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BAFTA Television Lecture: Jane Featherstone

13 September 2017
Jane Featherstone

BAFTA-winning television producer and executive Jane Featherstone will deliver prestigious lecture on Monday 30 October 

The BAFTA Television Lecture is the highlight of BAFTA's programme of television industry events, and is also open to the public. Each year, BAFTA invites one of television's leading figures to give their personal view on creative excellence in television and their vision for the future. Previous speakers include Alan Yentob, Armando Iannucci, Kevin Lygo, Lenny Henry, Liz Warner, Lorraine Heggessey, Paul Abbott, Peter Bennett-Jones, Stephen Fry and Tim Hincks. 

As the former chief executive of Kudos and co-chairman of Shine UK, Jane Featherstone oversaw the production of some of the UK’s most ground-breaking and best-loved dramas.  From BAFTA-winning television series Broadchurch, SpooksHumans, Life on Mars and Flowers, through to HustleThe Hour and River, Featherstone’s pioneering vision brought quality drama to the mainstream whilst growing Kudos into one of the UK’s most recognisable and formidable indies. 

In November 2015 Jane Featherstone launched Sister Pictures and since then has secured a raft of new commissions across a host of UK and global broadcasters and platforms. Sister’s slate boasts the BBC/Sundance relationship drama The Split, ITV series Clean Break, Chernobyl for HBO/Sky and Giri Haji for BBC/ Netflix.

As part of the lecture, Featherstone will draw on years of experience in bringing together the best creative teams around a script and the confidence this has given her to make bold decisions.  She will examine the conditions needed to preserve and protect creative ambition, particularly in mainstream television.

Krishnendu Majumdar, Chair of BAFTA’s Television Committee said: “Jane Featherstone has played an instrumental role in bringing quality drama to mainstream audiences. With runaway successes such as Spooks and Broadchurch, her work is testament to the power of great storytelling. She is a true nurturer of new writing talent, as shown in the current slate of Sister Pictures productions, making her the perfect person to deliver the Television Lecture, where BAFTA aims to drive debate around excellence in broadcasting.”

Public tickets for the BAFTA Television Lecture will go on sale 13.00 Friday 15 September. To book tickets, go to www.bafta.org/whats-on/

Video highlights, a podcast and a transcript from the event will be available on BAFTA Guru, BAFTA’s online learning channel (www.bafta.org/guru). Recordings of previous Television Lectures are available now.

‘BAFTA Television Lecture: Jane Featherstone’ event details:

Monday 30 October at BAFTA, 195 Piccadilly in London
18:45    Champagne Taittinger Reception
19:15    Event commences

Jane Featherstone Biography:

Jane Featherstone is the Chief Executive of Sister Pictures, the independent scripted company she founded in November 2015. Prior to that, she was the Chief Executive of Kudos where she had been for fifteen years and Co-Chairman of Shine for four years.

Jane Featherstone began her television career at Hat Trick Productions, where she worked on landmark comedy shows such as Whose Line Is It Anyway?, Have I Got News For You and Drop The Dead Donkey, before producing the first two series of Paul Abbot’s BAFTA-nominated ITV thriller Touching Evil, followed by BAFTA-nominated BBC2 single drama Sex ‘n’ Death.

Featherstone joined Kudos in 2000, where she developed and executive produced many innovative and ground-breaking series dramas in the UK and internationally, including: the BAFTA-winning hit Spooks and twice-BAFTA-nominated Life on Mars for BBC1; BAFTA-nominated River by Abi Morgan for BBC1/Netflix; Emmy-winning and BAFTA-nominated Utopia and BAFTA-winning Humans for Channel 4; and The Tunnel for Sky Atlantic/Canal. She also executive produced the highly successful and multi-BAFTA-winning Broadchurch (ITV1), and continued this role on the third and final series, which was co-produced with Sister Pictures.

Under Sister Pictures, Featherstone has executive produced Humans for C4/AMC by Sam Vincent and Jon Brackley and Flowers by Will Sharpe for C4/ Seeso. Sister’s current projects include: The Split by Abi Morgan for BBC 1/Sundance; Clean Break by Mark Marlow, starring Sheridan Smith for ITV; Giri Haji by Joe Barton for Netflix/BBC 1 and Chernobyl by Craig Mazin for HBO/Sky.

Amongst its development slate is the major contemporary novel The Power by award-winning writer Naomi Alderman and Pandora by Sam Vincent and Jon Brackley for AMC. In addition, Naomi de Pear’s in-house label, Hootenanny, is producing the second series of Flowers and The Bisexual, created by and starring Desiree Akhavan, both for Channel 4.

Jane Featherstone was made a Fellow of the Royal Television Society in 2011 and in 2007 received the Contribution to the Medium Award at the Women in Film and TV awards. She is a trustee of the arts charity, the Freelands Foundation.

For further information, please contact:

Eleanor Pickering at BAFTA
T +44 (0) 20 7734 5863
E [email protected]

Niyi Akeju at BAFTA
T +44 (0) 20 7292 5865
E [email protected]

About BAFTA

The British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) is a world-leading independent arts charity that brings the very best work in film, games and television to public attention and supports the growth of creative talent in the UK and internationally. Through its Awards ceremonies and year-round programme of learning events and initiatives – which includes workshops, masterclasses, scholarships, lectures and mentoring schemes in the UK, USA and Asia – BAFTA identifies and celebrates excellence, discovers, inspires and nurtures new talent, and enables learning and creative collaboration. For advice and inspiration from the best creative minds in working in film, games and television, visit www.bafta.org/guru. For more, visit www.bafta.org.