TV SALES, PICK-UPS, ATTACHMENTS, RENEWALS & DEALS (1.23.15)

TV SALES

NBC commissioned 13 episodes of Eva Longoria‘s new single-camera comedy, TELENOVELA.  The Desperate Housewives star portrays a persistent diva and star of Latin America’s most beloved telenovela. Written/executive produced by Cougar Town co-executive producers Chrissy Pietrosh and Jessica Goldstein. Longoria and Ben Spector are set to executive produce.

Sky has ordered two new pilots, the comedy BIRTHDAY and Harlan Coben’s THE FIVE. The comedy stars Stephen Mangan as Ed, a pregnant man going through labor in a British maternity ward. Coben’s 10-part thriller follows a group of friends who are forced to revisit the past when the DNA of one of their missing brothers turns up at the scene of a murder.

 

Netflix has ordered Will Arnett’s FLAKED, which has been given an eight-episode season. Co-created by Arnett and Mark Chappell, the series follows Arnett as a self-appointed “guru” who falls for girl his best friend is pursuing. Arnett and Arrested Development‘s Mitch Chappell executive produce with Ben Silverman, Peter Principato and Hurwitz for Electus and Principato-Young.

 

NBC picks up the multi-camera comedy PEOPLE ARE TALKING that focuses on a white and a black couple while examining sex and race. DJ Nash and Will Packer will serve as executive produce. 

 

NBC orders TAKE IT FROM US pilot described as a love story told in flashbacks in New York in the 1990s. The story centers around a couple that tell their son lessons they learned growing up in the ’90s in hopes he and his fiancée can avoid making the same mistakes. The show is co-written by Greg Malins and Barry Schwartz. 

 

Fox picks up 3 new dramas and a comedy for its upcoming season. Sci-fi drama FRANKENSTEIN, British adaptation LUTHER, and crime drama ROSEWOOD all come by way of 20th Century Fox TV, while family comedy 48 HOURS UNTIL MONDAY originated at Universal TV. This marks the first pilot order to an outside studio this pilot season. 

 

NBC orders GAME OF SILENCE based on Turkish drama Suskunlar. The drama centers on a rising attorney whose perfect life is at risk when his long-lost childhood friends threaten to expose a dark secret from their violent past. David Hudgins is executive producing with Carol Mendelsohn, Julie Weitz, Timur Savci and Tariq Jalil.

 

The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation has teamed up with Emmy Award-winning writer/showrunner René Balcer on the new one-hour international thriller, THE COUNCIL. The show revolves around an investigation of a murder in a remote Canadian Arctic town. The killing goes on to expose an international conspiracy to control the natural resources of the Arctic. Louise Clark, Erin Haskett, Keston’s Trevor Walton and Denis Coyne will serve as executive producers. 

TV RENEWALS

Fox has renewed GOTHAM, BROOKLYN NINE-NINE, and breakout star EMPIRE for next season.

TV CANCELLATIONS

TV ATTACHMENTS

Gary Sinise is attached to lead in the CBS spinoff of Criminal Minds. The untitled project focuses on an FBI unit that deals with American citizens in trouble abroad. Sinise will play the 20 year veteran and unit commander, Jack Garrett. Erica Messer will executive produces with Mark Gordon and Nick Pepper of the Mark Gordon Co. Sinise is repped by Brillstein Entertainment Partners and CAA.

Keir O’Donnell has joined FX‘s Golden Globe award winning mini-series, FARGO. The American Sniper actor is said to be playing Ben Schmidt, known only as a “driven and ambitious” character. The new installment is already set to star Kirsten Dunst, Jesse Plemons, Ted Danson and Patrick Wilson. O’Donnell is repped by UTA and Visionary Entertainment.

Julianne Hough and Vanessa Hudgens are attached to star in the Fox and Paramount Television‘s GREASE: LIVE (working title), a re-imagined live-event based on the musical Grease. Hough and Hudgens will star as Rydell High’s iconic duo Sandy and Rizzo. The show will be executive-produced by Marc Platt. It will be a Paramount Television production.

Rob Lowe,  Jenna Fischer, Megan Mullally, Mathew Baynton, Pauline Quirke, Patterson Joseph and Joel Fry have all signed on to Sky 1‘s 10-part British series, APOCALYPSE SLOUGH. The series follows an eclectic group of people hunker beneath the town of Slough to watch the end of the world on TV. 

Luna Blaise has been cast in ABC’s debut sitcom FRESH OFF THE BOAT in a guest starring arc as Nicole, a girl who lives in the same neighborhood as young Eddie Huang. Blaise is repped by Coast to Coast and DNA Entertainment.

Kerry Condon and Toby Leonard Moore have been cast in the Showtime drama pilot BILLIONS. The story takes a forensic look at the world of high finance by tracking the approaching collision between two titanic figures – U.S. Attorney Chuck Rhoades, and hedge fund king, Bobby “Axe” Axelrod. Starring opposite Paul Giamatti and Damian Lewis, Condon will play Lara Axelrod, Bobby’s wife and Moore will play Chief Assistant U.S. Attorney Bryan Connerty. The drama is written and executive produced by Brian Koppelman and David Levien and Andrew Ross Sorkin. Condon is repped by ICM Partners, Frameworks and Curtis Brown. Moore, repped by Gersh and McKeon/Myones Entertainment.

Nadia Hilker and Amber Clayton are attached to star as the female leads in TNT’s pilot BREED. The drama, from writer/novelist John Scott Shepherd follows Cooper, a mentally unstable yet gifted detective, as he tracks down the mysterious race of creatures that have committed a series of brutal murders in the Pacific Northwest. Hilker will play Ruby, a powerful assassin born of a long line of Eastern European hunters called Avelytes.Clayton plays Mandy, Cooper’s girlfriend who followed him from New York to Tacoma after he got fired from the FBI. The show will be directed by Scott Winant and produced by Nicky Weinstock. Hilker is repped by Robert Kelly Associates in the UK. Clayton is repped by Catherine Poulton Management, Glick Agency and Brillstein Entertainment Partners.

TV GREENLIGHTS

TV DEALS

NBC has signed a development deal with Dolly Parton as the first step a plan to create a series of TV movies based on Parton’s songs, stories, and life. The network has said that the projects will not be musicals but that Parton may appear in them. Parton will develop the projects with production partner Sam Haskell of Magnolia Hill Entertainment and Warner Bros. Television.

PBS and BBC have inked a multi-title co-production deal also involving BBC Worldwide. The deal will create eight to 10 new programming specials, both one-offs and multipart series, to air on PBS nationwide. The specials will cover a full range of genres — natural history, history, science, religion and the arts.