News

The Just For Laughs Comedy Festival has unveiled its list of top up-and-coming comedians in New York, Los Angeles and elsewhere, who are set to participate in the New Faces of Comedy showcase later this week. The event is a traditional launch pad for major Hollywood talent like Kevin Hart, Amy Schumer, Kumail Nanjiani and Jimmy Fallon.

The success of their careers makes New Faces the industry’s biggest coming-out party for rising stand-up talent serious business. Young hopefuls eyeing Hollywood development deals grab the microphone at Just For Laughs in Montreal to draw laughter from a club audience as Los Angeles talent scouts, comedy agents and managers, TV execs and club bookers look on.

No pressure there. Abbott Elementary creator Quinta Brunson, who will receive the best comedy person award at the Just For Laughs ComedyPro conference later this week, was part of the New Faces comic discovery program in 2017.

Over three days,...

Exclusive: UK production company Mad As Birds (Mab) — best known for pics such as Six Minutes to Midnight, Poms, The Vanishing, and The Almond And The Seahorse — has landed a major cash injection from a private investor as it sets out a diverse slate of projects for the Cannes market.

We understand the investment is around the seven-figure mark. The investor, whose identity has been kept private, approached the UK-based indie headed by Celyn Jones, Andy Evans, and Sean Marley with the unique deal, which is set to supercharge the company’s work across film and TV, with several Mab projects heading to the Cannes market this week.

New Mab film projects hitting the market include:

Call Girls

Directed by veteran British filmmaker Catherine Morshead, the film comes from a screenplay by writers Paul Coleman and Brennan Reece. Coleman is the BAFTA-winning writer behind the BBC comedy Car Share,...

In today’s Global Bulletin, the BBC unveils “Dodger,” a new Dickens-inspired drama series with an all-star cast; U.K. comedy royalty recognizes Jenna Al as the head of the next generation of writer-performers with the Screenshot award; Keshet Productions in Israel and Twickenham Film Studios in the U.K. get makeovers with new rebrandings; Canada’s Black Screen Office and Telefilm Canada unite to improve the quality of minority representation in the country’s screen industries; Channel 4 commissions an anti-vaxx documentary; English soccer favorite Peter Crouch and the BBC prep a daily European Championship entertainment program; All3Media International deals “Too Close” abroad; Spanish golfing great Severiano “Seve” Ballesteros Sota gets the documentary treatment; and Warner Bros. International Television Production appoints Bruno Henriquet to lead operations in France.

Series

Christopher Eccleston (“Doctor Who”), David Threlfall (“Shameless”), Billy Jenkins (“The Crown”) and Saira Choudhry (“Hollyoaks”) are set to star in “Dodger,...