HBO Max Sets Hungarian Version of ‘The Bridge’ – Global Bulletin

Naman Ramachandran
·6 min read

FORMAT

HBO Max in Hungary will stream a local version of hit survival reality format “The Bridge.” The competition sees participants tasked with building a 250-metre-long bridge to an island for the chance to win a large cash prize. Presented by Csaba Magyarósi, “The Bridge Hungary” is produced locally by Free Monkeys Production. This is the sixth adaptation of the format, which was created in Spain by Zeppelin, part of Banijay Iberia and has U.K., Brazil and Australia versions..

Banijay Rights struck multiple deals for the U.K. version with broadcasters in the Netherlands and across Africa and Latin America. The U.K. series also aired on HBO Max in the US, Latin America, and Asia.

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The Hungarian agreement was negotiated by Veronique Verges, senior VP German territories, Poland and Hungary, Banijay Rights.

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LA and London based production company The ATS Team have launched competition series “Clash of Trades.” A Youtube-based project for the USA’s Department of Defense and not-for-profit organization Global Learning Accelerator’s Project MFG, it is a tournament-style skills series that gets teams to participate in manfucaturing-inspired challenges in an attempt to take home $100,000.

“Clash of Trades is part of a new type of media that blends branded marketing commercial and original reality competition TV together,” said Mike Woodward, VP for development and production at The ATS Team. “ATS brought our storytelling and competition expertise to create a series that in part is entertaining to watch but also helps cover a more serious issue facing America’s trades workforce.”

Check out the series here: https://youtu.be/TqZJOeSN8Q4

APPOINTMENTS

Christine Diakos is joining Entertainment One as VP, development, unscripted – Canada, television, responsible for the development, creation and pitching of non-scripted content, with a focus on lifestyle, reality and competition series, reporting into Jocelyn Hamilton, president – Canada, television.

Diakos was previously senior VP of production and development at Big Coat Media, where she served as a supervising producer on “Love It or List It” (HGTV) and “Jillian and Justin” (W Network). Also reporting into Hamilton is Scott Boyd, who has been promoted to VP, development, unscripted, and will oversee factual, true crime, and docu-series content.

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Meanwhile, the Content Catalyst Fund has rebranded as Catalyst and has appointed a new development co-ordinator, Mithila Majithia, who will support the team as it embarks on a growth strategy, which includes the launch of a series of community connector events designed to build a global network of women creatives. Majithia joins Catalyst from Toronto-based production company Alibi Entertainment, where she served as business affairs co-ordinator on a range of popular shows, including “Carnival Eats,” “Sarah off the Grid” and “Titanic: The New Evidence.”

Catalyst’s new name and image is designed to simplify its brand proposition and position itself as a community for women creators. The company is focused on attracting women creators in non-scripted content, but will represent IP in all genres and at all levels of entertainment, including scripted, premium features and podcasts.

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Elsewhere, U.K. media executive search agency Ibison Talent Group (ITG) has hired Alexandra Fraser, former joint CEO of All3Media’s Maverick TV, in the newly created role of non-executive director, responsible for helping ITG achieve growth across its two divisions: executive search, placing leadership and transformational roles into media organizations; and artist management, management of on-screen talent. ITG puts leading talent into roles both on and off-screen.

SALES

About Premium Content has sold Icelandic drama “Blackport” to Topic in the U.S. and Canada, SBS in Australia, AMC Networks International Southern Europe in Spain and Portugal, RTS in Switzerland and TG4 in Ireland. It had been pre-sold to DR in Denmark, NRK in Norway, SVT in Sweden, and YLE in Finland.

“Blackport” (8 x 52’) is created by Gísli Örn Garðarsson (“Ragnarok”), Björn Hlynur Haraldsson (“Trapped”) and Nína Dögg Filippusdóttir (“Prisoners”) and is produced by Vesturport and Turbine Studios for Arte (France) and RÚV (Iceland).

Set in the 1980s in a small Icelandic fishing village, the story follows a married couple, who along with their friends build a small fishing empire thanks to the introduction of the fishing quota system in the country. But the struggle for power deeply corrupts the couple, resulting in a feud of jealousy, greed and betrayal.

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Scorpion TV has won the distribution rights to documentary “A President, Europe and War,” made for broadcaster France Télévisions by Guy Lagache and released by French producers Elephant, Miles and Breath Film. The 115-minute documentary centres on Emmanuel Macron’s attempts, as president both of France and the Council of the EU, to avert Putin’s invasion of Ukraine and provides an insight into his handling of the conflict in its first few months.

The film joins another new title in Scorpion’s ‘conflict’ catalogue: CIC Media’s “Secret Wars Uncovered” (10 x 44′), produced by Marlon Quintero for Sky History U.K. The 10-part series, which reveals the covert operations behind some of the deadliest conflicts in history, has already been picked up by TelevisaUnivision’s ViX, the Spanish-speaking streaming service that launched in March.

Scorpion has also sold CBC Canada’s “In Your Face,” which unpacks the intriguing science behind human facial recognition, to RTVE Spain, EBR in Estonia, SVT Sweden and YLE Finland; and documentary “The World’s Biggest Family,” in which a man with 600 half-siblings takes a hard look at the hidden costs of anonymous sperm donation and “Chile: A Wild Journey” (8 x 60′), which explores the fascinating creatures, some virtually unknown to science, to be found in the South American country, to VRT Belgium. The latter title has also been sold to Smithsonian Channel for the U.S. and Latin America.

Alienoid
“Alienoid”

FESTIVALS

The 17th London Korean Film Festival (Nov. 3-17) will open with the U.K. premiere of sci-fi box office hit, Choi Dong-hoon‘s “Alienoid,” starring Ryu Jun-yeol, Kim Woo-bin and Kim Tae-ri, with the director in attendance. The program includes some 35 films across strands including Cinema Now, After Dark: K-Horror, Indie Talents, Women’s Voices, Documentary, Shorts and Artist Video.

The Special Focus strand is dedicated to acclaimed actor Kang Soo-yeon, known internationally for Im Kwon-taek’s “The Surrogate Woman” (1987), for which she won best actress at the Venice Film Festival. The actor, who died earlier this year, also served as the co-chair of the Busan International Film Festival. Her co-chair Kim Dong-ho and director of the Korean Film Archive, Kim Hong-joon will be participating in the Forum event dedicated to Kang and the Korea’s cinema landscape of her era.

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Shocking Pink Endorphins, a short film festival created and curated by Laura Aimone, focusing on women in diverse sports, will take place in Venice Sept. 26-30. Films screened include “Kanya” (swimming); “Precious Leader Woman” (snowboarding); “Cold Sweat” (fusball); and “Not Alone” (ice climbing).

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