Page 62 - 2018 Powerlist

Zadie Smith
Media, Publishing& Entertainment Author

It’s been 16 years since she became an overnight success
with her debut novel White Teeth, and Zadie’s latest
offering, Swing Time, has cemented her position in the
higher echelons of British literary talent.
Set in north-west London and west Africa, the story
follows the lives of two ‘brown girls’ who both want to
become dancers but only one of whom has talent. It was
released last November to near-universal acclaim, with The
Guardian hailing its ‘virtuosic plotting’ and ‘cinematic’
breadth as ‘truly marvellous reading’. The LA Times
described it as a ‘multi-layered tour de force’. It also marked
her first foray into first-person narrative and was shortlisted
for the 2017 Carnegie Medal for excellence in fiction.
Last autumn also saw the premiere of the BBC2 adaptation
of her 2012 novel NW, starring Luther actress Nikki Amuka-
Bird and Hollow Crown actress Phoebe Brown.
Zadie’s debut White Teeth was an instant bestseller and
was praised internationally winning a number of awards
including The Guardian First Book Awards, the Whitbread
First Novel Award and the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize
(Overall Winner and Best First Book).
It was adapted for television by Channel 4 in 2002. Her
Kwadjo Dajan success was followed by The Autograph Man and On Beauty,
Producer & Creative Director, Sugar Films which was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize and won the
Orange 2006 Prize for Fiction. NW was shortlisted for the
Royal Society of Literature Ondaatje Prize and the Women’s
Kwadjo co-founded Sugar Films in 2015, with the express Prize for Fiction.
aim of making “bold, provocative and popular shows” that
just happened to have diverse talent at their core.
As Creative Director for Drama, Kwadjo is responsible
for overseeing a wide range of scripted programmes for
broadcasters in the UK and the international market.
His hallmark of turning provocative, intelligent and at
times difficult stories into stylish dramas for mainstream
audiences has marked him out as one of the UK’s most
formidable producers.
Last year Sugar Films scooped substantial investment
from Sky and the long-term aim is to make its vision a
global one.
Kwadjo began his career as a documentary producer in
the late 1990s, making the transition into drama into 2007
and using his journalistic instincts and ability to unearth
compelling, access-driven true stories to develop hard-
hitting stories for TV.
Kwadjo’s credits over the years include a string of hit TV
dramas, including the Bafta-nominated Cilla as well as
ITV’s The Widower and Mrs Biggs. This year he produced
the powerful four-part ITV drama Little Boy Blue, about
the murder of 11-year-old schoolboy Rhys Jones, and the
Liverpudlian gang culture that claimed his life. Reeling in
7 million viewers the series won acclaim for its impactful
portrayal of a senseless tragedy.
Recent wins on behalf of Sugar Films include a deal to
develop two dramas for Channel 4, and there are ongoing
conversations to develop dramas for the international
market, including in the US.
He also sits on the board of the High End TV Council,
a multi-million-pound bursary aimed at plugging the
skills gap in the TV drama industry and promoting
diversity.

58 Powerlist 2018