BossaNova calls on factual indies to pitch during Development Day event

BossaNova, the UK content creation, funding and distribution company led by Paul Heaney, is inviting factual indies to pitch content during a two-day event.

Olivia Morgan

The Development Day event brings together buyers and sellers to fast-track the creation of unscripted content.

Producers who join the event, which takes place on January 11 and 12, can pitch either virtually or in person at a London screening suite. Buyers will then vote on the projects, which can be general factual or true crime.

The first BossaNova Development Day took place in January this year, connecting 55 buyers with 29 producers. Some 77 new projects were pitched, with 20% of those now in production or in advanced funded development.

These include the recently announced Extreme Tow Truckers from Australia’s Fredbird Entertainment, Hidden Histories of WWII from UK producer Bright Button and Secrets of the Lost Liners from Canterbury-based indie Content Kings.

The Development Day event was created by Heaney and is helmed by Jasmin Joseph, BossaNova’s marketing head, and Olivia Morgan, who was recently appointed as the firm’s first acquisitions and coproduction executive.

Morgan said: “Our Development Day is the backbone for our upcoming slate of projects we will be championing next year. We’re aiming to bridge the commissioning gap by putting the right projects in front of key factual buyers, and – using the responses gathered to provide us with clear data for investment criteria – create a slate based on this forensic data.

“After all, producers just want to produce great TV, and our aim with the Development Days is to streamline the often-bumpy road to a green light. With the explosion in interest in true crime, we wanted to concentrate the efforts of our producers and buyers and so we have a day focused purely on the genre to address the growing demand.”