Our People

Simon Knight Chief Executive Officer

Simon joined Maverick as Chief Executive Officer in October 2015.

Previously Simon was Creative Director at Warner Bros Television Production UK indie’s Ricochet where he was responsible for growing the company’s output which included launching and nurturing Channel 4’s ratings success Food Unwrapped, Superfoods: The Real Story, BBC 2’s The Hairy Bikers and Lorraine Pascale Cooking The Nation’s Favourite Foods, and More 4’s Simon Hopkinson Cooks.

Beforehand, Simon was Executive Producer at BBC Bristol where he developed and grew BBC ONE’s huge success DIY SOS: The Big Build, launched Nigel Slater’s Simple Suppers on BBC1, Simon Hopkinson’s The Good Cook, and developed BBC daytime’s hit Wanted Down Under.

Simon has also produced I’m A Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here, Celebrity Love Island, and Poor Little Rich Girls for ITV.

John Hesling President, USA

Hesling is a BAFTA and Rose D’Or nominated Producer who was most recently the Senior Vice President of Programming at Shed Media where he had creative oversight of the company’s output.  Prior to his time at Shed, Hesling spent 14 years at the BBC in London, New York and Los Angeles, where he developed, produced and directed award winning documentaries and factual entertainment formats filmed in a dozen countries, as well as the first 2 seasons of the long running BBC2 hit Dragons’ Den. In the US, he has developed and produced shows for ABC, NBC, Lifetime, Oxygen, E!, TLC, History, GSN and others and successfully introduced Top Gear – one of the BBC’s top brands – into the US market. Hesling’s additional credits include Executive Producing ‘First Dates’ for NBC, the upcoming ‘Genius Junior’ for NBC, ‘Long Lost Family’ for TLC, and ‘Criminal Confessions’ for Oxygen. 

Maria French Head of Production

Maria first joined Maverick TV as Production Executive in 2010 and is now our Head of Production.

Maria previously worked for several other production companies as Production Manager and Production Executive, where she oversaw a variety of documentaries, factual, features and childrens programmes, both in studios and on location.

She is responsible for programme production management and supervising all projects from development to delivery.

Emily Dollman Head of Development

Emily came to Maverick with a strong development and production background. She is responsible for creating ideas across all genres, with a focus on Factual Entertainment, Features and Formats. Emily is a former Broadcast Hotshot and has developed ideas for all the major UK broadcasters as well as US networks.

Emily has had a focus on development for the past few years, working in a variety of teams at companies including Wall To Wall and Pulse Films, as well as in-house at the BBC. In production, Emily worked on a range of shows and her credits span different genres: entertainment brands The Voice and The Apprentice, factual entertainment shows including The Young Ones and BAFTA nominated The Audience. Her goal at Maverick is to devise excitingly fresh and bold big ideas.

Emily Mayer Senior Vice President of Development, USA

Senior Vice President of Development at Maverick TV USA. Previously, she was SVP of Development at Fishbowl Worldwide Media where she sold and produced shows on a number of networks such as Bravo, Oxygen, WE, TLC, HGTV, OWN and Animal Planet. Prior to that, she served as Vice President of development at NBC/Universal’s Wilshire Studios, developing, selling and producing projects for more than a dozen different networks including E!, Vh1, WE, Bio, Travel and Sundance. Before that, Mayer was Vice President of development at GRB Entertainment, selling projects to Discovery, Animal Planet, A&E, E!, AMC, OWN, VH1 and WE. She also held positions at Alchemy Television Group, 44 Blue Productions and Fox Television Studios, after her start in the alternative department at UTA. Mayer graduated from John Hopkins University with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Film and Media Studies.

Phil Tredinnick Head of Quiz

Phil joined Maverick in December 2016 to head up a new initiative to develop original and innovative quiz formats.

Previously, he devised the TV quizzes “For What It’s Worth” (BBC1) and “Relatively Clever” (Sky One) and has created games and tasks for shows ranging from “Big Brother” to “Distraction”.

He has worked in senior development roles for a number of independent production companies, including Crackit Productions, Tuesday’s Child, Talkback and Chocolate Media. He has been instrumental in commissions across a variety of genres – from Features formats such as “Save Money Good Food” on ITV1, to the “Horribly Wrong” nostalgia brand on Channel Five, and the comedy panel show “Virtually Famous” on E4.

Formerly a comedy writer for the likes of Graham Norton and Alistair McGowan, he is creating quiz formats that will make viewers smile as well as think.

Ian Ayres Chief Financial Officer

Looks after accounting, and ultimately the money.

Natalie Dowling Personal Assistant

Personal Assistant to Simon Knight, CEO of Maverick Television.

Alex Rose Development Coordinator, USA

Alex is the development coordinator for Maverick TV USA. In his role he supports the SVP of Development. After graduating from the University of Southern California, Alex got his first taste of the TV world at Mark Burnett Productions working in casting on Shark Tank. Shortly after, he began working at William Morris Endeavor, supporting various agents in the TV business. He found he loved working closely with content creators to promote their visions. Alex now works closely with the development team at Maverick to identify the best storytellers.

Emily Guarino Head of Legal and Business Affairs

As part of the senior management team Emily is responsible for the legal and business affairs function at Maverick. She provides legal and commercial advice and negotiates and drafts agreements across the business on matters relating to development, financing, talent, partnerships, co-productions, production, compliance, distribution and brand exploitation.

Emily joined Maverick in 2015 having held previous senior legal and business affairs roles at RDF now Banijay Media, NBCUniversal and A+E Networks. She has extensive experience in programming and formats across multiple genres for the UK, US and international territories.

She has enjoyed leading Maverick as one of the first production companies to make use of the children’s tax credit. She is also very proud to have worked on multi Emmy, BAFTA, Golden Globe, Rose D’Or and Broadcast award winning programmes throughout my career including Wife Swap, Faking It, Secret Millionaire, Being Human, Made in Chelsea, Downton Abbey and Operation Ouch!.

Sukh Sahota Producer, Development

Llinos Griffiths Assistant Producer, Development (Maternity Leave)

Part of the development team coming up with programme ideas, writing and cutting taster tapes to pitch to broadcasters.

Tamara Durnford Talent Manager & Production Manager, Development

As Maverick’s Talent Manager Tamara is responsible for helping find off-screen talent. She oversees Maverick’s talent database and network, building and developing relationships with all levels of production and development staff from runners to series producers. She work closely with executive producers and production management to staff projects and help develop the skills of our talented staff. Alongside, Talent Managing Tamara is also the Production Manager for Maverick’s Development team; supporting them in the day to day running of the department.

Piera Cuttica Head of Post Production

Manor Production Services is Maverick Television’s internal post facility. We offer the complete post production experience, Avid Offline suites, Da Vinci Resolve Grading tool, Symphony Online, Voice booth and 5.1 surround sound Dubbing Suite and QC.

Being part of Maverick means we have the opportunity to be part of the pre- production workflow and offer our expertise in cameras; media backups services and of course the complete post production package.

I manage a fabulous team of ten people, based both in the London and Birmingham office. Together we bring, experience, continuity, calmness under pressure and offer every production the same quality of service as if they were at a commercial Post Facility.

Christina Beachy Vice President of Production, USA

Christina Beachy is the Vice President of Production for All3media America and currently oversees production for Maverick Tv USA. Prior to joining the All3media America team, Christina worked in casting and production management at Renegade 83, Tijuana Entertainment and Studio Lambert USA on multiple series and development projects. Previous and present show credits include “Miracle Workers” for ABC, “Obsessed” for A&E, “The Pitch” for AMC, “Shaunie’s Home Court” for VH1, “ Reunion Road Trip” for E! and Maverick TV’s hit show “Chrisley Knows Best” for USA.

Ashley Shoener Director of Development, USA

Ashley Dawn Shoener is the Director of Development for Maverick TV USA. She is responsible for creating ideas across all genres, developing formats, producing talent, executing creative, and delivering content for network, cable and digital platforms. At Maverick since 2015, Ashley has played a key role in the sale of several presentations, pilots and series to a variety of US networks. Ashley came to Maverick with a strong development and production background. As Manager of Development at Levity Entertainment Group, she honed her talent for identifying talent and developing comedy formats. Previously, she developed and produced hit domestic and international series as part of the development team for ITV Entertainment. She spent a few years on the production side, as a writer for Disney and NBC projects. She previously held unscripted development positions with GRB Entertainment and Zoo Productions.

Ashley is a graduate of Pepperdine University with a degree in Telecommunications Production and emphasis in Marketing.

Sharon Rowley Financial Controller

Sharon is the Financial Controller for Maverick Television, Operation Ouch and Manor Post Production.

Sue Hankinson Financial Accountant

Main responsibilities are payroll, production petty cash and bank reconciliations.

Karen Hill Purchase Ledger

Payments, payments, payments!

Romily Menzies Executive Producer

Executive Producer of the multi award winning ‘Operation Ouch’, overseeing the editorial from pre-production to series delivery.

Emily Kennedy Executive Producer

Emily’s most recent posts have been as Head of Popular Factual at DSP and Head of Factual at Primal. Prior to that she worked with Jamie Oliver, first as Series Producer, then as Executive Producer, looking after Jamie and Jimmy’s Friday Night Feast, Jamie’s Comfort Food, Jamie’s Money Saving Meals and various Christmas specials. She’s supervised The Art Show for Sky Arts, and Inside Out Homes, Cooks’ Questions and Secret Eaters for Channel 4. She was nominated for two awards for Collaboration Culture, an arts series she made for BBC World in 2012. Before that, she spent sixteen years in the BBC Arts department, where she worked on an array of shows about contemporary culture, including directing an Arena about The Archers, and was for nearly five years Series Producer of The Culture Show, where she looked after specials on art, design, books, music, architecture and comedy.

Sorcha Kiernan Producer, Development

Sorcha works within the development team generating new ideas and pitching them to all the major broadcasters. Previous roles have seen her working everywhere from Albert Square to the forests of Montana, but recent development credits include Channel 4’s daytime series 1 Star to 5 Star, National Geographic’s Intruders and 5 Star’s Don’t Tell The Doctor.

Taimmy Hango Receptionist

Front of House and Receptionist for all businesses at the Ray Street office.

Mark Delbridge Technical Manager

Maintaining the technical facilities at Manor Production Services.

John Coyne Deputy Technical Manager

Working with Mark to maintain the technical facilities at Manor Production Services.

Rea Menzies Series Producer

Series Producer of the multi award winning Operation Ouch.