Ioanina Pavel
Creative Producer & Co-Founder @ May One (RO)
Unlike many creatives in continental Europe, Ioanina got into producing not from a love of arthouse cinema, but an obssession with TV series. Chiefly among them back then, and still occupying space rent-free in her brain, were Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Showtime’s Queer as Folk adaptation. She has never stopped watching shows and considers it an absolute privilege that she gets to make them now too.
While in her sophomore year at Pol Sci, Ioanina started working in series development for Media ProPictures. She then pivoted into culture journalism and marketing, but TV was never in her rearview. While dipping her toe in the IT industry as chief content oHicer for a tech startup, Ioanina moonlighted at HBO as a freelance translator, getting Romanian writers’ scripts into English for HBO’s UK commissioners. When a position opened up, she moved into development at HBO and learned the ropes of series production.
As head of HBO’s Original Production Department in Romania, Ioanina built up a healthy slate and creative-produced local dramas, docu-series and reality series – among them bubbly rom-com RUXX, hybrid shiny-floor and house-reality series One True Singer, and taut spy thriller Spy/Master, which world-premiered in competition at the 2023 Berlinale and aired on BBC4 in May 2024.
In May 2023, the month after HBO shut down its production arm in the region, Ioanina co-founded prod-co May One with Johnathan Young, formerly HBO’s VP Original Production in CE, and producer of, among many others, the BAFTA-nominated The Sinking Of The Laconia.
May One is a boutique drama company focusing on developing and producing premium drama series from Central Europe that aim to connect with the local audience, but that can also travel. May One’s first commission, SUBTERAN, a 6-part thriller for Netflix, premiered in January 2025 and placed in the top 10 across 69 countries.