PRODUCTION BIOGRAPHIES
LISA ZWERLING (EXECUTIVE PRODUCER, SHOWRUNNER)
Lisa Zwerling got her start on the NBC series “ER,” and she went on to write and produce “Flashforward” and “Betrayal” for ABC as well as create the TV movies Weekends at Bellevue and Midnight Sun for NBC. She met Karyn Usher on her first writing job. Together, they founded Carpool Entertainment where they have developed a variety of projects at AMC, HBO, Showtime, Hulu and Starz. KARYN USHER (EXECUTIVE PRODUCER, SHOWRUNNER)
Karyn Usher is a writer and producer who was a seminal force on an array of iconic dramas, including “Prison Break,” “Bones” and “Backstrom.” She created the TV movies Rogue and Delirium for FOX. She and Lisa Zwerling formed their Carpool Entertainment banner to develop series for premium cable and streaming. They have multiple projects in active development. STEPHEN GARRETT (EXECUTIVE PRODUCER)
Stephen Garrett is an accomplished producer with an eye for pedigree material. In 2016, Garrett launched his production company, Character 7, for high-end television and film that resonates with the expanding global audience. The company has offices in Los Angeles and London.
Garrett and Character 7’s first venture, “The Night Manager,” was produced in association with The Ink Factory for AMC and the BBC. The limited series garnered rave reviews and rapturous audience responses, receiving 12 Emmy® nominations, including Outstanding Limited Series, and winning two Emmy® awards for director Susanne Bier and music composer Victor Reyes. In addition, the HFPA honored Tom Hiddleston, Olivia Coleman and Hugh Laurie, who won Golden Globes® for their performances in the series.
Garrett and Character 7 have an upcoming high-profile HBO limited-series, “The Undoing.” As an executive producer, Garrett is reunited with Bier, who is directing the series that was written by David E. Kelly and that stars Nicole Kidman, Hugh Grant, and Donald Sutherland.
Other upcoming projects from Character 7 include developing the television adaptation of Liza Klaussmann’s best-selling psychological thriller Tigers in Red Weather. Produced by Character 7’s Garrett and Head of Development Michele Wolkoff, this multifaceted thriller explores the complexity of women and the choices they make.
Prior to Character 7, Garrett served as founder and executive chairman of Kudos, the U.K.’s leading independent producer of TV drama. With his business partner Jane Featherstone, Kudos’ TV drama arm galvanized British television with such popular and acclaimed series as “Broadchurch,” “Hustle,” “Life on Mars,” “The Hour” and the BAFTA® award–winning “Spooks” (“MI-5”). Garrett also led, first in partnership with Paul Webster and more recently with Ollie Madden, Kudos’ (then Shine’s) stand-alone PRODUCTION BIOGRAPHIES
filmmaking entity. Under this banner, he was executive producer for a number of movies, including the Simon Beaufoy–penned Salmon Fishing in the Yemen and David Cronenberg’s Eastern Promises. He also produced Bharat Nalluri’s Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day, another Beaufoy screenplay. Garrett and Featherstone sold Kudos to Elisabeth Murdoch’s Shine Group in 2006 and continued to be involved with the company until a few years ago.
Prior to Kudos, Garrett was at Channel 4, where he gave “first breaks” to a wide range of writers and directors, including such now- established talents as The Full Monty director Peter Cattaneo and its writer, Oscar®-winner Simon Beaufoy. Responsible for more than 100 hours of broadcasting a year, Garrett was involved in everything from the youth drama “Teenage Health Freak,” directed by Cattaneo, to the groundbreaking late-night, love-it-or-loathe-it series “The Word.”
Outside of production, Garrett and Character 7 sponsor the Verity Bargate Award for new writing at London’s groundbreaking Soho Theater. He is on the board of Scenario Two, a theater company with a new production of the musical “Light in the Piazza,” starring Renée Fleming, planned for June 2019. He has written about film and television for a range of publications, including the Financial Times, The Guardian and The Independent. In 2010, he was the News International Visiting Professor of Broadcast Media at Oxford University, where he gave a series of lectures about the intersection of creativity and commerce, and the future of storytelling.
Garrett studied jurisprudence at Oxford and counts his first break as a 6-year-old extra in a Milkybar Kid commercial. STEVE CLARK-HALL (PRODUCER)
From small independent productions to blockbusters, British producer Steve Clark-Hall has experienced highs and lows over a career that spans 50 years. When his career in film production began in 1988 with Jim O’Brien’s war romance The Dressmaker, Clark-Hall already had more than 20 years in television under his belt.
In 1964, he joined the BBC before moving to Scotland in 1972 to set up his own production company, Siddhartha Films. The launch of Channel 4 in 1982, which effectively launched the independent production sector in the U.K., resulted in Clark-Hall moving back to London, where he made the long-running series – including magazine show – “Years Ahead.” With his partner, Mairi Bett, they renamed the company Skyline Films, which they still run today.
Following a string of features in the 1990s, which included Derek Jarman’s Edward II, Mort Ransen’s Margaret’s Museum (starring Helena Bonham Carter) and Alan Rickman’s directorial debut The Winter Guest, Clark-Hall co-produced Calendar Girls.
It was while working on Man to Man (2005) that the producer first began his fruitful relationship with Guy Ritchie. Following Revolver and RocknRolla, Clark-Hall co-produced Sherlock Holmes, starring Robert Downey Jr., and he executive produced the sequel. These two films made more than $1 billion at the global box office. He worked with Ritchie again on the 1960s spy reboot The Man From U.N.C.L.E. and King Arthur: Legend of the Sword. PRODUCTION BIOGRAPHIES
AMANDA TUDESCO (CO-PRODUCER)
Amanda Tudesco is a producer, casting director and actress. She currently serves as director of development at Carpool Entertainment, where she works alongside Karyn Usher and Lisa Zwerling to develop and produce dramas for cable and streaming platforms. In casting, Tudesco has worked on numerous television and film projects, including Tim Burton’s Dumbo and Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children, “Backstrom,” “Bones,” “Guilt,” “Uncle Buck” and 99 Homes. Tudesco is a graduate of Northwestern University’s Acting Program. She has appeared in various TV shows, plays, commercials and films, including the upcoming feature Ad Astra, which stars Brad Pitt. KARI SKOGLAND (DIRECTOR – 101 AND 102)
Emmy®-nominated, BAFTA award–winning director and showrunner Kari Skogland is CEO of Mad Rabbit, a Red Arrow Studios company, which launched in 2016. As CEO, Skogland is committed to producing high-end, one-hour dramas for the international market while she continues her award-winning work as director of hit series, which include “The Handmaid’s Tale”; the first two episodes of AMC’s “NOS4A2,” starring Zachary Quinto. Skogland also serves as pilot block director and an executive producer of Showtime’s upcoming limited series “The Loudest Voice in the Room,” starring Russell Crowe as Roger Ailes.
Skogland has become one of the world’s most prolific female directors of one-hour dramas and feature films. She was named one of The Hollywood Reporter’s “Ten Directors to Watch” for her auteur debut, she won a prestigious BAFTA award for directing “The Handmaid’s Tale” Season One finale, and she was nominated for a 2018 Emmy®Award for Outstanding Directing for a Drama Series for “The Handmaid’s Tale” Season Two. Most recently, she was featured in Variety’s 2018 Women’s Impact Report.
Skogland’s additional television credits include the premiere season of “Condor” (Audience), “The Borgias” and “Penny Dreadful” (Showtime), “Boardwalk Empire” (HBO), “The Killing,” “The Walking Dead” and “Fear the Walking Dead” (AMC), “Under the Dome” (CBS), “Vikings” (History Channel), “Power” (Starz), “The Americans” (FX), “House of Cards” and “The Punisher” (Netflix), and many more. Skogland also directed “Sons of Liberty” (History), a six-part event miniseries, for which she won the Directors Guild of Canada (DCG) award for best director of a television miniseries.
As a feature film writer, director and producer, Skogland’s film Fifty Dead Men Walking, starring Sir Ben Kingsley and Jim Sturgess, premiered at a gala at the Toronto International Film Festival. The film won the Canadian Screen Award for Best Adapted Screenplay and was nominated for an additional six awards, including Best Film. It also won Best Feature Drama at the Leo Awards. Additionally, Skogland was recognized by the DCG for Best Director. Her previous film, The Stone Angel (starring Ellen Burstyn and Ellen Page) –which Skogland directed, wrote and produced – garnered nominations for Best Director and Best Film by the DGC, as well as Best Screenplay by the WGC, along with a win for Ellen Burstyn for the Genie Award for Best Actress.
For her body of work, Skogland was honored at the 2015 BIRKS/TELEFILM Diamond Tribute to Women in Film. She has also worked for many years advocating with the DGA and the DGC on behalf of women directors. PRODUCTION BIOGRAPHIES
CHINA MOO-YOUNG (DIRECTOR – 103, 105 AND 108)
China Moo-Young is a director and writer. She trained at the National Youth Theatre before studying drama film, theater and television at Bristol University. She wrote and directed her first short, Liar. Her second short film, Juvenile, was made with the support of the U.K. Film Council’s New Cinema Fund. In 2008, she directed the episode “Emo” for Channel 4’s sixth season of “Coming Up” and went straight on to direct four episodes of the third season of “Secret Diary of a Call Girl” for ITV/Showtime as well as the opening block of the second season of “Scott & Bailey.” She has since directed multiple episodes of the award- winning BBC drama “Call the Midwife,” “Spotless” (Canal+/Netflix), “Humans” Season 1 (Channel 4/AMC), BBC Three’s pioneering drama “Thirteen” and the 18th-century period drama “Harlots” for ITV Encore/Hulu. She is developing several original television and film projects. SUNU GONERA (DIRECTOR – 104 AND 106)
Hailing from the townships of Zimbabwe during the turmoil of its civil war, Sunu Gonera’s career path reads more like a movie than real life. His sporting abilities enabled him to travel and study, resulting in a degree in organizational psychology from the University of Cape Town.
Despite a promising banking career, Gonera’s dream of filmmaking soon took over. Within three short years, he received several prestigious directing awards for commercials for such companies as Nike® and Coca-Cola®. His short film, Riding With Sugar, was screened at Cannes.
Gonera was the top-ranked director at the Loerie Awards in 2017. His “One Source” music video with Khuli Chana for Absolut won four medals (a Gold, two Silvers and a Bronze) at Cannes Lions, and it was the most awarded campaign at The Bookmarks in 2017.
Gonera opened the Design Indaba 2018 conference with a moving talk on Afrofuturism. Spanning Gonera’s roots, his journey and the meaning of Afrofuturism, the talk ended with him in tears and the crowd on their feet. He also spoke of how his love of filmmaking started when he was young, watching movies to escape.
In 2006, Gonera landed his first feature directing assignment with Lionsgate: Pride, which tells the true story of Jim Ellis (played by Academy Award®–nominee Terrence Howard), a black swimming coach who transformed the lives of troubled inner-city youths in Philadelphia. In Hollywood, he has recently directed episodes of “Madam Secretary” – a People’s Choice–nominated series with Téa Leoni – and the gritty FX drama “Snowfall.”
In 2018, he directed and produced the long-awaited passion film “Riding With Sugar,” which is currently in post-production for release late 2019/early 2020. PRODUCTION BIOGRAPHIES
He is already back in Hollywood to direct another episode of “Madam Secretary” as well as the season finale of FX’s “Snowfall.” He has also sold a show to FX, which he is co-writing and executive producing with Danny Brocklehurst, a BAFTA- and International Emmy®–winning English screenwriter. JONATHAN LEE (PRODUCTION DESIGNER)
A fine art graduate of the Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art (University of Dundee), Jonathan Lee specialized in painting under Alberto Morrocco. His work was shown in the Royal Scottish Academy and in numerous private collections. Lee’s work always evinced a love of light on landscape, which, not unnaturally, led to an interest in stage design and to working on a number of productions with both Tayside Opera and Scottish Opera, including “Nabucco” and “La Traviata.”
An enduring love of film motivated Lee’s move to London in 1986, where he began working in film art departments on projects such as Being Human, Riff-Raff, Restoration, The Saint, Tomorrow Never Dies and Star Wars: Attack of the Clones. He began working as a supervising art director in 1997 on Elizabeth (which garnered a prestigious Art Directors Guild nomination), Ali and xXx. Experience with drawn and painted images – as well an ability to render these designs in a technical, drafted form – was pivotal in helping conceive set designs. Lee’s best work reflects the idea of bringing paintings to life.
Lee has been working as a production designer since 2006 on films such as Stratton for director Simon West, Patient Zero for Apollo Productions (starring Matt Smith and Natalie Dormer) and Head in the Clouds. He has also designed TV dramas, including American television series “24” for Fox Entertainment, “Colditz,” “Crusoe” and “Strike Back” Seasons 1 and 2.
More recently, Lee worked on “Genius” with director Ron Howard for Fox and National Geographic. ANNIE SYMONS (COSTUME DESIGNER)
Annie Symons began her career in costume at the age of 14, skipping school to work in the local theater. After graduating from Hornsey College of Art with a degree in fine art (painting, performance and filmmaking), she cut her teeth in film and costume design at the National Film and Television School, financing this part of her education by working at the London Palladium.
Symons then designed several shorts and features for the British Film Institute with some of the U.K.’s most innovative and creative directors. During this period, she was designing for commercials, music videos and a fashion company in Italy while simultaneously running her own label, Manifest.
Since then, she has gone on to design many film and television productions, including Worried About the Boy, which won a BAFTA TV Award for Best Costume Design; “The Crimson Petal and the White,” which won an RTS Award for Best Costume Design; and “Great Expectations,” which garnered an Emmy® Award for Outstanding Costumes. Other television credits include “The Terror,” “Dracula,” “The Hollow Crown” and “Da Vinci’s Demons.” Film projects include Guy Ritchie’s King Arthur: Legend of the Sword, The Woman in Black 2: Angel of Death and Love Is the Devil. PRODUCTION BIOGRAPHIES
ERIKA ÖKVIST (HAIR AND MAKEUP DESIGNER)
Erika Ökvist is a Swedish makeup, hair and prosthetics designer who has worked on many highly successful high-end television dramas and features throughout her career to date. Recently, she designed Hugo Blick’s “Black Earth Rising,” starring John Goodman and Michaela Coel. Before that, she designed the makeup for “Taboo” (directed by Kristoffer Nyholm and starring Tom Hardy and Oona Chaplin) for which she won the RTS Craft Award for Best Makeup and Hair Design at BAFTA Craft 2018.
Her other TV credits include Peter Kosminsky’s miniseries “The State”; Pete Travis’ The Go-Between with Vanessa Redgrave and Jim Broadbent; “Tyrant”; “24: Live Another Day” for Fox; and “Mr. Selfridge” for ITV.
Her feature credits include Amazon Adventure, starring Calum Finlay with director Mike Slee for SK Films; Captain Webb with director Justin Hardy; In Secret, directed by Charlie Stratton and starring Elizabeth Olsen and Oscar Isaac; and Dementamania with director Kit Ryan.