UK and US-based outfit 42 has a long-running partnership with Amazon and a successful management arm
Need to know: Producers Ben Pugh and Rory Aitken formed London and Los Angeles-based management and production outfit 42 in 2013 alongside talent agents Josh Varney and Kate Buckley. Aitken left last year to form a new company, with Los Angles-based Pugh assuming leadership of film and TV production. Former Tiger Aspect managing director Ben Cavey stepped up to become managing director of international TV and moved to 42’s London office.
42 mixes director-driven projects, such as Peter Cattaneo’s The Penguin Lessons, Agnieszka Smoczynska’s The Silent Twins and Dominic Cooke’s The Courier, with genre project fare for the streamers. It had a first-look deal with Netflix (including on Sand Castle with Henry Cavill), and now has strong ties with Prime Video. 42’s biggest hit for the streamer is the My Fault: London franchise, with two sequels now wrapped production.
The company has 70-80 employees across its UK and US offices. Its management arm represents actors, writers, directors, comedians, presenters, producers, casting directors and media book rights.
Key personnel: Josh Varney, CEO; Ben Pugh, president of production; Ben Cavey, managing director, UK; Erica Steinberg, SVP production, Cathy King, managing partner, Kate Buckley, managing partner
Incoming: 42 wrapped on Chork from Shane Meadows, with BBC Film and the BFI among the backers. Also in post is Next Life, written and directed by Drake Doremus and starring Emilia Clarke, Edgar Ramirez and Jack Farthing.
There is a partnership with Range Media on The Last Druid, directed by William Eubank and starring Russell Crowe; Javier Gullon’s The Bet, in development at Warner Bros; Andrew Sodroski’s legal thriller Conflict Of Interest, set up at Netflix; and Rupert Wyatt-directed heist thriller Boxman with Lionsgate.
Ben Pugh says: “We’ve gone down this road of wanting to do really cool, auteur-director-driven prestige projects, whatever that may mean, and then commercially driven-streamer and studio content. We’ve been regularly producing different things and last year and this year have both been really good years. We’ve been fortunate to navigate Covid and the strikes within that.”
Ben Cavey says: “What we do find is when [our management clients] work with us, we can move incredibly quick, and that’s the upside of being a production management business. We can respond to what the market’s looking for quickly. I think it allows us a rapidity that is kind of hard to match.”
Contact: info@42mp.com
No comments yet