Governors

Jay Hunt OBE is Apple TV+ Creative Director for Europe. She is the only person to have led BBC One, Channel 5 and Channel 4. She started her career at BBC News working on Newsnight and Panorama before becoming editor of both the One O’clock and Six O’clock News. She was Controller of BBC Daytime and Director of Programmes at Channel 5, before returning to the BBC in 2008 to run BBC One. In 2011 she was made the first Chief Creative Officer of Channel 4. Over the next seven years, she led what was described as a “creative renaissance”. She has commissioned an array of global hits including Luther, Sherlock, Slow Horses, Black Mirror, Derry Girls and Gogglebox and in 2023 was named one of the 35 most powerful women in TV by the Hollywood Reporter. Jay was awarded an OBE in the King’s 2023 Birthday Honours for services to the arts.

Having been first appointed to the Board of Governors in 2020, Jay was appointed in January 2024 as Chair for a four-year term commencing on 16 February 2024.

Michael is a Senior Partner at McKinsey & Company and serves as Managing Partner of the firm in the UK and a member of McKinsey’s global board of directors. He previously was global co-leader of the firm’s Strategy & Corporate Finance Practice and a member of the McKinsey Global Institute Council.

Michael is also a governor of the Royal College of Art, one of the world’s leading art and design universities. He has served as a trustee of the Marshall Scholarships and the World Schools Debating Championships, on the advisory council of King’s Business School, and as a director of BritishAmerican Business.

Michael chairs the BFI’s Finance Committee.

Monica Chadha serves on the boards of, or as an adviser to, several privately held companies in the entertainment and technology sectors. Previously Monica was CEO of MyMovies.Net; Vice Chair of Queen Mary University of London; Founder and Co-Chair of the Deloitte Higher Education Cyber Security Group; Chair of the British Independent Film Awards Advisory Board; Non-Executive Director of Obviously Creative; Advisory Board member of the BAFTA Digital Communications Group, Marlow Film Studios, the CMI President’s Advisory Council; and member of the APPG for AI and Bias in AI Research Group at Durham University.

In 2018 Monica was appointed an ambassador for Women on Boards. In 2019 she was voted one of the top 50 Women to Watch in the UK in the Female FTSE Board Report.

Tanya Cordrey is a leading product and technology executive with over two decades of experience scaling some of the world’s best-known businesses. She is currently Chief Product Officer at Motorway, the UK’s largest online used-car marketplace, which is pioneering the development of AI products to transform how people buy and sell cars.

Previously, Tanya held senior roles at Instagram as VP of Product and at Guardian News & Media as Chief Digital Officer, where she sat on the executive committee and oversaw an award-winning product portfolio. She brings extensive board experience, having served as a Non-Executive Director at Clarks and Schibsted, and as an adviser to the Government Digital Service. She holds an MBA with distinction from London Business School.

Mark’s first producer role was on the hit show Peter Kay’s Phoenix Nights in 2001. In 2002, Mark co-founded the Sheffield based production company Warp Films, which has become a beacon for working-class and regional film and TV. 

Across Mark’s 20 plus years as CEO of Warp he has produced 25 films, 17 TV series and eight short films, and has won an Emmy, a Golden Globe and five BAFTA awards in both film and television for work including the film This Is England to executive producing the recent global Netflix award-winning hit show Adolescence with long-term collaborators Jack Thorne and Stephen Graham. Mark’s career highlights also include Everybody’s Talking About Jamie (2021), The Virtues (2019), Tyrannosaur (2011), Four Lions (2011), Dead Man’s Shoes (2004) and My Wrongs (2002).

Ganan Kanagathurai is a senior executive and entrepreneur with a proven track record of scaling iconic brands across the UK’s hospitality and creative sectors. Ganan is the owner and Chairman of the acclaimed Roti King restaurant group and was previously the Chief Executive Officer of the UK food chain itsu.

Deeply committed to the UK’s cultural landscape, Ganan serves as Chairman of Rifco, the UK’s leading South Asian theatre production company and is also a trustee of Women in Sport. Ganan brings a unique blend of high-level corporate governance, entrepreneurial agility and a passion for diverse storytelling.

Elizabeth Karlsen is an internationally renowned, award-winning producer who co-founded Number 9 Films, one of the UK’s leading independent production companies, with partner Stephen Woolley in 2002. In February 2019, Elizabeth and Stephen jointly received the highly prestigious BAFTA Award for Outstanding British Contribution to Cinema.

Elizabeth’s work with Stephen on films such as Living (2022), Carol (2015), Colette (2018), Little Voice (1998), Made in Dagenham (2010), Youth (2015), and The Crying Game (1993) has garnered a total of 52 BAFTA nominations and wins and 20 Academy Award nominations and wins.

Elizabeth has served on the board of The Edinburgh Film Festival, the NFTS Gala, the American Academy of Motion Pictures and Arts Events Committee, and was Chair of Women in Film and TV UK.

Declan Keeney PhD, FRSA is a Professor (Chair) of Screen Technologies & Innovation at Ulster University, Director of the Ulster Screen Academy and CEO of Studio Ulster. He is an expert advisor on the screen industry’s future workforce needs and in emerging screen technologies trends such as real-time VFX workflows. Declan co-founded Studio Ulster, in Northern Ireland, a £75m large scale commercial virtual production and real-time visual effects studio in partnership with Belfast Harbour Studios, Northern Ireland Screen and Ulster University. He was appointed as its CEO in June 2024.

Declan is a Fellow of The Royal Society of Arts and a member of the British Council’s Arts & the Creative Economy Advisory Group. His current research portfolio in support of the screen industries represents £91.5m worth of live grant-based research and development investments. Declan is an AHRC/DCMS Policy Fellow in the Future Observatory at the Design Museum in London exploring net zero and carbon reduction using emerging technologies for film production. He leads the CoSTAR Network Lab in NI, a £17m investment in a world class research lab and part of the largest research network for Virtual Production in Europe. Declan is a Co-investigator at Future Screens Northern Ireland and a Co-investigator on an EPSRC Network+ project entitled ‘Virtual Production in a Digital Economy’. He has over 25 years of film and television production experience, including 13 years as staff at the BBC.

Hakan Kousetta is, alongside Jamie Laurenson, the co-founder of 60Forty Films and, since 2015, has produced over 100 hours of scripted television. Hakan is currently executive producer on the second series of Down Cemetery Road, both seasons of Hijack, and Apple TV’s yet to be released limited six-part series Last Seen. He’s also been the executive producer on Slow Horses since the show’s inception and throughout the entire six season run on Apple TV and each of series 7 and 8, currently shooting in London.

Hakan’s other production credits include Apple TV+’s The Essex Serpent directed by Clio Barnard, BBC series The North Water directed by Andrew Haigh, Love Nina for BBC2, The End for Sky, season 2 of Jane Campion’s Top of The Lake: China Girl (which premiered at the 2017 Cannes Film Festival and was nominated for a Golden Globe). He also executive produced two seasons of State of the Union, written by Nick Hornby, directed by Stephen Frears and winner of four Emmy Awards.

Passionate about the UK’s television and film industry, Kousetta has been a vocal advocate for the production community. He was on PACT council for over five years and Chair in 2021 when he also received a special innovation award by the Producers Guild of Great Britain for extensive work with the government on designing and implementing the COVID Film and TV Production Restart Scheme.

Laura Miele is a technology and media executive who recently celebrated 30 years at Electronic Arts.

Previously, she has held several senior leadership positions, including Chief Studios Officer, Executive Vice President of Global Publishing, and Senior Vice President of Global Marketing. In 2013, she was named General Manager of the Star Wars business, where she led EA’s partnership with Lucasfilm Ltd. and Disney.

Laura is widely recognised as a leading voice in the global interactive entertainment industry and is a sought-after speaker and media commentator. In 2024, she joined the Board of Directors of On Holding AG (On Running).

For the past 25 years Ryan has founded and overseen complex operating businesses in the hospitality and housing sectors. He is Vice Chairman of multinational investment company Realstar Group, a real-estate and investment management company with over $7 billion of assets focused on rental residential, hospitality and alternative asset classes. Having acquired, renovated and constructed projects with an end value of £4 billion, Realstar’s UK business has developed over 10 residential towers in the UK, including the tallest in London, a 45-story tower designed by Rogers Stirk Harbour in Elephant and Castle and the Bankside Hotel next to Blackfriars Bridge.

Almost a decade ago, Ryan also founded the UK’s leading residential owner and operator of rental apartments UNCLE, which supports renters in major cities across the UK for a better, fairer rental experience. Ryan is also the past Chairman of the UK Advisory Board and main board member of education and programming charity Facing History & Ourselves. The charity creates content and lesson plans for teachers in order to help students aged 14 to 18 tackle the hard questions of human behaviour throughout modern history.

Made a CBE in 2025 for services to television and a recipient of the BAFTA Special Award for her contribution to television, Tranter is one of the industry’s most experienced television executives and CEO and Co-Founder of Bad Wolf in Cardiff since 2015. She previously served as the BBC’s Controller of Drama and subsequently Controller of Fiction, founding and running commercial production companies BBC Worldwide Productions and Adjacent Productions in LA.

Bad Wolf’s purpose is to create ambitious, imaginative and relevant drama for UK, US and global television audiences, made locally in Wales. In 2016 she co-founded Wolf Studios Wales, starting the building of a world class seven stage studio that is currently the only studio in the world built by producers for the purpose of their own productions. 

Tranter’s credits for Bad Wolf include the multiple Emmy Award-winning series The Night Of, three seasons of BAFTA-winning series His Dark Materials, four seasons of BAFTA-winning Industry, three seasons of the hugely popular A Discovery of Witches and two seasons of the BAFTA-winning I Hate Suzie and Doctor Who. Other releases include an adaptation of Bernard Cornwell’s The Winter King and Dope Girls. Recent productions include a second season of Red Eye for ITV and new dramas The Other Bennet Sister for BBC/BritBox and The War Between the Land and the Sea for BBC and Disney Branded Television. Future projects include Berlin Noir for Apple and Bad Wolf’s first production with Netflix, The Lords’ Day. Tranter was also an Executive Producer on the multiple award-winning series Succession.

Eleanor (Nell) Whitley is a leading figure in the immersive arts and experiential media sector, working at the intersection of culture, technology, XR, film and live experience. Nell regularly contributes to international industry conversations, reports and policy initiatives exploring immersive storytelling, creative technology and the future of experiential distribution.

As Managing Director and Executive Producer at Marshmallow Laser Feast, Nell has played a key role in shaping a new language for multisensory and location-based storytelling. Her work spans art, XR, performance and digital culture, with a practice centred on developing ambitious, research-led experiences that combine emerging technologies with cultural storytelling and public engagement.

Edgar Wright burst on to the scene with the groundbreaking British sitcom Spaced, instantly marking himself as a bold new creative voice. He followed with two back-to-back genre-defining hits: the ‘RomZomCom’ Shaun of the Dead and the action-comedy Hot Fuzz, both made with longtime collaborators Simon Pegg and Nick Frost.

After completing The Cornetto Trilogy with The World’s End, Wright directed the BAFTA-winning, Oscar-nominated blockbuster Baby Driver, which earned over $220 million worldwide, three Academy Award nominations, and a BAFTA for Best Editing. He followed up in 2021 with the psychological thriller Last Night in Soho and the documentary The Sparks Brothers. Most recently, he co-wrote and directed Paramount’s Stephen King adaptation, The Running Man.

Beyond film and television, Wright has directed commercials for brands such as SquareSpace, Hotels.com, Nike, and McDonald’s, as well as music videos for artists including Pharrell Williams, Daft Punk, Beck, and Mint Royale.