John Williams, who produced the Shrek feature films, has acquired rights to make an animated TV version of 2002 documentary series The Future is Wild. Williams’ Vanguard Films has picked up the rights to the property from The Future is Wild Australia, a Melbourne-based company that controls the rights. Besides producing Shrek movies, producer Williams […]
National Geographic Channels International has acquired ORF Universum documentaries Making an Ancient Forest – Kalkalpen National Park and Dolomites – in the Heroes’ Garden. The deals were among a number the commercial arm of Austrian broadcaster ORF, ORF Enterprises, closed at the German Screenings. SRC in Canada also bought 4K wildlife doc Wild Venice, Return […]
Broadcast network ABC is adapting an Austrian comedy, Braunschlag, for the US market. The deal is a script commitment with a significant penalty attached – meaning ABC will have to pay out if it does move forwards with the project. This is the second pilot from the commercial arm of Austrian pubcaster ORF, ORF Enteprises, […]
US broadcast network ABC has ordered a pilot script of Austrian-created scripted format Janus. The crime drama will be reworked in the US by Europacorp Television Studios USA, which picked up the remake rights in the US from ORF Enterprise, the commercial arm of Austrian pubcaster ORF. The deal has a script-plus-penalty structure, and was […]
Austria’s ORF and Chinese statecaster CCTV10 are going into production on a three-part wildlife series, Sky River of the Himalayas. Produced in 4K, the show reveals the nature and wildlife that lives in and around the famous Asian river region. CITVC’s VP, Lynn Zhang will sign the coproduction agreement on behalf of CCTV10 at the ORF […]
Austrian pubcaster ORF has entered into a joint venture with local SVOD portal Flimmit in a bid to counteract overseas players Netflix and Amazon Prime Instant Video. ORF’s commercial arm ORF Enterprise will supply indie on-demand start-up Flimmit with premium German-language and European-produced movies, series and documentaries after upping its investment in the company from […]
RTL Group’s long-serving Hungarian chief executive Dirk Gerkens is leaving his post, with Andreas Rudas appointed interim CEO. Gerkens, who has been chief exec since 2001, has been offered another, undisclosed role within RTL, the Bertelsmann-owned broadcaster said in a press release. The hunt for a permanent RTL Hungary CEO has begun, with RTL planning […]
Austrian pubcaster ORF will coproduce a pair of wildlife films with factual specialist Earth Touch. These are 50-minute one-offs Monster Frog and Black Mamba – Kiss of Death. The former will look at the strangest frogs from around the modern world, including western Africa’s Goliath, while investigating the existence of Beelzebufo, a 70 million-year-old Devil […]
Austria’s ORF will sign a Memorandum of Understanding with Mexico’s TV UNAM next week at MIPCOM. This will mark Maximilian – Dreams of Power, a historical drama-documentary the pair are working up. Heinrich Mayer-Moroni from Vienna’s Interspot Film is producing. The series will look at Maximilian, who was Emperor of Mexico between 1864 and 1867, […]
Spain’s Imira Entertainment has acquired a trio of new programmes, including Austrian live-action series Tom Turbo (pictured). The deals give the Spanish kids distributor 188 26-minute episodes of the series to sell worldwide (ex. Austria and China), plus Tom Turbo the Movie (ex. Austria). Imira has also acquired Latin American rights to animated film The […]
