Derren Brown’s Incognito to be shopped worldwide by ITV Studios

Derren Brown: Incognito is being made by Brown’s Vaudeville Productions

MIPCOM: ITV Studios (ITVS) has picked up the global distribution rights to Incognito, a new social-experiment format created by Derren Brown and produced by Vaudeville Productions for UK pubcaster Channel 4.

The deal is one of numerous agreements revealed by the UK producer and distributor as Mipcom gets underway in Cannes today.

Arte has boarded ITVS’s Downing Street-set comedy-drama Number 10 (Hartswood Films for Channel 4) as a coproducer, airing the show across France and Germany. The series has also been acquired by HBO Max for Australia, TVNZ in New Zealand, YLE in Finland, DR in Denmark and NRK in Norway.

Upcoming love story Adultery (Poison Pen Studios) has been pre-sold into 18 countries, including HBO Max in Australia, TVNZ, TV4 in Sweden and TV2 in Norway.

Serial-killer thriller The Dark, also from Poison Pen, has been picked up by TV4 Sweden, TV2 Norway, MTV3 in Finland, DR, BritBox for Australia, BBC Studios for New Zealand, and VMTV in Ireland.

Mystery thriller The Killings at Parrish Station (Helium Pictures for Stan in Australia) has been bought by Canal+ for the Czech Republic and Slovakia, TV4 Sweden, TV2 Norway, TV2 in Denmark and MTV3. Drama Tip Toe has been acquired by HBO Max for Latin America, covering 32 countries including Mexico, Argentina and Brazil.

ITVS has also added BBC drama Sherlock, which ran from 2010 to 2017 and stars Benedict Cumberbatch, to its third-party catalogue.

Finally, cold-case drama Karen Pirie, produced by World Productions and starring Lauren Lyle, has been renewed for a third season on ITV.

Ruth Berry, head of global partnerships and Zoo55 at ITVS, said it is business as usual while Sky’s £1.6bn deal to buy ITV’s broadcasting and streaming arm goes through regulatory review.

Berry told C21: “It’s quite easy to be distracted by everything that’s going on, but for now it’s a case of heads down and carrying on with the day job.

“The industry is definitely changing and it’s a good thing because we’re getting ourselves into a shape that the market needs us to be in. Certainly, the world of distribution has become complicated and experienced enormous change recently, which we’ve become quite used to.

“We’re seeing the rise of streamers and free-to-air broadcasters still being very relevant and having great cultural moments. As a distribution business we need to support and sell into all of those.”