Erik Barmack Latest Celebrity News & Gossip

Could Scottish soccer be the next to benefit from Hollywood investment?

Elsa Keslassy International Correspondent Arte has boarded “Reykjavik Fusion,” the first series produced by ACT4, an Icelandic banner launched by award-winning industry veterans, including Ólafur Darri Ólafsson (“True Detective”), Hörður Rúnarsson (“Black Sands”), Jónas Margeir Ingólfsson (“The Minister”) and Birkir Blær Ingólfsson (“Thin Ice”). The high-concept show will be distributed internationally by Wild Sheep Content, led by Erik Barmack, a former Netflix head of international.

John Hopewell Chief International Correspondent Fabula–Fremantle’s “Hot Sur,” The Mediapro Studio’s “El Mal” and “Two Nights in Lisbon,” from Portugal’s Hop Films and the U.K’s Heroes Films, look like potential standouts at next week’s Content Americas Copro Pitch 2024, one of its industry centerpieces. These series projects will be joined by crime mystery thriller “Delito,” from Barcelona’s Grup Focus TV & Films, behind banner Amazon Original “Reina Roja,” “Iron Woman,” a tumultuous political saga from Brazil-based Jarsom Wayans, two high concept doc series – Argentina’s “Climate Migrants” and Brazil’s “Mystery of the Megafauna” – and bio doc feature “Farraquito, a Flamenco Story,” profiling the famed flamenco bailaor.

The MediaPro Studio will look to invest in literary and library program rights in the U.S., the Spanish company’s boss told delegate here at Mipcom Cannes today, as it unveiled several new projects during a Mipcom Cannes keynote.

John Hopewell Chief International Correspondent “The Head,” The Mediapro Studio’s biggest hit, will have a third season, Ran Tellem, TMS head of international content development, confirmed Tuesday at Iberseries & Industria Platino. “‘The Head’ started out something like four years ago as a limited series only for six episodes and now it’s going into third season, so you might say we never lived up to our promises,” Tellem joked on stage at an early Iberseries panel, entitled Creative Content Strategies, where he shared the stage with former Netflix international head Erik Barmack, now at L.A.-based Wild Sheep Content. The Mediapro Studio will produce ‘The Head,’ Season 3 out of Spain.

John Hopewell Chief International Correspondent SAN SEBASTIAN — In a first big deal to be announced during this year’s San Sebastian Festival, Madrid-based The Mediapro Studio, one of Europe’s biggest independent and international creation-production-distribution powerhouses, has acquired Cimarrón, the Uruguay, Argentina and Mexico-based production house and services company. Of “highly significant value,” TMS said Friday, the deal looks set to consolidate TMS’ presence in Latin America and beyond.

Leo Barraclough International Features Editor Zurich Film Festival will honor the chief executive of German film and TV company Leonine Studios, Fred Kogel, with its Game Changer Award, which is presented to a leading personality from the film industry whose “extraordinary efforts serve to advance the sector.” Kogel set up Leonine four years ago, and it has grown rapidly to become Germany’s leading independent film company, as well as a major TV producer. Its successes as a film distributor have included the release of “The School of Magical Animals,” “Knives Out” and the “John Wick” franchise.

Leo Barraclough International Features Editor Prime Video debuted the first-look image and revealed the premiere date for the adaptation of thriller series “Harlan Coben’s Shelter” from New York Times best-selling author Harlan Coben on Thursday. The show marks Coben’s first collaboration with Prime Video. The first three episodes of the eight-episode series will premiere globally on Aug. 18 exclusively on Prime Video in more than 240 countries and territories worldwide, with new episodes available each Friday, leading up to the season finale on Sept. 22. “Harlan Coben’s Shelter” follows the story of Mickey Bolitar after the sudden death of his father leads him to start a new life in Kasselton, New Jersey. Mickey quickly finds himself tangled in the mysterious disappearance of a new student at his school, Ashley Kent, which leads to uncovering unimaginable secrets within their quiet suburban community.

John Hopewell Chief International Correspondent CANNES —  Belinda, one of Mexico’s biggest popstars and a star of Netflix hit “Welcome to Eden,” is attached to headline “The Red Diamond,” the latest project from Erik Barmack’s L.A. and Mexico City-based Wild Sheep Content. One of the fastest-growing of production companies in international markets, Wild Sheep has a production alliance with The Mediapro Studio.  “The Red Diamond” is also set up at Mexico City’s Wild Sheep Content Latin America, headed by producer Jimena Rodríguez who produced “3 Idiots,” the second highest-grossing Mexican movie of 2017. Rodríguez was instrumental in helping bringing Belinda to the project.

John Hopewell Chief International Correspondent In April 2018, Netflix announced that Spanish heist thriller “Money Heist” (“La Casa de Papel”) had become the U.S. streaming service’s most-watched non-English series ever. With a Spanish series crowned as the first foreign-language blockbuster at the company that has transformed entertainment worldwide, Spain’s expansion — long nurtured by hits such as “The Red Band Society,” “Grand Hotel” and “Locked Up” — well and truly lifted off. Building on that success, in March 2021, Spanish prime minister Pedro Sánchez unveiled the AVS Hub Plan, which would invest €1.6 billion ($1.8 billion) into Spain’s audiovisual sector.

Homeland co-creator Howard Gordon will receive the 62nd Monte-Carlo Television Festival’s Honorary Golden Nymph, an award that honors renowned professionals for their extraordinary contributions to the entertainment and television industry.

Sophia Scorziello editor Legendary Entertainment has secured the rights to “The Golden Cage,” a psychological thriller novel by the award-winning Swedish author Camilla Läckberg. The studio anticipates adapting the story about a wife scorned and her plot for revenge into a television series and is currently working on casting for the show. “The Golden Cage” follows Faye, a woman who runs away from her past to start a new, promising life with a successful career and a wonderful family. She soon realizes, however, that she has traded in a life of independence and ambition so she can please her husband, a man who ends up betraying her in more ways than one. To escape this golden cage, this facade of luxury, and return to her old self, Faye and her best friend team up to create the dish that’s best served cold: a cosmetics business called Revenge.

EXCLUSIVE: Peacock is developing drama series Queen of Flow, a premium adaptation of Caracol Television’s Colombian telenovela, La Reina Del Flow. Jorge Reyes is attached to pen the script for the project, fromWestbrook Studios and Universal Television. Singer and actress Becky G (Good Mourning, Power Rangers) is in early negotiations to lead the series, Deadline understands.

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: 

John Hopewell Chief International Correspondent Driving ever more into Latin America, Wild Sheep Content, the L.A.-based label of former Netflix head of international original series Erik Barmack, has launched the Mexico City-based Wild Sheep Latin America as well as a dedicated film completion finance-distribution fund targeting five-to-eight investments a year in the region.  “Three Idiots” producer Jimena Rodríguez, who also created the distribution arm of Mexican exhibition giant Cinepolis, will head up Wild Sheep Latin America following on her production with Barmack of a burgeoning line in star-studded, character-driven crime thrillers begun by Netflix Mexico original “Invitation to Murder.”

EXCLUSIVE: Felix Herngren, director and writer of Oscar-nominated The 100 Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared, is directing a Viaplay adaptation of Emelie Schepp’s novel Jana – Marked for Life, with Erik Barmack exec producing amongst others.

EXCLUSIVE: Tony Award-nominee Tovah Feldshuh (Funny Girl, The Walking Dead) has joined the cast of Amazon’s , Deadline has learned. She will portray the character of Bat Lady who is described as a wraith-like recluse who gives Mickey (Jaden Michael) an ominous disturbing piece of news.

EXCLUSIVE: Erik Barmack’s Wild Sheep Content has boarded Synchronicity Films and Mr. B Films’ feature KILL, which has entered principal photography.

John Hopewell Chief International CorrespondentIn one of the biggest swings in Europe’s market, Erik Barmack, the former Netflix VP of international originals, is teaming with Benjamin Munz, producer of “Blood Red Sky,” Netflix’s most-watched non-English movie of all time, on a tentpole high-speed German action film, “The Chase.”Billed by Barmack as “‘The Fast and the Furious’ meets ‘Money Heist’” – which he helped bring to Netflix – “The Chase” marks the first movie out of the gate at Munz’s Berlin-based new label, Fright Zone, the first production company in Germany that will focus exclusively on developing and producing fantasy, action, horror and science fiction films as well as TV shows in and from Germany. Overseen by founder and CEO Munz, Fright Zone will produce with Barmack, who is now working out of his own L.A.

Joe Otterson TV ReporterAmazon has picked up the series adaptation of Harlan Coben’s “Shelter,” Variety has learned.The show was ordered to pilot at Amazon in 2021. Based on the first novel in Coben’s Mickey Bolitar trilogy, the YA thriller series stars Jaden Michael as Bolitar as he navigates his new life with a mom in rehab, a dead father, an annoying aunt, and a new school in New Jersey with a camel as its mascot. When a creepy old lady who may or may not be a ghost tells Mickey that his father isn’t dead, Mickey is sure he’s losing his mind on top of everything.

EXCLUSIVE: Mark Lawrence’s fantasy novel trilogy One Word Kill is the latest YA book series to be adapted for television.

John Hopewell Chief International CorrespondentIn his first major move in the German market, Erik Barmack’s Wild Sheep Content, the fast-growing L.A.

John Hopewell Chief International CorrespondentAs a Netflix VP and head of international original series, Erik Barmack shaped today’s fiction TV business. He brought “Money Heist” (“La Casa de Papel”) to Netflix and spearheaded the U.S.

John Hopewell Chief International CorrespondentPairing two of the most iconic figures on the Spanish-language business scene, actress-producer Kate del Castillo, star of Telemundo smash hit “La Reina del Sur,” is teaming with former Netflix VP Erik Barmack to produce and star in a womanhunt thriller.Provisionally entitled “Cold, Dead Hands,” a title that may well change, the movie is set up at Del Castillo’s Cholawood Productions, Barmack’s Wild Sheep Content, both in L.A., and Park City-based

John Hopewell Chief International CorrespondentErik Barmack’s Wild Sheep Content, the new L.A.-based company of the former Netflix VP, has boarded steamy romantic comedy “Sweet Paprika,” the first animation project from internationally renowned comic book artist Mirka Andolfo (“Unnatural” “Mercy”).Directed by Gabriele Pennacchiolo (“Love Death + Robots”), “Sweet Paprika,” which was originally announced last July, will be produced by Turin’s Arancia Studio and Gray Ladder

Christopher Vourlias Few companies in the global television industry have been better placed than Netflix to take advantage of the surge in demand for premium international content.

Sega is allegedly in the process of developing a new live-action film based on its hit Yakuza game series.The film will be a partnership between Sega, 1212 Entertainment and Wild Sheep Content, according to Variety. Erik Barmack, Roberto Grande and Joshua Long will serve as the film’s producers.Variety has also confirmed that no scriptwriters have been attached to the project yet.

Dave McNary Film ReporterSega is developing a live-action movie adapted from its “Yakuza” video game franchise with 1212 Entertainment and Wild Sheep Content, Variety has learned exclusively.Erik Barmack, Roberto Grande and Joshua Long will produce.

Erik Barmack, the former Netflix executive who oversaw its game-changing drive into production around the world is teaming with renowned French African artist Nicholle Kobi on “Queens,” a high-concept, stylish animated series about six extraordinary real-life African queens.Set up at Barmack’s L.A.-based Wild Sheep Content, the high-concept “Queens” is an attempt to reclaim for Black people around the world a history and source of inspiration that has been denied them by mainstream media and

MIAMI — In a coup for both parties, The Mediapro Studio has taken an equity stake in Wild Sheep Content, the new and forging Los Angeles-based content production company of Erik Barmack, the former Netflix executive who spearheaded the U.S. streaming giant’s game-changing drive into original non English-language productions around the globe, which is now a centerpiece of the U.S. streaming giant’s business model.