About Us
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Essential Media and Entertainment is one of Australia’s leading independent television producers of high quality content for both local and international audiences with offices in Sydney, Los Angeles and Toronto. Broadcast partners outside Australia include BBC, National Geographic, PBS, Discovery, Sundance, History Channel, Arte, and RTE Ireland. Recent successes from its diverse slate include the landmark natural history series Australia: The Time Traveller’s Guide (ABC, UKTV, PBS Nova, Arte), standout lifestyle hit Gourmet Farmer (SBS), and award-winning drama series Rake (ABC, Sundance Europe, Audience Channel USA). Essential Media forms part of the international Essential 11 Media Group alongside US/Canadian factual entertainment prodco 11 Television. With its head office in Sydney, Essential Media produces content across several genres including TV drama, animation, lifestyle and factual programs. Attached to the Sydney office is a 16-suite HD post facility and a CGI design studio. The Company’s principals – Chris Hilton, Carmel Travers, Sonja Armstrong and Ian Collie – are behind some of the country’s best entertainment from The Colony to Beyond 2000, Gourmet Farmer to Jack Irish. All four are highly credentialed producers and industry leaders in Australia. Essential Factual’s slate is as strong as ever with natural history single Dingo: Wild Dog at War (ABC) and feature doc My Brother, The Serial Killer (Investigation Discovery) while middle-eastern food travel show Shane Delia’s Spice Journey and Series 3 of Gourmet Farmer are in production , as well as history series Raising the Curtain (Studio Australia). Essential Drama is currently producing a second series of the critically acclaimed Rake starring Richard Roxburgh, as well as crime drama tele-movie Jack Irish starring Guy Pearce. Essential Kids has several series in production or development: animated series Bubble Bath Bay, Alien TV and Minding Millie and factual series My24. Also in development an iPad and iPhone app based on The Floods books by Colin Thompson as a prequel to an animated feature film. Essential’s factual entertainment slate is a growing focus. Original formats are developed and rolled out across the Essential 11 Group. The Los Angeles and Toronto offices produce series for a variety of networks including Discovery, Lifetime, Travel Channel and Oxygen and the Bell and Shaw media groups in Canada Essential’s feature film slate is off to an impressive start with the upcoming Disney production of biopic Saving Mr Banks, and Almost French, a romantic comedy adapted from the best-selling memoir. Essential is represented by Creative Artists Agency (CAA) for scripted, and United Talent Agency (UTA) for unscripted. |
