Jane Featherstone

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May 20th 2002, and millions of viewers have their evening rocked by one of the most shocking scenes ever seen in a TV drama.

Spooks ran for ten series, but ask many what they most remember about the BBC spy drama and they’ll recall an MI5 trainee being pushed face down into a deep fat fryer.

For TV producer Jane Featherstone (History and German 1991, Hon DLitt 2019), this was just one memorable storyline in a career studded with highlights – Adrian Lester and Marc Warren running naked through Trafalgar Square in Hustle; the engineers’ suicide mission in Chernobyl; the shocking reveal of the Broadchurch murderer.

“There have been some big moments,” Jane concedes. “But I don’t tend to look back. I’m always thinking ‘what next?’”

Jane (front centre) with the cast and crew of *Chernobyl*, as they receive the Outstanding Limited Series award at the 2019 Emmy Awards in Los Angeles.

Jane (front centre) with the cast and crew of *Chernobyl*, as they receive the Outstanding Limited Series award at the 2019 Emmy Awards in Los Angeles.

It’s a philosophy which served her well, as she moved steadily upwards from her first TV job as a runner on a dirt bike show.

From here, Jane’s career took a skywards trajectory via innovative, award-winning series from Drop the Dead Donkey to Black Doves; The Hour to The Split. If you started watching her programmes now, back-to-back, 24/7, you’d still be going in a month’s time.

Yet this stellar career might never have begun, but for the intervention of one of the world’s most famous footballers. “I’d always loved TV drama but had no idea how to get into that world. My dad was a chemical engineer and my mum was a nurse and we had no connection to anyone in that field. I applied for the BBC graduate scheme, but didn’t get in.”

Then fate played its hand: “My friend Claire was working at Tottenham Hotspur. Paul Gascoigne needed a personal assistant, and she recommended me. I took a train to London on my last Friday at university and by the afternoon I’d got the job.”

It was the time of peak Gazza-mania and Jane worked to keep at least some of his life in order over the next 18 months, before she got her break. “Chrysalis were making a documentary about Gazza, and I asked the producer if he knew of any openings in TV. He recommended me to a company making dirt bike series Superchamps – and that was my first job in the industry.”

Three decades and countless memorable TV moments on, Jane heads up Sister Pictures, whose productions include hospital comedy This Is Going to Hurt, psychological thriller Eric, and Netflix series Kaos, which put a contemporary slant on Greek mythology.

She describes being Executive Producer as “a bit like being CEO for a production. You’re responsible for developing the show on time, on budget and with the best possible edit. You work step-by-step, from talking about the initial idea with a writer, through to creating something employing hundreds of people that is hopefully watched by millions. You’re building something from nothing, and it’s amazing to do this with a team and collaborate with a creative crew.”

She’s proud of the diversity of work these collaborations have produced: “TV drama helps us make sense of the world we live in. To understand as much of the world as we can, we must hear from writers from all walks of life, irrespective of their gender, ethnicity, disability or background.”

We’re talking in the company's fourth-floor offices, where picture windows reveal a dramatic central London skyline. Even so, our conversation readily transports Jane back to her student days. “I remember Leeds very fondly,” she says. “It was the prospectus that attracted me in the first place. I was from Croydon and wanted to explore other parts of the country. I looked at various prospectuses and the Leeds one had a simple olive-green cover with the University crest. I thought ‘that’s a lovely cover’.

“I went to visit and loved it straight away. I liked that Leeds offered a joint honours course. I loved the architecture of campus with buildings from different eras, and the fact it was so close to the city centre. Coming to Leeds is a decision I’ve never regretted for a single minute.”

Keira Knightley stands on a bridge in London in the snow

Keira Knightley starred in spy thriller Black Doves

A group of four women pose for the camera in front of a blank background

The Defoe family at the heart of legal drama The Split

Jane made the most of her time at Leeds. “I saw bands in the Refectory, went clubbing in the Warehouse and enjoyed walks in the Dales.” And through the Theatre Society she made friends who have become part of her remarkable TV journey – producer Diederick Santer (Psychology 1991), director Omar Madha (English 1990) and BBC executive Jo Episcopo (English 1990). Dan Isaacs (Dentistry 1990) is now Chief Operating Officer at Sister Pictures. “The University was a brilliant safe space to grow and find out who we were,” she says. “It felt open and welcoming, it was demographically mixed and a really diverse environment.”

The University was a brilliant safe space to grow and find out who we were.

This sense that the University was formative to her development perhaps informs Jane’s continuing involvement with Leeds, notably supporting the kind of creative arts which are so important to her career. She has funded PhD scholarships in the humanities and has returned to campus to talk to students about her experiences.

She also provides bursaries to enable school art teachers to complete a Postgraduate Certificate in Teachers’ Research and Practice, giving them the opportunity to enhance the impact of their work in the classroom. “Many of these teachers work with marginalised children and in Pupil Referral Units. Art matters for these children; it allows them to be creative and express themselves.”

Jane is also a governor of the London Screen Academy, a free school which brings under-represented groups into the industry: “I’m fortunate to find myself in a career I love which also enables me to give back – and support issues close to my heart. As a society we overlook the critical value of the arts and this comes at the cost of many students’ self- expression. There is so much evidence that bringing these into the curriculum in a meaningful way means that other subjects benefit from students’ creative thinking.

“Countries that embrace culture seem happier, more united and there’s less crime – yet here we see the arts subjects getting left behind. As a nation, we should be putting arts education at the heart of the curriculum. STEM really should be STEAM!

“The arts can give young people a brighter, better future.”