About us

Hayley McKenzie

CEO & Founder

Hayley McKenzie is the Founder and CEO of Script Angel, a professional scripted development and screenwriter training organisation for the global content business. She is also a Partner at production company Studio21 International alongside C21Media’s founder David Jenkinson.

Hayley has over 20 years’ experience as a scripted development executive in the content industry, including at BBC Studios, ITV Studios, and Channel Four Television.

Hayley is an international speaker and moderator at events including Cannes Film Festival (European Producer’s Club), NEM Zagreb, Zagreb Film Festival, Raindance London Film Festival, National Writers’ Conference UK, London Screenwriters’ Festival, Creative Europe Media Programme and Content London Drama Summit.

James Gillam-Smith

Screenwriting Coach

James is an experienced television script and story editor. He has worked in both drama and comedy, most recently script editing Silent Witness (BBC Studios). James has script edited on hit drama series such as EastEnders, Holby City (BBC Studios) and The Bill (Talkback Thames) as well as series such as Apparitions (Lime Productions), Stella (Tidy Productions) and Rev, The Job Lot and Youngers (Big Talk Productions).

With a passion for helping develop new writing talent, James has also helped run the Shadow Writing Scheme for Holby City and been a Script Consultant for Screenwriting Goldmine. As well as script editing, James has written on The Dumping Ground (CBBC) and a shadow scheme script for Doctors (BBC1).

Lucy Hackney

Screenwriting Coach

Lucy has worked in script development and production for over twenty years. Script editing credits include Dickensian (Red Planet Pictures/BBC1 with Tony Jordan and Sarah Phelps), A and E (ITV1, Exec Producer Andy Harries), The Gentleman Thief (BBC, Writer Matthew Graham), City Central (BBC, Exec Producer John Yorke), Emmy-Award winning Dustbin Baby (Kindle Entertainment for BBC, CBBC) and The Bill (ITV1). Lucy was Development Executive at Kindle Entertainment and has worked in drama development roles at Projector Pictures, Hardy Pictures, RTE, BBC and ITV Studios. Lucy is also an experienced radio drama producer and has taught drama at the prestigious RADA and Italia Conti.

Katherine Lannon

Screenwriting Coach

Katherine Lannon is a BAFTA-Cymru award-winning producer and experienced script
development professional.
After a background in scheduling and commissioning at the BBC Katherine worked in BBC
Drama where she developed the daytime soap Doctors and high profile dramas on Stephen
Hawking with Benedict Cumberbatch and Beethoven’s Eroica which won the Prix Italia.  She
then built a reputation for producing single films and dramas including BAFTA-Cymru award
winning feature length drama for BBC Two Shirley a single film about the life of Shirley
Bassey. Other producing credits include The Secret Life of Mrs Beeton for BBC Four, The
History of Mr Polly for ITV, Lennon Naked for BBC Four, Lawless and a Little Cracker for
Sky.  In 2017 Katherine produced her first feature Last Summer.
She has worked in a range of development and script editing roles including for the BBC,
Channel 4, Talkback Thames, Ecosse Films, Hillbilly Films and World Productions.

Rachel Hall

Screenwriting Coach

Rachel has almost twenty years’ experience working in scripted development in the UK television drama industry. She has worked as a senior script editor and producer on award winning shows including EastEnders, Hollyoaks and Brookside. Rachel is passionate about developing new writing talent and mentors new writers joining the Hollyoaks writing team.

Also a professional screenwriter, Rachel has written over fifty episodes of the award-winning teen/YA drama series Hollyoaks. She also has several original series currently in development.

Rachel’s passion is bold characters and the small interactions of people in everyday life that create the larger stories we love to see on screen.

Louise Donald

Screenwriting Coach

Louise is a highly experienced script and story editor with fifteen years of professional scripted development experience in the UK drama industry. She has worked as a story producer and script editor for some of the UK’s biggest drama producers including BBC Studios Drama, Tiger Aspect Productions and Red Planet Pictures. Script editing credits include EastEnders, Holby City, Death in Paradise (Series 1) and Good Karma Hospital (Series 4).

With a passion for nurturing new voices, Louise has worked with a number of emerging writers on schemes such as the BBC Writers Academy and Tiger Aspect’s mentorship programme.

Louise loves authentic character driven stories and is excited to work with writers to help develop their unique voices and achieve their full potential.

Douglas Dougan

Screenwriting Coach, Scotland Hub

Douglas Dougan has worked in script development and production for over 15 years. After graduating from Stirling University with a degree in Film and Media, he worked as a dramaturg for Edinburgh’s Words and Actions Theatre Company. After stints as director of Edinburgh Mediabase and a development producer at the BFI funded Cineworks film programme, Douglas worked as a development officer in Scottish Screen’s film department. He set up his own production company in 2005. Among their credits are the BAFTA Scotland award-winning Run, Tony, Run!, Mono (BBC Three Film Award), Waiting for the 42 and Half Way Home. Douglas works regularly as a script consultant for independent producers and national funding agencies. His credits as a script consultant include the multi-BAFTA award winning dramas Margaret, Small Island, Five Minutes of Heaven, Occupation, Killing Bono, Sex ‘n’ Drugs ‘n’ Rock & Roll and ’71. With a passion for helping develop new writers, Douglas created and teaches the year long screenwriting programme at University of Edinburgh.