Hot Properties June 2020
June is normally one of the busiest months in the TV industry calendar, with trade events, screenings and conferences galore. Well, the coronavirus put paid to all that and buyers are now getting used to being pitched via Zoom and ‘attending’ digital screenings.
Reflecting the evolving needs of the market at this challenging time, C21 Digital Screenings publishes a Hot Properties playlist each month, unearthing hot new programmes from the world’s leading distributors that can refresh schedules and platforms worldwide.
On the Hot Properties playlist for this month, we have a broad selection of programmes chosen from all the new shows arriving on the C21 Digital Screenings platform. These range from historical miniseries like History channel drama Washington (3×120’) – from A+E Networks and focusing on America’s first president – to HBO Latin America’s drama The Business, which tackles entrepreneurial sex workers in Brazil.
More non-English-language drama comes in the shape of topical anthology series Games People Play (8×25’). From Russia’s Yellow Black & White, the show is about relationships during a pandemic. Japanese broadcaster Nippon TV’s Mr Hiiragi’s Homeroom (10×60’), meanwhile, is a thriller in which a teacher takes his students hostage 10 days before their graduation.
From France comes period crime drama La Garçonne (6×60’), marking distributor eOne’s first French-language acquisition. The series features a stand-out performance from Smet, an established leading star on French screens and also the daughter of rock musician Johnny Hallyday and actor Nathalie Baye.
Also in French but from French Canada is Happily Married (10×45’), shopped by Cineflix Rights. Made by Montreal’s Productions Casablanca for Radio-Canada’s streaming platform Tou.tv, the show tells the unlikely tale of Quebec’s most infamous criminal foursome.
Patria (8×60’), meanwhile, is a Spanish-language coproduction between HBO Europe and HBO Latin America, based on the novel of the same name by Fernando Aramburu. HBO Europe is handling international sales of the series – set in the Basque Country at the time when terrorist organisation ETA was active – after a strategic decision to bring distribution of its originals in-house.
For buyers interested in English-language dramas, we have New Zealand fantasy-adventure series The Dead Lands (8×60’). Produced by New Zealand’s GFC Films for AMC’s SVoD service Shudder and Kiwi pubcaster TVNZ, the show is distributed by NENT Studios UK (fka DRG).
The second season of Sky drama Brassic (6×60’) is also available, courtesy of ITV Studios. The show, from Bafta winner Danny Brocklehurst, is described as “an edgy and authentic original comedy” that “follows a group of working-class friends who find unconventional ways to win at life.”
On the unscripted side, take a look at Race Across the World S2 (9×60’) from All3Media International, in which five teams race from the top to the bottom of Latin America, and Drive’s Cash in the Spare Room (10×60’), a new renovation series featuring designer Sarah Moore and small spaces expert Max McMurdo.
Dynamo: Beyond Belief, meanwhile, is a 3×60’ series from Passion Distribution that combines jaw-dropping magic with the story of Dynamo’s road to recovery after the magician’s career was threatened by the onslaught of chronic arthritis. And Dying Alone, from Ruptly’s Documentary Collection, explores Japan’s elderly population and the number of people dying alone in their apartments.
Also for documentary buyers, the Hot Properties playlist for June includes Two Sisters One Body (1×60’), a Channel 4 coming-of-age story about a pair of conjoined twins, produced by Barcroft Studios and distributed by Banijay Rights.
For younger audiences, check out live-action series First Day (4×24’) from the Australian Children’s Television Foundation; animation Olobob Top (78×5’) from Cake; and wildlife-themed Kids Safari (36×15’) from West One International. Also take a look at goofball toon comedy Antiks (104×2’) from Singapore’s One Animation.
There’s also Emmy-nominated kids’ science series Operation Ouch! (100×26’), which comes from Serious Lunch and teaches children about the human body, and Covid & Corona, from Lygo Productions, which offers a humorous take on the pandemic for all the family.
Sony Pictures Television’s globe-trotting kids’ spy drama Alex Rider, from Sony-backed Eleventh Hour Films and adapted from Anthony Horowitz’s young-adult spy novels, is also on the playlist, as is ‘fang-tastic’ vampire drama Heirs of the Night (26×26’), from ZDF Enterprises.
Enjoy the Hot Properties playlist for June 2020!
Contact Hayley Salt to feature in next month’s Hot Properties Playlist.
