Understanding The TV Trade in The UK – Scripted Edition

Great addition to our Scripted Edition UK -webinar, Drama Commissioning Editor Lee Mason from Channel 4!

His recent credits include The End of the F***ing World, No Offence, Loaded and Ackley Bridge and up-coming dramas include Adult Material by Lucy Kirkwood and Boys by Russell T Davies.

Audiovisual Producers Finland APFI will together with Percy & Warren organize a Scripted Edition of the well-received UNDERSTANDING THE TV TRADE IN THE UK -webinar!

16.9. | 14.30–16.00 EEST

UNDERSTANDING THE TV TRADE IN THE UK – SCRIPTED EDITION

Speakers:

Diederick Santer, drama commissioning at BBC, former CEO of Kudos
Lee Mason, Drama Commissioning Editor / Channel 4
Pete Thornton, Head of scripted / UKTV
Jo McGrath, Chief Creative Officer / Eagle Eye Drama & Co-Founder / Walter Presents

The webinar is hosted by Alexander Ross and Holly Miller, TV and Entertainment Consultants at Percy & Warren, and co-hosted by Robin Parker, Journalist and Editor specializing in media, arts and TV.

Sign up here before Monday September 14th!

Speaker bios:

Diederick Santer
Diederick has been working in TV drama for nearly 25 years. After working in script development at ITV, Diederick joined BBC Drama in 2000, where he developed and produced a variety of series including Cutting It, Jane Eyre and an adaptation of Much Ado About Nothing by David Nicholls. In 2006 he became Executive Producer of EastEnders. Over the next four years, in over 700 episodes, he introduced numerous characters and presided over many highly successful storylines winning awards including BAFTA, National Television Awards and RTS Awards. He stepped down in March 2010 following the show’s 25th anniversary live episode.

Later that year he set up his own production company, Lovely Day, which produced the hugely popular ITV crime series Grantchester, which is still in production. In 2015 Diederick became CEO of the production company Kudos. Under his leadership, Kudos thrived with a string of hits including the International Emmy Award-winning Man in an Orange Shirt, Channel 4 and AMC returner Humans, Apple Tree Yard and Gunpowder for BBC One, BBC Two’s the Boy with The Topknot, and the Sky Atlantic hit, Tin Star. In 2019 Diederick stepped down from his role as CEO at Kudos. He is currently working in drama commissioning at BBC.

Lee Mason
Lee is a Drama Commissioning Editor at Channel 4. Recent credits include The End of the F***ing World, No Offence, Loaded and Ackley Bridge. Lee began at Channel 4 as Commissioning Editor of Hollyoaks. Up-coming dramas include Adult Material by Lucy Kirkwood and Boys by Russell T Davies.

Pete Thornton
Pete commissions scripted comedy and drama for UKTV channels Gold, Dave, Alibi and Drama.
Current comedy productions under his management include Red Dwarf and Sliced for Dave alongside The Cockfields, Sandylands and Dial M for Middlesbrough for Gold. He’s also responsible for UKTV’s first Original Drama, the Anna Paquin fronted Flack on W, as well as overseeing Alibi’s new slate of drama commissions including Traces and We Hunt Together.

Pete began his career at Spitting Image before moving to Aardman animations where he partnered with Nick Park on two of the Oscar winning Wallace and Gromit films, The Wrong Trousers and A Close Shave. After a freelance career as a production manager on shows such as Father Ted, Brass Eye, Don’t forget Your Toothbrush and The Big Breakfast he joined the BBC as a producer on series including the BAFTA award-winning The Smoking Room and Roger and Val Have Just Got In, before becoming one of the key creatives within the in-house comedy team and the lead BBC executive producer for Comic Relief.

In 2012 Pete left the BBC to take up the role of commissioning editor at Comedy Central where he was responsible for the broadcaster’s first scripted comedy Threesome. Before joining UKTV in 2017, Pete was Head of Comedy at Tiger Aspect Productions.

Jo McGrath
Jo is an experienced producer and broadcast commissioner with a proven ability to develop returnable series and best-selling spin-off books for the UK and international markets. Formerly Head of Production for Fox International Europe, Head of Features for Channel 4 Television and Head of Factual for Tiger Aspect Television, Jo’s track record of combining mainstream appeal with strong brand identity has made a major contribution to the stunning success of Walter Presents.

The streaming service, which has attracted international acclaim for curating the very best of ’world drama’, now operates in eight territories and recently launched a new curated collection of ’Walter Presents’ books in collaboration with Pushkin Press. In November last year, with her co-founders of WP, Jo launched Eagle Eye Drama, which has already secured two drama series commissions.

 

More information:

Heli Vahvanen-Mölsä, heli.vahvanen-molsa@apfi.fi, 050 491 1786