Edinburgh TV Festival names Amazon’s Georgia Brown as chair for ‘hybrid’ event

Georgia Brown

The Edinburgh TV Festival (ETF) has named Amazon Studios’ director of European originals Georgia Brown as advisory chair for its 2021 edition, which is set to feature virtual and physical events.

Brown becomes the first advisory chair to come from a streaming service and will work across the festival’s slate of sessions and panels, which are focused on a theme of ‘Accelerating Change’.

Brown will explore how the TV business could look as it emerges from the pandemic, the ways in which the industry can become more diverse, and how the production sector has been reshaped over recent years.

Additional arrivals & hybrid model

The ETF is also planning a hybrid event for 2021 that will include a Spring and Summer programme, which will include both digital and physical events, TBI understands. Details of these are set to be revealed in the coming months. The event was forced online-only last year following the outbreak of Covid-19.

Brown said: “Our industry has faced one of its most challenging years ever and we have proven what we can overcome when we unite around a common goal. I’m looking forward to working with the ETF team and my friends, colleagues and partners to put together a programme to talk frankly about the challenges ahead; confronting our shared responsibility in order to the accelerate the change needed to re-build, re-shape and future-proof our industry.”

The Festival’s recently appointed executive chair, Fatima Salaria, added: “The TV community has had one of its toughest years on record. What will a post-pandemic, post-Brexit, diversity-aware industry look like? It’s an amazing and terrifying time to be making TV and at this year’s Festival we will continue to reflect upon and question our evolving industry.”

In other appointment news, last year’s advisory chair, BBC director of factual Patrick Holland, has been appointed to the ETF’s advisory board alongside Whisper CEO Sunil Patel and Rogan Productions MD Soleta Rogan.

BBC commissioning editor for documentaries, Carl Callam, has been appointed to the TV Foundation board.