Mammoth Screen appoints Samantha McMillon as managing director

Mammoth Screen, the award-winning ITV Studios indie behind critically acclaimed shows including The Serpent, World On Fire and Endeavour has announced that Samantha McMillon is joining as Managing Director.

McMillon will join from ITV Studios where she is currently Commercial Director for its in-house UK drama labels and will have a role across the development and production slates, helping foster new relationships domestically and internationally to support the future growth of Mammoth.

McMillon will work alongside James Penny, who becomes CEO, Damien Timmer who will become Chief Creative Officer and Jon Williams, Chief Operating Officer.

In her Commercial Director role, McMillon worked across the slates of ITV Studios’ labels and producers including Silverprint Pictures, Happy Prince, Quay Street Productions, Tall Story Pictures, Jeff Pope and Patrick Spence’s studio. Prior to this McMillon worked with ITV Studios’ distribution arm in its Global Content team, bringing scripted content to the international market from UK, European and Australian producers. McMillon built her relationship with Mammoth while partnering with the team to launch Poldark to global audiences.

In addition to McMillon’s arrival, Sheena Bucktowonsing has also joined as an Executive Producer, working across shows including World on Fire series 2, having previously worked on the last three series of Doctor Who, most recently as a producer. Before this, she was Development Executive at Imaginary Friends with credits including Broadchurch series 3, and prior to that ran the kids and drama development slates at Kindle Entertainment.

Damien Timmer, CCO, said: “Sam’s arrival marks the beginning of a new phase of Mammoth; post-pandemic we’re looking forward to making more ambitious and varied shows for a variety of buyers and Sam is going to be key to that. The drama landscape has changed fundamentally in recent years and we will gain from Sam’s expertise as a leader and from her experience piecing together production finance, maintaining talent relationships and increasing commercial value. With Sheena joining the creative team alongside Creative Director Rebecca Keane, Director of Television Helen Ziegler and Executive Producers Tom Leggett and James Gandhi, we’re excited about the range of shows entering production in the next 12 months.”

Samantha McMillon said: “I am delighted to be joining Mammoth at this exciting moment for the company. My real passion is facilitating story telling on the local and international stage and I cannot wait to begin working alongside Damien, James and Jon. They are a formidable trio and I am excited to join them and the wider team to help realise Mammoth’s ambitious aims for the future.”

Forthcoming shows include Noughts + Crosses series 2 for BBC One, new series Grime Kids for BBC Three, an adaptation of Tom Jones for Masterpiece and ITV, McDonald and Dodds series 3 for ITV and Hugh Laurie’s adaptation of Agatha Christie’s Why Didn’t They Ask Evans? for Britbox.

Based in London and Belfast, Mammoth Screen’s award-winning slate also includes crime thriller The Serpent for BBC One and Netflix, one of the most streamed shows on BBC iPlayer last year, recent ITV thriller The Tower and long-running ITV detective drama Endeavour.

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