Who are we?

Lucky Bean began life producing television for the fledgling MTVBase in South Africa. We produced Club MTV and Total Request Live and then became the production partner on Thumb Wars, an innovative reality gameshow that was licensed internationally. In 2010, we joined forces with Fuel Media and produced a series of FIFA 2010 World Cup related projects including Countdown 2010 and Fevacasters by Sony. Lucky Bean was also appointed co-producers of MasterChef South Africa along with Quizzical Pictures and added Celebrity MasterChef to our slate. The series was twice nominated for an international Emmy in non-scripted entertainment.

In 2017, Lucky Bean entered into a deal with new channel Via to produce a slate of original Afrikaans programming. We were also commissioned to develop and produce Twende Kazi, a celebrity reality adventure race across 15 countries, with BBDO and Diageo. Lucky Bean then licensed Girl Eat World to Netflix and sold its documentary feature, Mandela’s World Cup to History Channel.

In 2019, founding member Donald Clarke left Lucky Bean to join Rapid Blue (owned by BBC Studios) as its Commercial Director responsible for development and working alongside its CEO, Duncan Irvine, in growing the business. In 2022 after relocating to the United Kingdom, Donald Clarke has reignited Lucky Bean for the global television market.