Christopher Toyne is an actor, producer and multi-cam director, with wide experience in many disciplines of media production. He is the fourth generation of an established British theatrical family including Sir Gerald du Maurier, Daphne du Maurier and Diana Beaumont. Having become a J. Arthur Rank contract child actor, he trained and worked as an actor in London during his youth. Returning to performing and narrating in 2008, he is represented by Actors In Action in the Pacific Northwest, Organic Talent in LA/NY and nationally by In Both Ears for voice work. He has achieved a number of screen credits, including over a 150 hours of edited voice-acting for PBS, NPT, OPB, Microsoft, Adobe, Nike, Intel, Kellogg’s and many others.
His first love is long-form dramatic production for television and cinema - on both sides of the camera. Having played the evil doctor Dr. Brandt in Todd Freeman’s Cell Count, which has its world première May 2012 at the prestigious Fantaspoa Film Festival in Porto Alegre, Brazil, he worked on the feature Angel Punk. He has completed a co-starring role in the hit TNT series Leverage and recently developed The Beautiful at Frontières Co-pro Market 2015, Montreal, again with the Freeman Brothers, as co-producer and in the role of Reginald.
He was Producer/UPM on White Air, starring Riley Smith, Dominique Swain and Tom Sizemore. Previous to this, he produced the 2-hour dramatic TNT movie Diana: The People’s Princess, in which he also performed the BBC Anchorman, documenting the troubled last year in the life of the iconic Princess. It was shot entirely on the island of Mallorca, Spain, depicting 10 countries and 52 locales. He was sole-credited producer on PBS/Wonderworks’ TV movie Frogs, with Shelley Duvall, Elliot Gould and Robin Tunney.
Christopher second love is music programming. He received an 2010 EMMY® nomination for Outstanding Entertainment Special/Live, producing Gershwin at One Symphony Place. He received a 2008 EMMY® for Outstanding Event/Live, producing Gala Opening: One Symphony Place, both in Nashville for PBS and as live Hi-Def broadcasts worldwide. He also received an EMMY® Nomination as associate director. He was supervising producer of An Evening with Amy Grant, Featuring LeAnn Rimes, Geffen Records/MTV’s The Roots Present - New York, EMI Gospel’s Donald Lawrence Presents the Tri-City Singers Finalé in Atlanta and Look Up Sing Out, all shot in HD. He acted as Supervising Producer and 2nd unit director on the high profile PBS pledge special George Winston - Seasons In Concert, shot in Maui, Montana and Tennessee.
Christopher was line producer and played Himself on the reality series The Real Roseanne Show with Roseanne Barr, for ABC Network and ABC Family.
Christopher returned to his early career of ten years as a globe-trotting documentarian in 2003, to be US coordinating producer of The Mysteries of the Parthenon for the BBC/Discovery Channels and producer of Operation Sethos: High Tech in the Tomb of Pharoah Seti for NBC/ZDF, the first material to be shot in Hi-Def in Egypt’s Upper Nile region.
He was senior associate producer/special effects director on the CBS series Beauty and the Beast starring Linda Hamilton and Ron Perlman; Showtime’s Nightmare Classics with Laura Dern, Amy Irving and Meg Tilly; and Turner Network Television’s Dinner at Eight with Lauren Bacall and John Mahoney.
Christopher was an established 1st Assistant Director and UPM on numerous feature films, including Canon’s The Godsend; EMI’s Not Now Darling; Universal’s Applause, originally with Bacall; NBC’s Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde with Kirk Douglas and Sir Michael Redgrave and CFF’s The Johnstown Monster.
Christopher is also an experienced film festival programmer and artistic director. He helped found the Palm Springs International Film Festival for Sonny Bono, as International programmer for the first three years. He was International programmer and board member of the Santa Barbara International Film Festival and artistic director of ‘The British and the Oscar Festival’ Orange County and ‘Style Film’ San Diego. He has moderated at film festivals and International market places from Cannes to London.
