Creative Director

Music is Universal

It’s the passionate and dedicated team at Universal Music who help make us the world’s leading music company. From A&R to finance, legal to digital, sales to marketing, Universal Music is the place to grow and develop your career within a truly commercial and innovative business that leads in everything it does.

Everyone is welcome to apply for our roles, and we are determined to ensure that no applicant or employee receives less favourable treatment because of gender, race, disability, sexual orientation, religion, belief, age, marital status, background, pregnancy, or caring responsibilities. We also recognise the importance of diversity of thought within our teams and are fully committed to embracing the talents of people with autism, dyslexia, ADHD, and other forms of neurocognitive variation.

We will always seek to make appropriate adjustments to recruitment, workplaces, and work processes to be fully inclusive to people with different needs and working styles. If you need us to make any reasonable adjustments for you from application onwards, including alternatives to the online form or to disclose a neurocognitive condition, please email UniversalMusicCareers@umusic.com.

The A Side: A Day in The Life

Universal Music Group is the world's leading music company. We own and operate a broad array of businesses in more than 60 countries.
Based in London, Los Angeles and New York, Mercury Studios is a music first content studio established to develop, produce, globally distribute and invest in innovative, music-rooted storytelling. Editorial independent from Universal, we work with a global network of creatives and artists in the areas of premium factual Film & TV, concert capture and performance led content, shortform and audio. We are filmmakers in the world of music.
Alongside our original content, Mercury Studios represents the world’s leading catalogue of music-related content, consisting of thousands of hours of premium music-driven film and television programming. Our Distribution and Content Sales team has over 20 years of experience of licensing music-driven content to buyers worldwide, from global platforms to national broadcasters, theatrical and emerging platforms like FAST.
Bringing these areas together we are uniquely placed to produce powerful projects which are editorially sound and reach global audiences. Our projects have received Academy, BAFTA, Emmy, Grammy Awards and extensive festival wins.
Recent credits include: One to One; John & Yoko (Venice, Telluride, London Film Festivals) American Symphony (Telluride Film Festival, Netflix) Reggaeton: The Music That Conquered The World (NBC Peacock) Andrea Bocelli 30th: The Celebration (global theatrical release) Cypress Hill Live at Royal Albert Hall (global TV) The Girls Aloud Show (ITV1) My Life As a Rolling Stone (BBC1, EPIX and 101 countries globally).

About the Role

This new role at Mercury Studios will play an integral role in the business, leading our creative endeavours and generating opportunities to produce new stories and keep Mercury at the forefront of world class music content.

The B Side: Skills & Experience

Responsibilities:

• Working in partnership with SVP Creative, North America - to creatively lead all Mercury Studios Unscripted Film & TV content
• Evaluate incoming and original content viability with respect to creative, critical, and commercial potential, but also with respect to Mercury's reputational profile, and logistical and political feasibility with respect to both Music and Film/TV industry dynamics.
• Facilitate industry insights, trends, and needs from your unique position in the marketplace back to Mercury leadership including Exec, Sales, and Creative.
• Manage Mercury's external creative partners and prospects (producers, directors, etc) relationships - day to day.
• Turn our business strategy and growth plan into a creative strategy and vibrant pipeline
• Find and stand-up original new stories with music at the heart of them
• Work alongside SVP Creative, NA on the global development slate, guiding, advising and motivating the internal development team
• Provide editorial sign-off on our creative work
• Create and maintain healthy and effective networks across all aspects of our business – artists, management, labels, directors, producers, commissioners, buyers, distributors
• Build highly effective relationships across Universal Music Group globally – distilling ideas and creative thinking
• Manage Mercury's external creative partners and prospects (producers, directors, etc) relationships - day to day.
• Represent our work to the world – including being at the forefront of selling our work both globally and territory by territory
• Form part of the senior team who collectively run Mercury Studios

Person Specification

You will have:

• Proven track record of developing, selling and delivering critically acclaimed and commercially successful films and TV
• Hands on editorial experience– producing and exec-producing a wide range of films and programmes
• Good working knowledge of development such that you can guide a small development team
• Impeccable industry connections that you can and will bring to the job – established connections with Directors, Producers, off and on screen artists – you know who we should be working with and ensure those creatives want to work with Mercury
• Love of Film, TV, and music and a sense of adventure

Bonus Tracks: Your Benefits

• Group Personal Pension Scheme (between 3% and 9%)
• Private Medical Insurance
• 25 paid days of annual leave
• Interest Free Season Ticket Loan available
• Holiday Purchase scheme
• Dental and Travel Insurance options
• Cycle to Work Scheme
• Salary Sacrifice Cars
• Subsidised Gym Membership
• Employee Discounts (Reward Gateway)

Just So You Know…

The company presents this job description as a guide to the major areas and duties for which the jobholder is accountable. However, the business operates in an environment that demands change and the jobholder's specific responsibilities and activities will vary and develop. Therefore, the job description should be seen as indicative and not as a permanent, definitive, and exhaustive statement.

Job Category: Creative, Design & Production