by Bob Penn | FEATURES

If you’re a fan of independent British films, the name Jonathan Sothcott will be one you recognise. At 38 he has produced dozens of crime and action movies including Vendetta, White Collar Hooligan, Fall of the Essex Boys and the We Still Kill The Old Way series, working with stars such as Mark Hamill, Jason Statham, Ray Winstone and Peter Capaldi.

Born in Surrey, Sothcott, described as a “walking film encyclopedia” started out as a film journalist while still in his teens and wrote for the likes of GQ and Esquire, before landing a job as Head of Programming for The Horror Channel, aged Just 24. He struck out on his own as an independent film producer with the thriller Stalker, which marked the directorial debut of Martin Kemp and starred Colin Salmon and Jane March. Kemp became one of a number of iconic regular collaborators for Sothcott, others including Billy Murray, Danny Dyer and Steven Berkoff, and he built a ‘stock company’ of regular actors, citing Hammer Films and Roger Corman as key influences.

Sothcott rapidly became the UK’s premiere producer of straight to video genre films, cementing his reputation with the likes of Devil’s Playground, Riot, Age of Kill and Bonded By Blood 2. In 2013 he co-wrote the book The Films of Danny Dyer, a subject he knew a lot about having made most of them, which was described by The Telegraph as “strangely delightful.”

His company Hereford Films is now justly celebrated as one of the most successful production companies in the UK and in 2018 a television division was launched with a true crime series first off the starting blocks.

A shelf full of awards and well over a million DVD sales later, Sothcott continues to produce the gritty thrillers he is best known for, with The Krays – Dead Man Walking due for release in September but he is currently forging ahead with a slate of so-called ‘Hereford Horror’ movies. The first, Aura, is released in the US and the UK in August and the upcoming slate includes Pentagram, Demonicus, Aura 2, Tormented, Witch House and After Shock.

For years Sothcott was a familiar, dapper figure on the London social scene in his trademark blue blazer, whether partying with Kirk Norcross and Vicky Pattison or lunching with Tom Parker Bowles, but these days he leads a quieter life with his partner and “love of his life”, stunning actress Janine Nerissa and 4 children. The couple regularly turn heads at glitzy parties and are virtually inseparable – their loved up social media posts show they are clearly as crazy about each other as when they first met.