Hot Shots 2022: Riva Japaul

Just two years ago, Riva Japaul was a receptionist at Windfall Pictures. Now she’s an in-demand producer with experience in putting Hollywood royalty, sports stars and vulnerable members of the public equally at ease.

Honing her sharp people-watching skills at the indie’s front desk, it was a natural progression to researcher on its Discovery series Unearthed and Nat Geo commission Europe From Above, before branching out as a freelancer on Nutopia’s Netflix series The World According To Jeff Goldblum.

From there, it was a quick rise to assistant producer, working with Twofour on Tom Daley’s Comic Relief Challenge (BBC1) and The Reluctant Traveller With Eugene Levy (Apple TV+), and Minnow Films on BBC1’s DNA Family Secrets, plus delivering a YouTube Original honouring Nelson Mandela’s love of football, from conception to delivery.

Sensitive touch

Looking on was Dare Pictures creative director Derren Lawford, who would go on to hire Japaul as producer of Channel 4’s Queen Of Crypto (w/t).

He marvels at her “knack for discovering contributors – from Finnish sauna scholars to all-black female motorcyclist groups. If they exist, Riva can cast them.”

Japaul is adept at sensitively handling difficult subjects. For a Little Gem doc on the Qatar World Cup for the BBC, she gave two young black footballers the space to speak openly for their first time about their mental health in front of their hero, footballer Patrice Evra. She says this was the moment she realised she could be a great producer.

Lawford observed Japaul’s diplomatic skills on Queen Of Crypto: she was making late-night calls and sending encrypted messages to gain exclusive access to a firm reported to have pulled off one of the biggest financial frauds in history, while gaining the confidence of victims, fraudsters and internet sleuths to put their stories on screen.

Lawford praises her “tireless work ethic, relentless positivity, dogged determination to do right by the story and consistent compassion for contributors”, adding: “Riva’s as valued by her colleagues as she is by the extraordinary characters she connects with. Her enthusiasm, emotional intelligence and editorial instincts are a powerful combination.”