ITV Studios announces new sales and unveils stunning spring drama slate

ITV STUDIOS ANNOUNCES NEW SALES AND UNVEILS STUNNING SPRING DRAMA SLATE TO WORLDWIDE BUYERS AT THIRD ANNUAL LONDON

DRAMA FESTIVAL

London Screenings 2020, 11 February - On the eve of its third annual Drama Festival, ITV Studios announces new sales of its enviable portfolio and a new slate for 2020 to be presented to global buyers.

Mammoth Screen's major three-part television adaptation of H.G. Wells' seminal tale - the first alien invasion story in literature - The War of the Worlds - has been acquired in the US by the AMC upgrade subscription service AMC Premiere, taking the total number of territories it is available in to 221.

The hotly-anticipated Noughts + Crosses, also from Mammoth Screen and based on the award-winning young adult novel series by Malorie Blackman, has sold to HBO Europe and BBC First Australia.

Mammoth Screen's epic World War Two drama World on Fire, now available in 144 territories, has sold to BBC First and BBC Player Asia along with Mainstreet Pictures' character-driven relationship thriller starring Emmy winner Julia Ormond, Gold Digger.

Both titles make their way into Latin America with a pan regional Satellite TV service, DIRECTV, which acquires ITV Studios Factual Drama and Urban Myth Film's A Confession written by the Oscar-nominated Jeff Pope in addition.

A Confession will also be available on Magenta TV (Deutsche Telecom) Germany, Telefonica Spain, SVT Sweden, Cineplex Thailand, Channel Zero Canada, Britbox Canada, YES Israel, Viacom Russia, Okko Russia and BBC in New Zealand, which has also picked up Stick and Stones.

TVNZ has picked up Genial Productions' new comedy drama starring Dawn French, The Trouble With Maggie Cole (former w/t Glass Houses), which delves into what happens when idle gossip escalates, and Silverprint Pictures' family drama meets contemporary thriller, Flesh and Blood. Flesh and Blood has also been acquired by Network Seven in Australia, KT Corp in Korea, Virgin Media Eire and RTV Slovenia.

Additionally, all six seasons of the Emmy -nominated Schitts Creek have sold in a pan regional deal to ViacomCBS Networks Americas.

The success of these now world-renowned titles is set to be replicated in 2020 with a stunning new slate of premium titles launching internationally today.

World Productions' up-coming adrenaline-fuelled thriller Vigil (6 x 60', w/t) starring Suranne Jones (Gentleman Jack, Doctor Foster), Rose Leslie (Game of Thrones, The Good Fight), Gary Lewis (His Dark Materials, Billy Elliot), Martin Compston (Line of Duty) and Paterson Joseph (The Leftovers, Peep Show) leads the new slate. Written and created by BAFTA nominee Tom Edge (The Crown, C.B. Strike, Oscar -nominated Judy) and directed by BAFTA winner James Strong, Vigil unravels a high-stakes conspiracy threatening the very heart of Britain's nuclear deterrent, a Trident nuclear submarine.

The Singapore Grip (6 x 60), from Mammoth Screen adapted by Oscar -winning screenwriter Christopher Hampton from J.G. Farrell's classic novel, is an ambitious and exotic family saga set in colonial Singapore during World War Two. Featuring David Morrissey (The Missing, The Walking Dead) as rubber merchant Walter Blackett, Jane Horrocks (Little Voice, Absolutely Fabulous) as his wife Sylvia and Charles Dance OBE (Game of Thrones) as his business partner, it centres on a wealthy British family living a life of luxury which is slowly crumbling around them as the Japanese make their invasion.

Inspired by the short stories created by Anai s Nin, Little Birds (6 x 60'), from Warp Films and directed by Stacie Passon (The Affair, House of Cards), is set in Morocco in 1955 and centres on two very different women: troubled American heiress Lucy Savage (Juno Temple, Dirty John, Atonement, Vinyl) and the famous Moroccan dominatrix, Cherifa Lamour (Yumna Marwan, The Translator, One of These Days). Their lives, and those of their lovers - Hugo Cavendish-Smith (Hugh Skinner, Fleabag, Harlots) and Adham Abaza (Raphael Acloque, Mission Impossible, Humans, 24, Versailles) - become dangerously entangled in Tangier's International Zone'. Little Birds weaves together stories of private desire and public politics against a backdrop of hedonism and conflict, to deliver a modern tale of freedom and feminism.

Cattleya and Groenlandia's Romulus (10 x 60') is an ambitious drama that reconstructs the epic tale of Rome, as never told before. In the eighth century BC, a primitive and brutal world exists, where a man's fate is decided by the merciless power of nature and the gods. Romulus is the story of this world as seen through the eyes of three people marked by death, loneliness and violence. As these men and women learn how to shape their own destinies instead of passively suffering the whims of fate, a ferocious and protective female figure leads the formation of a new society - laying the foundations for one of the greatest Empires ever.

ITV Studios also proudly unveils a new slate of crime titles, including the true crime dramas Honour and Pembrokshire Murders, English crime procedural Grace as well as the European titles Voiceless and Thin Blue Line.

Honour (2 x 60' or 1 x 90') from Hera Productions is based on the heartbreaking true story of Banaz Mahmod, a young woman murdered by her family for falling in love with the wrong man. When DCI Caroline Goode (Keeley Hawes, Bodyguard), discovered that Banaz had been to the police five times to report threats to her life from members of her own family, she was appalled that her colleagues had missed multiple chances to prevent this so-called honour' killing. This powerful factual drama explores the fight to bring her killers to justice.

Based on the book by Detective Superintendent Steve Wilkins and Jonathan Hill,

The Pembrokeshire Murders (3 x 60', w/t) f

LINK:	https://www.itv.com/presscentre/press-releases/itv-studios-announces-n...
	See more stories from itv

Most recent headlines