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On Wednesday 20 November 2024, True Crime broadcasts Cold Cases Reopened!

Cold Call Killer Season 1 Episode 3 Episode Summary

The upcoming episode of “Cold Cases Reopened,” titled “Cold Call Killer,” promises to delve into a chilling story from 1990. This episode focuses on the life and tragic death of Sharon Gill, a woman who hoped for a fresh start that year. Unfortunately, her dreams are shattered when she is found brutally murdered in her own home.

Viewers will be taken back to a time when Sharon’s life was filled with promise. The episode will explore her background, the events leading up to that fateful day, and the impact her death had on her family and community. Investigators will revisit the case, uncovering new evidence and insights that could shed light on what happened to Sharon.

As the story unfolds, the show will highlight the challenges of solving cold cases and the importance of keeping memories alive.

AMC Networks’ Acorn TV and Channel 5 today announced the recommission of The Madame Blanc Mysteries, the much-loved crime drama created by and starring Sally Lindsay. The fourth season is currently in production.

Clapperboard and Saffron Cherry Productions (The World According to Grandpa) co-produce with Acorn Media Enterprises on board as an international distributor, holding exclusive rights worldwide except for the UK and Northern Ireland.

Photo Courtesy of Acorn TV

The Madame Blanc Mysteries Season 4 returns to the wonderful world of Sainte Victoire, packed with unusual antiques and objéts d’art, murder, mystery, sunshine, and laughter for seven episodes, including a Christmas special. Creator Sally Lindsay returns as Jean White, who is navigating a fledgling romance with her sidekick Dom Hayes, played by Steve Edge.

Co-writer Sue Vincent stars as mechanic Gloria Beaushaw, Robin Askwith and Sue Holderness reprise their roles as eccentric married couple Jeremy and Judith Lloyd James...

Exclusive: AMC Networks’ Acorn TV and Channel 5 are serving up a third season of The Madame Blanc Mysteries.

As with Season 2, the U.S./UK co-commissioners are preparing a Christmas special along with six episodes. Filming is currently underway, with the Christmas special set to air on Acorn TV and Channel 5 in 2023, while the rest of the season will continue in 2024.

Starring and created by Sally Lindsay, The Madame Blanc Mysteries sees renowned and respected antiques dealer Jean White (Lindsay) return with her expertise in the world of antiquities, proving to be the key to solving a series of murders and mysteries against the backdrop of the beautiful French village of Sainte Victoire.

Series creator, Lindsay, reprises her role and again joins forces with Sue Vincent (Mount Pleasant), who returns as Gloria Beaushaw and as series co-writer. Also reprising their roles are Steve Edge (Starlings), Robin Askwith (Strike), Sue Holderness...

Ben Frow, the man who has spent the past decade turning around the fortunes of Paramount-owned Channel 5, has labelled some shows on BBC One, BBC Two, ITV and Channel 4 “lazy,” “second-rate” and “mediocre.”

In a typically candid Royal Television Society Q&a session with Apple Europe Video boss Jay Hunt, who has run programing for BBC One, Channel 4 and Channel 5 in the past, Frow urged the UK’s Public Service Broadcasters to “ensure we do our very best to keep our viewers watching us” in the face of mega competition and rising budgets.

Including his own channel in this analysis, Frow said he “sometimes looks across the schedules and thinks ‘Is this the best we can really be?’.”

He went on to call some competitors’ shows “lazy,” “second-rate” and “mediocre” and said “99 out of 100 times I can tell when they won’t work.”

“Viewers aren’t stupid...

ITV Studios Strikes Major CBC Content Deal

ITV Studios has struck a major scripted and non-scripted content deal with Canadian network CBC as the London Screenings approaches. The deal includes BBC drama Showtrial from ITV Studios-backed Line of Duty producer World Productions, the second series of Kelsey Munro’s Bump, Paramount+’s Australian comedy Spreadsheet, adult animation Ten Year Old Tom and Swedish procedural Thin Blue Line. On the non-scripted side, CBC has taken British factual titles such as Paul O’Grady: For the Love of Dogs and The Queen Unseen. The Canadian network has also extended its deal to air ITV soap Coronation Street. “This is a top notch list of amazing scripted and factual titles from across the globe,” said Craig Bohland, ITV Studios’ Vice President Sales, Canada. The deal comes as ITV Studios gears up for next week’s London Screenings, which will feature major distributors pitching shows...

Throughout the 2021 Tokyo Olympics, Kevin Hart and Snoop Dogg have provided some bonus commentary for the Summer Games on the streaming service Peacock, with the duo interviewing athletes, recapping events and, most notably, doing play-by-play for sports they don’t understand.

In a segment called “Cold Call” uploaded Friday, the comedian and the rapper/budding play-by-play man first gave their insight into synchronized diving and then, hilariously, the equestrian event.

“The horse crip-walking! You see that? That’s sick,” Snoop Dogg joyfully announced as a horse pranced during the event.

Australian Thriller Gets North America Deal

Exclusive: Gravitas Ventures has acquired rights to Australian indie feature film Rage for VOD release in North America and a Vimeo On Demand release in Australia from February 23rd, 2021. Matt Theo (Night Shift), Hayley Beveridge (Dead Moon Circus) and Richard Norton (Mad Max: Fury Road) star in the film about a man who waked up after a violent home invasion to find that one of the attackers is still on the loose. Director is John Balazs and writer is Michael J. Kospiah. Producers are Marlane Ghmed and Vikki Blinks for Prima Lux Films in association with Adam La Rosa for La Rosa Productions.

Channel 5/Acorn TV Team For ‘The Reluctant Madame Blanc’

ViacamCBS network Channel 5 and AMC streamer Acorn TV have partnered on their second drama series together: The Reluctant Madame Blanc (working title). Produced by Clapperboard and Saffron Cherry Productions, the six-part...

In today’s Global Bulletin, WarnerMedia appoints Vanessa Brookman as head of kids for Emea, Discovery commissions two new unscripted series while Channel 5 gets a pair of dramas and the Göteborg Film Festival selects “Tove” as its opening film.

Appointment

WarnerMedia has announced that Vanessa Brookman will be promoted to the newly created position of head of kids for Emea, effective immediately.

The move brings, for the first time, all WarnerMedia’s operational, editorial and creative responsibilities for kids’ content and channel brands in the region under a single remit. The consolidated portfolio includes Cartoon Network, Boomerang, Boing and Cartoonito as well as digital properties on third-party and WarnerMedia streaming platforms.

Brookman will collaborate closely with Johannes Larcher and Christina Sulebakk at HBO Max to improve the platform’s offerings for kids before it launches across Emea markets.

A near-six-year vet at WarnerMedia, Brookman has worked in senior content,...

UK Indie Pic Sets Cast

Exclusive: Crissy Rock, Paul Barber and Kayleigh-Paige Rees will lead the cast of UK indie movie Kate & Jake. The pic is being helmed by Jack McLoughlin, his feature debut, and is based on the filmmaker’s own experiences of love and loss. It is privately funded and will shoot in the UK from January. Rees, known for her role in ITV drama Sanditon, is producing the project through her banner Raspberry Films alongside Thomas Griffiths, with Debbie Honeywood as executive producer. Rock is most recognized for her role as Maggie Conlan in the 1994 film Ladybird and is also a stand-up comedian and author. Barber is known for playing Denzil in Only Fools And Horses as well as his role as Horse in The Full Monty.

WarnerMedia Appoints Head Of Kids Emea

WarnerMedia has appointed Vanessa Brookman to the new role of Head of Kids Emea.

James Cameron To Appear At Wildscreen

Avatar director James Cameron is to headline the Wildscreen Festival 2020. Cameron will appear at the natural history event in conversation with BBC Studios’ Natural History Unit producer Orla Doherty. They will discuss his National Geographic series OceanXplorers (which is made by BBC Studios) and Secrets of the Whales. Cameron said: “I feel very much at home in the natural history film-making community, so I’m pleased to be joining everyone at Wildscreen to share some of my personal experiences working in the field.” Wildscreen takes place October 19-23.

Netflix Underway On ‘We Were Songs’

Netflix has rolled cameras on original film We Were Songs (Fuimos canciones), the Spanish-language project based on the two-part book series by Elísabet Benavent. Goya-nominated Juana Macías is directing from a screenplay by Laura Sarmiento. Production will take place in Madrid and Lisbon with producers Zeta Studios. María Valverde and Alex González lead the cast,...

Exclusive: Channel 5’s profit has dropped more than 30% after ViacomCBS’s restructure of its UK channel brands resulted in a £19.8M ($25.6M) programming write-down.

The British broadcaster’s operating profit fell to £27.4M in the 15 months to the end of December last year, compared with £39.9M in 2018, according to its annual earnings report. ViacomCBS extended Channel 5’s financial year after the CBS merger last year.

Channel 5 said the drop in earnings could largely be blamed on the content write-down, which followed Ben Frow reviewing ViacomCBS’s UK slate after he took control of the company’s channel brands, including Channel 5, Comedy Central, and MTV. The impact of the restructure was marked given that Channel 5’s write-down costs were only £2.1M in 2018.

Channel 5’s revenue rose 20% £452M last year — though this was a result of its accounting period being extended by three months. Like-for-like, Channel 5’s revenue was down 6.8% to £350.7M,...

Channel 5 Plans Feature-Length Princess Diana Film

ViacomCBS-owned Channel 5 has commissioned a documentary that will tell the inside story of Princess Diana’s explosive BBC Panorama interview in 1995, during which she was candid about her faltering relationship with Prince Charles. Diana: The Interview That Shocked The World will premiere on October 11 and is produced by Rogan Productions. Channel 5 commissioner Daniel Pearl said: “This is an incredibly compelling and empowering film, looking back at this iconic interview 25 years on, and shining a light on revelations that have never been uncovered before.”

My5 Signs Up AMC Channels

Channel 5 streamer My5 has struck a deal with AMC Networks International to launch CBS Reality and Horror Channel as branded channels on its service. The channels, a joint venture between ViacomCBS and AMC in the UK, will bring 400 additional hours of content to My5 over the next year, including original true-crime series Murder by the Sea...

Exclusive: Endemol Shine Group and ViacomCBS network Channel 5 have become the latest companies to sever ties with Kew Media Distribution (Kmd) as the embattled TV sales house edges closer to collapse.

Kmd was responsible for selling Agatha And The Curse Of Ishtar and Agatha And The Death of X (working title), a pair of Agatha Christie-inspired dramas Channel 5 commissioned from Endemol Shine producer Dsp. But Endemol Shine terminated the distribution deals last month and is in the process of handing the contracts over to Endemol Shine International.

The Agatha dramas formed part of a three-year co-production deal Kmd inked with Channel 5 in September 2018, under which the distributor fronted a chunk of the production fee on selected scripted projects in exchange for taking international rights. Channel 5 does not expect to draw on the financing arrangement again, meaning the deal is effectively dead.

Deadline understands that around six dramas were funded under the co-production agreement,...

Jill Halfpenny, Jonas Armstrong and Rupert Penry-Jones are to star in an identity thriller for British broadcaster Channel 5 from Noel Clarke and Jason Maza’s Unstoppable Film & Television.

The Drowning is the latest drama order for the ViacomCBS network, which has been aggressively ramping up its scripted slate with shows including Cold Call and Penance.

The Drowning starts when Jodie, played by Liar’s Halfpenny, catches sight of Daniel, played by newcomer Cody Molko, a teenage boy, she is convinced she has found her missing son. Whether she is right or not, in that moment her spark of hope is ignited and she commits to a dangerous and transgressive path that will take her to the edge of reason. How far will she go? How far would any of us go to find a missing child?

Since losing her son eight years ago, Jodie has been rebuilding her life...

Exclusive: Kew Media Distribution, the British sales arm of the beleaguered Canadian TV group Kew Media, is on the precipice of closure as it stares down the barrel of a winding-up order.

Kew Media Distribution represents high-profile shows including HBO’s Michael Jackson documentary Leaving Neverland, made by Amos Pictures, and World Productions’ hit BBC drama Line Of Duty. But after its parent company ran into trouble last year and was ordered to cease trading on the Toronto Stock Exchange, producers including Amos are fighting to claw back the money they are owed from the international sales of their shows.

Now, in a final attempt to recover cash, film distribution company 101 Films has served Kew Media Distribution with a winding-up petition. Such a move is seen as a last resort and, if successful, will result in Kew Media Distribution being liquidated and its assets being sold off. The legal...

In this week’s special Natpe: Miami International TV Newswire, Variety looks at the AVoD revolution through a new deal between Tubi and Mexico’s Azteca, ITV and Kew Media sell big across the Americas and two high-profile HBO Latin America series join Hulu Japan’s Latin American showcase.

Tubi and Azteca Presage AVoD Revolution

Tubi, the world’s largest AVoD (Advertising Supported Video on Demand) player, based out of San Francisco, signed this week a strategic partnership with Mexico’s broadcast network TV Azteca to launch a localized Spanish-language app.

As part of the deal, TV Azteca will sell ads on behalf of Tubi while promoting the service to the company’s audience across several platforms. Several of TV Azteca’s more popular titles will also be made available to Tubi members in Mexico, including: “Exatlón Mexico,” “MasterChef,” and “Lo que La Gente Cuente.”

That’s the deal. More will come.

Smithsonian Channel has been promoted from slot 99 to slot 57 on the Freeview television guide in the UK following the ViacomCBS merger. The channel will also launch on Viacom-owned British broadcaster Channel 5’s streaming service My5 in the coming weeks. “We are thrilled to deepen our footprint in the UK as it’s been truly inspiring to see Smithsonian Channel’s programming resonate so strongly with international audiences,” said Tom Hayden, president of Smithsonian Networks.

Italian broadcaster Mediaset Italy has acquired Netflix’s Spanish period drama Cathedral Of The Sea in a deal with Endemol Shine International. The eight-part show is based on the best-selling novel by Ildefonso Falcones and is produced by Diagonal Televisió, part of Endemol Shine Iberia, for Atresmedia Televisión, Televisió de Catalunya and Netflix. “Cathedral Of

The Sea is a powerful historical drama with huge emotions and great characters,” said Mark Lawrence, executive director Emea,...

Viacom’s UK network Channel 5 is plotting an adaptation of classic Welsh novel How Green Is My Valley and a new version of Oliver Twist and as it doubles down on its drama drive.

The broadcaster held a lavish event at London’s Renaissance Hotel in Kings Cross last night to showcase its latest slate and its recent talent drive.

C5’s Director of Programmes Ben Frow also revealed a number of new dramas, building on shows such as Cold Call, which is currently on air, Clink and The Decieved from Catherine The Great producer New Pictures.

How Green Was My Valley is a 1939 novel by Richard Llewellyn. It tells the story of a respectable mining family from South Wales through the eyes of son Huw Morgan. While Huw’s five brothers and father are coalminers, Huw’s academic ability set his apart and allows him to consider a future away from the mines.

Exclusive: Viacom’s British broadcaster Channel 5 is getting back into the drama business – commissioning a four-part psychological thriller – its first original drama order in four years.

The broadcaster has ordered Cold Call from Chalkboard TV. Written by Karyn Dougan-Buckland and Mark Buckland, Cold Call is a dark thriller, set in Manchester, detailing the story of a single mother caught up in a fraudulent cold call scam that threatens to see her life unravel.

It stars Sally Lindsay as June, a hard working mother left determined to salvage her family’s future after a phone call that changes her life. Following the death of her elderly mother and fuelled by a bubbling rage, June attempts to hunt down those responsible in order to seek her revenge.

The show was ordered by Channel 5 Commissioning Executive Sebastian Cardwell, who has lead the broadcaster’s charge to get back into the drama business,...