Fox 21 Television Studios has signed a first-look deal with The Gotham Group, producer of the Maze Runner movie trilogy.
Under the multiyear deal, the Disney Television Studios unit will have first crack at projects for linear and streaming platforms created by Gotham, which is headed by founder and CEO Ellen Goldsmith-Vein. Gotham Group partner Jeremy Bell and vp television D.J. Goldberg are also key players in the pact.
“We couldn’t be more excited to work with Bert Salke and his extraordinary team of executives at Fox 21,” Goldsmith-Vein said Thursday in a statement. “They have an unsurpassed record of successfully launching and supporting television projects that speak to the zeitgeist and create a conversation. After working with them on so many projects over the past decade, it’s a dream come true to now officially be partners moving forward.”
Said Salke, “Getting in business with The Gotham Group was a huge priority for me and everyone at Fox 21. Ellen Goldsmith-Vein is incredibly impressive, she’s smart, aggressive and a real force creatively. She has spectacular taste in material and talent alike, and her company has a wealth of deep and meaningful relationships in the publishing world. We’re really excited about this deal.”
The Gotham Group produced the Maze Runner movies and is also behind the Disney+ film Stargirl, which is set to premiere March 13 on the streamer. The management and production company’s other credits include the Netflix movie Kodachrome and the upcoming films Sorta Like a Rock Star, starring Auli’i Cravalho, and the animated Wendell & Wild from Jordan Peele and Henry Selick. Gotham is also producing USA’s pilot Masters of Doom with UCP and developing Washington Black at Hulu with Fox 21’s sister studio 20th TV, executive producer Sterling K. Brown, writer Selwyn Seyfu Hinds and director Anthony Hemingway.
Fox 21 is home to FX’s Pose, Mayans MC and American Crime Story (all with FX Productions); USA’s Queen of the South; National Geographic’s Genius anthology; and the FX on Hulu pilot The Old Man, starring Jeff Bridges, among other series.
WME and Nelson Davis brokered the deal on behalf of The Gotham Group.
