Killing Eve boss addresses backlash over all-white writers' room

Killing Eve executive producer Sally Woodward Gentle has promised to improve diversity on the show's writing team after criticism over the lack of writers of colour working on the show.

A recent post on Twitter by a writer, Kayleigh Llewellyn, revealed every season four writer on a final day Zoom call was white, sparking a backlash against Killing Eve producers.

The show has received praise for giving women major creative roles and casting Asian-American Sandra Oh as the title character.

Oh previously told Variety magazine: "The development of people behind the camera is very slow in the U.K. Sometimes it would be me and 75 white people."

According to NME's website, Gentle has addressed the issue during a recent SeriesFest virtual panel, Killing Eve: Behind the Lens. Promising to hire a more diverse team going forward, Gentle said: "The make-up of the room should be more racially diverse than it is, and we're really aware of that and I take full responsibility for it."

Although the show had some 'brilliant female writers' and 'a really strong LGBTQ contingent', the producer declared "it's not good enough."

Adding that the criticism has provoked much 'soul-searching' among her team, Gentle assured viewers they would tackle the issue: "We've all had long talks and lots of soul-searching and we can come up with excuses, we can come up with platitudes, we can talk about the people that we've spoken about in the past, but we've got to do better."