MODERATOR: Sarah Asante

Asante has spent two decades finding comedy voices early and backing them all the way to screen. As part of the BBC’s award-winning comedy team, she greenlit Bafta Craft-winning Famalam and the pilot of Dreaming Whilst Black, which was later picked up internationally by A24 and Showtime. More recently, as scripted commissioning editor at UKTV, a BBC Studios company, Asante worked on titles including Murder They Hope, Meet the Richardsons, Sneakerhead and Newark, Newark. She also piloted four original comedies from emerging talent, and her slate included Perfect, the UK’s first all-disabled sitcom pilot. Asante began her career in advertising and digital and has commissioned more than 30 digital comedy shorts. That shortform grounding shapes how she spots the series inside a sketch, which matters more than ever as online comedy and longform TV keep converging. In May 2025, she launched her development consultancy, Asante Space, which works with production companies and writers to get pr