Kudos co-founder Garrett to exit

Shine Group’s UK drama producer Kudos will say goodbye to its co-founder and chairman later this year.

Stephen Garrett will step down from the Life on Mars and Spooks prodco more than two decades after co-founding it.

In his other role as executive chairman of movie producer Shine Pictures, Garrett is currently working on crime thriller Blowback and adaptation of The Farm, in association with BBC Films. These and future projects will now be lead solely by Shine Pictures’ head of film, Ollie Madden.

Garrett will remain as producer on Spooks film spin-off Spooks: The Greater Good, which is due for release in 2015.

Garrett said he was leaving Kudos and Shine Pictures as “two vibrant creative businesses that have never been in better shape”, and paid tribute to long-term production partner Featherstone.

He added being part of the wider Shine Group had felt like “a family you marry into only to discover that, wherever you turn on the planet, you’ve acquired some unexpectedly stimulating and entertaining new relative”.

“This feels like a great time to reinvent myself in the scripted space,” said Garrett.

“Stephen is an exceptional producer, a passionate intellectual and thoughtful collaborator,” said Shine CEO Alex Mahon. “He leaves a great base to build on in our film team, he has been an enduring influence on our scripted business and we wish him the best for the future. After 20 years as part of the wider Group we will miss him.”