STAFF BIOGS
Hothouse Director – Ben Gibson
From the late '80's to 2001 Ben worked as a producer, and as Head of Production at the British Film Institute from '89 to '99. His credits as producer and executive producer include Terence Davies' The Long Day Closes, Derek Jarman's Wittgenstein, John Maybury's Love is the Devil, Carine Adler's Under the Skin and Jasmin Dizdar's Beautiful People, as well as 18 other low budget features and numerous shorts by UK directors including Patrick Keiller, Gurinder Chadha, Lynne Ramsay, Richard Kwietniowski and Andrew Kotting.
From '81 to '87 he was a partner in distributors The Other Cinema/Metro Pictures, acquiring and promoting films by Almodovar, Marker, Akerman and Godard and opening the Metro Cinema. He has also been a theatre director, a repertory film programmer, founder of the London International Festival of Theatre and a film critic and journalist.
Hothouse Development Producer - Margaret Glover
Margaret began her professional life in the American theatre, where she worked as dramaturg and director for off-Broadway and regional companies. A move to UK led to a move into television, where she delivered single dramas and series as script editor and producer. As a screenwriter, Margaret’s most recent film credit is Shadows in the Sun (UK release 2009), featuring Jean Simmonds in her final role. Margaret currently teaches writing and producing at the London Film School.
Hothouse Production Manager – Dhiraj Mahey
Dhiraj is an independent producer, currently developing a slate of projects through company, Primal Pictures. These include a mystical thriller, a quirky romcom and a feature doc on Iranian Hip Hop. He was identified by Marc Samuelson as one of the UK’s most promising producers, being contracted full time to Samuelson Productions (now cinemaNX) as a salaried producer and seconded to a series of major film companies to learn the business of producing at ‘the coal face’. For nine months he worked at companies that spanned sales, distribution, exhibition, law, accounting, financing, PR and music, including Focus Features, Paramount Pictures, Momentum Pictures, AIB Capital Markets, Olswang, DDA PR, Totally Entertainment, Vue Cinemas, Everyman Media, AGN Shipleys, EMI Music Publishing and the UK Film Council.
Dhiraj has also worked for various UK distributors (including Verve Pictures and The Works) across acquisitions, development, marketing and PR. This included working on a range of release strategies for titles such as LONDON TO BRIGHTON, ONCE, SCOTT WALKER – 30 CENTURY MAN and LA VIE EN ROSE. Most recently he acted as Sales & Distribution consultant on Clio Barnard’s debut feature, THE ARBOR, working closely with producer, Tracy O’Riordan to secure a sales agent and UK distributor. The film will be released nationwide later this year.
As well as producing, Dhiraj has taught on a range of filmaking programmes, devised placement based training schemes and worked as a mentor. He sat on the steering group of The Raindance East (now East End) Film Festival for its first two years and also co-produced screening events with them for Black History Month. He also served on the board of Four Corners Film and Photography Workshop for several years.
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