{"id":480385,"date":"2026-03-17T12:45:09","date_gmt":"2026-03-17T12:45:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/480385\/"},"modified":"2026-03-17T12:45:09","modified_gmt":"2026-03-17T12:45:09","slug":"uk-taxpayers-pick-up-bill-for-unpaid-crew","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/480385\/","title":{"rendered":"UK Taxpayers Pick Up Bill For Unpaid Crew"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tEXCLUSIVE: A year on from Simon Pegg<\/a> film Angels in the Asylum<\/a> collapsing and leaving crew out of pocket, some are now being paid a slice of what they are owed \u2014 but not by producers.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe British government\u2019s Redundancy Payments Service has stepped in to repay some of the roughly \u00a3600,000 ($800,000) owed to people employed on the indie feature, which halted midway through its month-long shoot<\/a> in February 2025.<\/p>\n

\n\tAngels in the Asylum was housed at special purpose vehicle AITA Films Limited, with first-time feature director Rob Sorrenti serving as producer and director, alongside Heather Greenwood, who co-produced\u00a0Gavin & Stacey: The Finale. Pegg starred in the film and served as an executive producer, but was not involved in its finances and was not paid for his work.<\/p>\n

\n\tSome crew members have been notified to expect payment from the Redundancy Payments Service, which is funded by National Insurance contributions. Run by the Insolvency Service, it provided financial relief for nearly 70,000 victims of distressed businesses last year.<\/p>\n

\n\tAngels in the Asylum workers are not getting the full amount owed. One crew member said they expected to receive around a third of what they should have been paid. They were furious that more had not been done to support those who lost money when the film collapsed.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cIt\u2019s absolutely outrageous,\u201d this person said. \u201cThe government is paying up for the mistakes of the producers. This is not why I pay my taxes. Pegg and the executive producers could write this off in a second and pay everyone off.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tAn AITA Films spokesperson said: \u201cCrew payments are being handled through the standard insolvency process.\u201d AITA Films filed for administration in April, a process equivalent to Chapter 11 bankruptcy in America.\u00a0Sorrenti and Greenwood initially said this was a precautionary and temporary measure<\/a>, but nearly a year on, around \u00a33.8M ($5M) is owed to creditors. <\/p>\n

\n\tThey have previously apologized to angry crew<\/a>. At the time of the collapse, Pegg told colleagues: \u201cWe\u2019re making something really special here, something important. This is a crisis, but it\u2019s also an opportunity, and we\u2019ll be back soon.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tIn December<\/a>, Kallis Insolvency Practitioners, AITA Films\u2019 administrator, said the company was in \u201cdetailed\u201d talks with a prospective rescue investor. This sparked speculation that Sorrenti is looking to remount the film over the summer. \u201cThat is not currently the case,\u201d an AITA Films spokesperson said.<\/p>\n

\n\tAmong the creditors are Brandhouse Global Limited, which provided \u00a3486,966 in interim financing after \u201canticipated funding from Parkland Pictures did not materialise,\u201d per a July report by administrators. Parkland CEO John Cairns has previously told Deadline that his company had no agreement to finance\u00a0Angels in the Asylum\u00a0beyond its work as a sales agent.<\/p>\n

\n\tInspired by true events,\u00a0Angels in the Asylum\u00a0co-stars Katherine Waterston,\u00a0Minnie Driver<\/a>, Lesley Nicol, Rose Williams,\u00a0Aurora Perrineau<\/a>, and\u00a0Alex Jennings<\/a>. It centers on women who were forcibly confined in isolation at Surrey\u2019s Long Grove Asylum in the 1930s after being deemed to be typhoid carriers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"EXCLUSIVE: A year on from Simon Pegg film Angels in the Asylum collapsing and leaving crew out of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":480386,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[170792,96,2839,31254,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-480385","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-movies","tag-angels-in-the-asylum","tag-entertainment","tag-movies","tag-simon-pegg","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/480385","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=480385"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/480385\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/480386"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=480385"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=480385"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=480385"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}