Charles Denton

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Charles Denton is a British film and television producer and executive. He first worked for the BBC as a documentary filmmaker for five years from 1963, before he left the corporation to go freelance. He then worked for several ITV companies, such as ATV, Yorkshire Television and Granada Television. At the latter, he worked on the award-winning World in Action series.

In the 1970s he also began working in the film industry, becoming the Managing Director of Black Lion Films. The most notable productions he worked on during this time were the film version of the sitcom Porridge and the controversial Bob Hoskins-starring The Long Good Friday. In television, he became Controller of Programmes at ATV.

In 1980, he came under extreme political and diplomatic pressure from both the British and Saudi governments both before and after ATV financed, produced and screened the controversial drama-documentary Death of a Princess.

In 1981, he controversially sacked Noele Gordon star of the soap opera Crossroads, and as an act of revenge she famously sang a 'love song' to him at the ATV End of Year Party - which although never seen was leaked to YouTube in April 2007.

In 1982, the ITV Midlands broadcast franchise was transferred from ATV to Central Independent Television, but Denton remained in his post.

In 1984^[1] he left Central to become Chief Executive of Zenith Productions, which was initially financed by Central as one of its programme-making subsidiaries^[2], though it was sold to Carlton Television in 1989 with Denton remaining in his post. In 1993, Carlton sold Zenith^[3] and Denton left to re-join the BBC in the perhaps surprising role as Head of Drama, despite not having a background in drama production. His time there coincided with a general downturn in the fortunes of the department, with several senior producers leaving and many productions such as the expensive Rhodes receiving a negative press.

He left the Head of Drama post in 1996, was a member of the Arts Council of England 1996-1999^[4] and worked for a time for BBC Films. He is a fellow of the Royal Television Society and of the Royal Society of Arts.