Zodiak Kids has created a studio that will bring together the DeAgostini-owned company’s UK and French production arms. Zodiak Kids Studios will consist of UK-based prodco The Foundation and France’s Marathon Media and Tele Images Productions, with Foundation CEO Michael Carrington taking on the same post for the umbrella brand. Marathon’s chief creative officer Eryk […]
Former Télé Images Productions president Philippe Alessandri has returned to the fold by launching an animation and drama-focused indie producer in Paris. WatchNext Media will look to create shows with “engaging brands and aspirational stories” for the international market. It will also focus on properties that can work as television series, apps and licensing products. […]
Philippe Alessandri is exiting Zodiak Media, with Benoît Runel upped to run the former’s prodco, Télé Images Productions, and fellow French kids firm Marathon Media, TBI has learned. Runel (pictured) takes the newly-created role of managing director, Zodiak Kids, France following the change, which is effective immediately. Alessandri departs after 16 years at Télé Images, […]
Every year, brave indie producers stand before the great and the good of European animation commissioning to pitch their latest wares at the Cartoon Forum. Ahead of the event in September, Jesse Whittock looks at the projects heading for Toulouse. In the third part of our run-down, we look at efforts from Italy, Spain and […]
New broadcasters have acquired Zodiak Kids’ animated series Extreme Football as the FIFA World Cup tournament begins today. In the UK, the BBC’s Scottish service BBC Alba has bought the show for an early July debut, while Finland’s MTV has also bought it. Chinese VOD platforms IQiYi, Tencent and Youku Toudu will also run the […]
With the Annecy animation festival beginning today, Pascale Paoli-Lebailly hears from leading players about the wave of changes that have befallen the French toon industry in the past year. The French animation industry is renowned for its creative output in both TV and the cinema. The sector – which can in part thank production quotas, […]
Zodiak Media has hired Gaspard de Chavagnac as CEO of its French operation putting him in charge of production companies including KM, Marathon, GTV, Tele Images, Marathon Media and Mona Lisa. De Chavagnac is the founder of French production company Odena Media and Discovery-backed pay channel Televista. He also worked at premium broadcaster Canal+ as […]
Franco-German channel Arte and Zodiak Media’s French drama producer GTV have joined Norway’s NRK on an original political thriller series from acclaimed scriptwriter Jo Nesbø, TBI can reveal. The French companies are now onboard Occupied, a 10x45mins thriller from another Zodiak drama producer, Norway’s Yellow Bird, which is best known as the producer and rights […]
Four free-to-air broadcasters are among new buyers of Zodiak Kids’ animated series The Ranch. The 26x26mins show, which comes from Zodiak Media-owned Tele Images Productions and launched on TF1 last year, has gone to FTA nets RTS in Switzerland, SVT Barnkanalen in Sweden, POP TV in Slovenia and CFI in French-speaking Africa. Furthermore, pay TV […]
Pascal Breton, the co-founder of Marathon, has stepped down as CEO of the French production company. He will be succeeded at the Zodiak Media-owned firm by Philippe Alessandri who is currently CEO of Tele Images Productions. “Pascal Breton has decided to pursue new personal projects and to concentrate on being an independent producer,” Zodiak said […]
