Terry Jervis | |
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Born | 1962 (age 62–63) Hackney, London, England |
Occupation(s) | Media producer, entrepreneur and business executive |
Website | jervismedia |
Terry Jervis (born 1962) is a British media producer, entrepreneur and business executive, working for more than three decades across the entertainment industry in film, music and television, having begun his career as a broadcast journalist. [1] [2] Jervis has worked with many high-profile musicians, including Diana Ross, Stevie Wonder, Michael Jackson, Madonna and Elton John. [3] After being employed by the BBC for 20 years, he set up his independent venture Jervis Media Entertainment. [2]
Jervis was born in Hackney, east London, England, [3] [2] where he grew up in a single-parent family on an estate. [4]
In a 1996 interview with Sarita Malik, he spoke about his start in television, saying: "I actually used to make films on 16mm and Super-8mm back in the late 1970s when I had aspirations of starting my own movie company. I'd made a film called From Gospel To Soul about the life of Sam Cooke and I put it on at a local cinema and a lot of people turned up to see it including people from Channel 4, the BBC, Sam Cooke's daughter and Bobby Womack, totally uninvited. Then Channel 4 gave me a call and said we're launching this new station..., 'Would you like to come on board with a couple of productions we have at the moment?' So I did." [5] Before long, Jervis joined the BBC, where he worked for 15 years, [1] running his own department at the age of 27, [6] and counting among his successes as producer/director the comedy show The Real McCoy . [7] [8] Among other widely viewed BBC programmes he created are the Black music magazine programme Behind the Beat (1987–91) [9] and Our Common Future. [10]
In 1999, Jervis set up his own production company, Jervis Entertainment Media (JEM), [2] [3] continuing to provide programming that won critical acclaim. [10] Documentary shows he directed include Raising Tennis Aces: The Williams Story, about the relationship of tennis stars Venus and Serena Williams with their father Richard. [10] [11] Other initiatives by Jervis included his Motown-linked record label, Down To Jam, [10] [12] and animation projects such as the calypso-based Tropical Island. [13]
Jervis has also been concerned to commemorate the contributions of Africans, West Indians and other people of colour in the Second World War, [14] including former RAF officer Cy Grant. [15]
A photograph of Jervis was one of those featured in the 2019 National Portrait Gallery exhibition Black is the New Black: Portraits by Simon Frederick. [16]