Former Fox Entertainment president David Madden has officially joined AMC Networks where he has been named president of original programming for AMC, SundanceTV and AMC Studios. He fills the void left by the departure of Joel Stillerman, President of Original Programming and Development for AMC and SundanceTV, who left in May to become Chief Content Officer at Hulu. Starting later this month, Madden will report to Charlie Collier, president of AMC, SundanceTV and AMC Studios.
As we reported August 30 at the time of Madden’s exit from Fox and as his official AMC title suggests, in addition to overseeing programming for AMC and SundanceTV he will have hands-on involvement in AMC Studios, bringing his 15-year experience building up Fox TV Studios into a major cable series supplier. One of the series FtvS generated under Madden was The Killing, which started on AMC before migrating to Netflix post-cancellation.
“David Madden is a terrific, thoughtful person and a proven, tested executive,” Collier said. “He’s known broadly not just for his leadership but also for developing and producing original programming alongside some of our industry’s most outstanding talent, His rare and noteworthy success in this industry speaks for itself. He will have an immediate impact across our AMC and SundanceTV senior management team and, notably, our AMC Studios business as it continues to play an increasingly significant role for our networks and well beyond.”
During his three-year tenure at Fox, the network launched respectable new scripted performers in Lethal Weapon, Lucifer, The Mick, The X-Files revival and Star, though it is still searching for a breakout of the size of Empire. While running a broadcast network has its constraints, Madden excelled in his previous role as president of cable-focused Fox Television Studios. Series developed and produced by the company during his tenure included The Shield and The Americans for FX; The Killing for AMC and later Netflix; and White Collar, Graceland, Burn Notice and Queen of the South for USA among others.
“While I’m enormously grateful for my 17 years at Fox and proud of everything we accomplished at the network and the cable studio, I just landed my dream job,” Madden said. “The opportunity to play a leadership role at networks like AMC and SundanceTV, which live at the very highest end of television content, and at a growing studio operation, is the culmination of everything I’ve done to date in my career and something I could not pass up.”
AMC had been in a rebuilding mode following the end of its Emmy-winning Mad Men and Breaking Bad. The network continue to boast the biggest hit in all of television with The Walking Dead, headed into its eighth season, and has launched promising series in Breaking Bad prequel Better Call Saul and Into the Badlands. Its new shows slated for 2018 launch include The Terror, Lodge 49, Dietland and McMafia. SundanceTV just premiered Top of the Lake: China Girl from Jane Campion and starring Elisabeth Moss, Nicole Kidman and Gwendoline Christie, and has new limited series, Liar, starring Joanne Froggatt and Ioan Gruffudd, coming up.
Madden, who will be based in AMC’s Los Angeles office, will work closely with Susie Fitzgerald, EVP Scripted Programming for AMC and SundanceTV; Kristin Jones, SVP Iinternational Programming Development, Acquisitions and Co-Productions for AMC and SundanceTV; and Eliot Goldberg, SVP Non-Fiction and Alternative Programming for AMC and SundanceTV, and their teams.
Madden joins Collier’s senior leadership team which includes Rick Olshansky, president of business operations, and Stefan Reinhardt, president of production and finance, who both also have dual network/studio roles and also report to Collier.
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