Available Light Advisory

Over the last eighteen years, Richard Miller has conducted over a hundred consulting assignments for companies and public sector bodies around the world. From 2010 to 2018, he was Professor of Film and Creative Economy at the University of Hertfordshire (UH). Prior to this, Richard was an award-winning film producer in New York and London. Previously, he was an investment banker on Wall Street.

Richard’s consulting assignments have mostly been in the areas of film and television. They have involved well over a thousand consultations with industry experts and stakeholders. He has also worked in animation, interactive media and music. Particular areas of expertise include business strategy development, international production and coproduction, fiscal incentives and funding for film production and distribution, independent production, film & TV studios, the use of digital media to drive urban regeneration strategies, moving image archives, and training and skills strategy. Clients have included British Film Institute, UK Film Council, Telefilm Canada, Scottish Screen, Scottish Enterprise, Film Finance Corporation of Australia, European Commission, BBC, Channel 4 and many independent film and television production companies.

At UH, Richard ran the Creative Economy Research Centre for five years. He was involved in consulting and research in film, immersive technologies and the creative industries in general. He also taught a highly rated course on The Creative Economy for UH’s AMBA accredited executive MBA programme. Previously, Richard was a Visiting Lecturer at Cass Business School for the Film MBA Programme for the two years of the programme’s existence. He was a Visiting Tutor at Goldsmiths College, University of London, for three years, Associate Professor at New York University for four years, and has taught at Bucks New University.

Richard developed and produced two critically acclaimed American independent feature films for which he received the credit of Producer. Songcatcher (1998) was written and directed by Maggie Greenwald, and starred Janet McTeer and Aidan Quinn. With his co-producer, Richard was nominated by the American Film Institute as the 2000 “producer to watch”. Heavy (1996) was written and directed by James Mangold and starred Liv Tyler, Shelley Winters, Deborah Harry and Pruitt Taylor Vince. Richard was sole Producer for this film. Among their numerous honours, both films were selected for official competition at the Sundance Film Festival, where they both won special jury prizes. In addition, Heavy was selected for the Directors Fortnight section of the Cannes Film Festival. Richard’s Associate Producer credits include James Mangold’s Copland (1997).

Prior to 1990, Richard was Senior Vice President in the Corporate Finance Department of the New York investment bank Dean Witter Reynolds, and previously Vice President at E.F. Hutton. His areas of expertise included public offerings, private placements and advisory work for clients including AT&T, Texaco and many smaller companies.

Richard possesses an MFA in Film specialising in Producing from Columbia University in New York, an MBA in Finance from McGill University in Montreal and a BA in Theoretical Physics from Cambridge University.

Jane Wright

Jane Wright’s experience in the feature film industry spans distribution, international sales, production and financing. She began her career in the US independent film production and distribution sector before moving to BBC Worldwide in New York as Vice President of Co-Production and Sales for Drama and Children’s television. She made a permanent move to London to work at BBC Films in 1997 where she remained for fourteen years. Jane worked with producers to create and execute production finance strategies on films as diverse as Maybe Baby, Ben Elton’s directorial debut; John Crowley’s Is Anybody There; Richard Eyre’s Iris; and We Need to Talk About Kevin, directed by Lynne Ramsay. Many of the BBC Films titles Jane worked on won critical praise and a vast array of prestigious awards. During 2000/2001 Jane was seconded to The Sales Co. as Acting CEO where she was responsible for successful launch of one of the Cannes Film Festival’s top Official Competition films, No Man's Land, which went on to win the Academy Award for Best Foreign Film.

When Jane took on the role of Managing Director and Executive Producer at BBC Films in 2010, she sat on the Editorial Board of BBC Vision and executive produced Andy De Emmony’s West Is West (the sequel to East Is East), Scott Hicks's The Boys Are Back and Stephen Poliakoff's Glorious 39.

Prior to joining the BBC, Jane associate-produced the multiple-award winning Heavy, written and directed by her fellow Columbia Film School graduate, James Mangold (Walk The Line). Jane has an MBA, also from Columbia University, specialising in Media Management and Corporate Finance. Jane was honoured with a Women In Film Award for her contribution to the Industry in 2007.

Jane now works as a consultant, producer and executive producer. Most recently she executive produced Remainder, an adaptation of the Tom McCarthy novel, directed by celebrated artist Omer Fast and Been So Long (an adaptation of Che Walker’s hit musical) directed by Tinge Krishnan which has been acquired internationally by Netflix.