Beach House Pictures’ Donovan Chan Finds Positives in a Year of Turmoil in Asian TV Production: ‘If You’re in True Crime, It’s a Good Time to Be Alive’

Prime Video India has unveiled Wedding.con, a true-crime docu-series about women who are deceived and betrayed in pursuit of love. Scroll down for a trailer for the show that launches next week.

Variety Staff Follow Us on Twitter Darryl F. Zanuck was a legendary figure in Hollywood known for leading a major studio, producing top films and assaulting aspiring actresses in the 1930s. That same decade, the term “casting couch” surfaced to describe the abuse of power by Zanuck and other high-powered men who were the gatekeepers of access to the big screen.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Chinese-made crime drama, “Endless Journey” opened on top of the mainland China box office on a weekend with three new releases in the top five. The Wanda Pictures and Alibaba title earned $20.5 million (RMB146 million) between Friday and Sunday, its official opening weekend, according to data from consultancy Artisan Gateway. Together with previews from the week earlier, it ended the weekend with a cumulative total of $34.5 million (RMB245 million).

Meek Mill is the latest voice to speak out against the use of lyrics as evidence against rappers in criminal trials. posting his take on Tuesday (December 11) to X.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Two Hollywood films “Wonka” and “Migration” opened in Chinese cinemas over the latest weekend. But neither did enough business to appear among the box office top five. Instead, the weekend crown went to “The Invisible Guest,” a Chinese remake of the 2016 Spanish mystery thriller about a woman who must work with a police officer to clear her name after her lover is found dead in a locked room. It earned a modest $12.6 million (RMB89.6 million), according to data from consultancy Artisan Gateway.

Naman Ramachandran The burgeoning ‘acquimissions’ model of co-productions was one of the points of discussion at Singapore’s Asia TV Forum and Market. Conceptually, acquimissions blend the worlds of acquisitions and commissioning where independent producers and production studios engineer co-productions between themselves and platforms and commissioners across territories and windows.

Adam B. Vary Senior Entertainment Writer “Stranger Things” is finally going back to Hawkins. Production on the fifth and final season of the juggernaut Netflix series is currently set to begin in early January, according to multiple sources, though the start date is still subject to change.

EXCLUSIVE: A true-crime series exploring a possible serial killer in the Portland area is in the works.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief The Korean-produced series “The Glory” won the best drama series award on Thursday at the Asian Academy Creative Awards Gala Final. Thai-produced TV movie “Hunger” was named best feature film. The awards are organized by the Asian Academy of Creative Arts (AACA) a.k.a Asian Academy Creative Awards (AAA) and are held alongside the Asia Television Forum and Market (ATF) in Singapore. The AACA “was established to honor creative excellence and serve as a peer judged pinnacle of achievement in content creation, performance and media production.” By the conclusion of the gala ceremony, Singapore, Japan and India had each claimed seven prize wins.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief China’s Linmon Media celebrated its tenth anniversary this week by unveiling 16 new shows for its 2024 production and release slate. The roster included seven Chinese period drama series, five contemporary shows and two more being made in Thailand. “We are not just a producer, we are a studio,” Zhou Yuan, co-founder and EVP of Linmon, told Variety on the sidelines of the company’s predominantly English-language presentation at the Asia Television Forum & Market in Singapore.

EXCLUSIVE: Cloud10 Media and writer, producer & narrator Branden Morgan have joined forces to launch the third season of the true-crime podcast The Devil Within; which literally dropped yesterday. The podcast, which was in a limited format, racked up 8M downloads in its first two season. The podcast will now drop episodes on a 45-week basis.

Hollywood star Tilda Swinton has arrived at the Chanel fashion show tonight (Thursday) looking striking. The Grand Budapest Hotel star is known for her icy looks and inimitable style, and tonight's appearance was no different.

Hugh Grant is the latest celebrity to arrive in Manchester ahead of tonight’s Chanel show.

Phoebe Violet has always dreamt of one day walking the catwalk but never in her wildest dreams did she think a Chanel runway would appear on her street.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Hollywood’s role in Asian TV has changed in the streaming era and age of hyper-local content. A top-down sales and distribution position has eased into one of co-production, co-financing and acquisition. A high-powered array of western executives offered experienced views and discussed their current positions at a panel session Thursday within the Asia Television Forum & Market in Singapore. “We want to be an additive partner on shows that cannot be created locally, said Georgina Gonzalez, director of scripted series and global series at Universal Int’l Studios, NBCU.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Singapore is launching a new fund to support international coproduction of TV series. It will also expand government investment into virtual production (VP). The two moves were announced on Wednesday by senior minister of state for communications and information Tan Kiat How at the opening ceremony of the Asia Television Forum and Market (ATF).

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief China and Netherlands-based Fortissimo Films has picked up international sales rights to anticipated Chinese blockbuster movie “If You Are the One 3.” To be released on Dec. 30 in China, the picture is directed by Feng Xiaogang as the second sequel in his anti-romance comedy franchise, about a rich businessman and an air stewardess, which kicked off in 2008 and earned a follow-up in 2010.

A petrol bomber who got himself caught after police discovered that he stored his target’s address in his car’s sat nav system has been jailed.

Amazon Prime Video is delving deeper into the true crime mystery game.

Natalie Weiner Reports of Maren Morris leaving country music have been greatly exaggerated. “You don’t fight for what you don’t love,” says Morris over Zoom during a chat from her Nashville home, squeezed in while her son Hayes is taking a nap.