Mark Fennessy’s Last King of the Cross greenlit for season two by Paramount+

True crime series Last King of the Cross

Paramount+ has commissioned a second season of the Last King of the Cross, Mark Fennessy’s big budget, true crime series produced by his independent Oz-based production house, Helium.

Launched last year with an estimated production budget of AUD$50m (US$33.48m), the first season has been sold via distributor Cineflex Rights to Sky UK, Ireland, Italy and Germany. The series has also been picked up by Paramount+ in Canada and Warner Bros Discovery in New Zealand.

Helium founder and chief creative officer Fennessy described the new chapter as bigger, bolder and even more action-packed.

The project was a creative lynchpin for Fennessy who started development of the TV adaptation of the book, written by key protagonist and notorious Australian underworld identity John Ibrahim, while he was still at Endemol Shine Australia and took it with him as a flagship project for Helium Pictures, launched in 2021.

Series one, featuring a cast of local emerging talent and Tim Roth, covers the rise of the Ibrahim family in the nightclub scene of Sydney in the 1980s and 1990s.

Paramount+ revealed that season two would explore the underworld and queer scene of Australia’s Kings Cross, against a backdrop of the ecstasy-laced 2000s.