Courtney Thomasma is the Executive Director of BBC AMERICA, a hub of innovative, culturally contagious programming including the wildly acclaimed series Killing Eve; top-rated phenomenon Doctor Who; Emmy® and IDA-winning Planet Earth II and the producers’ next epic story of our planet, Seven Worlds, One Planet; Emmy-winning Blue Planet II; acclaimed drama Luther; ground-breaking unscripted series Top Gear; and the buzzy and hilarious The Graham Norton Show.

Killing Eve, the Emmy, Peabody, Golden Globe®, BAFTA, Critics’ Choice and Screen Actors Guild Award-winning series, has been a significant critical, cultural and business success since it launched in 2018. It finished its first season on more critics’ top 10 lists than any other drama on TV and achieved an unbroken record of weekly ratings growth – something no other show on television has accomplished in the history of Nielsen live+3 ratings. Season two of Killing Eve had the highest rate of growth of any returning TV drama since the final season of AMC’s Breaking Bad 6 years ago.

As the exclusive U.S. television home of the Planet Earth collection and other landmark series from BBC Studios’ Natural History Unit, BBC AMERICA has  continued its expansion of its iconic nature offering with the recent launch of Wonderstruck. Every Saturday, BBC AMERICA transforms into Wonderstruck, a new weekly 24-hour destination of wildlife and wonder.

Thomasma joined AMC Networks in 2013, most recently serving as Vice President of Research & Insights for BBC AMERICA. During her time at BBC AMERICA, she developed audience strategies to drive ratings and revenue growth, inform brand positioning and program development, and advance multi-platform solutions for the network. She also helped launch the network’s Galaxy of Women initiative, which aspires to elevate the role of women in front of and behind the camera, and co-authored the study Superpowering Girls: Female Representation in the Sci-Fi/Superhero Genre with the Women’s Media Center, which was covered by media outlets around the world. Thomasma previously led Research for sister network SundanceTV, where she oversaw the network’s transition to a Nielsen-rated, ad-supported model.

Prior to joining AMC Networks, Thomasma held a number of roles at Nielsen, where she managed key national television accounts, directed strategic business initiatives internationally, and completed the flagship Emerging Leaders Program. She started her career in Ad Sales Research for Sony Pictures Entertainment. 

Thomasma earned a B.A. in Communication from Pepperdine University and an M.A. in Cinema Studies from New York University. She was named as one of Multichannel News’ “40 under 40” industry executives and completed the Cable Executive Management program at Harvard Business School.

Speaking on: 30 Minutes With... Courtney Thomasma, BBC America