Director of BBC Comedy Reveals New Commissioning Team

Jon Petrie, director of BBC Comedy, has unveiled his new commissioning team, which will be in place by the end of January 2022.

Tanya Qureshi, formerly head of comedy at Various Artists, is the head of BBC Comedy. In her previous role at Various Artists, she earned credits on Michaela Coel’s I May Destroy You and Dead Pixels. She joined the BBC Comedy team in March.

Emma Lawson, Ben Caudell and Gregor Sharp have been appointed as commissioning editors. Most recently, Lawson produced the first scripted comedy for Apple TV+, Trying, and earned an in-house commissioning role under Jay Hunt. She left Apple in February to produce a sitcom she’d developed for Sky One. Caudell was an executive producer on Mandy (BBC Two) and Famalam (BBC Three), and Sharp worked as a writer, producer and executive producer for the BBC and in the independent sector.

Seb Barwell will serve as acting commissioning editor through April 2022. He has developed and produced comedies including I Live with Models (Comedy Central), the new paramedic comedy Bloods (Sky One) and all three series of Jamie Demetriou’s Stath Lets Flats (Channel 4).

Hannah Rose, who has developed and produced scripted and entertainment titles across BBC’s comedy portfolio, has been tapped as assistant commissioner for North England. Her focus will be on nurturing Northern talent both on- and off-screen.

Rounding out the commissioning team is Navi Lamba in the newly created role of head of comedy talent development. Previously, Lamba joined E4 in 2020 from BBC Three, where she commissioned short-form formats for the channel before becoming head of social, where she led campaigns for key programs like Fleabag, RuPaul’s Drag Race UK and Glow Up.

“We have managed to assemble an incredibly experienced, multi-talented team that have years of experience working in award-winning comedy,” said Petrie. “I believe we are well equipped to deal with the new challenges our industry faces, and we will continue to make BBC Comedy the unrivaled home of new and established talent in the U.K.”

Petrie added, “I have also created a new head of comedy talent development role. It’s vital that we help support new talent on their development journey to creating long-form content, and I’m especially keen that we have people in our team that are just as familiar with finding new talent through social media as they are through the more traditional paths.”