Chris Hale
agent: Natalie Spanier - natalie@sternwild.com
Chris Hale is an creative Executive Producer & Showrunner and Series Director who delivers vision, ambition and adventure with scale. With a focus on epic cinematography and quality storytelling packed with heart and humour across a wide range of subjects – from ob-docs to drama docs, entertainment shows to large-scale live events and commercials – Chris has a particular love of history series and a wealth of experience in travel adventures.
He can take an idea from early development to pitching, scripting, producing and post, and having started his career as a successful editor, has applied that sensibility to craft hundreds of hours of TV and content.
He is best known for his work on both Top Gear and Grand Tour brands, most notably as creative and logistical lead on 10 feature length Top Gear and Grand Tour ‘Specials’ as well as devising and delivering special projects for both shows – from motoring festivals in South Africa and Barbados, to a global studio tour, marketing stunts and audience engagement on top of the series’ themselves.
Less widely known is his work in independent film. Creating and Directing a trilogy of award winning stylised documentary films for the international festival circuit. Everybody Falls Down, Dreams and Nightmares & Life Spent about Refugees, Referendum and Genocide in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq, and currently Exec Producing, Start Up: Ukraine, a documentary series about a tech start-up and the war in Ukraine.
Highly experienced in shaping first series’ and setting the style for hugely successful returning brands such as The Gadget Show & Nazi Megastructures, also working closely with Amazon to help create The Grand Tour from the beginning as well as consulting on a new Nigerian original show for Amazon Studios.
Chris is equally adept at invigorating and adding scale to existing shows or special episodes within established series – from embedding with a Chinese company to boost Top Gear China to 220 million viewers, Directing Tom Hardy in a special insert film for The Millies on ITV, or elevating Goodwood Festival of Speed content in a new premium direction for both ITV and brands.
As part of his work at all stages, Chris is an accomplished writer creating everything from synopsis to screenplays and enthusiastically works with a team to steer research and shape narratives to uncover new and dramatic angles in his story telling.
One of the few senior creatives working in the unscripted space who has experience working on projects with movie level ambition, he has produced and directed action sequences, car chases, explosions, stunts and aerial combat with teams from Rush, Transformers, Dunkirk, Mission Impossible and more. And has worked with talent as varied as Dermot O’Leary, Lewis Hamilton, Idris Elba & Keanu Reeves as well as contributors and experts from all walks of life.
A particular superpower is Chris’ international filming experience. Having produced in 45 countries he is an expert on devising, planning, scouting and shooting in challenging and remote environments.
Working with multinational teams on large scale and ambitious projects he has driven shows’ narrative while personally delivering everything from unprecedented access & political negotiations, to complex logistics and management of units on location ranging from single camera to 2500 crew and extras.
Over the past 19 years, Chris has had the privilege of a very varied career, creating shows that have reached a large audience – from a unique hybrid broadcast event for Goodwood SpeedWeek that reached over 140 million viewers, to being a key creative behind the Most Watched Factual Programme in history with 350 million viewers in 200 countries.
He has overcome ‘never been done before’ challenges, made the impossible and he’s produced & directed shows & content with budgets ranging from £30k to £30 million – putting his heart and soul into all of them equally.