UK public relations agency Premier PRhas acquired another London-based publicity company, McDonald & Rutter.

The two willmerge under the Premier PR name, and will be jointly run by Premier's chiefexecutive Sara Keene and McDonald & Rutterfounding partners Charles McDonald and Jonathan Rutter.

Premier hasabout 40 staffers in its London headquarters and its Los Angeles branch, which will continue to beheaded by Pamela Godwin Austen.

McDonald& Rutter will move 15 staffers to Premier's London office. Both parties said therewouldn't be significant redundancies, although McDonald & Rutter will have to trim several administrative employees.

"We have areputation for a personal touch and that will remain," McDonald said. "We'vebuilt up a lot of strong relationships over the years and those won't change.We're not going to become some faceless monolith."

The companiesboth concentrate on film but also do television publicity as well. Premier alsodoes personal publicity for clients such as Kate Winslet,Jude Law, and Daniel Craig. McDonald & Rutteralso has a successful theatre division, so the merger brings Premier back intothe theatre world.

"Film isour core business but TV and theatre are very important clients as well," Keene added. "There's synchronicity andoverlap between those worlds. We'll continue to develop theatre and TV."

"The fit isremarkably complementary," McDonald said. "They don't have a theatre divisionand we do. We've started a TV division and they have a very successful TVbusiness. We're perhaps stronger on the international festival circuit, andwe're both strong on the distribution side. We've done some big films, but ourreputation is for smaller films, while their reputation is working with the Narnias of theworld. They have an LA office which issomething we've thought about adding for years. We sit extremely welltogether."

Thecompanies will combine offices in London in late April, but will runseparate offices during Cannes 2006 because those had to be booked months inadvance. "We'll have two separate offices but we'll be sharing resources," Keene noted.

Premier PRwas formed in 2000 when its parent company Miracle Media Group acquired film PRagency Corbett and Keene. Premier has handled recent campaigns for Brokeback Mountain, The Chronicles of Narnia,and Wallace & Gromit:The Curse of the Were-Rabbit.

McDonald& Rutter was founded in 1994 and has worked onfilm campaigns including The ConstantGardener, Good Night, and Good Luck, Billy Elliot, Bend it Like Beckham, and Vera Drake.