Derren Lawford
agent: Camilla Chiverton - camilla@sternwild.com
Derren Lawford is an award-winning creative and editorial leader working across broadcast, streaming, digital-first platforms, and brand-funded content. With over two decades of experience, he partners with broadcasters, platforms, and brands to deliver premium work with real commercial traction, bridging the worlds of television, digital storytelling, and innovation.
As an executive producer, Derren works across a wide range of genres, including talent-led formats, archive-driven social history, popular factual, and true crime, for global markets. An early adopter of digital, Derren is uniquely placed to deliver a highly strategic, digital-first perspective, delivering ambitious content across traditional linear broadcasters, digital platforms, and the commercial branded space.
Derren’s career is defined by bold, visionary leadership - developing original ideas and formats, launching new talent, securing difficult access, and leading creative teams in high-ambition environments. He combines creative audacity with consistent delivery at scale.
After beginning his career as a broadcast journalist, becoming the first urban music journalist for BBC Radio 1 and a founding member of BBC 1Xtra, Derren then became a pioneer of short-form and multi-platform storytelling, securing a Broadcast Digital Award nomination for Born Survivors Online in 2007 followed by WeAreBornSurvivors, which broke BBC Three’s website traffic record. By 2008, as Multi-Platform Editor for Panorama, he executive produced more than 200 online films and tripled the programme’s digital traffic within 18 months.
Senior editorial and commissioning roles followed at BBC Three, Panorama and BBC Worldwide (Global iPlayer) and a key role as part of the launch commissioning team at London Live. From 2014 to 2022, Derren was Creative Director at Woodcut Media, helping to secure over 300 hours of IP across commissions, co-productions, and private equity investment. His credits include Netflix projects Mandela, My Dad and Me and Cut From A Different Cloth (both co-produced with Idris Elba), Fiennes: Return to the Nile for National Geographic, and a substantial slate of true crime.
He later founded DARE Pictures, named Emerging Indie of the Year at the 2025 Broadcast Awards. Credits include Fugitive: The Mystery of the Crypto Queen, Geordie Stories: Sophie’s Fertility Journey, UK Prisons Exposed: Sex, Drugs and Corruption, This Is Soho, and Our Fathers, with nominations across the Broadcast Digital Awards, True Crime Awards, Indielab Innovation Awards, Campaign Media Week Awards, and British Journalism Awards.
Alongside production, Derren is a sought-after editorial consultant and advisor. He is a Trustee of The Grierson Trust and has served on the boards of Sheffield Doc/Fest, Black Cultural Archives, and the One World Media Awards. His advisory work includes early support for Jamal Edwards and SB.TV, consultancy on the BAFTA-winning short film The Black Cop, and strategic advisory roles with emerging media organisations such as Dose of Society, where he helped secure investment from Snap Inc. He has also mentored and advised more than 30 filmmakers worldwide through prestigious documentary pitching programmes.