Brazil’s Grupo Globo and Sony Pictures Television have closed a milestone multi-title production-distribution alliance to co-develop and co-produce two English-language scripted dramas, with a third project forthcoming, all aimed squarely at global markets. The pioneering alliance was announced Friday at this year’s LA Screenings. Brazil-based and SPT-backed Floresta, is set to co-produce the ambitious new
Television
With cutting-edge programming across all categories, the Peabody Awards highlights, in its 78th year, television that boldly explores identity, diversity and the experience of the underrepresented in today’s society — often with a tinge of absurdist humor. This year’s winners in the entertainment category alone include HBO’s dark comedy “Barry,” about a hitman who would
At Wednesday night’s Paley Honors, which paid tribute to LGBTQ achievements in television, attendees never lost sight of those who first paved the way – both on screen and off. CNN’s Don Lemon opened the ceremony by thanking legendary transgender activist Sylvia Rivera, who helped lead the charge at Stonewall fifty years ago. After recounting the
Steve Kroft, one of the longest serving correspondents serving on “60 Minutes,” will retire from the CBS newsmagazine, CBS News said Friday. Kroft plans to announce his decision to step down on this Sunday’s broadcast, the show’s season finale. His last segment, also slated for Sunday’s broadcast, will feature an investigation into bank fraud, A
Julia Roberts doesn’t watch “Game of Thrones,” HBO’s critically acclaimed saga, which concludes on Sunday after eight seasons. Roberts, who recently starred in the Amazon series “Homecoming,” revealed this — and much more — during an intimate conversation with Patricia Arquette for “Variety Studio: Actors on Actors.” Before the interview began, Arquette collected submissions from
May 17, 2019 6:21AM PT The finale of CBS’ “The Big Bang Theory” went out with a bang in Thursday’s ratings. The hourlong airing of back to back episodes garnered a substantial 3.1 rating in the key 18-49 demographic and was watched by just under 18 million total viewers. For comparison, the “Big Bang” spinoff
In a landmark deal, Viacom International Studios Americas has sold to Telemundo the formats to two scripted hit series from its Argentine broadcaster Telefe, marking the first time Viacom’s formats will be adapted for the U.S. Spanish-language market. The titles — “100 Días Para Enamorarse” (100 Days to Fall in Love) and “Historia de un
Eva Longoria said Thursday in Cannes that Time’s Up, the progressive movement pushing for gender equality in the workplace that she co-founded, is looking for ways to be more politically active in the 2020 polls. “We’re trying to figure out what is Time’s Up’s role in these elections, and how can we have an impact,”
May 17, 2019 5:00AM PT “People Magazine Investigates: Cults” returns for a sophomore season on June 3 on Investigation Discovery. Each episode follows one infamous cult from the time of its creation, and tracks leaders as well as survivors. A team of People’s true-crime staff talks to survivors who escaped and are attempting to rebuild
Globo’s new telenovela “Orphans of the Land” (Orfaos de Terra) drew wild applause at its LA Screenings sneak peek showcase this week. Debuting in Brazil just last April 2nd, the slickly produced soap about refugees in Brazil, was written by Intl’l Emmy-winning showrunners Duca Rachid and Thelma Guedes (“Rare Jewel”). Since its April 2 debut
May 17, 2019 1:30AM PT National Geographic has acquired international rights to a documentary about the fate and discovery of the U.S.S. Indianapolis from U.K. independent Drive, the production-funding and distribution agency announced Friday. The hour-long special “U.S.S. Indianapolis: The Final Chapter” was bought for broadcast via National Geographic’s channels worldwide, excluding the U.S. and
There is drama behind the scenes of Fox’s upcoming “Beverly Hills 90210” revival that is worthy of — well, “Beverly Hills 90210.” Showrunner Patrick Sean Smith and several senior writers have quit the six-episode series, which is titled “BH90210.” The exact reason for the exodus is unclear. One source said the dispute was over interference
After 12 seasons and 279 episodes, “The Big Bang Theory” ended its run on Thursday with an emotional finale that revealed some big news, tied up loose ends, and even featured a celebrity cameo. In the first of two back-to-back episodes, scientists Sheldon Cooper (Jim Parsons) and his wife Amy (Mayim Bialik) receive the news
The 2019-2020 broadcast season will be here before we know it, and the schedule for the season has several compelling match ups to offer. The final seasons of multiple shows will bow this fall, while several freshman shows will find themselves facing stiff competition in their timeslots. Likewise, some returning shows have been shuffled to
Verve has become the first sizable Hollywood talent agency to sign the WGA’s Code of Conduct, giving the guild a win in its standoff with the largest agencies over the issue of packaging fees and other business practices. Verve’s decision had been expected. The company founded in 2010 is a literary-focused agency that is largely
May 16, 2019 4:01PM PT The BBC has commissioned a drama about the Novichok poisoning crisis in Salisbury in 2018. “Salisbury” will be a two-part factual drama produced by Dancing Ledge Productions for BBC Two which will focus on the impact of the case on the English city and the community. The Novichok poisonings dominated
In today’s roundup, Comedy Central’s “South Side” sets a premiere date, and “Drag Race” producers announce a drag docuseries, “Werq the World.” DATES “South Side,” a new scripted comedy set at a rental store in the South Side of Chicago, will premiere on Comedy Central on July 24 at 10:30 p.m. ET/PT. The series is written by and stars Bashir
May 16, 2019 2:49PM PT Few things in the TV industry are predictable anymore, but the cornerstone of the breezy summer procedural stands strong. This season of global misadventures and banter thick with sexual tension kicks off with “Blood & Treasure,” a new CBS drama about renegades trying to track down priceless artifacts and a
Amazon Studios announced Thursday that it has greenlit its first young adult drama, “Panic,” based on the 2014 novel by Lauren Oliver. The series will premiere globally on Amazon Prime Video. “Panic” takes viewers to a small town in America, where every year, the graduating seniors engage in a competition they believe is their one
Upfronts week always revolves around big reveals and highly anticipated first looks. This year, one of the most talked-about contenders to emerge was not a show but a studio. The newly minted Disney Television Studios made a splashy debut as three large production entities – 20th Century Fox Television, ABC Studios and Fox 21 Television
As TruTV is incorporated more fully along side TNT and TBS, its top programming executives are also departing. That means Marissa Ronca, executive VP and head of programming, as well as marketing and digital executive VP Puja Vohra, are no longer with the network. Ronca and Vohra exit alongside TruTV president Chris Linn, whose departure
Richard Kind, the kindly goofball actor from “Spin City” and many Pixar films, opened the ASCAP Screen Music Awards with a bondage joke. “You wonder, why do I tell that to start off?” Kind said, responding to the roomful of titters at the Beverly Hilton. “Well, a joke about bondage and sexual deviation, amongst musicians
Luca Guadagnino is set to start shooting his first TV series, “We Are Who We Are,” for HBO and Sky, “in a couple of weeks,” the director of “Call Me by Your Name” told Variety. Guadagnino is currently in Cannes with his star-studded short “The Staggering Girl,” which world-premieres Friday in Directors’ Fortnight. “We Are
As another year of new broadcast series orders comes to a close, and while parity has been achieved when looking at the division of male-female lead and co-lead roles on new series, the percentage of those roles for people of color, as well as executive-producer positions for women and people of color, actually declined when
May 16, 2019 11:28AM PT “The Tick” has been canceled after two seasons at Amazon. Series creator Ben Edlund broke the news on Twitter. “I’m sorry to say Amazon has chosen not to proceed with [‘The Tick’],” Edlund wrote. “I’m not sorry to say I love this show, its cast, its story, and its message.
May 16, 2019 11:27AM PT AMC has given the greenlight to an anthology series from “Black Mirror” writer Will Bridges and actor/comedian Brett Goldstein. The yet-to-be-titled series is set 15 years in the future, when science makes a discovery that changes the lives of everyone on the planet – a way to find your soul
The CW will enter “Crisis” mode during the 2019-2020 TV season. The TV network will tackle one of the most complicated stories in mainstream superhero comics next season, using the annual cross-over it orchestrates among its various superhero dramas to take on “Crisis on Infinite Earths,” the landmark DC comic-book series that radically changed the
ABC has quite the feud brewing under its own roof. “Grey’s Anatomy” star Ellen Pompeo came to Kelly Ripa’s defense on Thursday after Ripa’s comments about “The Bachelor” on “Live With Kelly and Ryan” sparked a Twitter feud with the creator of the franchise, Mike Fleiss. On Thursday’s episode of the talk show, Hannah Brown,
Kevin Reilly has signed a new four-year deal with WarnerMedia that will keep him at the company through 2022 and expand his oversight of its basic cable networks. Reilly will now oversee the TruTV cabler in addition to running TNT and TBS, and serving as chief content officer of direct-to-consumer for WarnerMedia. Chris Linn, who
The long-running newsmagazine “Dateline” is about to explore a mystery that can’t be neatly wrapped in the one or two hours NBC typically devotes to the program: Can a TV-news staple flourish in the world of podcasts? Producers hope so. On Friday, NBC News will launch “13 Alibis,” a twisty tale of a man, Richard