BBC Director General Race Heats Up As Frontrunners Emerge For Biggest Job In British Media

The BBC’s hunt for its next director general is about to enter crunch time, with frontrunners starting to surface from a wide pool of names linked to the biggest job in British media.

BBC chair Samir Shah has made clear that finding a successor for Tim Davie, who dramatically quit last November amid an editorial scandal over Donald Trump, is his top priority. The BBC’s official job application process closed late last month, while headhunters at Egon Zehnder have been speaking to the great and the good of the industry. Formal interviews are expected to take place in the coming weeks.

Speaking on condition of anonymity to protect relationships, numerous sources told Deadline that Apple TV’s Europe chief Jay Hunt, former BBC content boss Charlotte Moore, and ex-Channel 4 CEO Alex Mahon, are among the most serious contenders. A leading internal candidate has yet to emerge.

Davie is expected to remain in post until at least March, when the government’s public consultation on BBC charter renewal closes. An interim could be appointed, with BBC insiders suggesting that Rhodri Talfan Davies, the nations and regions chief, is a likely caretaker.

Davie’s successor will inherit an organization wrestling with its place in a media ecosystem dominated by overseas tech giants, as well as battling enemies closer to home, with conservative politicians and media proprietors wishing to see the BBC diminished during charter renewal. There is also the small matter of a looming legal fight with the U.S. president over the botched Panorama edit that triggered Davie’s resignation.

Hunt is said to be considering the BBC role, but is keeping her cards close to her chest in conversations with industry colleagues. One person, who has spoken to Hunt in recent weeks, said she was clear about the challenges of the top BBC job without ruling herself out.

Many consider her to be the most well-rounded candidate, given her credentials as a former journalist, her experience at the BBC, track record of backing hits like Slow Horses and Sherlock, and recent years at one of the world’s most revered tech companies. Several sources said her time at the British Film Institute, which she now chairs, has burnished her CV and kept her hand in with public service media — an important consideration for the BBC board.

Moore only left the BBC last year to become CEO of The Crown producer Left Bank Pictures, but many at the UK national broadcaster would welcome her back with open arms. Crucially, she is said to have admirers on the BBC board, on which she served for five years while juggling work overseeing hits like The Traitors. One senior figure from the media world said she will “definitely” be on Shah’s wishlist.

The big question is whether she wants to succeed Davie. Several people close to Moore said she has all but ruled herself out, with the received wisdom being that she left the BBC for a quieter — and more creative — life at Left Bank owner Sony Pictures Television. There is a feeling, however, that she has not completely shut the door on a return to the BBC, given her fierce advocacy for the public service broadcaster.

As for Mahon, meanwhile, two sources said she is “serious” about the director general vacancy, despite only recently leaving Channel 4 to become the boss at Superstruct Entertainment, the festival company backed by private equity giant KKR.

Mahon ran Channel 4 for eight years and is seen as a savvy political and commercial operator, who is sure-footed under scrutiny — all attributes that would serve her well in the hellfire moments that often come with running the BBC. With crunch funding and charter talks with the government on the horizon, sources said she could summon experience saving Channel 4 from privatization and partially moving the network out of London.

“Alex is looking increasingly like a strong candidate given her political management skills,” said a former colleague.

There are some, however, who question her broader record at Channel 4 and her lack of journalism experience.

Money would be a consideration for all three women, who could make history by becoming the first female director general. All would likely have to take pay cuts to run the BBC, even though The Mail on Sunday reported over the weekend that the corporation is looking to raise the DG’s £540,000 ($724,960) salary.

Hunt, Moore, and Mahon are by no means the only credible contenders. Jane Turton, boss of The Traitors producer All3Media, is widely admired across the television industry and, although we understand she has not formally applied for the BBC role, she has not ruled herself out.

Patrick Holland, the Banijay UK chief and former BBC2 boss, has been the focus of some recent speculation linking him with a return to the corporation. He is thought to be happy at Banijay and not formally in the mix to replace Davie, but has told industry colleagues that the director general role is a crucial job.

One well-connected individual said that Anna Mallett, the former ITN CEO who is now Netflix’s vice president of production in Europe, is a dark horse candidate. She is highly-regarded at Netflix, where she has worked since 2021, and held senior roles at BBC Studios before joining ITN.

News Executives

The news executives linked to the BBC role are all male. They include former Sky News chief John Ryley, former BBC News boss James Harding, who delivered the recent Edinburgh MacTaggart lecture about BBC independence, and John Micklethwait, the editor-in-chief of Bloomberg. The latter is said to have privately told colleagues that he is not interested in becoming director general.

Kevin Bakhurst, director general of Ireland’s RTÉ and a former BBC News journalist, is also seen as a credible candidate, though some have said he may be better suited to the deputy director general role that the board would like to create. He told Irish lawmakers in December that he had not applied for the BBC vacancy and said he was “very happy” at RTÉ.

Unusually, there appears to be a paucity of internal candidates, particularly after the departure of Moore, and the shock resignation of BBC News CEO Deborah Turness. Talfan Davies, the likely interim DG, could put himself forward, while another option might be BBC Studios CEO Tom Fussell, with Davie showing that Studios can be a path to DG. They are not being discussed as serious contenders, though two sources said applying would do their internal reputation no harm.

Other more outlandish suggestions have included Nicola Mendelsohn, the head of Meta’s global business group and a doyen of British business, and Tristram Hunt, a former broadcast journalist and Labour Party politician who now runs the Victoria & Albert Museum. Mendelsohn would likely need to take the biggest pay cut of the lot.