PRODUCTION & DEVELOPMENT
NBC’s Law & Order franchise just got bigger, with a 13-episode order for Law & Order: Hate Crimes, from Dick Wolf and Law & Order: SVU showrunner Warren Leight. Series is based on New York’s Hate Crimes Task Force. “AsLaw & Order: SVU’ enters its remarkable 20thseason, it is exciting to get back into business with Dick Wolf on a new Law & Order incarnation that feels extremely timely,” said Lisa Katz, co-president of scripted programming, NBC Entertainment. “Considering that last year there was a double-digit rise in hate crimes in our 10 largest cities – the highest total in over a decade – it seemed like this topic is begging to be explored.”
Dennie Gordon (Goliath) has been tapped to direct and exec produce three episodes of Amazon drama Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan. Series premiered August 31.
Len Wiseman (The Gifted) will exec produce DC Universe drama Swamp Thing, as well as direct the first episode. Series from Atomic Monster in association with Warner Bros. TV is set to start streaming in 2019.
Dina Shihabi (Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan) signed a development deal with Propagate for scripted series Habibti, based on her life in LA living with Saudi friends. Shihabi created, wrote and EPs the project.
NEW & RETURNING SERIES
Starz’ unscripted six-part series Warriors of Liberty City will be available on the Starz App and VOD platforms on Sunday, September 9,, one week ahead of its linear debut on September 16 at p. Each subsequent episode will be available across all digital and on-demand platforms one week prior to the linear airing. Warriors explores a marginalized neighborhood in Miami that is arguably the NFL’s most successful football factory.
Family Feud launches its 20th season on Monday, September 10p. “Happy anniversary to one of the best gifts I’ve ever received, Family Feud,” said host Steve Harvey. “I’ve been here 9 of the 20 seasons and it has been the most fun I’ve had throughout my career.”
Warner Bros. Television starts New York Comic Con on Wednesday, October 3, with the world premiere screening of the live-action dramatic adventure series Titans, which launches October 12 as the first original series for the new DC Universe digital subscription service.
FarmHer returns to RFD-TV for season three on Friday, September 7 at 9:30p, with an episode featuring Budweiser Clydesdales and one of the women who trains them.
COMING UP
Ellen DeGeneres’ stand-up special, Relatable, will premiere on Netflix December 18. It’s DeGeneres’ first stand-up special in 15 years. “I just all of a sudden was like, ‘I miss stand-up, I want to do it,’” she said on Tuesday’s season 16 premiere of The Ellen DeGeneres Show. “So I made a deal with Netflix.”
Freeform has expanded its annual spooky programming stunt from 13 nights to 31, with “31 Nights of Halloween.” The event will also be the exclusive TV home to the film Hocus Pocus, celebrating its 25th anniversary.
Children of IFC employees spin the wheel in a special Back to School Bingo edition, during an airing of Billy Madison on Thursday, September 6 at 9p. Viewers can play along live during “Bingo Breaks” to win the prize of the week.
CNBC doc Crisis on Wall Street: The Week that Shook the World offers an account of the most tumultuous days of the financial crisis of 2008. CNBC anchor Andrew Ross Sorkin, author of best-seller “Too Big to Fail,” reports on Wednesday, September 112 at 10p.
E! returns as the official multi-platform media partner of New York Fashion Week: The Shows. Coverage includes backstage access to the runways, red carpets, parties, and fashion collections across platforms (on-air, online and across mobile and social), as well as E!’s all-new series Model Squad. Two-week event runs Tuesday, September 4-Friday, September 14 at 8p.
Gusto Worldwide Media confirmed today that eight original series and four specials will become available on Pluto TV, for access to 75 hours of Gusto original content: The Urban Vegetarian; Spencer’s BIG 30; Flour Power; One World Kitchen; Crate to Plate; Licence to Grill; Cook Like a Chef; Watts Up for the Holidays: Spencer’s Ultimate Christmas Recipes (1×60′); Spencer and Robert’s Game Day Buffet; One World Kitchen Bakes the Holidays; and One World Kitchen: Our Favourite Holiday Recipes.
Estrella TV music awards show, Premios de la Radio, will be held in Mexico for the first time in its 19-year history. “I strongly believe that you can’t stop culture, music or talent with any immigration law or wall, and this is why we are trying to bring Mexican artists, who are beloved in the U.S., closer to Hispanic audiences here,” said Pepe Garza, radio programmer, Que Buena Radio and founder of Premios de la Radio. “We are committed to bringing our loyal viewers their favorite artists via television, and vice versa, we are also taking new and developing regional Mexican acts from the U.S. to Mexican audiences who are unable to come to the U.S. to see them.”
An expanded edition of Discovery’s Expedition Unknown solves the mystery behind the missing pair of ruby red slippers worn by Judy Garland in “The Wizard of Oz”, tonight at 8p.
ADVERTISING
Former San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick has a new, multi-year deal with Nike that makes him one of the faces of the company’s 30th anniversary “Just Do It” campaign – tag line, “Believe in something. Even if it means sacrificing everything.” Kaepernick found himself out of a job after igniting a controversy in 2016 by kneeling during the national anthem to protest police brutality and racial inequality. In a mix of positive and negative mentions in the 24 hours after the news broke, there were over 2.7 million mentions of Nike, a 1400% increase versus the previous day, according to social media analysis from Talkwalker. Shares of NKE stock closed down more than 3% on Tuesday, while NFL EVP of communications and public affairs Jocelyn Moore said, “The social justice issues that Colin and other professional athletes have raised deserve our attention and action.”
CASTING
Henry Cavill (Man of Steel) will star in Netflix drama The Witcher, based on the fantasy saga….Jacki Weaver (Blunt Talk) landed a co-starring role in upcoming Epix drama Our Lady, LTD….Kali Rocha (Man With a Plan) was promoted from recurring to series regular on season three of the CBS comedy.
DIGITAL
Yesterday Amazon became the second company, after Apple, to see its market value pass $1 trillion. In early 2018, the company was worth $580 billion, but in the second quarter net income jumped from $197 million in 2Q17 to $2.5 billion, helped by its cloud business, advertising on its sites and Prime subscriptions.
The move to active mobile video offerings will grow along with entertainment bundling with mobile services, according to the 2018 Economics of Mobile Programming Report by Kagan. North American and Asian markets lead the charge in a shift to active mobile video markets. In both the Asia-Pacific and North/South American regions, 86% of operators offer mobile video services, followed by 71% in the Mideast and Africa region. “As 5G moves forward, over the next decade consumers will increasingly make a choice between wires versus wireless for home broadband,” said John Fletcher, principle research analyst with S&P Global Market Intelligence, “and Mobile Network Operators are already bundling video services alongside mobile phone services to not only retain existing customers but to position themselves as a future one-stop shop for home broadband and video services.”
Speaking of, 5G will be a hot topic at the Mobile World Congress Americas 2018, taking place in LA September 12th-14. “Unlike last year’s event, we are closer to 5G commercial service rollouts, so all vendors and operators that participate in the 5G value chain will be touting their wares, showcasing the possible use cases, and amping up the excitement for adjacent technologies that will be advanced by 5G such as AR/VR, enhanced video broadcasting and streaming, and advanced interactive gaming systems,” said Kathryn Weldon, research director, and Emma Mohr-McClune, service director, at Global Data.
Synamedia, born from the sale by Cisco of its Service Provider Video Solutions business to Permira, will work with media companies on building OTT distribution. “Synamedia enters the market at a time when the TV landscape is being redrawn,” said new chairman Abe Peled. “We will hit the ground running as a private, independent entity committed to help customers boost engagement and revenues by capitalizing on the myriad opportunities that IP distribution and cloud-based services bring.”
CBS Sports will stream Super Bowl LIII across more platforms than ever, including mobile phones, as part of an expanded agreement with the NFL announced earlier this year. CBS Sports’ broadcast coverage of Super Bowl LIII will also be available to stream live via the CBS All Access subscription service. “We’re looking forward to bringing this season’s biggest game to the biggest possible digital audience and building on the record-breaking Super Bowl streams we’ve delivered in the past,” said Jeff Gerttula, EVP and General Manager, CBS Sports Digital
DPAA released a preliminary list of speakers for its annual Video Everywhere Summit, to be held in NYC on Tuesday, October 30 as part of Digital Signage Week (Oct. 29-Nov. 2) for brands, agencies, digital out-of-home networks, ad tech, mobile/location companies, data firms and others from multi-screen advertising. Among the speakers so far are Denise Karkos, CMO, TD Ameritrade; Frenemies author Ken Auletta; Jeff Brooks, CMO, Casper, and Alicia Hatch, CMO, Deloitte Digital.
What will Facebook and Twitter have to say to lawmakers in D.C. today, during testimony about foreign operatives’ use of their services, and their influence on people’s thinking? “We were too slow to spot this and too slow to act. That’s on us,” Sheryl Sandberg, Facebook COO, said in prepared testimony that was obtained by The New York Times. “We’re getting better at finding and combating our adversaries, from financially motivated troll farms to sophisticated military intelligence operations.” Twitter head Jack Dorsey posted, “Twitter is approaching these challenges with a simple question: How do we earn more trust from the people using our service? We know the way to earn more trust around how we make decisions on our platform is to be as transparent as possible.”
GOING GLOBAL
OUTtv announced the launch of OUTtv South Africa. In partnership with MultiChoice, OUTtv South Africa, will broadcast as a pop-up channel on DStv channel 198 from October 4 until November 4.
Alfred Haber, Inc. is lining up international sales for the 2019 Grammy Awards, airing Stateside on CBS on February 10. Onboard so far: Rogers (Canada), Tencent (China), WOWOW (Japan), VTM (Belgium), M-Net (Africa), Channel One (Russia), Viacom 18 (India), WDR (Germany), D17 (France), and Bangkok Broadcasting (Thailand).
SOCIAL GOOD
Canada’s Family Channel empowers kids to make a positive change in their communities with the launch of its annual Bullying Awareness Week campaign, promoting the message to Stand UP!, not stand by when you see bullying happen. The net is raising awareness with an extensive social media campaign running from Sunday, November 18- Saturday, November 24.
