County Stearns Showbiz Latest News and Updates

Lise Pedersen Following in the footsteps of its Nordic neighbors, Finland is fast becoming a destination of choice for foreign co-productions, not least thanks to its up-front cash-back tax incentive introduced in 2017. Despite a slight drop in 2020 due to the COVID pandemic, figures show a 40%-plus growth of the audiovisual industry in the past five years, distributed evenly between co-production and service production. In addition to the national rebate of 25%, productions can get up to 40% incentive money thanks to top-ups from regional film commissions. Other support mechanisms include public broadcaster YLE and the Promotion Centre for Audiovisual Culture (AVEK), as well as a growing number of private investors such as VOD platform Elisa Viihde and Aurora Studios,  which   are   working actively on getting Finnish content out to the world.

Manori Ravindran International EditorSkyShowtime has made a number of senior appointments to its leadership team under CEO Monty Sarhan ahead of the platform’s launch later this year.The streamer’s offering will include over 10,000 hours of content including the TV premieres of first-run theatrical films from Paramount and Universal; new scripted series from Showtime, Paramount Plus, Sky Studios and Peacock; local original programming; kids and family programming from Nickelodeon, DreamWorks and Illumination; and a library offering across all genres and key franchises from the Universal and Paramount catalogues.Francesca Pierce has been named chief financial officer. Pierce, who joins from Sky, was one of the key members of the team that helped shape the SkyShowtime project and brings extensive experience in financial planning and commercial negotiations to the leadership team.

“Dual,” the latest film from director Riley Stearns that stars Karen Gillan and Aaron Paul, has sold its U.S. rights to RLJE Films, a division of AMC Networks, for a deal that landed in the low to mid 7-figure range.

Variety Staff Follow Us on TwitterVariety has reorganized its growing editorial operations, advancing and promoting a number of senior editors as the global entertainment brand expands the scope of its coverage.Claudia Eller will resume her role as Editor-in-Chief as of Oct. 26.