Development News - June 28, 2018
Amazon's College, Panic & The Wilds; and HBO's The Righteous Gemstones & Watchmen.
AMAZON NEW PILOT ORDERS
- COLLEGE (Drama) - Written by Marja-Lewis Ryan (6 Balloons). Executive produced by Ryan, Channing Tatum, Jill Soloway, Andrea Sperling, Reid Carolin and Peter Kiernan. Produced by Free Association and Topple Productions. Logline: Digs beyond the headlines that make college campuses ripe for drama and steps inside the shoes of six roommates as they hook up, mess up and grow up on their own terms.
- PANIC (Drama) - Written by Lauren Oliver based on her book of the same name. Executive produced by Oliver, Joe Roth, Jeff Kirschenbaum and Elle Triedman. Co-executive produced by Alyssa Altman and Lynley Bird. Produced by Roth Kirschenbaum Films and Glasstown Entertainment. Logline: Brings viewers to a forgotten rural town where every year the graduating seniors risk their lives in an illegal, high-stakes game to win life-changing money - and a chance to escape. Anonymous judges force the players through a series of challenges that will compel them to confront their deepest fears - and upend their ideas of who they are, who to trust, and who they might become. This year, 47 players will compete for the biggest pot ever. All of them will be changed. Only one will win.
- THE WILDS (Drama) - Written by Sarah Streicher (Daredevil). Executive produced by Streicher and Jamie Tarses. Produced by ABC Signature, Fanfare Entertainment and Dylan Clark Productions. Logline: A group of teenage girls from radically different backgrounds find themselves stranded on a remote island, unaware that they have just become the subjects of an elaborate social experiment. Part survival drama, part dystopic slumber party, the series explores the past and present struggles of these young women, offering up a vivid portrayal of what it means to grow up female in our time - whether you are lost in the wilderness or not.
HBO's WATCHMEN
- Tom Mison, Frances Fisher and Jacob Ming-Trent have joined the cast of the drama pilot starring Jeremy Irons and Regina King. Mison starred for four seasons in FOX's Sleepy Hollow. Fisher starred for two seasons in ABC's Resurrection. Ming-Trent starred in Showtime's short-lived comedy White Famous.
- Like with all previous casting on the pilot written by Damon Lindelof, no details were immediately confirmed about the characters they will be playing.
HBO NEW PILOT ORDER
- THE RIGHTEOUS GEMSTONES (Comedy, Single Camera) - Starring Danny McBride (Vice Principals) and John Goodman (Roseanne). Written and directed by McBride. Executive produced by McBride, Jody Hill and David Gordon Green. Produced by Rough House Pictures. Logline: The story of a world-famous televangelist family with a long tradition of deviance, greed and charitable work, all in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ.
- Goodman will play Eli Gemstone, the patriarch of the Gemstone family. He is unbending and a force in the ministry game. He's known over the world for his aggressive salvation techniques, his worldwide ministries and his award-winning weekly television program. His light is fading, but he takes no guff. He is obeyed, unquestioned.
- McBride will play Jesse Gemstone, the eldest son and heir to the throne. He walks in his father's shadow while simultaneously blazing his own path. Like Eli, he takes no shit and demands loyalty from those in his circle and surrounds himself by those who will follow him. Jesse fancies himself a maverick in the ministry game, taking what Eli has built and expanding it for a more modern audience.
