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On Thursday, August 15, 2024, GMA3: What You Need to Know welcomes actor Mike Colter, U.S. Mint director Ventris C. Gibson, and podcast host Kelly Senyei to the show. Mike Colter, known for his roles in Halo and Murder City, joins the show to discuss his latest role in the third season of Paramount+ series […]

GMA3: Mike Colter, Ventris C. Gibson, Kelly Senyei...

Village Roadshow Entertainment Group is staying in business with Kevin Garnett.

The company has extended its first-look deal with Garnett’s Content Cartel. The move will see it join the partnership between Content Cartel and Bill Maher’s podcast network Club Random Studios to develop films and series from its podcast content.

Village Roadshow struck its first-look deal with NBA legend Garnett in 2021 to develop and produce feature films, scripted and unscripted TV, and digital content. Garnett set up the company with Brian Bennett and Mike Marangu.

The deal has already generated series including Goliath about Wilt Chamberlain, features such as Cinnamon with Pam Grier and Damon Wayans and Murder City starring Mike Colter.

Club Random Studios was founded by Maher, Chris Case, and Chuck Labella to house, finance, and develop celebrity-hosted podcasts. The company launched a partnership in March with Garnett for Kg Certified, the Content Cartel podcast hosted by Garnett,...

Village Roadshow Entertainment Group has renewed its production partnership with Content Cartel Production Studios, NBA legend Kevin Garnett’s film and TV banner.

In late 2021, Garnett’s Content Cartel inked a first-look development deal with Village Roadshow to cover scripted and unscripted projects for television, film and digital. The new and expanded deal includes Village Roadshow joining a new collaboration between Content Cartel and Bill Maher’s podcast network, Club Random Studios.

The new arrangement will see Village Roadshow look to develop films and series from podcast content stemming from that Content Cartel and Club Random partnership.

Village Roadshow and Content Cartel have already jointly worked on projects like Goliath, the docuseries about basketball icon Wilt Chamberlain for Showtime, and movies like Cinnamon, a crime-thriller starring Pam Grier and Damon Wayans, and Murder City, starring Mike Colter and directed by Michael D. Olmos. Both features were produced for Tubi as...

“Cinnamon” and “A Song From the Dark” were two of the big winners at the Best of the ABFF Awards presented Saturday during the American Black Film Festival.

Following its world premiere at the Tribeca Festival, “Cinnamon” continued its festival run at ABFF in Miami Beach, Fla., where it was awarded the prize for best narrative feature and best director for writer-director Bryian Keith Montgomery Jr.

The Tubi original film stars Hailey Kilgore, Damon Wayans, Pam Grier, David Iacono and Jeremie Harris. Kilgore plays Jodi, a struggling small-town gas station attendant with “killer pipes and big dreams,” who falls hopelessly in love with a hustler (Iacono) and falls foul of a local crime lord (Grier) and her murderous family. The noir thriller serves as the inaugural project filmed under Village Roadshow Pictures’ Black Noir Cinema banner, with Fox Entertainment Studios, co-founded by NBA all-star Kevin Garnett. Veteran producer Oz Scott oversees the content slate,...

Tubi opens June with an intense WWII drama “Inglourious Basterds.” Allied officer Lt. Aldo Raine (Brad Pitt) assembles a team of five tough Jewish soldiers to spread fear throughout the Third Reich. They have one assignment: assassinate Nazi leaders. Quentin Tarantino wrote and directed the unconventional war drama. Eli Roth, Melanie Laurent, and Christopher Walz co-star.

Watch the trailer of “Inglourious Basterds”:

The network is also streaming the original documentary “Mystery Unsolved: The Adnan Syed Story” on June 7. The murder of teenager Hae Min Lee was the focal point of a “Serial” podcast, which questioned if boyfriend Syed was her killer. After serving 22 years in prison, Syed was released, still proclaiming his innocence. Now, he may return.

Another streamer original, “Magic Carpet Rides,” arrives June 14. It centers on a social influencer torn between sharing her budding romance or honoring her boyfriend’s request to keep their life private.

Check...

Village Roadshow Entertainment has made a wave of additions and promotions with Nic Gordon being elevated to Vice President of Feature Film for Village Roadshow Pictures (Vrp), and Anne MacKay is being named as a Creative Executive at Vrp. Elizabeth Elliott joins Vreg as Executive Vice President of Business Affairs. Gordon and MacKay will report to Jillian Apfelbaum and Tristen Tuckfield, Vrp’s Executive Vice Presidents of Feature Film. Elliot will report to Louis Santor, COO, Vreg.

“We are extremely pleased that Vrp homegrown executives Nic and Anne continue to demonstrate the creative thinking and initiative that allows us to generate a diverse slate of feature films based both on our deep library as well as original IP. Their contributions to the department have been incredible and we will continue to greatly benefit from their work across all of our projects as we bring them to fruition,” said Apfelbaum and Tuckfield.

Exclusive: New Line has set Secret Headquarters filmmakers Henry Joost and Ariel Schulman to direct Undo, from Will Simmons’ 2022 Black List screenplay. The action thriller is currently in development.

Undo follows a former getaway driver who comes into possession of a watch that allows its user to go back in time, but only by one minute.

Beau Flynn is producing through his FlynnPictureCo banner. Flynn’s most recent producing credits are New Line/DC’s Black Adam, Netflix’s Red Notice and Disney’s Jungle Cruise. FlynnPictureCo’s Scott Sheldon will executive produce.

Simmons is currently adapting Robert Kirkman’s acclaimed sci-fi/action graphic novel Hardcore for Universal, with Skybound producing and Adam Wingard (Godzilla Vs Kong) directing. He recently wrote for the Sleepy Hollow remake for Paramount and Todd Garner, as well as a reboot of Internal Affairs also at Paramount. Prior to that, he adapted the acclaimed graphic...

When Village Roadshow CEO Steve Mosko first met with Kevin Garnett to discuss the basketball star’s pivot to the world of entertainment, the longtime film executive says it was immediately clear that the NBA champion’s Content Cartel production company wasn’t merely a vanity label.

“He just laid out how passionate he was about the business and building his company, and was beyond impressive,” Mosko tells Variety in a phone interview, recounting the lunch meeting. “I knew he just wasn’t another athlete who wanted a production shingle so he could tell his friends he has a production shingle.”

Beyond passion, Garnett came to the table with ideas. As the duo, who were introduced by Garnett’s “Uncut Gems” co-star Adam Sandler, discussed what they loved about cinema, the topic of Blaxploitation films came up.

“[Kevin] looked at me and — it was very heartfelt — he said, ‘Growing up as a kid,...

Dci Jo Davidson: D for Devious. C for Corrupt. I for I wonder what hold the Ocg has over her. Because that flappy car tantrum was not the act of an ice-cool customer solely in it for the spondulicks. Jo’s a foe in woe. Why? We don’t know.

What we do know is that AC-12’s shade-ar now has a 100% detection rate. Every time it’s pointed at a potentially bent copper, it finds one. The moment Davidson picked up that burner phone from Beardy Blue Van Man, she lost all claim to innocence. Everything now points to her having 1) tipped off the Ocg about Carl Banks running his mouth, 2) bought them enough time to kill him and the Chis framed for Banks’ murder, and 3) used her keys to Farida’s to plant those burner phones and frame her as the leak.

What made Davidson do it, and...

Exclusive: Investigation Discovery (ID) and Acast are fueling the country’s thirst for true crime to your ears. The network is teaming up with the podcast platform to release a slate of original the weekly true crime talk show Red Flags, the television companion podcast The Clown and the Candyman as well as the anthology series Unraveled.

Through this partnership with Acast, Investigation Discovery offers all-new explorations into famous mysteries and unknown murders, showcasing ID’s industry-leading investigation teams, skillful reporting, and expert storytelling.

The weekly talk show Red Flags will launch next month and is designed to be a one-stop-shop for all the latest buzz in the true crime world. Crime writer Tori Telfer and armchair detective-turned-Tik Toker Karina Michelle share their unique perspectives, passion for investigation, and insightful analysis as they lead listeners through the latest crime headlines and shocking stories. Red flags warn us of danger but...

With help from leading epidemiology experts and top reporters, science TV personality Bill Nye has launched a series of episodes of his popular Stitcher podcast, “Science Rules! with Bill Nye,” dedicated to explaining information on the novel coronavirus and the disease it causes, Covid-19.

The three-month series, published on Tuesdays and Fridays, will feature doctors and reporters from the frontlines of the pandemic, experts on the development of a vaccine, leading analysis on the economic impact and regular listener Q&a episodes.

Nye says the series will provide a fact-checked analysis on the latest news surrounding the pandemic to help listeners remain prepared, informed and calm.

“During this unprecedented public health crisis, it’s important that people get good information, so they can make good decisions for themselves and their families; it’s vital,” Nye said. “We’re working to help our listeners cut through the confusion and learn about the situation from trustworthy experts.