Diederick Santer

Diederick has worked for more than 25 years in British TV as a producer, a commissioner, and running production companies. He’s currently a Commissioning Editor in the drama team at Sky working on a number of new dramas.

He began his TV career in 1996 as a script reader, and then a script editor on various series for ITV. He joined BBC in 2000, where he developed and produced shows including Cutting It and the Emmy-nominated Jane Eyre.

In 2006 he became Executive Producer of EastEnders and over the next four years (and 700 plus episodes) delivered a consistent period of ratings and awards success. He stepped down in 2010 following the show’s 25th anniversary live episode.

He then set up his own production company, Lovely Day, which went on to produce the hugely popular crime series Grantchester (still in production twelve years later). In 2015 Diederick became Chief Executive of Kudos. Under his leadership, Kudos thrived with a string of hits including the International Emmy Awards-winning Man in an Orange Shirt, Channel 4 and AMC returner Humans, Apple Tree Yard, Gunpowder for BBC One & HBO, Flowers for Channel 4, BBC Two’s The Boy With The Topknot, and the Sky Atlantic hit, Tin Star.

In 2017 he chaired the Edinburgh International Television Festival.

He left Kudos in 2019, and moved into scripted commissioning, first working with the commissioning team at BBC Drama. He then spent two years as Chief Creative Officer, BritBox International, where he was responsible for overseeing commissioning and acquisition for the rapidly growing global streamer. In 2023, he worked as a Content Creative at Netflix, working on titles including Baby Reindeer, Fool Me Once and Scoop, before starting at Sky in 2024.