Peter Friedlander, the former head of scripted U.S. and Canadian television at Netflix, has been hired at Amazon MGM Studios as head of global television. He will enter the role on Oct. 6.
Having left Netflix in August after nearly 14 years at the streamer, Friedlander serves as the successor to Vernon Sanders, who stepped down as the TV boss earlier in September.
Friendlander first joined Netflix in 2011 as director of the original series team before ascending to a vice president position and later becoming the leader of his department. During his time there, he helped oversee some of Netflix’s early hits, such as “House of Cards” and “Orange Is the New Black,” as well as its current tentpoles, like “Wednesday,” “Monster” and “Bridgerton.” Previously, Friedlander was an executive at Tom Hanks’ production company Playtone.
News of Friedlander’s hire came in a memo sent to staff by Mike Hopkins, head of Amazon MGM Studios and Amazon Prime Video. Read the full memo below.
Team,
Please join me in welcoming Peter Friedlander, who joins Amazon MGM Studios as our new head of global TV. In this role, Peter will oversee our original TV portfolio in the US, in addition to our global tentpole titles, MGM Television and MGM Alternative. Peter joins us from Netflix, where he led their scripted series division for the past 4+ years, having joined that company initially in 2011. His resume at Netflix speaks for itself, as his tenure brought global audiences shows like Wednesday, Bridgerton, Monster, Ozark, Emily in Paris, The Queen’s Gambit, Stranger Things, The Night Agent, 3 Body Problem, Black Mirror and more. He joined Netflix as the first dedicated original series employee, helping to shepherd their first generation of shows, including House of Cards and Orange Is The New Black, among others.
Prior to Netflix, Peter was an executive at Tom Hanks’ and Gary Goetzman’s Playtone, where he produced the Emmy-nominated drama series Big Love and served as a creative executive on many of the company’s feature films. Peter began his career working on film sets, including Road To Perdition and Austin Powers In Goldmember.
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I can’t wait for Peter to ramp up and meet all the teams, and I know he’s equally ready to get started on Day 1, which will be Monday, October 6. Please join me in congratulating Peter on his new role and in welcoming him to Amazon.
-Mike
From Variety US