World Screen

NEW YORK: SCI FI is joining forces with James Lassiter, Will Smith and Ken Stovitz through their venture, Overbrook Entertainment, for a two-hour back door pilot, tentatively titled Unfinished Business. The story of an ex cop, who, after a brain …

MOUNTAIN VIEW: The online video platform Ustream and Ashton Kutcher’s Katalyst Media are combining their content and technology offerings to bring live, interactive and original programming to audiences online. Katalyst, behind shows such as Punk’d and Beauty and the Geek, …

HONG KONG: Pay-TV broadcasters in the Asia Pacific will achieve revenues of $20 billion by 2013, according to a new report from Media Partners Asia, which also notes that the region will see between 20 million and 25 million net new …

BURBANK: Authentic Entertainment, a U.S.-based production outfit dedicated to nonfiction programming, has launched a new division, Authentic Digital, to support its new-media efforts.  The new division will focus on syndication of the company’s library titles and generating new revenues in …

EL SEGUNDO: DIRECTV’s The 101 Network has added the HBO dramas Deadwood and OZ to its Sunday night lineup, airing them commercial free beginning May 21. The shows were previously only available to HBO subscribers. Deadwood centers on the lives …

NEW YORK: The first three seasons of American Gangster, a new series from BET that spotlights notorious criminals, have been acquired by AETN International, which now holds the worldwide sales rights and will air the program on its Crime & …

MAINZ: Karoline Meichsner-Sertl has been appointed as the head of ZDF Enterprises’ legal and contract department. Meichsner-Sertl takes over from Tobias Könemann, who remains the head of personnel at the company. She was previously an in-house lawyer at Deutsche Welle. She also served stints …

LONDON/ABERDEEN: Tern Television has received a commission from Sky Real Lives for the 10×30-minute series Celebrity Parents’ SOS. Each episode of Tern’s new lifestyle format will feature a British household that needs assistance in the fundamentals of mending, cleaning, cooking and DIY. …

PALISADES PARK: Alfred Haber Distribution, Inc. (AHDI) has reached a deal with Nash Entertainment for the international distribution rights to the sixth season of the police reality series Most Shocking, which airs in the U.S. on truTV. AHDI now how has the …

LOS ANGELES: E! Entertainment Television has ordered an eight-episode series, The Lamas Family, from Mike Fleiss and Warner Horizon Television, as well as a new show from Ryan Seacrest Productions and Bunim-Murray Productions featuring two of the Kardashian sisters. From the producers of E!’s …