‘Develop BC’ Showrunners Announced
The PSP is pleased to announce the three showrunners selected for Develop BC this year: BC’s Simon Barry (Bet) and Jonathan Lloyd Walker (House of David), and Ontario’s Robina Lord-Stafford (Saint-Pierre). Each showrunner will develop a project for a week with two emerging BC screenwriters.
The PSP designed the Develop BC program in response to an awareness that buyers of scripted content are looking for a deeper level of development to take place before they commit to a project, and a recognition that talented early-career tv writers need opportunities to hone their craft in real-world environments.
Thanks to the support of Creative BC and the Province of British Columbia, Develop BC advances these goals by paying the fees of two BC-based emerging writers to work with each showrunner for a week, developing a new Canadian project to demonstrate its viability.
Prem Gill, CEO of Creative BC commented, “Creative BC is proud to celebrate the showrunners selected for this year’s Develop BC program! This initiative is key to supporting creators when development resources can have the greatest impact on original IP. By connecting emerging creators with established mentors, we’re investing in the infrastructure that elevates the level of storytelling coming out of Canada.”
In the program’s first iteration in early 2025, Develop BC supported the development of projects by Sonja Bennett, Ken Craw, Jennica Harper, and Brad Wright. The emerging writers hired were Jackson Chow, Jordan Hall, Ken Kabatoff, Norman Yi Li, Christopher Nash, Helene Taylor, and Tammy Tsang.
Biographies
Simon Barry
Simon Barry is a Vancouver based Show-Runner / Director / Writer / Producer and a founding partner of Reality Distortion Field Inc, a Film & TV production company. After graduating from the University of British Columbia, Simon worked as an Assistant Cameraman on several Feature Films and Television Series before relocating to Los Angeles to pursue a career as a Screenwriter. His first feature credit was the 2000 Action thriller The Art of War starring Wesley Snipes. Simon followed up with several uncredited rewrites on films such as Deep Blue Sea and Formula 51 before moving into Television, working for companies such as CBS, FX, USA, Spelling and Bell Media before returning to Canada and creating and show-running the Saturn Award winning series Continuum which ran for 4 seasons on SyFy and Showcase. Following Continuum, Simon helped launch the SyFy series Van Helsing as Executive Producer and followed this up creating the award winning Mafia drama Bad Blood and show-running the SyFy series Ghost Wars. His next series was creating and show-running the critical and fan favourite, Warrior Nun for Netflix which ran for 2 seasons. At the same time he produced Fakes for CBC and Netflix. His latest series is Bet the Netflix adaptation of the Manga ‘Kakegurui’, which was recently renewed for season 2. Simon also just directed the pilot for the new Netflix series Crew Girl.
Robina Lord-Stafford
Robina Lord-Stafford is an award-winning Jamaican-Canadian Screenwriter/Producer. Currently, a Creator and Co-Showrunner of CBC’s hit drama, Saint-Pierre, she has previously written for and produced Wild Cards, Pretty Hard Cases and Moonshine, among others. She weaves aspirational (and often messy) characters into authentic, conversation-inspiring stories that are peppered with unexpected levity. A champion for meaningful representation in front of and behind the camera, she serves as a panelist and mentor for several prestigious North American screenwriting initiatives.
Jonathan Lloyd Walker
Jonathan Lloyd Walker launched his writing career after selling his first three scripts to the legendary series The Outer Limits. His work has been produced by Canadian and American networks across multiple genres, earning him a prestigious Alfred P. Sloan Fellowship finalist selection at Sundance for his feature, The Beholder. Focusing primarily on writing and producing television since 2012, Jonathan wrote and produced all four seasons of the hit SyFy series, Continuum. He later served as Showrunner and Executive Producer on the final two seasons of Van Helsing (SyFy/Netflix) and as Co-Executive Producer on the Netflix series Wu Assassins. Jonathan is currently the Executive Producer and Showrunner of the hit Amazon Prime series, House of David, which became the streamer’s #1 global show in 2025.