Top Stories

LONDON, June 9: FIVER has secured the rights to two celebrity-based observational reality series from E! in the U.S.: Living Lohan and Denise Richards: It’s Complicated. Living Lohan, from E! Entertainment Television, stars celebrity mom and manager Dina Lohan as …

TORONTO/BANFF, June 9: Shaftesbury Films has acquired Smokebomb Entertainment, a developer of original multiplatform digital content, with Smokebomb’s executive producers, Daniel Dales and Jarrett Sherman, heading up the newly created digital-media division. Smokebomb’s name remains intact and the company will …

AMSTERDAM/LONDON, June 9: Jetix Europe has inked an agreement with an affiliate of its majority shareholder, The Walt Disney Company, for the distribution of its channels and digital content across Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA), effective July 1. …

TORONTO, June 9: GlassBOX Television, the Canadian company that operates BITE TV, has received C$5 million in financing from several investors, including former Alliance Atlantis executive Ted Riley and ex-CHUM chief Jay Switzer. The series A financing, led by Toronto …

MONTE CARLO, June 9: The 48th Monte-Carlo Television Festival opened last night with the European premiere of the full-length television film Father, based on Andrei Platonov’s short story The Return. During the opening ceremony at Monte Carlo’s Grimaldi Forum, the …

STOCKHOLM, June 9: As part of an effort to ramp up its format development, Metronome Film & Television has named Johan Westman, previously with Sweden’s Channel 5 and Channel 9, as its development manager, effective September 1. In his new …

NEW YORK, June 9: In a deal valued at 70 million euros ($109.4 million), GE and NBC Universal’s Peacock Equity Fund, together with GMT Communications Partners (GMT), an independent European private-equity group, have acquired a majority stake in Bigpoint, a …

LOS ANGELES, June 9: Toei Animation will roll out a range of animated content online, with Slam Dunk and Fist of the North Star scheduled to launch this month. Each series will be available for download on IGN.com’s Direct2Drive section. …

NEW YORK, June 9: As the Licensing Show kicks off in New York tomorrow, the International Licensing Industry Merchandisers’ Association (LIMA) has revealed that of the $5.98 billion in royalty fees paid for licensed products in North America in 2007, …

TORONTO, June 9: Cookie Jar Entertainment is set to launch a trading-card game based on its multiplatform property Magi-Nation, brought to the market by 3 Point Entertainment. The trading-card game, set to launch later this year, will allow players to …