EXCLUSIVE: UK sales and production firm Embankment (The Father, The Wife) is teaming up with veteran UK producer Kevin Loader (The Death Of Stalin, The Lady In The Van) to create new label Free Range Entertainment.

The key shareholders in the company are Embankment’s Tim Haslam and Hugo Grumbar and Free Range’s Kevin Loader.

The combined company will develop, produce, co-produce, sell, and distribute film, TV and “allied” content, while also investing directly into production and working with third party investors and financiers.

Tim Haslam explained: “Free Range Entertainment is a creative hub for like-minded storytellers, writers, directors, and producers; converting IP from inception and development, through to production and commercial global exploitation. The Embankment sales brand will continue.”

Free Range Films was founded by producer Kevin Loader and director Roger Michell in 1996. Following Michell’s untimely passing last September, the production company has decided to embark on a new structural partnership.

Loader commented: “Having worked so closely with Embankment on Michell’s last film, Elizabeth: A Portrait In Parts, I know Roger would proudly approve of this partnership. Tim, Hugo and their colleagues have consistently proven that they convert storytelling into high-quality films. It’s exhilarating to be working together within the complex matrix of film finance and a constantly evolving distribution landscape.”

Embankment co-founder Hugo Grumbar added: “Both Free Range Films and Embankment are coming through Covid-19 with productions filmed throughout 2021 and early 2022. Free Range Entertainment is delivering eleven movies for global release in 2023 through a broad spectrum of distribution outlets. Kevin and this team supercharge the company to fulfil its offering as a world leading ‘conversion platform’ of cinematic movies and episodic formats.”

Loader most recently produced Richard Eyre’s Allelujah starring Judi Dench, continuing his collaboration with Alan Bennett, for whom Loader also produced box office hit Lady In The Van starring Maggie Smith and The History Boys starring James Corden.

In a co-production with Juliet Dowling’s Essential Cinema, Free Range is currently in post-production of The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry, starring Jim Broadbent.

The Wife and The Father seller and co-producer Embankment is celebrating its tenth anniversary with its 54th film – The Movie Teller – currently shooting in the Atacama Desert, northern Chile; its 2023 release slate is due to include Florian Zeller’s The Son starring Hugh Jackman, James Napier Robertson’s Joika starring Talia Ryder, Guy Nattiv’s Golda starring Helen Mirren, and Francis O’Connor’s Emily starring Emma Mackie.