See-Saw hires Salmasi, opens in US

Top of the Lake producer See-Saw Films is opening a US division and has appointed an exective from Pascal Pictures to run it.

Negin Salmasi

Negin Salmasi takes the newly created role of VP of creative affairs with a remit to develop US TV and film projects, working with the company’s offices in the UK and Australia. She will be based in LA.

Salmasi was most recently a development exec at Pascal Pictures, the prodco run by Amy Pascal and backed by Sony Pictures Television, which is behind Terence Winter’s Andy Warhol show.

Iain Canning and Emile Sherman, See-Saw’s joint MDs, described Negin as “an extremely talented creative executive with wonderful talent relationships and a deep understanding of quality material.

“Negin is the perfect person to spearhead our US presence as part of what is now a truly international production company.”

Negin, who also worked for WME and Fox Searchlight, added: “I am beyond thrilled to join the See-Saw team and very much look forward to establishing our US presence. To be welcomed into this next phase of growth is truly exciting.”

The appointment is the latest expansion for See-Saw, which became well known thanks to its 2011 Academy Award-winning movie The King’s Speech. It is also been behind Bafta-winning movie Lion, while its TV output includes BBC drama Top of the Lake: China Girl, the next instalment of Jane Campion’s hit series that has also been picked up by Hulu.

The prodco was also behind Aussie drama Banished for the BBC and is producing The Legend of the Monkey for ABC in Oz, TVNZ and Netflix.