Lush, the ethical cosmetics company and global activist, has announced the launch of a new entertainment creation hub, Lush Presents. The new development has been established to develop, create, commission and deliver film and television, podcasts, books, music and events.

Lush established a media-creation division in London’s Soho in 2016 in response to increased employee and customer interest in the video, publishing and music content it broadcasts through its online VoD platform Lush Player and live events. The content produced by Lush Player, which has a highly engaged audience of many thousands across its channels, is anchored in entertainment that addresses the company’s core humanitarian, environmental and animal-welfare principles.

Lush’s new Presents team has been put together by Lush veteran and ‘free thinker’ Matthew Shaw with the film division led by documentary filmmaker, Paul Williams (Tony Conrad: Completely in the Present; The Ballad of Shirley Collins).

The first projects to be announced under Lush Presents are development deals with controversial filmmaker Julien Temple (The Great Rock ‘n’ Roll Swindle; Absolute Beginners; Glastonbury) and the award winning writer, performer and provocateur Mark Thomas (The Mary Whitehouse Experience; The Mark Thomas Comedy Product). The collaboration with Temple consists of a biographical documentary feature, Demand The Impossible, about the life and work of artist and anarchist Jamie Reid. The deal with Thomas will result in a six-part documentary & podcast series written and produced by the activist comedian, entitled Brit-ish – examining the state of the nation and how we got here.

Jamie Reid is one of the UK’s most influential radical artists. A creative catalyst, he has been at the epicentre of many of Britain’s seminal cultural moments of the last half century, from situationism and the student revolts of the 1960s through punk, the poll-tax riots, rave culture, gay rights, the Occupy and the anti-corporate movements to Pussy Riot, freedom of speech in the face of Trump, Putin and Brexit and the rise of the alt right.

Mark Thomas’ Brit-ish – examining the state of the nation and how we got here will initially be broadcast as a podcast and developed into signature presentations Thomas has been known for in recent years such as, Check Up: Our NHS @70 and previously Showtime From The Frontline combining theatre tours with book publishing.

Matt Shaw said: “The last two years have been spent figuring out how we can bring Lush’s global network, access and values to creative storytelling across all platforms and media. We want to use the principles at the heart of Lush — equality, inclusion, respect for humans, animals and our planet — to create entertainment that reflects the age we live in and the world we now inhabit. This is a huge opportunity for a company that strives to be in the vanguard of good business practice and we’re seeking like-minded partners to help us create content that entertains, inspires, informs, shocks, amuses, but above all speaks the truth.”

Categories: Press Releases