{"id":26352,"date":"2023-12-07T10:25:50","date_gmt":"2023-12-07T15:25:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dev2.worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/actf-sends-hardball-japan\/"},"modified":"2023-12-07T12:26:27","modified_gmt":"2023-12-07T17:26:27","slug":"actf-sends-hardball-to-japan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/actf-sends-hardball-to-japan\/","title":{"rendered":"ACTF Sends Hardball to Japan"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Japan\u2019s NHK has picked up both seasons of the live-action children\u2019s series <em>Hardball<\/em> from the Australian Children\u2019s Television Foundation (ACTF).<\/p>\n<p>The comedy tells the story of a boy who moves from New Zealand to Western Sydney and finds himself in the thick of the ultra-competitive world of schoolyard handball. It will premiere on NHK linear channels and NHK Plus in April 2024.<\/p>\n<p><em>Hardball<\/em> is produced by Northern Pictures for Australia\u2019s ABC, with production funding from Screen Australia, Create NSW and the ACTF.<\/p>\n<p>It has sold to broadcasters in 19 territories globally, including the BBC (U.K.), France T\u00e9l\u00e9visions (France), ARD HD (Germany) and Clan TV\/RTVE (Spain).<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt was in 2020 that I first came across and fell in love with <em>Hardball<\/em> when it won the NHK Japan Prize for best program in the primary age category,\u201d said Takako Hayashi, senior producer of Content Value Development Centre at NHK. \u201cI made it my mission to show it to Japanese children and let them make friends with Mikey and his colorful mates, and now my dream has come true. Mikey and his friends never lose the ability to laugh at themselves, even when they face difficulties and obstacles, and I believe their resilience will be a wonderful influence not only on children but also grown-ups in Japan.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Bernadette O\u2019Mahony, executive producer at ACTF, said, \u201c<em>Hardball<\/em> is a warm, funny and engaging series that has resonated with audiences worldwide thanks to its themes of friendship and resilience, along with a wonderful cast of endearing characters. We know that audiences in Japan will fall in love with Mikey, Tiffany, Salwa and Jerry and enjoy their hilarious exploits as much as we do.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Japan\u2019s NHK has picked up both seasons of the live-action children\u2019s series Hardball from the Australian Children\u2019s Television Foundation (ACTF).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1412,"featured_media":26353,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pmpro_default_level":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[21],"tags":[1859,717,412,411,7221,8836,3863,2052,8837,3864,2866,8838],"class_list":["post-26352","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","","category-top-stories","tag-abc","tag-abc-australia","tag-actf","tag-australian-childrens-television-foundation","tag-bernadette-omahony","tag-create-nsw","tag-hardball","tag-nhk","tag-nhk-plus","tag-northern-pictures","tag-screen-australia","tag-takako-hayashi","pmpro-has-access"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v21.7 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>ACTF Sends Hardball to Japan - TVKIDS<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/actf-sends-hardball-to-japan\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"ACTF Sends Hardball to Japan - TVKIDS\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Japan\u2019s NHK has picked up both seasons of the live-action children\u2019s series Hardball from the Australian Children\u2019s Television Foundation (ACTF).\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/actf-sends-hardball-to-japan\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"TVKIDS\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2023-12-07T15:25:50+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2023-12-07T17:26:27+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/9\/2017\/07\/ACTF-Hardball-1223.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"600\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"314\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Jamie Stalcup\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Jamie Stalcup\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"1 minute\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/actf-sends-hardball-to-japan\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/actf-sends-hardball-to-japan\/\",\"name\":\"ACTF Sends Hardball to Japan - TVKIDS\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2023-12-07T15:25:50+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2023-12-07T17:26:27+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/#\/schema\/person\/0da12602224807cc7b179b8405018deb\"},\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/actf-sends-hardball-to-japan\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/actf-sends-hardball-to-japan\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/actf-sends-hardball-to-japan\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"ACTF Sends Hardball to Japan\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/\",\"name\":\"TVKIDS\",\"description\":\"\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/#\/schema\/person\/0da12602224807cc7b179b8405018deb\",\"name\":\"Jamie Stalcup\",\"description\":\"Jamie Stalcup is the executive editor of World Screen. 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