‘Krapopolis’ Could Spawn Next Homer Simpson, Bob Belcher Or Peter Griffin, Says Fox Scripted Boss

Paul Grant has died at the age of 56, his family has confirmed.The actor, who famously played an Ewok in the Star Wars film Return of the Jedi alongside Mark Hamill and Harrison Ford, had been found collapsed outside King's Cross Station in London on Thursday afternoon.The father of three, who also had a turn as a goblin in the Harry Potter film series, was pronounced brain dead after being rushed to hospital. His family has since confirmed that his life support machine was switched off on Sunday 19 March. His daughter Sophia Jayne Grant, 28, paid tribute to her father, saying she was "devastated" by the news.

Australia. The actor, who had appeared in Australian soap Neighbours, was found dead at a beach in Fremantle near Perth on Thursday. According to reports in the country, Peter had flown from London to Perth just before his death to visit his mother.

Neighbours actor Peter Hardy has been found dead in Australia at the age of 66. Peter was sadly found dead on an Australian beach after drowning in Fremantle, near Perth, Western Australia, on Thursday. The actor had travelled to Perth from London in order to visit his mother, according to local reports, and is believed to have been snorkelling at South Beach in Fremantle when he found himself in danger.

John Hopewell Chief International Correspondent With an International Panorama spangled by gems  – think Spain’s “Apagón,” Sweden’s “Blackwater,” and Canada’s “Disobey” and “Little Bird” – Series Mania also weighs in this year with one, if not the, strongest and most mouthwatering of international competitions in its history.  Including the opening and closing series, Amazon’s “Greek Salad” and Netflix’s “Transatlantic,” nearly all the global streamers have titles in the lineup, from Apple TV+’s “Drops of God” and Paramount+’s “Fleeting Lies.” The lineup also features some A-List international writing talents, such as the U.K.’s Jack Thorne and Israel’s Ron Leshem and Amit Cohen, whose “The Virtues” and “No Man’s Land” rank among the most memorable of recent Series Mania competition titles, and closing the festival, out of competition, “Unorthodox’s” Anna Wenger.”Fleeting Lies” also represents one of the first series from Pedro and Agustín Almodóvar’s El Deseo label in Madrid, opening series “Greek Salad” Cedric Klapisch’s first works a TV series creator.

Savannah Chrisley has a newfound respect for single parents as she rejoins the dating scene while taking care of her younger siblings after her parents, Todd Chrisley and Julie Chrisley, were sentenced to prison.

Pink Parrot, for example, unveiled a bevy of pre-sales on comedy romp “4 Days Before Christmas,” led by deals with Germany’s Splendid and Kaleidoscope in the U.K. FilmSharks has closed Latin America with The Walt Disney Co./Star Distribution on “Dalia and the Red Book,” as well as Germany, Russia/CIS and Taiwan with the U.S., France, Japan, Spain and Italy in discussions. Open-market international sales for theatrical distribution have sagged terribly in the past two decades on all but standout titles. One exception, which can still deliver seven figure returns, is animation.  Despite a slowing sales cycle, Mafiz and the Spanish Screenings still saw a dizzying slew of announcements. Following, a selection: 

Michael J. Fox is ever the optimist.

John Hopewell Chief International Correspondent MALAGA, Spain — It’s not over yet. In March 2021, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez announced the government would plow €1.6 billion ($1.9 billion) into a Spain AVS Hub plan designed to turn Spain into one of the foremost film and TV hubs in Europe. Supported by Spain’s E.U-backed Recuperation, Transformation and Resilience push for post COVID-19 recovery, the Spain AVS Hub plan has been co-financed by part of a €806.9 billion ($866.5 billion) NextGenerationEU stimulus package for the whole of the European Union, which is a temporary instrument.  As that package ends, Spain’s government will look to negotiate funding from alternative sources to ensure that Spain AVS Hub initiatives are more than a flash in the pan, a broad cross-section of governmental authorities told an audience Tuesday at a Malaga Spanish Screening Content conference.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor UPDATED: Reddit was suffering an hours-long issue on Tuesday that made the popular discussion site inaccessible for many users — and the company didn’t have an ETA on when it will be resolved. In an update at 2:43 p.m. PT, Reddit’s status page said, “We’ve identified a fix which may take some time to implement, in the meantime ready your bananas (or eat them!).” User reports of problems accessing Reddit’s website and apps spiked around noon PT on Tuesday, topping more than 60,000 outage reports, according to monitoring site Downdetector. The Reddit status page, at 12:18 p.m. PT, posted, “Investigating – Reddit is currently offline. We’re working to identify the issue” and subsequently said the problems stemmed from an “internal systems issue.”

Emiliano De Pablos Denver-based distributor Fathom Events and Spain’s Bosco Films are teaming to release this September in 700 U.S. theaters the Spanish documentary “Libres” (“Free”). Portraying the cloistered life of 12 monasteries in Spain, “Free” will be the fourth feature both partners jointly release stateside. Their distribution relationship kicked-off last year, with the U.S. release of faith-based doc “Vivo” (“Alive”), which scored $352,000 on its April 24 launch, entering into the domestic box office Top Ten.  Further recent Fathom-Bosco releases include Spanish biopic “Esclavos y reyes” (“Claret”) and French pilgrimage documentary “Lourdes.”

Pedro Pascal, one of the most popular actors at the moment and best known for his current roles in HBO’s ‘Last of Us’ and Disney+’s ‘The Mandalorian,’ attended the Oscars not only to present an award, also to support someone special in his life, his sister, Javiera Balmaceda.While Pedro has been in the spotlight a lot lately, his sibling also has a very successful career in the film industry. Javiera is a producer, and while she didn’t receive a nomination, she was part of several projects recognized throughout the awards ceremony.

Lachlan Murdoch, in his first public comments about a defamation lawsuit against Fox News that’s been grabbing headlines, said he believes the network is even handed and the “noise” is more reflective of the nation’s divided politics than anything else.

Elsa Keslassy International Correspondent Cannes’ Marché du Film has named Spain its Country of Honor for the upcoming 2023 edition which will take place May 16-24 during the 76th edition of the Festival de Cannes. The Marché du Film will work with ICEX Spain Trade & Investment and ICAA – Institute of Cinematography & Audiovisual Arts to showcase Spanish talent and content, ranging from cinema to documentary, animation and extended reality. Spain follows India which became Cannes’ first official Country of Honor in 2022. The industry event launched the initiative last year to spotlight and celebrate different nations at each market edition. Spain’s cinema sector has been having a banner 2023. Last month, Estibaliz Urresola Solaguren’s debut feature “20,000 Species of Bees” won three awards at the Berlinale, while Albert Serra’s “Pacifiction” won two Cesar awards, and Rodrigo Sorogoyen’s “The Beasts” won the Cesar award for best foreign film. Recent successes last year also include Carla Simón’s “Alcarràs” which won last year’s Golden Bear at the Berlin Film Festival and Alberto Mielgo’s “The Windshield Wiper” which won best animated short film at The Academy Awards).

Spain has been named as the country of honor for the upcoming edition of the Cannes Film Festival’s Marché du Film running May 16 to 24.

Pedro Pascal is tired of being asked about the internet’s obsession with him. The 47-year-old actor, who is currently enjoying the success of his HBO show ‘The Last of Us,’ recently attended the premier of season 3 of Disney’s ‘The Mandalorian,’ and took a moment to share what he thinks about the amount of attention he is currently receiving after being named ‘the daddy of the internet.’During an interview on the red carpet with Access Hollywood, the actor decided to politely decline a request to read thirst tweets from fans, as he wanted to focus the attention on his professional projects, instead of continuing the viral ‘daddy’ moment.

K.J. Yossman Dan Harmon’s upcoming animated comedy “Krapopolis” hasn’t yet broadcast a single frame but, in an unprecedented move, Fox has already renewed the show for a further two seasons, president of scripted programming Michael Thorn revealed on Wednesday. “Krapopolis,” which features an all-star voice cast including Richard Ayoade (“The IT Crowd”), Hannah Waddingham (“Ted Lasso”) and Matt Berry (“Toast of London”) is set in Ancient Greece but, despite the olde-worlde get-up, it turns out Ancient Greece has a lot of similarities to the present day. Ahead of previewing the show at London TV Screenings on Thursday, Thorn sat down with Variety to discuss the show and why Fox is betting on it being a runaway hit.

Ellise Shafer In an unprecedented move, Fox has renewed Dan Harmon’s upcoming animated comedy “Krapopolis” for a third season ahead of its series premiere. Additionally, the premiere of the show — which was most recently set for May — has now been pushed to the 2023-2024 season. The news was announced by Michael Thorn, president of scripted programming at Fox Entertainment, at the London TV Screenings on Wednesday. “The 2023-24 season is the perfect launching pad for this highly-anticipated and very funny animated comedy, complete with multiple seasons of epic laughs for fans,” Thorn said. “The more we see from production, the more excited we are about their creativity, story arcs, flawless execution, brilliant voice cast and ability to pump out episode after episode of astonishing events and outrageous, unexpected hilarity.”

explosive texts from Fox News hosts revealed in February as part of Dominion Voting System’s defamation lawsuit against the network, Hasan Minhaj is still a bit gobsmacked. On Tuesday night, the “Daily Show” guest host joked that, in reality, it seems Fox personalities are more like those on MSNBC.A quick refresher on those messages: in a court filing on Thursday, February 16, Dominion Voting provided texts, emails and other forms of communication between Fox News hosts from after the 2020 election, in which they called out some of the network’s guests for perpetuating unsupported claims that voting was electronically rigged against twice-impeached former president Donald Trump.Among the messages were ones that said things like “Sidney Powell is lying,” sent from Tucker Carlson to his producer Alex Pfeiffer on Nov.

Brian Steinberg Senior TV Editor Fox Corp. sought to tamp down furor around a series of implicating quotes and texts culled from corporate executives and Fox News anchors, in the newest filing, part of a closely watched defamation lawsuit from voting-technology firm Dominion Voting Systems. Fox Corp. and Fox News Channel made the case in two filings in the Superior Court in Delaware that many of the colorful utterances from Fox News stars such as Tucker Carlson and Sean Hannity and even some from Fox Corp. Chairman Rupert Murdoch were beyond the scope of Dominion’s case, and urged the court to reject the company’s call for a summary judgement, or a ruling in Dominon’s favor that would negate the need for a trial. Dominion is suing Fox for $1.6 billion in damages it alleges it is owed after Fox News made false claims about the Dominion’s actions and influence on the 2020 election. It is the second legal proceeding made against Fox News for its coverage of the aftermath of the 2020 race for the White House. Smartmatic, a voting technology company, has filed a massive $2.7 billion suit against Fox News. At issue in the suits, are allegations that Fox News falsely claimed the companies had rigged the election, repeated items about the matter and refused to engage in efforts to set the record straight. The 2020 election was not fixed and its results were certified by multiple legal processes.

John Hopewell Chief International Correspondent Former top VIS exec Laura Abril has been appointed EVP of scripted and global business development at Buendía Estudios, producer of “Veneno,” “Cardo” Season 1 and “Offworld,” in a move which signals the large international ambitions of one of Spain’s key production powerhouses. Abril will report to Ignacio Corrales, Buendía Estudios CEO.  Rising through the ranks at Viacom from 2009, Abril crowned her career at the studio as the highest-ranking international TV executive in Spain named in 2019 as head of ViacomCBS International Studios (VIS) for Europe, Middle East, Africa and Asia.