HBO, HBO Max senior acquisitions exec Leslie Cohen exits after two decades

Leslie Cohen, senior VP of content acquisitions for HBO and HBO Max, is leaving the company are more than two decades.

Leslie Cohen

The veteran exec, who has worked primarily on the film side of the business throughout her career, announced her departure in a LinkedIn post on Monday.

She did not reveal her next moves, noting only that she would “join colleagues and friends as we move on from Warner Bros Discovery to new opportunities.”

In recent years, Cohen has played a key role in acquiring the film titles that have populated HBO Max, including negotiating a major deal to add a large number of titles hailing from US-based studio A24.

During her time with HBO, Cohen developed and acquired content including studio films, independent features, concerts and standup comedy specials.

Before her promotion to senior VP of content acquisitions for HBO and HBO Max, Cohen was VP of film programming at the premium cable brand.

Last year, she negotiated the deal for HBO Max to pick up the North American streaming rights to three-part Chilean miniseries Isabel, about the life of writer Isabel Allende.

Earlier in her career, she sourced and negotiated HBO Latino’s first original Spanish-language series, Epitafios, and developed HBO Latino comedy series Entre Nos.

“I’m so grateful to have been able, along with my fantastic team, to curate and acquire the best films, shorts, concerts, series and standup comedy and help bring this amazing content to SVoD as we launched HBO Max,” said Cohen.

“I’m proud to have helped break ground for so many artists and partners – so many nominated and winning feature, short and concert films, and international series. All while discovering the next wave of emerging talent. What a gift to provide a platform for your stories and voices.”