Prolific British film producer Alan Latham, whose projects have featured Frasier's Kelsey Grammer and Four Weddings and a Funeral's Anna Chancellor, has had 50 of his production businesses forcibly struck off by Companies House, leaving workers unable to chase unpaid fees. This was reported by Qazaqyia.kz citing The Guardian.
Data compiled by the film workers' union Bectu shows the compulsory strike-offs. A compulsory strike off occurs when Companies House dissolves a company for failing legal obligations, such as ignoring warnings to file annual accounts or statements on shareholders. Failure to make these filings on time is a criminal offence and offending companies are frequently struck off.
Once a company is removed from the register, there is no longer an entity for creditors to make claims against. Film workers have told the Guardian that they have been unable to collect debts owed by Latham's former businesses, including those struck off.
One of Latham's companies, City Girls Productions, was set up to produce the film City Girls starring Elizabeth Hurley, which began filming in Yorkshire in 2021 but was abandoned after a cast member contracted Covid-19.
A crew member said she was among young film workers who were not fully paid. "We were all young, desperate for work and to prove our worth. We were exploited," she said.
A second supplier, who worked on another unfinished Latham film called Rufus Kane, said his business was owed thousands of pounds by RK Film Productions. "We got every excuse under the sun not to be paid. We had no choice but to write the debt off," he said.
City Girls Productions and RK Film Productions were compulsorily struck off by Companies House in 2024 and 2025 respectively. The Guardian has been told of further Latham productions where film workers claim they have not been paid.
In total, 50 companies have been removed from the register when Latham was a director, Bectu analysis reveals. The businesses were late filing annual accounts or confirmation statements on more than 400 occasions, according to Tech City Labs.
The frequency of strike-offs raises questions as to whether Latham planned for large numbers of his businesses to be dissolved. Industry sources note that discrete companies (SPVs) are routinely formed to manage a single project and tend to continue trading for years after a film's release to collect royalties.
Latham remains a director of about 50 active companies, according to Companies House data. He is credited as a producer on 81 releases dating back to 1996 with two further films in production, per IMDb.com.
In November, the Guardian reported on questions over the financing of some of Latham's films, where leaked internal budgets appeared to show significantly lower costs than published figures used to determine tax credits.