Albie Hecht is a television producer and media executive. He is the CEO of Worldwide Biggies, founder of Spike TV, and a former president of Nickelodeon Entertainment, and former head of HLN, the television channel.
Hecht oversaw the development and production of SpongeBob SquarePants, Dora the Explorer, Blue's Clues, and the live-action show All That at Nickelodeon. While at Nickelodeon, he built the Nick Digital Studio as well as the first new animation studio in Los Angeles in 35 years. He also co-created Nickelodeon GUTS and Nickelodeon's Kids Choice Awards (with Alan Goodman and Fred Seibert as the founding principal and executive producer with Chauncey Street Productions (originally a division of Goodman's and Seibert's Fred/Alan in New York).
Hecht produced some of Paramount's biggest films of the last five years, most recently, Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events, which received four Academy Award nominations, The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie, and The Rugrats Movie, the first non-Disney animated movie to sell $100,000,000 worth of tickets at the United States box office
Hecht has twice been nominated for an Oscar, the first as the producer of Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius, and the second as the producer of the documentary feature War/Dance.
Hecht was the executive producer of The Rugrats Movie, the first non-Disney animated feature to cross the hundred million dollar mark.
At Spike TV, his shows included The Joe Schmo Show, MXC and signing the Ultimate Fighting Championship franchise. Hecht is responsible for the development and is the executive producer of Worldwide Biggies’ series on Nickelodeon The Naked Brothers Band.
Hecht began his media career in college radio at Columbia University's WKCR in 1970. He was a manager of pop music acts (including Crack the Sky and Dean Friedman), and an executive at Terry Cashman's and Tommy West's Lifesong Records in the 1970s. In 1988 he joined Fred/Alan Inc. with Alan Goodman and Fred Seibert, running production for the advertising agency, and together they established Chauncey Street Productions (named for #328, the Brooklyn street Jackie Gleason's Ralph Kramden lived on in The Honeymooners) for their independent television productions. Hecht bought Chauncey Street when Fred/Alan closed in May 1992.
With his wife Susan MacLaury, a professor at Kean University, Hecht founded the non-profit film production company Shine Global in 2005. Hecht and MacLaury received a 2010 Emmy Award and an Oscar nomination for their documentary film War/Dance.
In 2013, Hecht became the founding director of the New Media Lab at the Macaulay Honors College of CUNY, the first public undergraduate media lab for the study and production of transmedia content.
In 2017, Hecht joined Pocket.watch as Chief Content Officer. Pocket.watch is a new studio creating global franchises from the YouTube stars characters loved by generation alpha. Hecht is the creator and Executive Producer of Ryan's Mystery Playdate on Nick Jr., the number one preschool show on TV. He also produced the HobbyKids Adventures, an animated series which streams on the Hobby Kids TV YouTube channel. The show has received over 30 million views of its episodes to date.