Rob Wade Tapped as CEO of Fox Entertainment

EXCLUSIVE: Rob Clark, Fremantle’s veteran Director, Global Entertainment, who helped develop The X Factor, Got Talent and Apprentice franchises globally across two decades, is exiting the company.

Production on Fox’shas been halted following the death of Leslie Jordan. Jordan, who portrayed Phil in the series since Season 1, completed work on a total of 9 episodes.

South Korean conglomerate CJ ENM has appointed Chang-Gun Koo as the new CEO of its entertainment division. Koo is a veteran of the CJ Group, now with a mandate to oversee plans for global expansion and accelerating growth “to lead a new paradigm in the entertainment industry,” the company said today. 

Joe Otterson TV Reporter Carol Mendelsohn and Julie Weitz’s Carol Mendelsohn Productions (CMP) has signed a multi-year first-look broadcast direct deal with Fox Entertainment. The announcement was made by Michael Thorn, Fox Entertainment’s president of entertainment, during MIPCOM Cannes. Under the deal, CMP will develop scripted drams for Fox. Should any shows be greenlit, they would be wholly owned by Fox with Mendelsohn and Weitz executive producing. CMP has already set up one project for development under the deal — a series adaptation of the Thomas Perry novel “The Bomb Maker.” Per the official logline, the series “follows former commander Dick Stahl, who is called in after the majority of the LAPD Bomb Squad is killed by a house bomb. On his first day back, the now three-person team is dispatched to a suspected car bomb, and it quickly becomes clear to him that they are dealing with an unusual criminal mastermind―one whose intended target appears to be the Bomb Squad itself.”

Carol Mendelsohn, the former showrunner of CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, has signed a deal with Fox and is once again attempting a series adaptation of Thomas Perry’s The Bomb Maker.

“CSI” showrunner and executive producer Carol Mendelsohn and producing partner Julie Weitz have struck a multi-year first-look broadcast direct deal with Fox Entertainment, president of entertainment Michael Thorn announced at MIPCOM Cannes. The duo’s previous deal with Universal Television is now over.Under the terms, Mendelsohn and Weitz will develop scripted dramas for the Fox.

Cynthia Littleton Business Editor CANNES – The newly constituted senior entertainment team at Fox Corp. came to Mipcom this year with checkbooks in hand. The trio of executives who offered the keynote address Monday evening at the international content conference were blunt in telling the crowd that they came to make some new friends around the world and strike some deals. The company is bucking the trend in media toward direct-to-consumer subscription platforms. Fox is putting its resources into content and IP that can travel around the world and be adaptable in many forms. “While others are trying to hide their content behind paywalls, we are doing the opposite,” said Rob Wade, who was promoted this month to CEO of Fox Entertainment (“I’m 10 days in to the job,” he noted with a smile on stage). “We see the potential of working with (outside) networks, producers and distributors to be able to get our content out there further.”

New Fox Entertainment CEO Rob Wade has talked up the potential for TMZ to become a “huge entertainment studio,” setting out his stall at Mipcom Cannes for the first time since he replaced Charlie Collier.

Joe Otterson TV Reporter Fox has given out an early Season 2 renewal to the Jon Hamm-led animated comedy “Grimsburg” before the show has even premiered. The announcement was made by Michael Thorn, president of entertainment for Fox Entertainment, during a MIPCOM panel moderated by Variety‘s co-editor-in-chief, Cynthia Littleton. “’Grimsburg’ is yet another clear example of our strong commitment to, and intense focus on, upholding the high bar of standards any show must exceed in order to reside under the Animation Domination banner,” Thorn said. “Of course, having Jon Hamm’s talent and star power front and center is a great place to start. Equally important, everything we’re seeing with ‘Grimsburg’ – from the very first scripts and show bible to animatics and preliminary cuts – makes us believe we have a winner on our hands that beautifully complements our animation brand.”

EXCLUSIVE: Sophia Bush (Good Sam) and Jeremie Harris (Fargo) will star alongside Simona Brown in MPI Original Films’ drama Freedom Hair from Oscar nominee Dianne Houston, which is currently in production in Atlanta.

Rob Lowe has come a long way. The 58-year-old actor rocketed to fame in 1983's and has since enjoyed an enviable career by any standards, but Lowe admits that even he worried that his career might be over at one point in the '90s.«One day I woke up and go, 'I haven't worked in two years,'» Lowe tells ET's Matt Cohen in a new interview, recalling the early days of raising his family with wife Sheryl Burkoff. The couple welcomed their first son, Matthew, in 1993, and their second, John, in 1995. «In fairness, I'd kind of taken my foot off the accelerator a little bit.» With a slew of big screen projects already under his belt -- including and — it was a starring role on in 1999 that marked a new beginning for Lowe, kicking off a run that would see him on a TV show (and sometimes more than one) every year since.

Community alum Joel McHale has been tapped for the lead of Fox’s straight-to-series workplace comedy, Animal Control. McHale also will executive produce the single-camera show, Fox Entertainment’s first wholly owned live-action comedy.

What’s better than a workplace comedy focused on the day-to-day operations of a company filled with whacky employees? A workplace comedy focused on TWO companies filled with whacky employees. Welcome to “Mythic Quest” Season 3.

Fox’s new Entertainment Global sales unit will “go against the grain of other U.S.-based media entities” by being wholly agnostic and selling to everyone, according to CEO Fernando Szew.

Dan Harmon’s “Krapopolis” has scored a Season 2 order from Fox Entertainment before it’s even debuted its first season. The “Community” and “Ricky & Morty” vet’s latest animated series will premiere in 2023. Set in ancient Greece, “Krapopolis” follows a dysfunctional family of humans, gods and monsters as they try to govern the world’s first cities to varying degrees of success.

EXCLUSIVE: Adeola Role (Blue Bloods), Ryan Broussard (Only Murders in the Building) and Graham Verchere (Stargirl) are set as series regulars opposite Dania Ramirez and Scott Caan in Fox’s Alert, a character-driven police procedural from The Blacklist showrunner John Eisendrath and Jamie Foxx, Sony Pictures Television and Fox Entertainment.

Fox is doubling down on Krapopolis.

Joe Otterson TV Reporter Fox has renewed the animated comedy “Krapopolis” for Season 2 before the show’s series premiere. The series, which hails from Dan Harmon, was originally picked up at Fox in February 2021. It is slated to premiere on the broadcaster in 2023, but it does not yet have an official premiere date. Per the official logline, “‘Krapopolis’ is set in mythical ancient Greece and tells the story of a dysfunctional family of humans, gods and monsters that try their hand at running the world’s first cities – without trying to kill each other, that is.” The show show’s voice cast includes stars like Hannah Waddingham, Richard Ayoade, Matt Berry, Pam Murphy, and Duncan Trussell.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer Rob Wade has been promoted to CEO of Fox Entertainment following the exit of former chief Charlie Collier. “Since the formation of Fox Entertainment, Rob has been an integral part of the leadership team responsible for delivering on its long-term strategy of creating an independent media company built on broadcast, developing an owned content portfolio and maintaining a disciplined in-house infrastructure,” Fox Corp. executive chief and CEO Lachlan Murdoch said in a statement Thursday. “Given Rob’s sharp creative instincts and proven operational acumen, he is well-suited to lead Fox Entertainment in what promises to be an exciting next chapter in its rich history.”

EXCLUSIVE: Fox’s reality supremo Rob Wade has been elevated to CEO of Fox Entertainment.