25th July, 2024 – ITV Studios has today announced that it has acquired a majority stake in Hartswood Films, the multi-award-winning production company behind a raft of landmark scripted series, including recent ITVX and ITV1 hit Douglas Is Cancelled, Prime Video’s critically acclaimed returning psychological thriller The Devil’s Hour and the BBC’s Emmy award winning Sherlock.
Based in London and Cardiff, Hartswood Films was founded in 1979 by Beryl Vertue, making it the longest established scripted producer in the UK.
Led by CEO and Executive Producer Sue Vertue, alongside Director of Operations Debbie Vertue, Managing Director Dan Cheesbrough and Creative Director and Executive Producer Steven Moffat, Hartswood Films has a broad slate of exceptional returning drama and comedy series, produced for global broadcasters and platforms including the BBC, ITV, Netflix and Prime Video.
The company works with a wide range of producers, writers and actors from Moffat to Mark Gatiss, Benedict Cumberbatch to Stanley Tucci, Hugh Bonneville to Karen Gillan and Dolly Wells to Ukweli Roach.
Other recent series include Dracula and mini-series thriller, Inside Man, both for the BBC and Netflix, as well as Wolf and The Control Room for the BBC, while the nine-time Emmy award-winning Sherlock, which ran for four series, has sold to over 200 territories worldwide.
International distribution for future Hartswood Films commissions will be handled by ITV Studios.
Julian Bellamy, Managing Director ITV Studios said: “From Men Behaving Badly to Sherlock, The Devil’s Hour to Douglas is Cancelled, Hartswood Films has been a huge part of the TV landscape for decades. They have a hard won reputation for being brilliant producers of quality, ambitious and highly successful scripted television. I’m delighted to welcome them to ITV Studios.”
Sue Vertue, CEO Hartswood Films, said: “Hartswood are not known for making rash decisions and it’s taken us 40 years to make this one: we are delighted therefore to have chosen to team up with ITV Studios.
“We have always been open to investment if we could meet like-minded people who understood the need for independence which is at the ‘heart’ of Hartswood, while bringing us a whole new range of strengths and skills. We are a small company and have done very well on our own, but we couldn’t be more excited about a bigger future and what we can achieve together with ITV Studios.”
The acquisition is a further milestone in ITV’s strategy of expanding its international content business, with Hartswood Films becoming the latest in a line of production companies to join the group in recent years, including Nicola Shindler’s Quay Street Productions, Happy Prince, led by Dominic Treadwell-Collins, Ben Stephenson’s Poison Pen Studios and premium natural history and factual entertainment prodco, Plimsoll Productions.