CBS Adapting A League of Their Own

CBS has ordered a sports comedy entertainment series based on A League of Their Own, the BAFTA-winning U.K. series currently in its 14th season on Sky, with Keegan-Michael Key on board to host the U.S. treatment.

The U.S. version will be hosted by Key, an Emmy and Peabody Award-winning actor, writer and producer, and will feature tennis champion and entrepreneur Venus Williams and New England Patriots Super Bowl champion Rob Gronkowski as team captains. Actor and comedian Bobby Lee (Mad TV, Tiger Belly) and Emmy Award-winning writer Ian Karmel (The Late Late Show with James Corden) will serve as comedian panelists.

To be titled Game On!, the series is produced by Eye Productions and Fulwell 73 Productions with CPL Productions, a Red Arrow Studios company. Executive producers for Fulwell 73 Productions are Ben Winston, James Corden and Emma Conway with David Taylor, Murray Boland and Danielle Lux serving as executive producers for CPL Productions. Gronkowski, Elle Key, Keegan-Michael Key, Henry Penzi and Williams also serve as executive producers.

“We are so delighted to be making this show with CBS,” said Winston. “We couldn’t have found a better host and partner in Keegan, and I can’t wait to see Gronk and Venus as we’ve never seen them before, going head to head in some epic yet ridiculous battles.”

The A League of Their Own format is distributed globally outside of the U.S. and Canada by Red Arrow Studios International.

Equal parts comedy and game show, the series pits two teams of three, captained by Williams and Gronkowski, with comedians Lee and Karmel and a rotating mix of sports stars, comedians and celebrities, against one another. The teams will go head to head in over-the-top physical challenges—from seeing who can dunk the most basketballs over a tank of water while harnessed on a bungee cord, to taking on a sumo wrestler in the ring. They will also have their sports-related knowledge tested with trivia questions.