Netflix‘s UK content chief, Anne Mensah, has called on the TV industry to face up to its in-built biases and help allow diverse creatives to “find their truth.”
In a spotlight session here at the Edinburgh TV Festival ahead of James Graham’s MacTaggart lecture, which is expected to focus on the industry’s issues with class, former BBC and Sky exec Mensah said she was “super-hyper-focused” on addressing diversity in UK television.
The Netflix VP of UK Content pointed to shows such as Supacell, which focuses on a group of Black working-class superheroes in East London as examples of how Netflix UK is tackling the issue, and urged the audience to address their own unconscious biases while admitting she held them herself.
“One of the tricky things is [the industry] is a closed circuit and a closed shop,” she said. “It’s so hard to get beyond your own biases and getting passed your own normal. The people who watch TV are not in this room and until we admit that, we won’t move forwards.
“If you can work with diverse content creators, let them find their truth. That’s why Supacell is so important. Rapman was speaking from his truth and I can’t do that. Weirdly, we went to same primary school, 100 years apart, but I can’t speak for him.”
Later in the session, she was questioned about the furore around Baby Reindeer, the darkly comic Richard Gadd series about his experience with an alleged stalker that has been being plagued by controversy over its authenticity and safeguarding processes.
“I stand by the fact we made the show,” said Mensah. “It’s a drama, not a documentary, and that will be remembered.” She added Netflix takes safeguarding in all of its productions “incredibly seriously,” and noted a huge uptick in men calling sexual abuse hotlines in the wake of the show.
“I don’t make shows for publicity’s sake,” added Mensah. “It was about giving the creator the space to tell that story. If [we’re] chasing publicity, its the antithesis of what I believe in. The audience is incredibly clever and diverse, and they spot good [work]. A really controversial show that isn’t great goes nowhere.”
Netflix announced several shows during the session, including a drama from Sid Gentle Films starring Anya Taylor-Joy based on a book by journalist Bella Mackie, Gordon Ramsay and Victoria Beckham shows, and a documentary about the 7/7 bombings in London. A second season of Love is Blind UK was also unveiled.