主播大秀

In our 主播大秀 factual dramas we have often dared to give a voice to people and communities who are rarely heard from and our challenging new film, The Left Behind continues this work.

The Left Behind follows a young man in a post-industrial Welsh town who gets drawn into a Far Right hate crime.

Why this story?

It’s hard not to notice we live in a divided country. Globalisation has benefitted some people, but left many others devastated and feeling economically humiliated and excluded. Living in towns shut down and boarded up, hundreds of miles away from the ‘Westminster bubble’. People are working multiple insecure jobs and we’re seeing more and more working poor. For many people the future is bleak and offers little hope.

At the same time anti-immigrant and anti-Muslim sentiment is sadly and disturbingly on the rise with more people moving to the Far Right - extreme Far Right referrals increased by 36% last year. It’s no coincidence that many of these disaffected and disenfranchised people come from these ‘left behind’ post-industrial towns and cities - hopelessness is a fertile breeding ground for the Far Right.

The face of the Far Right has also changed. Research by Prof Hilary Pilkington who embedded with the EDL for three years revealed that some of these people can be from diverse backgrounds themselves, some she met were gay, a good few were women.

To tackle anti-migrant and anti-Muslim sentiment it’s critical that we hear what people feel is missing from their own lives and address that lack. Too often people just hear something that they think is racist (which it often undeniably is) but don’t interrogate further. We hope our film goes a little way towards doing that.  

Why factual drama is important

We live in an age of fake news and uncertainty. It’s harder and harder to tell the difference between truth and lies.

At such moments it’s even more important to bring journalistic rigour to storytelling. I love fiction and watch endless hours of it but there is nothing more powerful than a true story - or one based on deep research. This is what draws me back to factual drama again and again. Our last film Killed By My Debt - the story of Jerome Rogers a young courier who worked in the gig economy and who died by suicide having accrued debts which then further escalated in the hands of unregulated bailiffs - is a perfect example of how factual drama can be simple and devastatingly effective. Drawing on court reports, texts, Jerome’s internet search history and interviews with family and friends we were able to show the horrifying consequences of debt on one young man’s life and mental health.

We always do a lot of research before we start a new film. We look at what young people are thinking about and what we think they should know.  It’s an incredibly exciting and privileged position to be in - helping create the stories that will be talked about, argued over and debated.

I’m from both a factual and a drama background - I used to be a director and have directed documentaries as well as fiction - and so I feel a passion for both forms. Making factual drama is a brilliant amalgam of my two favourite things.

Working on a number of factual dramas for 主播大秀 Three has been great for me personally because it’s really taught me a lot about just how sophisticated and passionate young people are. They have too often been characterised as apathetic and a self-absorbed selfie generation - but I think they are the exact opposite of this. Whenever one of our films comes out I watch the reactions  on social media and am thrilled to see empathetic, complex, nuanced voices responding to our work. 

What does an Executive Producer do?

The job of an Executive Producer can vary so I can only speak for myself and what I do. I am a very hands-on creative producer. The drama hub that I run at 主播大秀 Studios is driven by my passions and what I feel will be powerful stories for us to tell.  I work with a small but brilliant team – Marco Crivellari who is both script editor and development producer and a former newspaper journalist Paul Bignell. I also work with a book scout to help find unpublished books to option to turn into TV series.

So in my job I originate ideas, read a lot of books and plays with a view to optioning them, look for new writing talent, pitch ideas to commissioners at different broadcasters and then if we get the go ahead to develop up these ideas - I work with the writer, give notes on each draft of a script as it comes in and this goes on until we are happy with the script and the project is greenlit.

Once production gets going I will also decide who to take on as the director for the film - and with that director be part of the decision making in terms of other Heads of Department such as Director of Photography, Editor, Production Designer, Casting director etc.

When filming starts, I go to set for some of the filming days - not all. I watch the rushes, give encouragement where needed or occasionally feed back about anything that could be a bit different. After filming I work with the editor, director and producer, bringing together the finished product. I love the edit and see it as a very creative place as there is still lots of space to make things much better or alter the story in subtle, surprising ways, sometimes even structural ways to really make it as strong as possible.

The process for factual drama can sometimes be a little different from traditional dramas - in some instances such as Killed By My Debt and also The Left Behind - I will work with a director at a much earlier stage. With both these films - the director Joseph Bullman was key to the access and originating idea. He has spent a lifetime making films about the working class experience and thinking about areas that others tend to a little less - so he was integral to these specific stories.

How did I become an Executive Producer?

My route to becoming an Exec Producer was probably a bit different from most.

I love telly. I grew up watching an inordinate amount of it so it’s actually not that surprising that I ended up working in it. My first job in TV was working on reception at an independent TV drama company - run by one of my TV heroes Tony Garnett. Without being asked to I would read unsolicited scripts that came in and write up notes about what I thought about them.

I then became a script reader for lots of other film producers and drama companies. However I was desperate to direct and knew it would be easier to get a break to do so if I moved into factual. Which I did through being selected for a 主播大秀 trainee scheme which fast tracked me on the road to being a director. As a director I made a number of award winning and award nominated documentaries before I managed to find a way to return to drama. My last directing job was on C4’s teen series Skins.

Since then I have worked in a mixture of both forms - for six years I ran The Documentary Unit at 主播大秀 Studios and was Exec Producer on a range of programmes including some of Louis Theroux’s films, Life and Death Row, The Met as well as factual dramas such as Murdered For Being Different and Against The Law.

However, my heart has been forever taking me back to my love of drama and last year I was given the amazing opportunity to set up my own drama hub within 主播大秀 Studios. I am thrilled with the belief that has been invested in me and hope to continue to look for powerful stories, perspectives and voices such as in our latest film The Left Behind.

The Left Behind is available on 主播大秀 Three on Wednesday 10 July. Killed By My Debt is also available on 主播大秀 iPlayer.