Amazon alum Georgia Brown to lead UK skills task force

Georgia Brown

Georgia Brown, the former Amazon Studios Europe chief, is to chair a skills task force, convened by The British Film Institute (BFI), to address critical labour shortages in the UK production sector.

She will be joined on the task force by more than 20 senior representatives from UK broadcasters BBC, ITV and Channel 4, as well as international studios and steamers such as Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, Disney and NBCUniversal, and industry organisations Pact, ScreenSkills and the British Film Commission.

 The BFI put the task force together following a skills review commissioned by the UK government’s department for culture, media and sport last year, which showed severe crew shortages.

It will create a plan of action to help support growth, training and worker retention and seek improvements in equity, diversity and inclusion and mental health.

Brown exited her role at Amazon Studios last year, having led Amazon’s output across Eurpe for five years, working on shows such as Jeremy Clarkson-starring The Grand Tour, paranormal drama Good Omens and German series We Children From Bahnhof Zoo.

She joined Amazon from FremantleMedia International in 2017, shortly after the Amazon Prime Video SVOD service went fully international. She had been EVP, global scripted and factual content at the production group and before that was SVP of acquisitions at Shine International before its parent, Shine Group, merged with Endemol.

“The UK has an important and well-earned reputation for being the centre of creative excellence, however if we want to accelerate growth and build a sustainable industry, we must accelerate change by creating a robust framework to develop, support, train and ignite the next generation of talent,” said Brown.

“This task force will build on and complement the essential strategic work already undertaken by industry, ScreenSkills, the BFI and public bodies across the U.K. and it’s an honour to work collaboratively with colleagues from across the industry to lead this important work.”