Stephen Spence > Lee & Thompson LLP > London, England > Lawyer Profile

Lee & Thompson LLP
80 Charlotte Street
LONDON
W1T 4DF
England

Work Department

Film & TV

Position

Stephen is a Partner in our Film & TV Group. A media finance specialist, he advises a wide range of clients on the structuring and completion of complex financing arrangements for film and television. This involves drafting and negotiating the full range of transaction documents for the development, production and exploitation of content. In addition to acting for financiers, Stephen represents film and television production companies on all aspects of development, production and distribution.

Having read law at Oxford, Stephen trained at Slaughter and May, qualifying into its corporate finance team. He followed his passion for film and left the City to help set up and run an independent film finance and production company as well as a separate vehicle focusing on the development of film and television content in collaboration with some of the UK’s leading production companies. In 2017, Stephen began working with Ingenious Media as a consultant, acting as lead lawyer and advisor on many of the organisation’s film and television transactions.

Stephen has acted as Executive Producer on numerous feature films including the forthcoming Netflix drama “Worth” starring Michael Keaton, the Amazon biopic “Seberg” starring Kristen Stewart, Gurinder Chadha’s “Blinded by The Light”, “Military Wives” featuring Kristin Scott Thomas and Sharon Horgan, “Minamata” starring Johnny Depp, and John Banville’s adaptation of his own Booker Prize winning novel, “The Sea”.

 

Lawyer Rankings

London > TMT (technology, media and telecoms) > Media: Media finance

(Next Generation Partners)

Stephen SpenceLee & Thompson LLP

Steered by television head Richard Lever and film head Christos Michaels, Lee & Thompson LLP regularly handles financing arrangements for a range of high-profile productions, as well as inbound studio investments. Key media finance specialists within the team include Sam Tatton-Brown – noted for his representation of major banks – and Stephen Spence, who routinely acts for both financiers and production companies.