Five Secures Rights to Neighbours

LONDON, May
18: Five has beat out the BBC in acquiring the British rights to the hit
Australian soap Neighbours from FremantleMedia Enterprises.

Neighbours will premiere on Five’s main channel and digital
offering Five Life in 2008. Airing on Australia’s Network Ten for over 20
years, Neighbours is one of Australia's most successful television
programs. The drama was launched in the U.K. in 1986, and is the BBC’s highest rated daytime show.

Lisa
Opie, Five's managing editor of content, commented: "I'm delighted Five
has secured such a popular and sought after series. Neighbours is quite rightly much loved by its
many fans and it will be a greatly prized part of our schedule and suitably
cherished by us.”

Five has also announced
that it will launch Payday, a
new prime-time weekday quiz show produced by TwoFour Productions, on May 29 at
6:30 p.m. Hosted by award-winning DJ Colin Murray, the show gives eight players
the chance of winning one of their fellow contestants’ annual salaries. Each
player—who knows nothing about each other’s lives—tries to identify
the high earners from the low earners in order to pocket the most money. The
executive producers of the series are Stuart Murphy and Melanie Leach and the
series producer is Simon Horne.

Alex Menzies, Five’s
deputy commissioning editor of features and entertainment, said: “We’re all
intrigued by the incomes of others—and equally you just can’t help but
have an opinion when it comes to what a stranger might do for a living or who
might earn the big bucks. Every game tests whether players are right to judge a
book by its cover and it’s this compelling twist, the life-changing cash prize
and the general knowledge element which make Payday such an exciting format for
Five.”