Former president of Food Network and general manager of HGTV Courtney White, with whom Wheelhouse launched the lifestyle production venture Butternut, has been named president of Wheelhouse Entertainment.
Continuing to run Butternut, White adds oversight of all Wheelhouse U.S. production labels, including Spoke Studios, the new true-crime producer Twist and Wheelhouse DNA, the company’s digital and audio division. Since launching Butternut in 2022, White has presided over numerous series in the lifestyle space, including Max and Food Network’s Last Bite Hotel, HGTV’s Divided by Design, Roku’s Celebrity Family Food Battle and Discovery ID’s Bodies in the Water.
Glenn Hugill, who joined Wheelhouse in January 2023 to head the company’s U.K. operations, is expanding his role. While also serving as Wheelhouse Entertainment’s chief content officer, Hugill takes on responsibilities as chief creative officer at Wheelhouse Entertainment and president of Wheelhouse Studios, the company’s new international content hub. Hugill will oversee creative development and production of global formats (under the Wheelhouse Studios banner), specifically competition series, social experiments and game shows.
White and Hugill will work in close collaboration, with both continuing to report to Wheelhouse CEO Brent Montgomery.
Montgomery said, “Our goal is to always blaze new trails, and by fortifying our core business with the incredible leadership of Courtney and Glenn, who both in short order developed and executed our most exciting slate in company history, it will allow others of us to focus even further on other key priorities including sports, YouTube and the wider creator economy.”
White added, “I’ve been so fortunate to benefit from Wheelhouse’s bold ambition and total commitment to collaboration that inspires the very best in its creatives. I’m incredibly excited to now deepen my contribution to the company and its immensely talented teams as we continue to forge new business paths, ignite groundbreaking partnerships and create hit content that leads the pop culture conversation.”
Hugill said, “Brent sold me on coming to Wheelhouse to help build out a team of trans-Atlantic creative Avengers, and that’s exactly what we’re doing. We collaborate differently to share our superpowers across the entire group and it’s just thrilling to have the ability to plug into best-in-class business partners across the company—all experts in their genres. Meanwhile, the ability to now hatch our biggest and boldest global ideas out of the new international Wheelhouse Studios is a total homerun. Which is a baseball term, as I understand it.”
