Jumafor Ajogwu and Yemi Adegbulu Selected for BFI’s TIFF Market Producers Delegation

Two Nigerian filmmakers, Leeds-based Jumafor Ajogwu, Bold Pictures and British-Nigerian Yemi Adegbulu, Sleepwalker Studios, have  been selected as part of the six BFI-supported entrepreneurial UK Black and Global Majority producers to attend TIFF: The Market, the inaugural market at the Toronto International Film Festival.

Supported by the BFI National Lottery International Connections Fund, these producers will be attending TIFF: The Market. This is the first time TIFF has hosted a formal market representing a new expansion of one of the world’s largest public film festivals and will see global film professionals come together to raise finance as well as buy and sell projects.  Each has at least one UK/Canadian feature film project in active development and will be actively seeking international networks, keen to establish and grow collaborations which will push their co-productions forward. 

At TIFF, Canadian partners Ontario Creates will present a bespoke Ontario-UK day of activity for the delegation and a larger pool of UK and Canadian producers. This event will include presentations on the Canadian market from various funding and industry bodies including Ontario Creates, Black Screen Office and Indigenous Screen Office, as well as presentations from the Denitsa Yordanova, BFI’s Director of UK Global Screen Fund & International Funds, on working and co-producing with the UK. It will also feature a panel on distribution in the Canadian market, a networking lunch and curated one-to-one meetings.  

The programme for the delegation has been coordinated by the BFI’s International Fund and Inclusion teams and represents a continued collaboration between the two teams that seeks to foster co-production and create a more accessible environment at international film festivals.  

The BFI Inclusion team, in partnership with Collective Moxie and Prasanna Ranganathan are also presenting a panel in The Market’s industry programme. On Sunday 13 September, The Stories We Tell: Advancing Accessibility Through Inclusive Storytelling panel at Metro Toronto Convention Centre will look at how storytelling is key to making disability inclusion a reality. Shifting away from technical standards and legal compliance, the discussion will focus on the cultural and attitudinal changes required to make accessibility real. The panel is made up of talent featured in official selection and industry experts: athlete and activist Rick Hansen, BAFTA-nominated actor Ruth Madeley, filmmaker Matthew Kowalchuk, producer and DEI consultant Prasanna Ranganathan, Founder and CEO of Collective Moxie Julie Ann Crommett, and BFI Inclusion Partners, Tahliah Simumba and Melissa Allada.  

For the TIFF Market, Adegbulu who has  worked across scripted features, documentaries, and shorts and was Associate Producer on Dreamers (BBC Films/Quiddity Films) is currently the associate producer on the feature Everybody Wants to Fck Me* (Studiocanal/Film4/LuckyChap/Parkville Pictures). She is also producing Mother Me, a BFI NETWORK supported short film, in post-production and produced through Sleepwalker Studios, which she co-founded.

Ajogwu’s experience cut across the UK and Nigeria with his credits including Lionheart, Nigeria’s first Netflix Original, The Milkmaid, Nigeria’s official Academy Awards submission, and My Father’s Shadow, which premiered in Un Certain Regard at the Cannes Film Festival. He will be presenting Sleepless, a UK-Nigerian supernatural thriller selected for the Screen Yorkshire’s Local Landscapes, Global Horizons programme which is supported by the BFI. Written by Olivier Award-winning playwright Bola Agbaje and directed by CJ “Fiery” Obasi, the project is being structured as an international co-production with confirmed partners in Nigeria, South Africa and Ireland ahead of a planned February 2027 shoot.

Through Bold Pictures, Jumafor is building a slate of elevated genre films that connect British, African and diaspora audiences through international co-production. He is attending TIFF 2026 as part of the BFI-supported UK producer delegation to advance Canadian co-production partnerships, international financing and distribution for Sleepless, while building long-term relationships across the North American film industry.