News

Village Roadshow Television is developing a scripted series and a two-part docuseries based on the story of convicted serial killer William Dathan Holbert, better known as “Wild Bill,” who is currently serving 47 years in prison for murdering at least five American expatriates.

The company recently acquired the rights to an unpublished memoir by Scott McAda, who Wild Bill attempted to frame for his crimes, as well as “The Jolly Roger Social Club,” a book about the murders by journalist Nick Foster.

Per Village Roadshow, the two series tell the story of “a tropical ex-pat community in Panama’s Bocas del Toro, where a wealthy American retiree is framed for multiple murders by a serial killer.”

Chris Goldberg, who produces Village Roadshow’s previously announced upcoming podcast “Natural Selection: Scott vs. Wild Bill” on behalf of Winterlight Pictures, pursued the story of Wild Bill for a decade, eventually bringing together Foster and McAda’s books.

Following Emma D’Arcy’s critically acclaimed performance as Queen Rhaenyra Targaryen in House of the Dragon season 1, the actor’s career is expected to continue skyrocketing. While non-binary actor Emma D’Arcy was cast first in the role of Rhaenyra Targaryen, they were at somewhat of a disadvantage coming into the season after the widely beloved performance of Milly Alcock as the teenage version of the character. Nevertheless, D’Arcy gave one of the greatest and most compelling performances of House of the Dragon season 1, with Rhaenyra Targaryen set to be their most prominent role for the next few years.

Following the episode “The Black Queen,” Emma D’Arcy will be returning in a lead role in House of the Dragon season 2, which HBO executives expect will premiere in 2024 (via Vulture). D’Arcy is also slated to star in the upcoming movie Anna as Vera, in which they’ll star...

If you were an action fan in the 1970s, ’80s, or ’90s, one of the great pleasures of filmgoing was the experience, every year or two, of a new Walter Hill movie. No one else was really making movies like him, and no one had before; although his morally and philosophically oriented genre pictures owed something to the Westerns of Howard Hawks and the existential crime films of Jean-Pierre Melville, they weren’t really the same. Films like “The Driver,” “The Warriors,” and “48 Hours” were somehow both more heightened in their mythological resonances and more realistic in their behavior than the works of the American and European stylists on whose shoulders Hill stood.

Starting with “Hard Times” in 1975 and continuing on through masterpieces like “Southern Comfort,” “Streets of Fire,” “Johnny Handsome” and “Trespass,” Hill created a body of work that spoke to American culture both past and present, subtly...

Once the biggest staple of Hollywood filmmaking, the Western has seen ebbs and flows through the history of cinema. In recent decades you’d be hard-pressed to find many examples in multiplexes near you—especially ones that fit the traditional mold of the genre, rather than tongue-in-cheek revisionist takes. It’s fitting, then, that it would be Walter Hill who would deliver a new gift onto audiences eager for a journey into that gunslinging world.

Hill has said that all his films are Westerns, which can certainly be seen for anyone familiar with his oeuvre—from his directorial debut in 1975’s Hard Times through 1987’s neo-Western Extreme Prejudice, his own revisionist streak of Westerns in the early ‘90s with Geronimo: An American Legend and Wild Bill, and even into 21st century actioners like Bullet to the Head. Whether he’s in the traditional milieu of the genre or not, those...

Walter Hill is back with "Dead for a Dollar." The influential writer and director behind "48 Hrs," "Streets of Fire," Southern Comfort," "The Driver," and "The Warriors" has returned with another western. For Hill, all of his movies, in one way or another, are westerns. He tends to follow cowboys whether in the streets of New York, New Orleans, San Francisco, or in this case, Mexico. 

Hill's latest follows a bounty hunter (Christoph Waltz) sticking to his guns, both morally and literally. It's an ensemble film also starring Benjamin Bratt, Rachel Brosnahan, Willem Dafoe, and Warren Burke. Hill doesn't delight in the times he's depicting, only in the genre. "Dead for a Dollar" is now in good company with Hill's previous big-screen westerns, "Geronimo: An American Legend," "The Long Riders," and "Wild Bill." Recently, the filmmaker talked to us about his love of westerns and his exceptional contributions to the genre.

Plot: In 1897, a veteran bounty hunter, Max Borlund (Christoph Waltz), is hired to find Rachel Price (Rachel Brosnahan), the wife of a businessman who’s supposedly been abducted by a black soldier, Elijah Jones (Brandon Scott) and is now being held for ransom. He soon discovers that Rachel is far from a captive and is with Elijah by choice, putting him on a collision course with her husband, plus a Mexican land baron named Tiberio Vargas (Benjamin Bratt). He also has to worry about his sworn enemy, Joe Cribbens (Willem Dafoe), who’s working for Vargas and is bent on killing the bounty hunter.

Review: Walter Hill’s Dead for a Dollar is an interesting Neo-western with an agreeably off-kilter cast and a solid premise. Hill’s one of the few directors still working in the sphere, directing a handful of solid, modern westerns, including The Long Riders, Wild Bill and Geronimo: An American Legend.

“48 Hrs” and “The Warriors” director Walter Hill is set to receive the Cartier Glory to the Filmmaker Award for his lifetime of achievements at the Venice International Film Festival this year. But while he’s there, the 80-year-old director is also premiering a new film. “Dead for a Dollar” stars Christoph Waltz as an Old West bounty hunter (where have we seen that one before?) who confronts an old foe while in the middle of an important mission.

“Dead for a Dollar” stars Christoph Waltz, Willem Dafoe, Rachel Brosnahan, Hamish Linklater, Benjamin Bratt, Guy Burnet, Brandon Scott, and Scott Peat. Walter Hill directed the film, working from a script he co-wrote with Matt Harris.

The official synopsis for “Dead for a Dollar” reads: “Veteran bounty hunter Max Borlund is deep into Mexico where he encounters professional gambler and outlaw Joe Cribbens – a sworn enemy he sent to prison years before.

Prime Video has no shortage of shows or movies arriving in September. The biggest new show on the block for Amazon Studios is “Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power” which is a prequel based on the work of J.R.R. Tolkien that’s set thousands of years before the events of “The Hobbit” and “Lord of the Rings.” Several new 2022 films will be available on the streamer as well: including Channing Tatum’s “Dog,” Michael Bay’s “Ambulance,” Zac Efron’s “Firestarter,” Dylan O’Brien’s “The Outfit,” and more.

Noteworthy library titles arriving this month include “Fight Club” (1999), “Legally Blonde” (2001) and “The Silence of the Lambs” (1991).

Here’s everything new on Amazon Prime Video and Freevee in September.

Also Read:

Here’s What’s Leaving Netflix in September 2022 September 1

American Ninja Warriors S12-13 (2022)

Friday Night Lights S1-5 (2007)

Texicanas (2019)

Wags Miami S1-2 (2022)

21 Grams (2004)

23:59 (2011)

A Family Thing...

Click here to read the full article.

80-year-old American director Walter Hill can lay claim to have invented at least two movie genres: the street gang film — with the seminal 1979 action thriller The Warriors — and the buddy cop movie with the 1982 Eddie Murphy/Nick Nolte hit 48 Hours. As a producer, Hill was behind Ridley Scott’s groundbreaking sci-fi horror blockbuster Alien and its franchise’s spin-offs, including the three Aliens sequels and the Scott-directed Prometheus (2012) and Alien: Covenant (2017).

But Hill’s first love is the Western. He’s explored the lives of Wild West legends Jesse James (in 1980s The Long Riders), Wild Bill Hickok (1995’s Wild Bill) and Geronimo (1993’s Geronimo: An American Legend) and turned Akira Kurosawa’s Yojimbo, the inspiration for Sergio Leone’s Spaghetti Western classic A Fistful of Dollars, into 1995 Prohibition era oater Last Man Standing.

So it’s fitting that in Venice this year,...

It’s been a while since we’ve seen a movie from the legendary director behind The Warriors, 48 Hours, and Streets of Fire. Walter Hill hasn’t released a movie for over five years, but thankfully, that dry spell has ended. Quiver Distribution has released the new trailer for Dead for a Dollar, a western starring Christoph Waltz, Willem Dafoe, and Rachel Brosnahan.

Related Dead for a Dollar: Willem Dafoe and Christoph Waltz team for Western

Christoph Waltz stars in Dead for a Dollar as Max Borlund, a famed bounty hunter hired to find Rachel Price (Brosnahan), the politically progressive wife of Santa Fe businessman Nathan Price. Told that she’s been kidnapped by an African American army deserter and being held for ransom in Mexico, Max goes south of the border in search of her, only to run across his sworn enemy, Joe Cribbens (Dafoe), a professional...

Walter Hill’s new western “Dead for a Dollar,” starring Christoph Waltz, Willem Dafoe and Rachel Brosnahan, is scheduled to premiere next week at the Venice International Film Festival and ahead of that premiere, a new trailer has debuted. Ready to ride out?

The official synopsis for the new movie follows: “Veteran bounty hunter Max Borlund (Waltz) is deep into Mexico where he encounters professional gambler and outlaw Joe Cribbens (Dafoe) – a sworn enemy he sent to prison years before. Max is on a mission to find and return Rachel Kidd (Brosnahan), the wife of a wealthy businessman, who as the story is told to Max, has been abducted by Buffalo Soldier Elijah Jones (Brandon Scott). Max is ultimately faced with a showdown to save honor.” Zounds!

Also Read:

Will This Fall’s Film Festivals Finally Kick Off a Normal Awards Season?

The impressive cast for “Dead for a Dollar” also includes Warren Burke,...

With its list of new releases for September 2022, Prime Video is finally unveiling the most anticipated (and expensive) series in the streamer’s history.

The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power will arrive to Prime Video’s servers on Sept. 2, 2022. This Lord of the Rings prequel, set in J.R.R. Tolkien’s Second Age, is in many ways the kind of TV property that Prime Video must have always wanted. It’s certainly the TV property most fitting with the company’s largesse and riches. The Rings of Power will cover the creation of the titular rings and many important events from Tolkien’s lore (condensed into a more TV-appropriate timeframe).

Middle-earth is going to be the happening spot on Amazon and the streaming world at large this month, but Prime Video does have a handful of other originals for the fantasy-phobic. Flight/Risk, a documentary about the Boeing 737 Max design disasters,...

Exclusive: It’s a homecoming for Maria Bakalova who is starring in and producing Triumph, the first movie she has done in her native Bulgaria following her breakout role in Borat 2, which launched her Hollywood career. Bakalova has joined the cast of Triumph alongside another Bulgarian actor who has found success internationally, Shadow and Bone‘s Julian Kostov. The duo will produce through their company Five Oceans.

The darkly comedic Triumph (Триумф) is directed by award-winning Bulgarian filmmakers Kristina Grozeva and Petar Valchanov, whose most recent movie The Father featured Bakalova and was selected as Bulgaria’s 2021 International Oscar entry after winning the Grand Prix at the 2019 Karlovy Vary Film Festival.

Bakalova, who will play the lead, and Kostov join leading Bulgarian actors Julian Vergov and The Father star Margita Gosheva in Triumph, a military satire inspired by well-known, wild real-life events from the 1990s when, in the chaotic...

Sally El Hosaini’s refugee drama “The Swimmers” will open the 47th Toronto International Film Festival.

The film follows the journey made by swimming sisters Yusra and Sarah Mardini who fled as refugees from war-torn Syria all the way to the 2016 Rio Olympics.

In 2015, after their house was destroyed in the Syrian Civil War, the Mardini sisters decided to flee the country. They made their way to Lebanon and then Turkey, where they arranged to be smuggled into Greece by dinghy. In the middle of the Aegean Sea, the motor of the dinghy, overcrowded with refugees, cut out, and the Mardini sisters and others who could swim, ensured the safety of the passengers.

The film is based on a screenplay by El Hosaini and BAFTA winner Jack Thorne (“Help”).

The roles of Yusra and Sarah Mardini are played by Lebanese sisters Manal and Nathalie Issa (“My Favourite Fabric”). Manal Issa...

The headline news for fantasy fans on Netflix UK this month is the arrival of eight-part adaptation Shadow and Bone, based on Leigh Bardugo’s Grisha trilogy. It’s the story of Alina, a girl who discovers she wields a mighty power that sees her targeted by a covetous foe. You can read more about the cast here. For families, at the end of the month there’s Sony’s latest animated feature The Mitchells Vs the Machines, which is made by the creators of excellent animated film Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse.

Comedy-wise, Melissa McCarthy and Octavia Spencer co-star in regular-Joan-gets-superpowers movie Thunder Force. And for anybody looking to brush up their Spanish for a summer holiday, Netflix has the latest Harlan Coben mystery thriller, The Innocent.

On top of that, there’s a clutch of older films, from John Carpenter’s They Live to the Coen Bros.’ The Big Lebowski...

Exclusive: Amazon has greenlit a creepy thriller series from Hartswood Films, the British production company behind shows including Sherlock and Dracula.

From the mind of rising British writer Tom Moran, The Devil’s Hour is a UK original that tells the story of a woman who wakes up every night at exactly 3.33Am, in the middle of the so-called devil’s hour between 3Am and 4Am.

Lucy Chambers’ eight-year-old son is withdrawn and emotionless. Her mother speaks to empty chairs. Her house is haunted by the echoes of a life that isn’t her own. Now, when her name is inexplicably connected to a string of brutal murders in the area, the answers that have evaded her all these years will finally come into focus.

The series, announced at 3.33Am in the UK, is executive produced by Hartswood bosses Steven Moffat and Sue Vertue, the creative forces behind Benedict Cumberbatch’s BBC Sherlock series.

Rob Lowe has cut quite a path through primetime during the 20-plus years since he joined “The West Wing.”

He turned down “Grey’s Anatomy,” but landed in the ensemble of “Parks and Recreation.” He sold a show about chasing Bigfoot with his sons to A&e Network. From 2003 to 2018 he was also a regular or recurring on series “Code Black,” “The Grinder,” “Californication,” “Brothers and Sisters,” “Dr. Vegas” and “The Lyon’s Den.” Then there was the scene-stealing turn as a plastic surgeon in 2013’s “Behind the Candelabra,” and roles in U.K. episodic series productions including 2005’s “Beach Girls,” 2015’s “You, Me and the Apocalypse” and 2019’s “Wild Bill.”

Last year, Lowe landed his biggest hit yet as a TV leading man when he moved into Ryan Murphy’s orbit as the star of Fox’s “9-1-1: Lone Star.” In the spinoff of the procedural about emergency responders, Lowe plays Owen Strand,...

The BBC and ITV have agreed to fund a Dancing Ledge mentoring scheme for new writers and directors. With the funding, 16 “A-list” writers will select and guide a group of people looking to break into the television industry. The writers will receive a bursary to write a pilot episode for a series, while directors will be funded to work as a second unit director on a TV production. Past mentors have included Jed Mercurio, Jimmy McGovern, Jack Thorne and Lucy Prebble on the first iteration of the scheme in 2018. McGovern’s mentee Tony Schumacher was recently commissioned to pen BBC One drama The Responder, starring Martin Freeman. Dancing Ledge is backed by Fremantle and has made shows including Netflix original Delhi Crime.

Banijay Rights has hired John Richards from Endemol Shine International as CFO, while Roisin Thomas will remain chief operating officer. Both will report to new CEO Cathy Payne,...

While European actors have long been mainstays on American television, recent years have seen American stars gaining traction as the leads in international productions. Sandra Oh’s award-winning turn in “Killing Eve,” Carrie Anne Moss in “Wisting,” Anna Paquin in “Flack” and Rob Lowe in “Wild Bill” are just a few examples of familiar Hollywood faces popping up on screens around Europe.

Their inclusion raises profile domestically, but crucially, it also helps to bolster the content internationally and secure the sales that help finance the shows.

This year, there is a new crop of well-known North American actors making an appearance in European projects: BBC series “World on Fire,” which stars Oscar winner Helen Hunt, premiered in the U.K. last September and will have its American debut on PBS this April. Meanwhile, Finnish fish-out-of-water comedy “Californian Commando,” starring American YouTube sensation Kian Lawley, is looking for its international home after premiering domestically in February,...

This Outlander review contains spoilers.

Outlander Season 5 Episode 3

“Free Will” takes Jamie and Claire beyond the Ridge to rally the able-bodied men in the county to join the militia. Along the way, the Frasiers end up on the television equivalent of a side quest in a video game. This side plot is a huge risk in terms of keeping non-book readers invested but the trauma of the Beardsley brothers and Fanny, in particular, improves the relevance of the plot.

Josiah Beardsley, for viewers who did not read the book, can be seen as a potential time-waster in between militia and Regulators developments, but this episode makes a few small changes to bring out the history of the colonial underclass in order to make non-book readers invested in his plotline. In this episode, we learn that Josiah has a twin brother, Keziah, and both of them were orphans who were sold...

“Free Will” takes viewers on a slow-burn, militia-gathering journey through the lowest classes of Colonial America.

facebook

twitter

tumblr

This Outlander review contains spoilers.

Outlander Season 5, Episode 3

“Free Will” takes Jamie and Claire beyond the Ridge to rally the able-bodied men in the county to join the militia. Along the way, the Frasiers end up on the television equivalent of a side quest in a video game. This side plot is a huge risk in terms of keeping non-book readers invested but the trauma of the Beardsley brothers and Fanny in particular improves the relevance of the plot.

Josiah Beardsley, for viewers who did not read the book, can be seen as a potential time-waster in between militia and Regulators developments, but this episode makes a few small changes to bring out the history of the colonial underclass in order to make non-book readers invested in his plot line. In this episode,...

Joseph Baxter Feb 18, 2020

Dexter Fletcher, director of Elton John biopic Rocketman, is set to tackle Paramount’s reboot of classic TV franchise The Saint.

The Saint, and its exploits of Simon Templar, is readying a return with the shiny new halo that is a reboot movie; a notion that just became a lot more real with the appointment of highly-sought director Dexter Fletcher to the picture.

Studio Paramount has officially hired Fletcher to direct its remake of The Saint, according to Variety. The production will see Fletcher – who’s enjoying newfound momentum from acclaimed Elton John biopic Rocketman – work off a script by Seth Grahame-Smith, adapting the classic antihero spy-thief franchise of author Leslie Charteris’s 1928-1963 novels, which, after early film versions, were famously adapted for U.K. television as the 1962-1969 ITV series, The Saint, which starred a future James Bond, Roger Moore. The series managed to be a contemporaneously-rare global hit,...

Exclusive: A slew of the top television distributors from the UK, U.S. and Europe are pulling out of exhibiting at Mip TV after organizer Reed Midem made a number of significant changes to the Cannes event in April.

Deadline understands that American Gods producer and distributor Fremantle, Deputy and Designated Survivor studio eOne, France’s Banijay, which recently agreed a $2.2B deal to acquire Endemol Shine, and ITV Studios are among the top-tier companies not exhibiting at the TV market.

The move comes after Reed Midem put in a place a number of major changes to the event, which runs from March 30 to April 2. Last year, it officially separated Mip TV from its October sibling Mipcom and changed the layout of the event, bringing sales firms that previously enjoyed space around the Palais into the building.

As such, Banijay, which presented its shows yards from the main entrance to the Palais,...

In this week’s special Natpe: Miami International TV Newswire, Variety looks at the AVoD revolution through a new deal between Tubi and Mexico’s Azteca, ITV and Kew Media sell big across the Americas and two high-profile HBO Latin America series join Hulu Japan’s Latin American showcase.

Tubi and Azteca Presage AVoD Revolution

Tubi, the world’s largest AVoD (Advertising Supported Video on Demand) player, based out of San Francisco, signed this week a strategic partnership with Mexico’s broadcast network TV Azteca to launch a localized Spanish-language app.

As part of the deal, TV Azteca will sell ads on behalf of Tubi while promoting the service to the company’s audience across several platforms. Several of TV Azteca’s more popular titles will also be made available to Tubi members in Mexico, including: “Exatlón Mexico,” “MasterChef,” and “Lo que La Gente Cuente.”

That’s the deal. More will come.

Rob Lowe’s ITV drama Wild Bill, cop drama McDonald and Dodds (starring The Crown’s Jason Watkins), Martin Freeman’s A Confession and Sticks and Stones (starring Killing Eve’s Ken Nwosu) are the latest British titles to be snapped up by streamer BritBox.

This comes after the ITV and BBC joint venture unveiled its latest commission, Father Brown spin-off Sister Boniface, earlier this morning.

The announcements were made as part of BritBox’s Winter TCA press tour session.

“From day one, BritBox has delivered the known, the now and the new authentic British programming experience, whether it’s through groundbreaking originals and specials or proven international favorites,” said BritBox President and Founder, Soumya Sriraman. “Day in and day out, viewers are flocking to BritBox for premium UK entertainment they won’t find anywhere else in North America.”

Wild Bill stars Lowe as Bill Hixon, a high-flying Us police...

BritBox, BBC Studios and ITV’s streaming service in North America, has added several co-productions, live specials, renewals and short series to its lineup, BritBox president Soumya Sriraman announced Tuesday at the Television Critics Assn. gathering in Pasadena.

Among the shows coming to the service are “A Confession,” an original drama from Jeff Pope, starring Martin Freeman (“Sherlock”) and Imelda Staunton (“Vera Drake”), about divergent paths to justice for two women when the confession of a violent criminal is ruled inadmissible; the six-part mystery series “Wild Bill,” starring Rob Lowe; “Sister Boniface,” about a crime-solving nun, a spin-off of the mystery series “Father Brown”; a co-production with ITV from Mammoth Screen, “McDonald and Dodds,” about a pair of mismatched police detectives, starring Jason Watkins; and Mike Bartlett’s three-part psychological thriller “Sticks and Stones,” starring Ken Nwosu.

During the TCA session, Sriraman also led panel discussions on BritBox’s exclusive season 10 return of “Vera,...

The lovable filmmaker Dexter Fletcher is set to tackle an adaptation of ‘Dracula’ story R.M. ‘Renfield’ for Universal Pictures‘ new revamped Monster universe.

‘Renfield’ is a fictional character that appears in Bram Stoker’s 1897 Gothic horror novel ‘Dracula’. He was an inmate at a lunatic asylum who was thought to be suffering from delusions which compel him to eat living creatures in the hope of obtaining their life-force for himself. It later turns out he is actually a servant of Dracula.

Plot details are currently unknown, though it’s believed to take place during the present day and is not a period piece.

Also in news – Noah Hawley enters negotiations to write/direct ‘Star Trek 4’

The original pitch came from ‘The Walking Dead’s’ Robert Kirkman.

After a disastrous start to the Dark Universe with the Tom Cruise led ‘The Mummy’, Universal dropped the idea and subsequently saw Jason Blum...

Rob Lowe’s fish-out-of-water British cop show “Wild Bill” will not get a second season. Despite the pull of big-name U.S. talent, the series failed to set ratings alight in the U.K. and garnered mixed reviews. British broadcaster ITV said Wednesday that the show will not be coming back.

The series saw “West Wing” star Lowe play Bill Hixon, an American cop who relocates to the U.K. after being appointed chief constable of the East Lincolnshire Police Force. Lowe also exec produced the show.

The star pressed the flesh with international buyers earlier this year at an ITV Studios event where he said he hoped “Wild Bill” could follow in the footsteps of popular British crime shows such as “Luther.” ITV had hoped it would offer a fresh take on cop procedurals.

“Wild Bill” was produced by 42, Multistory Media, and Anonymous Content. ITV Studios handled international sales.

ITV has canceled Rob Lowe’s fish out of water British cop drama Wild Bill after just one season.

The West Wing star, who currently features in Netflix film Holiday In The Wild, played high-flying U.S. cop Bill Hixon, who was appointed Chief Constable of the East Lincolnshire Police Force in the UK.

But the series failed to arrest a huge audience, averaging just 3.7 million viewers, and it was not picked up by a big player in the U.S. despite Lowe suggesting that Netflix or Hulu could come in for the show.

Wild Bill was produced by 42, MultiStory Media and Anonymous Content. The show was created by The Hunted writer David Griffiths, before Awake creator Kyle Killen came on board with Silent Witness writers Dudi Appleton and Jim Keeble. Lowe acted as an executive producer.

An ITV spokeswoman said: “We are immensely proud of Wild Bill and loved...

ITV Studios Global Entertainment has racked up pre-sales for its leading Mipcom title “Noughts and Crosses”, and has unveiled a number of other deals on its drama slate.

“Noughts and Crosses” has been acquired by M-Net in Africa, Russia’s More TV, Tvnz in New Zealand and on BBC First across Benelux prior to its launch on BBC One in the U.K. next year.

Based on Malorie Blackman’s novel of the same name, “Noughts and Crosses,” is a love story set in a parallel 21st century Britain, where black people – Crosses – are the ruling race while white people – Noughts – are the lower class. It’s produced for the BBC by ITV-owned Victoria producer Mammoth Screen.

ITV Studios Global Entertainment managing director Ruth Berry said: “I believe Noughts & Crosses is a brand-defining piece of television and I’m delighted that broadcasters across the world are already coming on board.

Exclusive: Melanie Leach and Andrew Mackenzie are exiting The Jump and This Time Next Year producer Twofour Group to set up their own ITV-backed venture.

Deadline understands that the pair, who are CEO and Chief Creative Officer of Twofour respectively, are in the concluding phase of talks with ITV Studios to back their new production business South Shore.

This comes four years after ITV acquired TwoFour Group, one of the largest non-scripted producers in the UK, in a deal that cost it £55M for a 75% stake.

South Shore will produce documentaries, popular factual programming and entertainment formats. Leach and Mackenzie are to continue to oversee Twofour until talks with ITV Studios close. Twofour CFO and COO Anthony Hughes will also join them at South Shore.

TwoFour Group was founded in 1989 by former BBC news producer Charles Wace with Leach becoming CEO in 2014. It also produces series including the Educating franchise,...

Exclusive: Netflix has planted the seeds for The Big Flower Fight (w/t) – a major new competition format rooted in the UK.

The eight-part series has sprouted from ITV Studios-owned Multistory Media. It comes as Netflix continues to grow out its non-scripted library and builds on hit competition originals including Nailed It! and The Final Table.

The series will see ten duos, including florists, sculptors and garden designers, put to the test as they compete in a series of themed challenges to create large-scale flower installations.

Each episode will test a different set of creative and practical skills, from floristry to carpentry and landscaping. The materials each pair can use to create their installation will vary week-by-week, and participants will be encouraged to think about plants which give back to the environment – such as pollinating, insect-friendly species. One team will be eliminated each week as the competition intensifies, leaving...

To mark the release of Wild Bill on 29th July, we’ve been given 3 copies to give away on DVD.

Get ready for crime fighting as you’ve never seen it before. Acclaimed actor Rob Lowe stars as Bill Hixon, a high-flying Us police chief who shakes up the UK’s Lincolnshire Police Force – and his own life in the process – in this sharp-witted original crime drama. Whip-smart, acerbic and unstoppable, the impressively qualified Bill is determined to make his mark as the Force’s new Chief Constable. But Bill will soon discover that the people of this unfamiliar community are just as cynical and smart-mouthed as he is – and the result will be as funny as it is dangerous.

Please note: This competition is open to UK residents only

a Rafflecopter giveaway

The Small Print

Open to UK residents only The competition will close 8th August 2019 at 23.59 GMT The...

Dexter Fletcher, who most recently directed “Rocketman,” is attached to direct “Sherlock Holmes 3” at Warner Bros., with Robert Downey Jr. returning to star, an individual with knowledge of the project told TheWrap.

Fletcher takes over for Guy Ritchie, who directed the previous two “Sherlock Holmes” films that starred Downey Jr. and Jude Law, who is also expected to return. Ritchie made the classic detective story a steampunk, action-heavy, quick-witted joy ride, and the films from 2009 and 2011 made well over a $1 billion at the global box office combined.

The third “Sherlock Holmes” film is expected to hit theaters on Dec. 21, 2021 after initially announced to open on Christmas 2020. The gap between films will be 10 years, which was in part due to the scheduling troubles with Downey Jr.’s “Iron Man” and “Avengers” films.

Also Read: Henry Cavill Tapped to Play Sherlock Holmes in 'Enola Holmes'

Chris Brancato is writing...

“Rocketman” filmmaker Dexter Fletcher has come on board to direct the latest “Sherlock Holmes” film, with Robert Downey Jr. returning to star.

Fletcher is taking over the franchise from Guy Ritchie, who helmed the previous two films: 2009’s “Sherlock Holmes” and its follow-up 2011’s “Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows.” Both were highly successful, with the first grossing $524 million globally and the second bringing in $545.4 million worldwide.

Sources say Warner Bros. had always planned on making a third film. However, Downey’s busy schedule as Iron Man prevented any new filming for the series. The forthcoming entry of the mystery series is expected to hit theaters on Dec. 21, 2021.

Jude Law is also expected to return as Professor Watson. Chris Brancato is penning the script, while Susan Downey, Joel Silver, Dan Lin and Lionel Wigram are producing. The studio had originally announced that the film would open on Christmas Day of...

Graham Fletcher-Cook, a British actor and older brother of Rocketman director Dexter Fletcher who appeared in such acclaimed films as Sid and Nancy, The French Lieutenant's Woman and Cry Freedom, has died. He was 55.

A spokesperson for the family told The Hollywood Reporter that Fletcher-Cook died recently following a battle with cancer.

Fletcher-Cook played a maitre d' in the Elton John biopic Rocketman, which premiered at the Cannes Film Festival and opened in theaters May 31, and had small roles in two other films helmed by his brother: Wild Bill (2011) and Eddie the Eagle (2015).

A filmmaker in his ...

Graham Fletcher-Cook, a British actor and older brother of Rocketman director Dexter Fletcher who appeared in such acclaimed films as Sid and Nancy, The French Lieutenant's Woman and Cry Freedom, has died. He was 55.

A spokesperson for the family told The Hollywood Reporter that Fletcher-Cook died recently following a battle with cancer. 

Fletcher-Cook played a maitre d' in the Elton John biopic Rocketman, which premiered at the Cannes Film Festival and opened in theaters May 31, and had small roles in two other films helmed by his brother: Wild Bill (2011) and Eddie the Eagle (2015).

A filmmaker in his ...

Showtime’s “Escape at Dannemora” won the Crystal Nymph in the limited series and TV movie section of the 59th edition of the Monte Carlo Television Festival on Tuesday. The ceremony was attended by Michael Douglas, who received a lifetime achievement award from Prince Albert of Monaco.

“Escape at Dannemora’s” Patricia Arquette, playing a female prison employee who helps two convicts to escape, picked up the prize for best actress, and best actor went to Grégory Montel for French drama “Thirst for Life,” in which he plays the husband of an alcoholic, trying to cope with the effects of her illness on the family.

HBO’s Italian-language “My Brilliant Friend,” an adaptation of the Elena Ferrante novels, won best drama series. Richard Madden won best actor in the category for political thriller “Bodyguard,” which plays on Netflix in the U.S., and earned record ratings for the BBC in the U.

Rob Lowe is “ready” for a reboot of The West Wing but doesn’t think it’s going to happen anytime soon.

Speaking to BBC Radio 5 Live in the UK, Lowe said about a potential sequel to the hit political drama, “Of course I’m in. I’m in my suit ready to play Sam Seaborne. I don’t think he [Aaron Sorkin] is [writing a sequel]. I think he thinks about it, I think he’s asked about it incessantly, and in a perfect world there would be a version of it. But the problem with it is that, as yet, he’s been unable to figure out what that show looks like.”

Lowe has an idea for the storyline, however.

“All he [Sorkin] needs to do, frankly, is go back and watch the show where he says ‘Sam, you’ll be president one day’”, he quipped. “There’s your show. Hello,...

Avengers and Captain America star Anthony Mackie is to lead cast in and produce action-sci-fi Outside The Wire for Netflix with Mikael Håfström (Escape Plan) on board to direct.

Set in the future, Mackie will play a drone pilot sent into a deadly militarized zone where he finds himself working for an android officer tasked to locate a doomsday device before it falls into the hands of insurgents. Shoot is due to begin in August with additional casting under way.

Mackie is producing with Brian Kavanaugh-Jones (Sinister) for Automatik, Ben Pugh (Ironbark) and Erica Steinberg (Death Proof) for 42, and Jason Spire (Operation Finale) for Mackie’s Inspire Entertainment. Script comes from video game scribe Rob Yescombe and Rowan Athale (Way Down).

Executive producers are Josh Horsfield and Fred Berger for Automatik with Rory Aiken for 42. Charlie Morrison is co-producing for 42. Håfström, known for Escape Plan, 1408 and The Rite, is...

Deadwood: The Movie will debut on HBO on May 31st, nearly 13 years after the pay cable giant aired the unplanned series finale. That’s a very long time, particularly in Peak TV. You may have questions, whether you watched every episode back in the day or have experienced the show entirely through Richardson thumbs-up memes. So let’s trudge through the muddy thoroughfare to find answers!

So what’s Deadwood, anyway?

Deadwood was a Western that HBO aired for three seasons from 2004-06. Created by David Milch (NYPD Blue), it...

“Brits don’t like boasters,” Rob Lowe’s high-flying U.S. cop Bill Hixon is told in the first trailer for ITV drama Wild Bill. He responds by calling East Lincolnshire a “godforsaken cabbage patch,” which nicely sums up the fish-out-of-water series.

The West Wing star plays Hixon, who is appointed Chief Constable of the East Lincolnshire Police Force in the UK in the ITV series, which launches in June. The series is produced by 42, Shiver and Anonymous Content.

Lowe’s Hixon is an analytics expert, a Moneyball-for-police type and he is in Lincolnshire to help bring down the crime rate, while also dealing with his troubled young daughter.

The show was created by The Hunted writer David Griffiths and then Awake creator Kyle Killen came on board with Silent Witness writers Dudi Appleton and Jim Keeble. Lowe acts as an exec producer as well as on-screen star.

He told Deadline earlier this year,...