| Danny Cohen | |
| Birth Name: | Daniel Nicholas Cohen |
| Birth Date: | 1974 1, df=yes[1] |
| Birth Place: | Westminster, London, England |
| Education: | City of London School |
| Alma Mater: | Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford |
| Employer: | Access Entertainment |
| Known For: | Former director of BBC Television |
| Controller of BBC Three (2007–2010) Controller of BBC One (2010–2013) Director of BBC Television (2013–2015) President of Access Entertainment (2016–present) | |
Daniel Nicholas Cohen (born 15 January 1974) is a British television executive. He currently serves as President of Access Entertainment. He was previously the Director of BBC Television from 2013 to 2015.[2] Before that, he was the Controller of BBC One for three years,[3] the BBC's principal television channel in the United Kingdom.[4]
Cohen was born in Westminster.[5] He attended a local Jewish primary school in north London, followed by the City of London School, an independent school for boys in the City of London.[6] Cohen read English literature at Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford where he took a Double First.
Between 2000 and 2007, Cohen worked at Channel 4 and its youth service E4. His roles there included Head of Documentaries for Channel 4 and Head of E4.
Cohen's television commissions in this period included Skins, The Inbetweeners, Fonejacker, Supernanny and the documentary strand Cutting Edge.
Between May 2007 and October 2010, Cohen was the Controller of BBC Three. During his tenureship of BBC Three, the channel increased its share of 16-34-year-old viewers by 58% and won Digital Channel of the Year at the Edinburgh International TV Festival in two out of three years – 2008 and 2010.[7] His BBC Three commissions included Our War, the BAFTA nominated Blood, Sweat and T-shirts, Britain's Missing Top Model, Stacey Dooley Investigates, and Being Human.
Alongside these commissions, he also acquired Summer Heights High from Australia and built a strong following for US animation Family Guy. He also revamped the hourly bulletins 60 Seconds adding a World News update.
In February 2008, The Times newspaper described Cohen as "the boy wonder of British television".[8] In January 2009, the Royal Television Society's magazine Television wrote an article about Cohen which posed the question of whether he would become Director General of the BBC.[9]
As Controller of BBC One between 2010 and 2013, Cohen's commissions included: Call The Midwife, Happy Valley, Car-Share, Poldark, The Casual Vacancy, The Voice, Last Tango in Halifax, Eat Well For Less, and The Missing. During his time at the BBC, he led BBC One's coverage of the 2012 London Olympics.
In May 2013, Cohen became Director of BBC Television, succeeding Roger Mosey, who had been temporarily in the post since August 2012. In this role Cohen oversaw the BBC's Television Networks (BBC One, BBC Two, BBC Three and BBC Four) and BBC Productions – Europe's largest television production group. He also had responsibility for the BBC's feature film unit, BBC Films, and the BBC's content on its digital platform, BBC iPlayer.[10] In 2014, BBC Television was the most successful UK television network, and in the first quarter of 2015, the BBC's main network, BBC One, delivered its best start to the year in a decade with a prime-time audience share of 25.2%.[11]
In October 2015, Cohen announced that he was leaving the BBC.[12]
In May 2016, Cohen launched Access Entertainment with the businessman Len Blavatnik. Access Entertainment invests in content for theatre, film, television, gaming, the creator economy and the visual arts."[13] Under Cohen's leadership, Access has invested in the production company A24. Alongside Blavatnik, Cohen has been named as executive producer on several A24 films, including Beau is Afraid, The Iron Claw and the Oscar-winning film The Zone of Interest.[14]
The Pollard review into Newsnights decision to drop an investigation into sex abuse claims against Jimmy Savile found that Cohen had not read emails that had been copied to him warning of Savile's "dark side" and which indicated there was knowledge within the BBC of the unsavoury side of Savile's character. Had he done so "it was at least possible that further questions [on the advisability of running the Christmas 2011 tributes] would have followed".[15] [16]
Cohen is married to economist and author Noreena Hertz. They were married in 2012 at the Bevis Marks Synagogue in the City of London, in a ceremony conducted by Lord Sacks, the Chief Rabbi, and attended by guests including Rachel Weisz, Daniel Craig, Nigella Lawson and Charles Saatchi. They live in Primrose Hill, London.[17] [18] [19] [20]
A prominent figure in London's Jewish community, in an interview in 2014 Cohen said that he had "never felt so uncomfortable as a Jew in the UK".[21] Cohen said in 2016 that he was troubled by antisemitism in the Labour Party and suggested that voting for Jeremy Corbyn would be like being a Muslim and voting for Donald Trump.[22]
Since the October 7, 2023 Hamas-led attack on Israel and the ensuing Israel-Hamas war, Cohen has been a regular contributor to The Telegraph, writing on antisemitism in the UK. In particular, he has criticized the BBC's coverage of the war, accusing the broadcaster of anti-Israel bias.[23] [24] [25] [26] [27]