Kenton Allen became Chief Executive of Big Talk Productions in September 2008. He is a multi award-winning programme-maker with credits including the multi BAFTA-winning sitcom The Royle Family and the Oscar-winning film Six Shooter.
He was Creative Head of BBC Comedy and BBC Comedy North between 2003 and 2008, producing and executive-producing a diverse range of comedy programming including the BAFTA-winning sketch show That Mitchell and Webb Look (BBC2), the BAFTA-nominated drama series Funland (BBC Three),The Omid Djalili Show (BBC1), After You’ve Gone (BBC1), Freezing (BBC2), The Visit (BBC1 and BBC3), Massive (BBC3) and four series of Ideal (BBC2 and BBC3).
Prior to this he was the Creative Director of Elizabeth Murdoch’s Shine Ltd and Head of Entertainment Development at Granada TV. He began his Television career when Jonathan Ross invited him to leave the world of BBC Radio 4 and join Channel X Productions where he produced over 200 live editions of the comedy chat show Tonight with Jonathan Ross for Channel 4.
At Big Talk Kenton has produced two six-part comedies which were broadcast to record audiences and huge critical acclaim: the BAFTA-winning Rev. created by James Wood and Tom Hollander for BBC2, and Him & Her written by Stefan Golaszewski, starring Russell Tovey, which was the most successful sitcom launch in the history of BBC Three. He is Executive Producer of the ratings hit Friday Night Dinner, written and produced by Robert Popper and starring Tamsin Greig, Paul Ritter, Simon Bird and Tom Rosenthal. All three of these original series were recommissioned and second series are already underway.
This year Kenton is also executive producing new comedies Chickens, written by and starring Simon Bird, Joe Thomas and Jonny Sweet for Channel 4, Threesome for Comedy Central (UK), and a series for NBC (US) starring Hank Azaria, based on Big Talk’s Channel 4 show Free Agents.
He is also Executive Producer of the entertainment series King Of… with Claudia Winkleman, for Channel 4 and of Show Me The Funny for ITV, hosted by Jason Manford.
He is married to the writer Imogen Edwards-Jones and lives in London.
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