News

Exclusive: The BBC has renewed comedy series We Might Regret This for two more seasons, providing new impetus for its producers’ hunt for a U.S. buyer.

A recommission has looked likely for some time following strong reviews in the UK and two more six-part runs have now been officially confirmed to Deadline.

From creators Kyla Harris and Lee Getty, We Might Regret This follows Freya (Kyla Harris), a woman in love who leaves her native Canada for London to be with her boyfriend, Abe (Darren Boyd), a to-year-old straight-laced lawyer with whom she shares a loving relationship and an electric sexual connection.

Freya is a 30-something artist who is a tetraplegic, which means she is paralyzed below the neck and all four limbs are affected due to a spinal cord injury. She requires the assistance of a 24-hour Pa, an intimate role she offers to her chaotic and impulsive...

ABC News Studios, in partnership with All Ages Productions and in association with Ess Projects and Cedar Road, today announced Patrice: The Movie, a feature-length documentary from Peabody and Gotham Award-winning director Ted Passon and producers Kyla Harris (We Might Regret This), Innbo Shim (Amend), and Emily Spivack (Worn Stories).

The documentary will premiere on Monday, Sept. 30, on Hulu, following its world premiere at the 2024 Toronto International Film Festival.

Patrice: The Movie is a documentary romantic comedy about the next frontier of marriage equality — disability. Patrice Jetter has finally found the love of her life, Garry Wickham, who is also disabled.

They want nothing more than to get married, but if they do — or even if they just move in together — the government benefits they need to survive would be cut. Despite the scrutiny they’re under, they decide to plan a commitment ceremony that could risk their entire future.

Riz Ahmed’s Amazon Prime Video comedy series has added three new series regulars, Variety has learned exclusively.

Sheeba Chaddha, Aasiya Shah, and Sajid Hasan have all joined the untitled half-hour show alongside series lead Ahmed and recently announced cast member Guz Khan.

Exact character details are being kept under wraps, but the official series description states the show follows “Shah Latif (Ahmed), a struggling actor on the cusp of landing the role of a lifetime, only to find himself thrust into a full blown existential crisis and trippy conspiracy thriller all at the same time.”

Chaddha is a highly-accomplished actress who has worked in film, television, and the stage. Her past television credits include the hit series “Mirzapur” as well as “Bandish Bandits,” “Taj Mahal 1989,” “Tanhaiyan,” and the German Netflix series “The Signal.” Her film credits include her award-winning turn in “Badhaai Do” as well as “Doctor G,...

After nearly two years, “Industry” is back for a third season. And this time around, the HBO drama is chronicling a financial saga that will pull its antiheroes into the upper echelons of the financial, political and media worlds.

Created by Mickey Down and Konrad Kay, “Industry” first premiered in 2020 as a steamy and high-stakes drama about a group of new hires at a top-tier London bank. Not all of those newbies lasted, but Down and Kay have found new ways to dive into this ever-stressful world. This season, they’re diving into the world of ethical investment through a new character played by Kit Harington.

Consider this your guide on who’s who in the cast of “Industry” Season 3.

“Industry” Season 3 (Photo Credit: HBO) Marisa Abela as Yasmin Kara-Hanani

Yasmin is one of two characters who has remained at Pierpoint and at the center of “Industry” since Season 1. Part...

BBC Two introduces the upcoming comedy-drama series ‘We Might Regret This,’ inspired by the lives and experiences of its creators, Kyla Harris and Lee Getty. The series is produced by Roughcut TV, known for their work on ‘Big Boys,’ ‘People Just Do Nothing,’ and ‘Stath Lets Flats.’ ‘We Might Regret This’ will premiere on Monday, […]

BBC Two Comedy Drama ‘We Might Regret This’ Premieres 19 August...

Jordan Gray Comedy Special Heading To Channel 4

Jordan Gray’s comedy special has been picked up by Channel 4. The trans comedian, who made a name for herself when she stripped naked and played the piano with her penis on TV, will make her debut stand-up comedy special for television next month. Soho Studios and Bill and Ben will produce the one-off, Is It A Bird?, for Channel 4, spotlighting one of the brightest, award-winning talents in the British comedy game. “This silly little show has changed my life forever,” said Gray. The comedy special will be EP’d by Gray, Soho Studios’ Ian Lamarra and Laura Hill for Independent Talent Group. Lamarra added: “Jordan’s debut Is It A Bird? opened as the funniest and most important show in Edinburgh that year, it is vital that it’s now captured on film.”

‘We Might Regret This’: Trailer Drops For...

Edward Bluemel, the “Killing Eve” and “Sex Education” star most recently seen as the brooding love interest in Amazon’s alt-history fantasy “My Lady Jane,” has joined the cast of Netflix’s upcoming Agatha Christie series “The Seven Dials Mystery.”

Bluemel joins “How to Have Sex” breakout Mia McKenna-Bruce, who Variety announced last month would lead the whodunnit, written by “Broadchurch” creator and former “Doctor Who” showrunner Chris Chibnall.

Set in 1925, “The Seven Dials Mystery” follows a lavish country house party where a practical joke appears to have gone murderously wrong. It’s down to the fizzingly inquisitive Lady Eileen “Bundle” Brent (McKenna-Bruce) to unravel a chilling plot that will change her life, cracking wide open the country house mystery. Bluemel will play Jimmy Thesiger, a charming and witty man who becomes Bundle’s ally in the murder investigation. Helena Bonham Carter and Martin Freeman will also star.

The series...

“Stath Lets Flats” producer Roughcut TV have signed a first look development deal with Fremantle as they lean into their drama slate.

The deal will see Fremantle become the primary home for Roughcut’s drama projects, working closely with the global drama and international distribution divisions.

Roughcut, who recently announced upcoming Diane Kruger-fronted series “Little Disasters” for Paramount+, was founded by Ash Atalla and Tim Sealey and quickly built a reputation for comedy shows, including “Stath Lets Flats” and “Big Boys.”

They have since bolstered their drama offering under CEO Ash Atalla, creative director Alex Smith and head of drama Marianna Abbotts, including with recent drama hit “Coma,” starring Jason Watkins as a family man who hits breaking point after his neighborhood is terrorized by a group of teens.

The prod-co also have comedy drama “We Might Regret This” set to air on BBC Two later this summer.

Fremantle...

Fremantle, part of media giant Bertelsmann’s Rtl Group, has struck a first-look drama development deal with Roughcut Television, the production firm co-founded by CEO Ash Atalla, the producer of the original British version of The Office and The It Crowd.

The agreement follows the companies’ recent team-up on Paramount+ U.K. & Ireland psychological thriller series Little Disasters, starring Diane Kruger (Troy, Inglourious Basterds) and Jo Joyner (The Wives, For Her Sins).

Roughcut, founded by Atalla and chief operating officer Tim Sealey, is mostly known for comedy shows, such as Big Boys, Stath Lets Flats, and Cuckoo but it has also had success with recent Channel 5 drama Coma, starring Jason Watkins.

“The first-look and drama development deal will see Fremantle become the primary home for Roughcut TV’s scripted drama projects, with the producer working closely with Fremantle’s acclaimed global drama and international distribution divisions,” the companies said.

Exclusive: At the 2021 Edinburgh TV Festival, the BBC and Netflix unveiled what the pair described as a landmark five-year disability partnership that would unearth a new generation of shows helmed by disabled talent.

But more than half of the partnership’s five-year time period has now elapsed and not one show has been revealed.

In recent months, sources from the UK drama and disabled TV communities have begun questioning the partnership, getting in touch with Deadline unprompted to query why a tie-up that was unveiled with such fanfare has so far failed to bear fruit.

“It’s slightly bizarre,” said one professional connected with disability programs. “I’ve heard nothing from anyone to be honest. No one can get a definitive answer.”

The partnership came in the wake of a blistering Edinburgh TV Festival MacTaggart broadside from Help writer Jack Thorne, who slammed the UK TV industry for “totally and utterly” failing disabled people.

Ella Glendining is both the director and subject of documentary “Is There Anybody Out There?,” a global search for someone with a body that looks like hers.

The film debuted at Sundance this year and went on to achieve global acclaim, winning a slew of awards along the way. Recent accolades include winning the BFI and Chanel Filmmaker Award and being named as one of the U.K. talents in the BAFTA Breakthrough 2023 cohort.

“A big thing for me making a personal film was that I was insecure and worried that people would think that I was just the subject of a documentary, but to be recognized on this level is an incredible confidence boost in terms of me as a filmmaker, because that’s who I am. What I am first and foremost is a filmmaker and a storyteller,” Glendining, who was born with a rare leg disability, told Variety.

The exec producer behind BBC comedy-drama We Might Regret This has said his ambition was for a show starring and written by a disabled performer to be “at the very top table of creativity.”

The Office and People Just Do Nothing producer Ash Atalla, whose Roughcut TV outfit is making We Might Regret This in association with Village Roadshow Television, said there has been a tendency for British broadcasters to “use the dry slopes of smaller budget shows or ancillary channels as training progams” when it comes to projects led by disabled people.

Penned by Kyla Harris and Lee Getty, We Might Regret This, on the other hand, is being positioned as a bigger-budget primetime offering for the UK’s national broadcaster, which its backers feel could be a potential awards winner.

“There was always an ambition to make a show that stars a disabled performer sat at the very top table of creativity,...