Top Stories

SANTA MONICA: Ovation has put in place a three-week programming event, American Revolutionaries: The Hitmakers, which looks at some of pop music’s most influential artists. The event kicks off July 1 and runs through July 24. Justin Bua will host …

HONG KONG: Rising content acquisition costs are the number one concern for Asia Pacific pay-TV platforms, according to a CASBAA survey, followed by distribution costs and the regulatory environment. CASBAA notes that 71.4 percent of the respondents listed content costs are their …

EL SEGUNDO: DIRECTV Latin America has amassed more than 10 million customers, hitting the milestone eight weeks after posting its best-ever results in the first quarter, on top of a record year for subscriber growth and revenue for 2010. DIRECTV …

LOS ANGELES: Jane Lynch, an Emmy Award-winning actress whose credits include a starring role on Glee, as well as Party Down and The L Word, among others, is to host the 63rd Primetime Emmy Awards, which will air live from …

MADRID: De Agostini has picked up the publishing rights in Italy for the hit property Pocoyo from Zinkia Entertainment. The range of Pocoyo books are due to hit stores in Italy starting in September. The line will feature sticker books, …

BUDAPEST: Ivan Sevcik has been named country manager for HBO Czech Republic and Slovakia, while Ondrej Zach is being promoted to senior VP of programming and acquisitions for HBO Central Europe. Sevcik will be responsible for business operations in the …

LONDON: Camilla Lewis is to join Cineflix Productions as managing director in September, coming from a previous role as the head of factual features at talkbackTHAMES. Lewis will be tasked with increasing prime-time factual and factual-entertainment commissions from all the …

LOS ANGELES: Bunim/Murray Productions has extended its contract with executive VP Scott Freeman, while also promoting two development executives: Erin Cristall and Rachel Speiser. Freeman leads the development team at Bunim/Murray, a Banijay company. He has been with Bunim/Murray for …

NEW YORK: Scott Vila, whose credits include the development of 24, Dark Angel and Firefly, has been tapped to fill the newly created post of VP of current scripted programming at Syfy. Vila will be responsible for Warehouse 13, Haven …

LONDON: Zig Zag Productions has signed a partnership deal with Japanese creative agency Yoshimoto to collaborate on formats. Yoshimoto and Zig Zag will create and develop new formats that are principally targeted for the U.K. and international markets, but can …