Women behind TV: The A List
We're all familiar with the names Gyngell, Leckie and Mott -but who are the women in the Australian TV industry that wield power?
- Published by David Knox
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We’re all familiar with the names Gyngell, Leckie and Mott, and possibly Dalton, Brown and Walsh -but who are the women in the TV industry that wield power?
TV Tonight put the question to our TV networks and asked them to deliver a list of their top female executives.
One of those names is Beverley McGarvey, TEN’s Network Head of Programming. Chief Programmer David Mott has a strategic focus on TEN programming, securing programs and pursing formats but McGarvey is his 2IC.
Her role is primarily creative, although she also has an operational component, with a hand in development and acquisitions and looking after TEN’s on-air look and feel, managing the scheduling, publicity, marketing and promotions functions. McGarvey joined TEN in August 2006 from TV3 in New Zealand, where she was Director of Programming. Before that, she spent three years as head of program scheduling and promotions for TV3 in Dublin, Ireland.
Earlier this year Showtime’s Executive Producer Kim Vecera was awarded the first ASTRA Pioneer Award, however as TV Tonight has previously noted just one female has been inducted into the Logies Hall of Fame: Ruth Cracknell.
But who are the other women considered key shakers and movers within our networks?
Interpretation of the question was varied -some supplied Board members, internet platform execs, and on- staff producers.
It is worth noting the ABC is currently undergoing major structural reform with Marena Manzoufas, Head of Programming leaving and Head of ABC TV Marketing, Sue Lester, retiring. Lester’s replacement Di Constantini starts on Monday.
SBS is also seeing a number of staff changes, including the recent departure of Denise Eriksen, Manager, Commissioned Content.
Outside of networks there are a number of key female powerbrokers including Julie Flynn (CEO, Free TV),
Robyn Parkes (CEO, Freeview) and Kate Inglis-Clark (CEO, OzTAM), to name a few.
Here are the women working at Australian TV networks:
ABC:
Kate Torney, ABC Director of News and Current Affairs
Di Costantini- ABC TV Head of ABC TV Marketing and Promotions ( begins Monday)
Amanda Duthie- ABC TV Head of Arts and Entertainment
Debbie Lee – ABC TV Head of Comedy
Jen Collins – Head of Factual
Lesna Thomas- Head of ABC TV Publicity
Karen Vlakhoudis – Campaign Manager – ABC TV Marketing and Promotion
Liz Green- Digital Communications – ABC TV Marketing Manager.
Miranda Dear, Head of ABC TV Drama (leaves at the end of July).
SEVEN NETWORK:
Melissa Madden – Director of Marketing
Susan Wood – National Head of Publicity
Susan Davis – Director of Sales, Brisbane
Samantha Renwick – Director of Human Resources
Jenny Hosie – Integrated Sales Director (runs SMG Red)
Bridget Fair – Manager, Regulatory and Business Affairs
Janeen Faithfull – Head of Content and Rights Management
Lisa Fitzpatrick – Head of Programme Development
Isobel Kerr – Network Head of Research
Robbee Minicola – CEO, Hybrid TV, (TiVo)
Kath Hamilton – Audience Director (Yahoo!7)
NINE NETWORK:
Jo Horsburgh – Head of Drama
Jo Rooney – Network Drama Executive
Kylie Blucher – QTQ Director of Programming & Marketing Manager
Alex Hodgkinson – Chief of Staff 60 Minutes
Kerri Elstub – Executive Producer KAK
Penny Wieland – Programming Executive
Karen Dewey – Head of Factual and Reality
Kiah Wood – Corporate Counsel
Josie Macrae – EP of Network News
Lesley Tapsall – EP Sport
Penny Robinson EP RPA
Jean Jenkins – Director of Marketing
Victoria Buchan/Heidi Virtue – Network Director of Publicity and Talent Management
Michelle Stamper – Head of Publicity and Marketing (GTV)
Leanne Mercer – Executive Producer Postcards
Deborah Wright – CEO NBN
Amanda Paterson – Bureau Chief of Brisbane ACA
Joe Pollard – CEO Ninemsn
NETWORK TEN:
Christine Holgate – Board Member of the Ten Network Holdings Board
Kylie Rogers, National Sales Manager
Beverley McGarvey, Network Head of Programming
Annabelle Herd, Network Manager, Policy and Regulatory
Jude Allan, Network Commercial Sales Strategist
Cathie Schnitzerling, Director of News, Brisbane (TVQ)
Cherrie Bottger, Head of Children’s TV
Pam Barnes, Executive Producer, The Circle
Sandy Patterson, Executive Producer, The 7PM Project
Maria Michael, Executive Producer, Entertainment and Digital Media
Manda Hatter, Operations Manager, Melbourne
SBS:
Jacquie Riddell – Director of Marketing
Jane Roscoe – Network Programmer
Lesley Power – General Counsel
Mel Westhall – HR Director
Sally Begbie – SBS Ombudsman
Caterina de Nave – Executive Producer, Comedy and Drama.
Katherine Raskob – Group Marketing Manager
FOXTEL:
Sally Goodman, FOXTEL Head of Production
Penny Win, Group Channel Manager, W and FOX Classics
Kim Vecera, Drama Consultant
Fleur Fahey, FOXTEL Director of Acquisitions
AUSTAR:
Dana Strong Chief Operating Officer
Nikki Warburton Group Director, Product, Sales & Marketing
Deanne Weir Group Director, Corporate Development
Fiona Cottrell Director, Employee & Organisation Development
Rebecca Heap General Manager, Strategy and Programming
Page Henty Corporate Counsel
Liz Katsiotis General Manager, Marketing – Acquisitions
Jo Mullaley General Manager, Product & Customer Management
Lesley Portwain General Manager, Customer & Credit services
OTHER PAY TV CHANNELS (selected):
Nicole Sheffield (Lifestyle Channels)
Ros Jones (Universal and 13th Street)
Rebecca Batties (MTV)
Katrina Southon (Nickelodeon)
WIN TV:
Shirley Brown, Manager of Legal, Regulatory and Network Affairs
Kellie Cunningham, National Marketing Manager
PRIME TV:
Did not respond
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17 Responses
Be interesting to see an updated list now that all the Boys club are having a shake up at the top level (10, 7, SBS) – are the women following their leaders to the new networks or staying put? Whats happening to Tivo’s female execs now it’s folding, is Nikki Warburton following her husband to 10 and with few remaining board members for Free TV and Freeview does that mean Julie Flynn and Robyn Parkes could move on to?
Thanks for getting these women in to the spot light. But still many names are missing.
hope you will get them very soon.
and the whingebags in the industry claim Nine is a “boy’s club” – yeah right.
well I thought it was an interesting article, anyway. We hear so much about the Leckies and Gyngells of this world, but never hear much about the women who have influence behind the scenes. And there are far more on that list (list… article… whatever…) than what I would have imagined.
Another possible name for the list could be Alison Drower (remember from the old MTV?) who is news director for the Southern Cross Ten regional network based in Canberra.
Agree with kylie!
Hey David is there any news on who the new Head of Fiction will be once Miranda Dear leaves (as mentioned in this article). The search has been going on for a while.
I agree with Ronnie, except the comment about men green lighting. For better or worse, and I preface my comment with the disclaimer, as i don’t think it is great content always, but at the ABC Miranda Dear, Courtney Gibson, Amanda Duthie, Jen Collins among others have been commissioning content for many years, with Sandra Levy, Dasha Ross, before them. Not sure if ABC is representative, but along with the hits, they have also commissioned the misses!
Quite a few are naming other channel heads. I can think of a couple of Australian women who are far more influential than many on the list but may not necessarily work for a broadcaster.
Fascinating article (list!), David. I think you’d have to say Ruth Harley has an important role at the pointy end of production/greenlighting.
Kylie: shifting the spotlight from the usual suspects helps the audience to become familiar with other key players. You can call it whatever you like, I did put “List” in the header for a reason.
Thankfully there are more and more women getting into senior roles in television. However, the real power lies with who can greenlight a production. How many women are on that list I wonder? That is the response to effdee – most final decisions about greenlighting content are made by a handful of the same men who have been making these decisions for the past decade.
You forgot Kylie Merritt, Channel Manager of the Sky News Business Channle.
So it looks like there are quite a few females in the biz, which makes me wonder why we are watching such crap on our boxes!!
And the point of this article is… well can you even call a list of names an article?
Great article, David, and an interesting stock take on senior execs currently in jobs. I have worked with some of them, and was fascinated to read of various changes. Yes, so often it is the alphamales that we hear and see, but there’s much much more going on behind that. Particularly of interest was Ch 9 – seems like a blokey culture.
Patricia Turner, CEO, National Indigenous TV
This is an interesting article. It certainly seems that there are quite a few women with powerful positions in our free-to-air networks..and so there should be. I also think that there are a few female writer/performers who are particularly powerful such as Jane Turner, Gina Riley, Rebel Wilson and Robyn Butler – they’re likable to both men and women and are good creators of content. I’d like to see the powerful women who are executives at the networks join forces with these female writer/performers and turn out some new original Australian works.