year by the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity in 2014, earned the International Emmy Directorate Award for his impact on the industry from the International Academy of Television Arts and Sciences in 2015, and won the Variety Vanguard Award for contribution to the TV business in 2017.