Television

NBC’s holiday-season live-musical franchise is so proudly square that it’s surprising it took this long for them to get to “Annie.” The recent tradition, launched by the producers Neil Meron and the late Craig Zadan, of ceding a night of network primetime to a scrappy, let’s-put-on-a-show broadcast seems to have found its perfect match in

The production team behind Colton Underwood’s new Netflix show asked his ex-girlfriend Cassie Randolph to appear on the series, but she declined to participate, Variety has learned exclusively. Randolph was offered compensation to appear on the show, according to two different sources. She was approached by the production company the day after Underwood sat down on

“RuPaul’s Drag Race” will return for Season 14 with a two-part premiere on Friday, Jan. 7 at 8 p.m. ET/PT, VH1 announced on Thursday. A gaggle of 14 queens will vie for the $100,000 grand prize — including the show’s first-ever heterosexual, cisgender male contestant. The after-show, “RuPaul’s Drag Race: Untucked,” will premiere immediately following

Fox Business Network offers a market forecast each weekday. On weekends, it will start to offer one related to the weather. Starting Saturday, December 4, the Fox Corp.-owned cable outlet will offer two hours of Fox Weather programming in the early morning, the first time the streaming weather service, which launched in October, will be

SPOILER ALERT: Do not read if you have not watched the third season of “You,” currently streaming on Netflix. When Shalita Grant woke up on Oct. 15, she immediately opened Twitter. The Tony-award nominee couldn’t wait to see what fans thought of her portrayal of Sherry Conrad — the influencer queen bee of Madre Linda

While made-for-TV holiday movies have enjoyed an explosion in popularity in the past five years, they’re not a new phenomenon for Lifetime. The network has been making ripped-from-the-headlines films for three decades at this point and has the whole process down to a science: a few months for development and writing, 15 days for filming,

HBO has cast Juliebeth Gonzalez, Maya Eshet, Tyson Ritter, Kate Lyn Sheil, Liz Sierra and Finley Rose Slater in “The Idol,” the upcoming modern-day cult drama from “Euphoria” creator Sam Levinson, multi-hyphenate The Weeknd (Abel Tesfaye) and Reza Fahim. The hourlong drama series, which is currently in production, centers on a self-help guru and sect

Fans of Black A-list actors and Jay-Z went hard for Netflix’s revisionist Western banger “The Harder They Fall,” which shot up to No. 1 overall on Nielsen’s streaming rankings and to No. 1 on Nielsen’s Top 10 SVOD Movies list in the first week of November. “The Harder They Fall,” which debuted on the streamer

Naya Rivera’s “Glee” co-stars are reuniting for their second annual fundraiser in her memory. The Snixxmas Charity, named after the late actor’s annual holiday party, raises money for Alexandria House — a transitional housing program in Los Angeles for women and children in emergency shelter. A livestreamed event with several cast members, including Amber Riley,

“Ray and Manny,” “Witch’s Business” and “Worldoscope” feature among the five animation projects chosen for the 2nd Women Animation Directors Mentoring Program, run by Ventana Sur’s Animation! Launched with the aim to boost gender parity and build a more equitable and diverse animation industry, the initiative has been launched in alliance with the Annecy Festival’s

Michelle Monaghan, Jodie Turner-Smith and Meredith Hagner have all been cast in the upcoming Apple drama series “Bad Monkey,” with Marcos Siega (“Dexter,” The Flight Attendant”) now onboard to direct the first episode and executive produce. The trio of actresses join previously announced series lead Vince Vaughn in the show, which is being written by

Fresh off his Gotham Award win for breakthrough series, “Reservation Dogs” co-creator Sterlin Harjo is developing a new miniseries with a Native female lead at FX. The untitled series will see Harjo direct, as well as co-write with bestselling novelist Jonathan Lee. Harjo will also executive produce with Garrett Basch, through the latter’s new label

Netflix has bolstered its slate of Oscar short hopefuls with the acquisition of “Three Songs for Benazir.” Directed by Gulistan and Elizabeth Mirzaei, the 22-minute docu tells the story of Shaista, a young man who is a refugee living in modern-day Afghanistan. Newly married to Benazir and living in a camp for displaced persons in

Toronto may have shut down production for nearly four months due to COVID-19, but its film industry has come roaring back stronger than ever now that strict protocols have been launched to manage the pandemic’s impact. Local officials say production has already returned and is set to exceed its pre-pandemic levels. Some 1,500 projects, including

A flock of drag queens dressed like the Spice Girls stand together on a stage, awaiting final judgement on their performance in an annual competition to win a coveted crown. A villainous blonde in a beehive wig sneers at them. A proud trollop in a neon pink micro skirt wonders aloud if she should take

In time for International Day of Persons with Disabilities, this Friday, Dec. 3, ABC Owned Television Stations has produced “Our America: Accomplices – The Story of Ady Barkan,” which is set to premiere the same day on Hulu. The half-hour special follows the story of Ady Barkan, a lawyer and activist who has become a

Scripted formats and gameshows are performing strongly in Asia for Banijay Rights, the distribution arm of Banijay. “Grantchester” is a strong seller and the company licensed dramas such as “The Good Karma Hospital,” “Younger” and European titles locally to partners like Mola TV, says Banijay Rights EVP Asia Rashmi Bajpai. ” ‘Mr. Bean’ is an

Lana Cho, a writer and producer whose credits include “I Know What You Did Last Summer” for Amazon Prime Video and the upcoming “American Seoul” for Hulu, has signed a multi-year overall deal at 20th Television. Cho will create her own comedies and dramas for all platforms while supervising series from other writers. As her

Cobie Smulders is set to appear in the “Secret Invasion” series at Disney Plus, Variety has confirmed. Smulders will reprise the role of SHIELD agent Maria Hill in the series. She joins a cast that already includes stars like Samuel L. Jackson, Ben Mendelsohn, Kingsley Ben-Adir, Olivia Colman, and Emilia Clarke. The role reunites Smulders with

Capitalizing on its strength in video gaming, UTA is in the process of raising $200 million through a SPAC designed to pursue acquisitions of gaming-related companies. On Wednesday, UTA confirmed that the UTA Acquisition Corp. has launched an offering of 20 million shares priced at $10. Shares will trade on NASDAQ as of Thursday under

Susan Arnold, a veteran of consumer-products giant Procter & Gamble as well as the Carlyle Group investment firm, will take the reins as chairman of Walt Disney Co.’s board of directors, succeeding Bob Iger in the role when he departs on December 31. The transition will mark the end of an era for the big

On Tuesday, Amy Schneider became the first out trans person in the history of “Jeopardy!” to make the Tournament of Champions. An engineering student from Oakland, Calif., Schneider won her 10th game in a row on Tuesday, qualifying her for the annual event that brings together the top 15 players of the season. She has

In a video circulating on social media this week, “Law & Order: SVU” star and executive producer Mariska Hargitay  leapt into action to help get a shoot in New York City back on track. In the video, she respectfully asks a man  to stop singing and interrupting a shoot in in Washington Square Park, telling

Cara Delevingne has been cast as a series regular in Season 2 of Hulu’s “Only Murders in the Building.” She will play Alice, a sophisticated art world insider who becomes enmeshed in the mystery. The mystery comedy series, created by Steve Martin and John Hoffman, follows three strangers (Martin, Martin Short and Selena Gomez) who

CNN viewers should get ready to see a lot more of Anderson Cooper this week. Cooper, who has been with CNN since 2001, will co-host a new CNN “town hall” devoted to news about coronavirus Tuesday evening in the 9 p.m. slot typically anchored by Chris Cuomo, and is likely to fill in for that

MeatEater Inc. has signed with APA for representation, Variety has learned exclusively. The outdoor media and commerce company will work with the agency in an effort to expand its film and television content business. MeatEater continues to be repped by Marc Gerald of Europa Content. MeatEater was founded by outdoorsman, writer, and wild foods enthusiast Steven

SPOILER ALERT: Do not read if you have not watched “Zoey’s Extraordinary Christmas,” streaming now on The Roku Channel. “Nash Bridges,” “Ray Donovan” and “Zoey’s Extraordinary Playlist” are all fan-favorite television series that are continuing their stories with two-hour original TV movies, but only “Zoey’s” is set at the holidays and managed to turn its

AMC has officially ordered a series based on the Anne Rice “Lives of the Mayfair Witches” novels, Variety has learned. The cabler has ordered eight episodes of the show, which is titled “Mayfair Witches.” It was originally announced that AMC had opened a writers room for the series in August under their script to series model.

Apple has ordered a thriller series that hails from Alfonso Cuarón with Cate Blanchett and Kevin Kline set to star, Variety has learned. The show is titled “Disclaimer” and is based on the novel of the same name by Renee Knight. Blanchett stars as Catherine Ravenscroft, a successful and respected television documentary journalist whose work has

Bill Gates’ book “How to Avoid a Climate Disaster” has led to a 10-episode series for educational streamer Wondrium, the campany is set to announce on Wednesday. Besides the series, a companion documentary also inspired by the book will be produced for the service. Both the series and doc will premiere in 2022. Gates will