Sitarah Pendelton

“As a senior female Hollywood executive at MTV Entertainment Group, Sitarah Pendelton is a force behind some of the biggest reality shows in television, including The Real World Homecoming: New York on Paramount+, MTV’s Catfish and VH1’s juggernaut series Love & Hip Hop, among others. A champion of diversity and inclusion both in front of and behind the camera, Pendelton served as the executive producer of The Real World Homecoming, reuniting the original New York cast continuing the progressive conversations and culturally resonant stories that the series is recognized for, including the Black Lives Matter movement and equal rights for Women and LGBTQ+ communities. Additionally, the show brought back Norman Korpi, the first openly gay man on reality television. She also served as the executive producer of Season 8 of MTV’s Are You The One?, which won a GLAAD Award for Outstanding Reality Program because the first all gender fluid cast was not only groundbreaking for the franchise and reality TV, but also for how the LGTBQ+ community is represented in media.
Raised in New York, Pendelton danced for most of her life with the Dance Theater of Harlem. She went into production work after college, cutting her chops in production roles and as a writer/producer on MTV’s early programming Spring Break and TRL, before going on to become a successful executive at several networks including AMC and NBCU. She returned to MTV in 2017. “