Dustin Hoffman - P 2013
Getty ImagesThe French production powerhouse behind Welcome to New York and Blue is the Warmest Color is launching a TV division dedicated to international series.
The company’s first production will be Medici: Masters of Florence from X-Files creator Frank Spotnitz and Oscar- and Emmy-nominated writer Nicholas Meyer, and starring Dustin Hoffman and Game of Thrones’ Richard Madden. The eight-part English-language series will follow the rise of the Medici family in the Italian Renaissance and be directed by Sergio Mimica-Gezzan (The Pillars of the Earth).
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Spotnitz will serve as exec producer alongside Luca and Matilde Bernabei (Coco Chanel) and produced by Lux Vide and Big Light Productions. The series has be pre-sold to RAI in Italy.
Four Seasons in Havana will be the second eight-part series, this time a Spanish-language adaptation from the books of Leonardo Padura. The show will be helmed by Goya-nominated Spanish director Felix Viscarret, produced by Tornasol Films and co-produced by Nadcom Productions.
Wild Bunch TV will provide co-production and financing, as well as distribution and marketing worldwide.
The television division of the company, co-founded by Vincent Maraval, will be headed up by Carole Baraton, who also handles international sales. Producer Georges Campana, behind films such as Kiefer Sutherland-starrer Paradise Found and the BAFTA-nominated mini-series The Promise, will assist with the launch of the TV division and serve as general strategy advisor.
“These two first series, by the strength of their subjects, of their characters and their environment, by the quality of the production and of the talents attached, are perfectly representative of the editorial line to be developed by Wild Bunch TV,” the company said in a statement released on Thursday.
The company has been expanding across Europe following its recent merger with Germany’s Senator in July 2014.
