Education
Scholey graduated from Bristol University with a degree in Zoology in 1978 and subsequently completed a Doctor of Philosophy in Zoology at the same university.
Scholey graduated from Bristol University with a degree in Zoology in 1978 and subsequently completed a Doctor of Philosophy in Zoology at the same university.
He co-directed African Cats and Bears with Alastair Fothergill for Disneynature. He is also the executive producer of the series "North America" for the Discovery Channel. In 1983, he began working as a researcher at the British Broadcasting Corporation Natural History Unit on David Attenborough’s series ‘The Living Planet’.
He rose to become a producer in this British Broadcasting Corporation department, making programmes for ‘The Natural World’ and ‘Wildlife on One’ series as well as for David Attenborough’s award winning series "The Private Life of Plants’.
He also created and produced the original series of ‘Big Cat Diary’, which has continued for over a decade, began and series produced the ‘Wildlife Specials’ and became the series editor of ‘Wildlife on One’. In 1998, Scholey became the Head of the Natural History Unit.
During his four and a half year tenure, the NHU made the memorable David Attenborough series ‘State of the Planet’ and ‘The Life of Mammals’, and also ‘The Blue Planet’, ‘Andes to Amazon’ and ‘Wild Africa’. The department also reinvented its live broadcasting creating ‘The Abyss - Live’ and "Springwatch’.
In 2002, Scholey became the Controller of Specialist Factual for the British Broadcasting Corporation’s Factual and Learning division.
With responsibility for Science, Arts, Business, History, Religion as well as Natural History departments, he oversaw programmes with a range from landmark programming including, ‘Auschwitz’, ‘Planet Earth’, ‘Egypt’, ‘Supervolcano’ and ‘The Power of Art’ to the classic long-running series of Horizon, Timewatch, Natural World, and Arena and live events including the funeral of Pope John Paul World War II In 2006, Scholey became the Controller of Factual Production for British Broadcasting Corporation Vision, with the responsibility for all British Broadcasting Corporation Factual in-house production. During this time, he oversaw the creation of ‘The One Show’, the biggest factual commission in the organisation"s history. He was also the Deputy Chief Creative Officer for British Broadcasting Corporation Vision Productions, with responsibilities across all in-house television production.
In 2008, he resigned from the British Broadcasting Corporation to pursue a career as an independent film director and television producer.
In recent years, Scholey has directed and produced two feature films for Disneynature, ‘African Cats’ (2011) and ‘Bears’ (2014).(6) He was also the executive producer on the Discovery Channel series "North America" (2013) and ‘Deadly Islands’. He is currently the joint director of Silverback Films with Alastair Fothergill Scholey was made a Doctor of Science (Doctor of Science) in 2001, by the University of Bristol for his contribution to the public and to biological sciences.
He is a trustee of Wildscreen. Scholey is a qualified Submillimetre Common-User Bolometer Array diver and pilot.