World Screen

BURBANK: Warner Bros, Entertainment has established a new division focused on exploiting its DC Comics brand and characters across feature films, television and other platforms, to be led by Diane Nelson.  Nelson will serve as president and CEO of DC Entertainment …

TORONTO: CCI Entertainment and Ambience Entertainment have completed a third season of the CGI animated sitcom Erky Perky, with an additional 26 episodes produced. Erky Perky is a comedy series based around two bug buddies, Erky and Perky. Erky hatches …

LOS ANGELES: Talk-show host Ellen DeGeneres has signed up to serve as the fourth judge on the upcoming ninth season of American Idol, following Paula Abdul’s exit from the hit FOX series. DeGeneres will sit alongside Simon Cowell, Randy Jackson …

SILVER SPRING: Discovery Communications has unveiled a landmark 60-episode, five-year documentary series exploring life’s big questions, to be overseen by the company’s founder and chairman, John Hendricks, for launch in 2011. Curiosity: The Questions of Our Life will tackle "fundamental questions and …

NEW YORK/LONDON: HISTORY and HISTORY HD will launch Czech-language services on UPC in the Czech and Slovak Republics, adding to the current roster of Central European territories carrying the channels that includes, among others, Poland, Hungary, Romania and Serbia. This …

LOS ANGELES: MarVista Entertainment has closed new deals for a number of its feature films and family entertainment titles, including pickups from Disney Australia and Asia. The feature Will You Merry Me went to SBS in Belgium and ProTV of …

LONDON: The FremantleMedia dating show Take Me Out has been adapted for Japan, where it will launch on Tokyo Broadcasting System (TBS) in an 11:30 p.m. weekly time slot. Take Me Out will be the first local adaptation of an …

LONDON: In an e-mail to BBC staff, the pubcaster’s director-general, Mark Thompson, called James Murdoch’s recent tirade against the organization and other attacks "out of touch" with what audiences are saying, while Michael Lyons, the chairman of the BBC Trust, …

NEW YORK: Several big-name advertisers, major media companies and media-planning agencies today formally unveiled the Coalition for Innovative Media Measurement (CIMM), which will explore new ways to measure audiences in today’s wherever, whenever content landscape. CIMM’s 14 founding members are Time …

PARIS: Richard Pinder, the COO for Publicis Worldwide, will deliver the advertising keynote speech at MIPCOM on October 5. His speech, “Contagious Ideas that Change the Conversation,” will look at how content providers and advertising agencies need to work closer …