September 29 Finale
CW: Tell Me a Story at 9p

HBO renewed Real Time With Bill Maher through 2022. The weekly talker launched in 2003. “18 years – I can’t believe I’m turning 18 and HBO isn’t making me leave home,” said Maher. “Thrilled to be living under their roof for another couple of years.”

Royals fans won’t be Keeping Up with the Sussexes on Netflix. Despite UK tabloid The Sun reporting that Prince Harry and Meghan Markle will appear in a “tasteful” reality show spotlighting their philanthropy work, their rep responded that, “The Duke and Duchess are not taking part in any reality shows.” The couple’s high profile deal with Netflix includes scripted series, docu-series, documentaries, features and children’s programming.

Dentsu Aegis Network has been rebranded Dentsu International. “This represents an important milestone in the evolution of our international business as we build on Dentsu’s rich legacy of innovation and industry leadership along with the dynamic growth story of Dentsu Aegis Network,” said new global CEO Wendy Clark. “Our business provides our clients and our people with the best of both worlds, helping them to achieve meaningful progress against a backdrop of unprecedented change and disruption.” The company’s agencies include Carat, dentsu X, iProspect, Isobar, dentsumcgarrybowen, Merkle, MKTG, Vizeum and Posterscope.

Time hasn’t run out for TikTok – yet. The US Commerce Department said it would comply with the eleventh hour injunction against an executive order that would have forced app stores to remove TikTok, but added it would “vigorously defend” the order from legal challenges. The federal judge did not block a broader ban that would take effect on November 12. The administration maintains that ByteDance-owned TikTok poses a threat to national security because US user data could be sent to China.

A report on UK’s Channel 4 News claims Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign targeted 3.5 million Black voters with TV and Facebook ads to keep them from voting. Videos showing Hillary Clinton referring to Black youth as “super predators” aired on TV 402 times and had millions of Facebook hits, alleges the report. “This is fake news,” responded Trump campaign communications director Tim Murtagh.

With stakes at their highest and an unconventional path to election day, there’s a lot to parse. Register for our (free) digital discussion focused on political media buying. On Tuesday, October 20, you’ll come away with the knowledge of why the changing audience viewing landscape matters, best practices for developing creatives that pop across platforms, how to determine the best media mix for a campaign, and more. Sign up here!

Spectrum Networks announced plans to use the resources of its local news networks and Spectrum News App to provide network-wide coverage of the Presidential and Vice Presidential debates. With news networks in nine states, including five key battleground states – Florida, North Carolina, Ohio, Wisconsin and Texas – Spectrum News will bring national political conversations to the local level to provide objective context and insights of the issues impacting community neighborhoods. “We recognize that the information needs of voters are as diverse as the communities we serve,” said Mike Bair, EVP, Spectrum Networks. “With journalists deeply-rooted in five key battleground states, no one knows these communities and the issues that uniquely impact our customers better than our award-winning political team.”

Hallmark Channel’s Ready, Set, Renovate Sweepstakes is up and running. The promotion gives viewers the chance to win a Grand Prize package of $50,000 towards a kitchen renovation. Running through October 30, 2020, the sweepstakes will coincide with an on-air kitchen remodel on the set of the network’s daily lifestyle show, Home & Family. CAFÉ Appliances and Cabinets To Go are premier sponsors.

BET legal thriller Sacrifice has been picked up to series. The movie, which served as a back-door pilot, launched on BET+ in December 2019 and was the first original film on the streaming service. Paula Patton (Precious) will resume her role in the 10-episode series as an entertainment lawyer, accompanied by returning cast members Marques Houston, James Trevena Brown, Veronika Bozeman, Altonio Jackson, Liliana Montenegro, Michael Toland, and Nelson Bonilla.

Production is starting on HBO Max and Warner Bros. Pictures film No Sudden Move, directed by Steven Soderbergh. Produced under Soderbergh’s overall deal with HBO Max, additions to the cast include David Harbour (Stranger Things), Brendan Fraser (Crash) and Noah Jupe (Honey Boy).

Love Nature is prepping After the Wildfires, a look at Australia’s recovery effort a year after the 2019 bushfires. The hour-long special will premiere in November.

Former The View co-host Sherri Shepherd landed a recurring role in comedy Call Your Mother, slated to debut later this season. Kyra Sedgwick stars as an empty-nester mom who moves to LA to be with her kids.

STREAMING SCOOP

Cinedigm’s Bloody Disgusting streaming channel launches today, September 29 exclusively on The Roku Channel, just in time for the Halloween season. The channel will include feature presentations of their original films, new programming from Jon Grilz’ Creepy, Bloody Disgusting’s Boo Crew, SCP Archives, Horror Queers and This Week in Horror.

Peacock has added downloads for offline viewing. Subscribers to the streamer’s ad-free Premium Plan will get the feature.

SVOD subscriptions will double, to 1170 million in 2025 from 529 million a year ago, according to Digital TV Research data covering 138 countries. The forecast calls for Netflix to add 91 million subscribers, for a total of 263 million, and Disney+ to add 142 million, for a total of 172 million.

HITN preschool SVOD Edye released a suite of Apple iOS and Android mobile apps that will offer both in-app purchase subscription capabilities as well as authenticated services for pay-TV operators and telcos. The release of the apps marks Edye’s expansion into the US; the service launched in 16 countries throughout the Latin America region.

Roku is set to start rolling out its latest operating system, OS 9.4, offering new ways to access content quickly as well as performance enhancements. Coming up: AirPlay 2, allowing Roku customers to stream, control and share content from iPhone, iPad and Macs to their Roku device, and HomeKit, to control their device using the Home app and Siri. Roku TV users can now access Roku’s Lice TV Channel Guide directly from their home screen, and Helpful Hints will appear on the TV screen to inform users of voice commands they can use on their Roku device.

Future Today, publisher of video streaming channels, is expanding its footprint by launching three new FAST streaming channels on The Roku Channel. The new channels include HappyKids, iFood.tv, and The LEGO Channel.

Apple is releasing documentary film Billie Eilish: The World’s A Little Blurry on Apple TV+ and in theaters in February. The doc comes from Apple Original Films in association with Interscope Films, Darkroom, This Machine and Lighthouse Management & Media.

Mobile news brand Today NowThis has launched NowThis Earth, focused on coverage of human impact on the planet. NowThis Earth is launched in partnership with Earth HQ, the media arm of Global Common Alliance, a coalition of scientific, philanthropic and conservation organizations along with business networks. Additional support will be provided by Mongabay, a non-profit conservation and environmental science news outlet.

NEW & RETURNING SERIES

Season 10 of Discovery’s Alaska the Last Frontier premieres Sunday, October 25 at 8p. This season’s chilly challenges include summer wildfire season, and the pandemic.

Top Chef will call Portland, Oregon home for season 18 – a selection welcomed by the city. “Considering all our community is facing this year, Top Chef’s selection of Portland as its filming location means more than if we had been selected any other year because it recognizes that, in spite of everything, our city remains a world-class culinary destination,” said Jeff Miller, Travel Portland President and CEO. “The show will serve as a window into what Portland has to offer when viewers are ready to travel again.” For the first time, the Bravo competition series will feature a rotating judging and dining panel made up of Top Chef All Star winners and finalists.

COMING UP

Walk Against Fear: James Meredith focuses on the civil rights icon who in 1962 was the first Black man to enroll in the University of Mississippi, and in 1966 began a one-man “March Against Fear.” When he was stopped by a sniper’s bullet and hospitalized, Martin Luther King Jr. and other civil rights leaders attracted thousands of more people to join. The special airs on Smithsonian Channel on Thursday, October 1 at 8p.

Yahoo News is partnering with the Wounded Warrior Project to host a live global virtual town hall today, September 29 at 11a on YahooNews.com. Invisible Wounds of War will bring together wounded veterans, WWP leadership, and a specialist in post-traumatic stress treatment to talk about suicide prevention, veterans’ mental health, and free resources available to veterans and their families.

The T. Howard Foundation’s Diversity Awards, recognizing industry leaders and companies committed to increasing diversity and inclusion in the media and entertainment industry, will take place on Wednesday, September 30 at 7p. The event, streamed exclusively on Fuse Media’s YouTube channel, will feature special guests Tracee Ellis Ross, Trevor Noah, John Leguizamo and Grant Hill.

In Discovery’s Everest’s Greatest Mystery, mountaineers solve the mystery of two explorers who died on their journey to the summit of Mt. Everest in 1924. The documentary, part of Discovery’s Undiscovered series, airs Sunday, October 11 at 9p.

The 2021 Writers Guild Awards ceremony is scheduled to take place Sunday, March 21 in LA and New York. Nominees will be named February 13 and February 16.

TECH NEWS

Ad tech company TrueX is being acquired by location-based ad tech company Gimbal, offering Gimbal a chance to grab bigger piece of the advanced TV advertising pie. Founded by Joe Marchese and David Levy, TrueX was sold to Fox in 2014, then absorbed by Disney as part of its acquisition of 21st Century Fox.

GOING GLOBAL

Sony Pictures Television landed global distribution rights to Who You Gonna Call?, a documentary about the life of Ray Parker Jr., who wrote the song “Ghostbusters.” The project is produced by Ola Trom and Strine of Power Chord Films.

Banijay announced that P&G has commissioned the third season of Endemol Shine Brazil’s branded reality format, Cabelo Pantene. The four-episode-series will be delivered by Pantene Brazil’s YouTube channel in November 2020, with Maisa Silva as host.

Among the unscripted shows Red Arrow Studios International is launching at Mipcom are The Weekly: Special Edition, a collection of standalone documentaries; How to Become Superhuman, following a group of celebrities trained to face an endurance test; and Dieting With My Dog, which will have overweight owners and their pudgy pets shedding pounds together.

Enslaved: The Lost History of the Transatlantic Slave Trade will launch in 130 territories following multiple deals by Fremantle. Samuel L. Jackson’s CBC/Epix unscripted series sheds new light on 400 years of human trafficking from Africa to the New World, as millions of enslaved Africans were forcibly transported to the Americas by Western European slave traders.

Lineup Industries and NHK Enterprises are partnering to drive the global exploitation of NHK’s slate of formats. Lineup Industries will advise on and bring the Japanese public broadcaster’s formats to Western territories with a focus on Europe, North America, Australia and New Zealand. The first formats to headline the new partnership are The Late Night Show with Nitty & Gritty, 72 Hours, and Chiko’s Challenge.

The Story Lab and Japan’s Nippon TV announced details of their new entertainment format, 9 Windows, the first title to be launched by their recent co-development partnership. Each episode features nine contestants with unusual abilities, all beamed in from their home through giant studio screens.

Universal Studio Group has committed to shoot three television productions in Australia over the next 18 months. Young Rock from Universal Television, Joe Exotic from UCP and Irreverent from NBCUniversal International Studios’ Matchbox Pictures will shoot at Screen Queensland Studios in Brisbane, as well as surrounding locations.

Funimation, currently available in the US, Canada, UK, Ireland, Australia, and New Zealand, will expand to Mexico and Brazil offering anime series subtitled in Portuguese and Spanish, with select titles dubbed. The service will be initially web-only and roll out on various apps and connected television platforms in 2021.

The Inner Circle has been acquired by Walter Presents in the US, UK and Belgium. A Viaplay Original produced by Fundament Film, the Swedish political thriller adapted from a novel by Per Schlingmann.

Answer to Our Last Trivia Question
What was Alexis’ middle name (which her family forgot) on Schitt’s Creek (2015-2020)? Claire. Kudos to: John Ferlazzo/London, Carla Judah-KOIN 6 News/Portland, OR, Allyson Haas-Babiekins Magazine/LA, David Garber-Loyola Marymount University/Playa Vista, CA, Tom Moore-Kalt Productions/LA, Marni C. Gold/Hawthorne, NJ, Jeremy Cyril-Just Ducky/Toronto, Anne S. Rothwell-Smallville Productions/Washington, D.C., Traci Liner-MediaCom/NYC

Today’s Trivia Question
Which sitcom did internet company Gryzzl call home? (Email [email protected] with your answer and be sure to include your name, company, city and time zone. Unofficial rules: a limit of four answers per time zone.)