True crime award nod for Stern & Wild filmmaker’s cautionary tale of fraud, violence and murder

A warm welcome and many congratulations to new Stern & Wild client Paula Wittig whose chilling three-part docuseries Black Widow has been nominated for a 2025 True Crime Award. The series is one of 10 titles in competition for the award in the On Screen: Outstanding Three-or-More-Part Docuseries category, which includes another project from a Stern & Wild filmmaker - Gareth Johnson’s The Body Next Door.

Black Widow premiered on Sky in September 2024. It follows the decade-long police investigation into one of Britain’s most dangerous female murderers: Dena Thompson, the Black Widow. Over 20 years, Thompson carried out a sustained campaign of fraud, deception, bigamy and murder. Using Lonely Hearts columns to lure a succession of husbands and dozens of lovers into her life, she was able to coerce them into giving up their life’s savings, their homes, their families and their freedom. She was finally caught in 2003 and convicted of murder but was released after 19 years behind bars.

The series includes exclusive testimony from Thompson’s victims, dramatic reconstructions of events and hears from the two police officers at the heart of the investigation who explain how they untangled truth from the lies and ultimately brought her to justice.

It is a Blast! Films production in association with Sky Studios and was commissioned for Sky Documentaries by Zai Bennett, Managing Director of Content and Poppy Dixon, Director of Documentaries and Factual. Executive producers are Danny Horan and Tanya Winston for Blast! and Hayley Reynolds for Sky. The Series Producer is Rachel Heywood (Blast!) and the Senior Producer is Gilberte Phanor (Sky). Paula is the Director.

Paula is represented at Stern & Wild by Camilla Chiverton, Agent for Premium Unscripted Creative Talent. Her recent directing credits include the Grierson Award-nominated BBC series, Gold Rush: Our Race to Olympic Glory, the RTS Award-nominated Italia 90: Four Weeks that changed the World for Sky Docs and the 2023 two-part series Andrew: The Problem Prince for Channel 4 which was the channel’s second highest-rated documentary that year.

The True Crime Award winners will be announced on 5 June at the Hilton, London Bankside. For a full list of the screen sector nominations, click here.