Sky Studios inks multi-year partnership with Fremantle's The Apartment

Sky Studios and Fremantle's The Apartment have today announced a new multi-year development and production partnership. Under the deal, Sky Studios will provide development funding for a minimum of three shows alongside a commitment to produce.

Lorenzo Mieli, a co-founder of Fremantle's Wildside and producer behind hit shows such as The Young Pope and My Brilliant Friend , became the CEO of The Apartment in January 2020. The newly formed label is a subsidiary of global production and distribution giant Fremantle, which expanded its footprint in Italy by setting up The Apartment. This new label will focus on the creation and development of global drama produced with international talent behind and in front of the camera.

The deal strengthens the relationship between Sky and Lorenzo Mieli who has produced a number of international hits for Sky and HBO including Paolo Sorrentino's recently aired The New Pope and Luca Guadagnino's We Are Who We Are.

Working together, Sky Studios and The Apartment will focus on the creation and development of high-end global drama with a uniquely European sensibility.

Gary Davey, CEO, Sky Studios: Over the past few years, we have developed a strong creative partnership with Lorenzo Mieli and the time is now right for both The Apartment and Sky Studios to take our creative ambition to the next level. Lorenzo has a proven track record in bringing viewers sophisticated, international drama, working with world-class talent on both sides of the camera. I am excited about the projects we already have in the pipeline and can't wait to bring them to Sky's 24m customers in Europe and beyond.

Lorenzo Mieli, CEO The Apartment: Signing this contract is first of all a beautiful way to seal a long-standing and much-valued professional relationship between myself, Gary Davey and Sky. Years of work with a company and with people who have an enlightened and enlightening vision of our sector. Together we turned the idea of producing high quality international series from Europe into a concrete reality, creating a new scenario in a constantly evolving market. For these reasons I am so proud that this agreement with Sky Studios is the first we announce for The Apartment, in the evolving content market we are living in it is crucial to work with partners that share our same creative vision."

Contact:

James Rickard

James.Rickard@fremantle.com

Daniela DAntonio

daniela.dantonio@fremantle.com

Harrison Kelly

Harrison.Kelly@sky.uk

Notes to editors:

About Sky Studios

Sky Studios brings to screen unique stories from the very best talent in Europe.

We develop, produce and fund original drama, comedy and documentary for Sky's 24m customers and beyond, with 52 scripted shows already in production. Building on the success of critically-acclaimed Sky originals including Emmy-nominated Chernobyl, Bafta-winning Patrick Melrose and international hits Babylon Berlin and Riviera, Sky Studios is the new creative home of Sky originals, such as The Third Day with Jude Law, ZeroZeroZero from the makers of Gomorrah and The New Pope directed by Academy Award-winning director Paolo Sorrentino.

We're an agile Studio, seeking out the best untold stories from new voices while working in creative partnership with today's best writers, producers and on-screen talent to bring viewers stories they wouldn't find anywhere else.

With commissioning talent and production capability across the UK, Germany and Italy, we understand local tastes across Europe better than anyone else and have plans to more than double our investment in original content by 2024, fully supported and backed by Comcast NBC Universal.

We're also developing a new TV and movie studio, Sky Studios Elstree, which is expected to lead to the creation of over 2,000 new jobs and generate an additional £3 billion of production investment in UK creative sector in the first five years alone.

Sky Studios invests in the cultural economy and global production sector with equity stakes in nine production companies in the UK and the US, including Great British Bake-Off creator Love Productions, and the premiere reality crime producer in the US, Jupiter Entertainment, creator of long-running hit Snapped. Sky Studios has invested in high quality factual specialists Blast Films and True North Productions; entertainment and format expert Znak & Co (US & UK); natural history producer True to Nature; and growth businesses Sugar Films, Chrysalis Vision, and Talos Films (US).

Sky Studios launched in June 2019. The senior leadership team is Chief Executive Officer Gary Davey, Chief Commercial Officer Jane Millichip, Chief Finance Officer Caroline Cooper, Director of Drama UK Cameron Roach, Director of Comedy UK Jon Mountague, Director Original Production Sky Italia Nils Hartmann, and Marcus Ammon.

About The Apartment / Fremantle

The Apartment is a company founded in 2020 by Lorenzo Mieli within the Fremantle group. The company focuses on the creation and development of global scale TV series and feature films by investing in IP acquisition, exclusive deals with International level talent and writers. The Apartment will position itself on the market as an incubator of major projects that are developed and financed, and then physically produced by a network of partner production companies.

In its initial slate, The Apartment has co-produced with Wildside Paolo Sorrentino's The New Pope, Saverio Costanzo's, My Brilliant Friend - The Story of a New Name, and Luca Guadagnino's upcoming We Are Who We Are, and will also develop any follow-up.

The Apartment is led by Lorenzo Mieli, Founder and CEO and is 100% owned by Fremantle.

Fremantle is one of the largest and most successful creators, producers and distributors of scripted and unscripted content in the world. From Got Tale

LINK:	https://www.skygroup.sky/en-gb/article/sky-studios-inks-multi-year-par...
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