Big Bear Films | Marcus Mortimer

Marcus produced with his company, Big Bear Films the horror/fantasy drama,series STRANGE for BBC ONE. He has also been producing Big Bear’s hit comedy My Hero for BBC ONE starring Ardal O’Hanlon, which is presently in its 6th Series, and now starring James Dreyfus.

He directed ITV’s flagship Christmas drama, The Flint Street Nativity, written by Tim Firth and starring Stephen Tompkinson, Neil Morrissey, Jane Horrocks, Frank Skinner, John Thompson, Mark Addy and Dervla Kirwan.

Until 1989, Marcus was a staff Producer/Director with the BBC where his credits included Carrot’s Lib, Victoria Wood – as seen on TV and The Rory Bremner Show. In 1989 he produced and directed the series Alexei Sayle’s Stuff which won an RTS Award, the Writer’s Guild Award and an Emmy for the Best Popular Arts Programme.

On leaving the BBC to work as a freelance , he produced and directed The Mary Whitehouse Experience, the cult satire show, followed by David Renwick and Andrew Marshall’s If You See God Tell Him (starring Richard Briers, Ade Edmonson and Imelda Staunton), which marked the beginning of Marcus’s involvement in 50 minute comedy/drama. He went on to direct Tim Firth’s Preston Front, which was nominated for a BAFTA won an RTS Award and won best comedy/drama at the British Comedy Awards.

Marcus directed the first three episodes of Jonathan Creek, and won the BAFTA for best drama series. Other dramas he has directed include the highly acclaimed BBC 2 satirical thriller, In The Red, written by Malcolm Bradbury and starring Warren Clarke, Stephen Fry, John Bird, Richard Wilson, Richard Griffiths, and Rik Mayall; and Bostock’s Cup, a satirical drama about a 3rd Division Club’s road to Wembley starring Neil Pearson, Nick Hancock and Tim Healy and written by Chris England for LWT.

He has also directed commercials as well as videos for Victoria Wood, Rik Mayall and Ade Edmonson, Bob Monkhouse, Ben Elton and Peter Kay.

He is currently involved in developing new projects (see programmes) for Big Bear Films, as well as setting up a new Ben Elton sketch show for ITV 1 in production in the New Year.

Home | About | Contact | Programmes