Mark Heap & More Join ITVX Drama ‘Significant Other’
Mark Heap (Friday Night Dinner, Spaced), Kéllé Bryan (Me and Mrs Jones) and Shaun Williamson (EastEnders, Extras) are among cast added to ITVX comedy Significant Other. Katherine Parkinson (The IT Crowd, Here We Go) and Youssef Kerkour (Stay Close) have already been announced as leads on the show, which is from ITV Studios-owned Quay Street Productions. Further cast unveiled today includes Ben Bailey Smith, Sue Vincent, Olivia Poulet and Will Ash. The series follows the “unromantic romance of two people whose drastic, but fateful, first meeting turns their lives around.” Based on Yes Studios’ Israeli series of the same name, it is currently filming in Manchester, UK and will debut on upcoming streaming service ITVX in 2023. ITV Studios has international distribution rights.
‘Drag Race’ On Starting Grid In Asia
Veteran distributor Gary Pudney’s O4 Media has struck a deal to represent World of Wonder’s Drag Race format across Asia, in territories including Thailand, India, Japan, Singapore and South Korea. The drag competition format has already been adapted in the UK, France, Italy, Canada, Spain, Australia and New Zealand after beginning life in 2009 on U.S. channel Logo TV. O4 will also take spin-off format Secret Celebrity Drag Race into Asia. This sees celebrities attempt to pull off lip sync performances while hiding their true identities behind drag personas.
‘Candyman’ And ‘Elm Street’ Actors Join ‘What Happened To Dorothy Bell?’
EXCLUSIVE: Writer/director Danny Villanueva Jr.’s horror feature What Happened to Dorothy Bell? has added Michael Hargrove and Lisa Wilcox as supporting cast. Billed as a “nightmarish coming-of-age found footage horror,” follows Ozzie Gray (Asya Meadows) as she video documents her investigation into the traumatic events from her early childhood that involved her late grandmother, Dorothy Bell. Hargrove will play her father, while Wilcox will play a trauma therapist. Hargrove most recently played the Candyman, Sherman Fields, in the Jordan Peele-produced Candyman last year, while Wilcox starred in Nightmare on Elm Street‘s fourth and fifth films. Steven Alonte (The Cathedral), Sargon Odicho, Arlene Arnone, and J. Anthony Ramos also star. Production begins early 2023 in the Chicago area under I Dream of a Psychopomp director Villanueva’s independent production company, How Bizarre Pictures.
Nippon TV To Launch ‘Vocals Like Locals’, ‘First Kiss Boys’ At ATF
Japan’s Nippon TV is launching two new formats at the upcoming Asia TV Forum & Market (ATF) in Singapore – unscripted show Vocals Like Locals and scripted series First Kiss Boys and First Kiss Ladies. Vocals Like Locals is a reality singing competition in which contestants sing a local hit from their favorite foreign country, trying to sound like a native, while not necessarily even speaking the local language. Celebrity judges select a winner, who will have the chance to meet the singer of their favorite local hit. Targeted at Gen-Z audiences, First Kiss Boys is a ten-episode, half-hour drama series that will be followed by dating show mockumentary, First Kiss Ladies, which will intersect with the drama series through a crossover story. First Kiss Boys follows a schoolboy who moves to a new school shortly after receiving his first kiss from a young girl whom he later discovers is starring in a dating reality show.