Meet the Team
Emma Cooper
Film-maker, Producer and Founder
Cooper is an independent film-maker and Executive Producer recently founding Empress Films. Prior to this she was the Global President of Non-Scripted Television at Pulse Films. Delivering a strong slate of highly regarded non-fiction films and series which have won accolades at Sundance, Tribeca and Toronto Film Festivals and premiered on Netflix and other UK and US broadcasters and streamers.
Emma has most recently directed the feature doc, 'The Mystery of Marilyn Monroe; The Unheard Tapes', for Netflix. Emma’s other credits include: The Disappearance of Madeleine McCann (series Netflix) Bikram (feature Netflix) Rock and Roll (series SKY) No Greater Law (A&E Indie Films) The Deal (series BBC 2) with a number of projects currently in production launching in 2020/2021.
Having previously held the position of Commissioning Editor in Documentaries at Channel 4, Cooper has a track record for developing award-winning, innovative and trend-setting non-fiction that encouraged discussion within her strand Cutting Edge. Titles include The Fried Chicken Shop, Teens, Freshers, Going To The Dogs, Tattoos, The Jihadi Next Door, The Murder Workers, Ian Brady: Endgames of a Psychopath and Meet the Police Commissioner.
Prior to Channel 4, Emma directed and produced films for the BBC including Louis Theroux: A Place for Paedophiles, Miami Mega-Jail and America’s Most Hated Family.
Eloise Vanstone
Producer and Editor
Eloise is an Editor and Producer at Empress Films, who has worked with Emma for four years. Most recently, she Co-Produced the Feature Doc The Mystery of Marilyn Monroe: The Unheard Tapes, which she was also Assistant Editor on.
Eloise has worked at Empress Films since it was founded in 2019, across both the Production and Development slate. She is involved in the majority of every development and Production at Empress, and helped develop CNN's Diana. She has cut a variety of rough cuts for films in production, and numerous development tapes which have gone on to be commissioned.
Eloise previously worked at Pulse Films; from Cooper’s Assistant, to Production Assistant, to Casting Researcher, to Development Researcher.
Eloise has previously worked on projects such as The Disappearance of Madeleine McCann, Bikram, No Greater Law, Inside Missguided.
Carla Grande
Producer
Carla is a self-shooting producer/director with a decade’s experience on access-led documentaries and character-led factual programmes which have taken her up the Mayan pyramids, through Sri Lanka’s rainforests and deep into the Omani Desert for BBC, Channel 4, Discovery and National Geographic.
Previously at Raw TV, The Garden and True Vision, Carla has racked up credits on singles like BBC3’s STACEY DOOLEY: BACK ON THE PSYCH WARD, Channel 4’s acclaimed current affairs strand DISPATCHES as well as the Griersons-nominated series THE DOG HOUSE.
Proud of her Spanish upbringing, Carla is particularly interested in non-English language ideas and character-led stories which explore our modern day relationship with the media.
Alana Moreno
Director and Series Producer
Alana is a Director and Series Producer specialising in both talent-led and access-driven films. She is a highly adaptable filmmaker with ten years’ experience making documentaries in genres as varied as true crime, travelogue and sport for broadcasters including Disney+, National Geographic and the BBC.
Before joining Empress, Alana made programmes with Twenty Twenty, Nutopia and The Garden. Credit highlights include the Grierson award winning The Football Club: Artist in Residence, the Emmy nominated The World According to Jeff Goldblum and the ground-breaking medical series Emergency.
Born and raised in the United States, Alana is drawn to projects with an international scope and outspoken characters. Despite industry colleagues recommending against it, she loves working with animals.
Kiyomi Taylor
Production Manager
Kiyomi is a Production Manager at Empress Films. Coming from a predominantly Non-Fiction background, she has worked across many high end documentary productions including Dead Asleep (Hulu), Beastie Boys Story (AppleTV), The Disappearance of Madeleine McCann (Netflix) & Hair Power (Channel 4)
Prior to Empress Films, Kiyomi has worked at multiple Independent Production Companies including Pulse Films, Monkey Kingdom & Avalon.
Suzannah Gray
Business Affairs
Suzannah is responsible for business affairs at
Empress Films.
Her most recent project was 'The Mystery of Marilyn Monroe'. Suzannah joined Empress in 2019 after a long career in the fashion industry working with brands such as Burberry, Jigsaw and Gap
Aaron MacPepple-Jaja
Production Assistant/Junior Researcher
Aaron is a Production Assistant at Empress Films and is currently finishing his studies at Columbia University in the City of New York.
During his time at Empress he has worked on the Netflix Original The Mystery of Marilyn Monroe: The Unheard Tapes as well as the development of numerous other projects.
Before his time at Empress Aaron had produced, written and starred in numerous student short films with one of his films being shown in the Eton Film Festival.
Aaron has also interned at 42 Management & Production in which he worked a part of the scripted development as well as the talent & literary management team
Kate Glover
Executive Assistant
Kate joined Empress Films in April 2021. Prior to that, she has been an Executive Assistant in music and broadcast companies for many years, working for organisations such as FremantleMedia, National Geographic & Universal Music Group.
Starting with a temp role at FremantleMedia and staying for 8 years, ending as EA to the Global CEO until 2014. She then worked for National Geographic for 2 years, picking up lots of useful information about commissioning and the greenlight process, along the way, before moving to work for the CEO of a division of Universal Music Group called Universal Advanced Media, which was responsible for the production of music events (BTS, concerts, music videos, etc.) for any artist/label under the Universal umbrella.
