Variety 500 - Colin Callender →

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Callender originally mounted “Harry Potter and the Cursed Child” as a two-night, five-hour-plus stage spectacular in 2018, but when he returned the show to Broadway’s Lyric Theatre in December 2021, the version for post pandemic had been pared down to a still spectacular three and a half hours. That “single play” version has since opened in Melbourne, Toronto and Tokyo, while the original two-parter continued on in Hamburg, Germany, and London’s West End. An Emmy winner for 1982’s “The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby,” Callender in 2022 launched new seasons of TV shows he produced: “Dangerous Liaisons” (Starz), starring Lesley Manville and Carice van Houten; Peter Kosminsky’s “The Undeclared War” (Peacock/Channel 4), with Simon Pegg and Mark Rylance; and James Herriot’s “All Creatures Great and Small” (Masterpiece on PBS/Channel 5).  

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Richard Shepard To Adapt ‘The Wicked Girls’ For Playground →

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All Creatures Great and Small producer Playground has optioned Alex Marwood’s The Wicked Girls and Girls director Richard Shepard will write, direct and exec produce. The psychological thriller will be developed as a limited TV series, with no network attached as yet. Published a decade ago, The Wicked Girls tells of struggling journalist Kirsty Lindsay who is reporting on a series of attacks on young female tourists in a seaside vacation town. When her investigation leads her to interview carnival cleaner Amber Gordon, both of their lives are turned upside down. Colin Callender, Scott Huff and David Stern will oversee development and executive produce for Playground. They said: “Alex Marwood wrote a novel filled with complex female characters and page turning thrills. We were hooked from page one by the story of Kirsty and Amber and how their past secrets unravel to form a fascinating relationship that upends both their lives.”

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Laura Shin’s ‘The Cryptopians’ In The Works As Drama Series From ‘Dangerous Liaisons’ Producer Playground →

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EXCLUSIVE: Crypto page-turner The Cryptopians, written by Laura Shin, is in the works for the small screen.

Playground Entertainment, the company behind series such as Starz’s Dangerous Liaisons and Peacock/Channel 4’s Undeclared War, has optioned the rights to the non-fiction book with plans to turn it into a television drama series.

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Hilary Mantel’s ‘The Mirror and the Light’ BBC Adaptation Will Continue as a ‘Memorial’ to Great British Author (EXCLUSIVE) →

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At the time of her untimely death, British author Hilary Mantel was consulting on the TV adaptation of her most recent novel, “The Mirror and the Light” — the conclusion to her critically acclaimed Tudor trilogy that began with “Wolf Hall.”

The two-time Booker Prize-winning author’s sudden death at 70 was announced on Friday by her publishers, sending shockwaves among her fans and the literary and TV industries — but especially her inner circle of collaborators who were in constant touch with Mantel.

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Magic returns to San Francisco as 'Harry Potter and the Cursed Child' has official reopening →

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SAN FRANCISCO (KGO) -- San Francisco Mayor London Breed called Thursday night a milestone in San Francisco's reopening. It was the official opening night party for "Harry Potter and the Cursed Child" at San Francisco's Curran Theater that shut down nearly two years ago. Harry Potter fans could be seen here, there, and everywhere you looked outside San Francisco's Curran Theater Thursday night.

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‘All Creatures Great and Small’ Returns With Even More Creatures →

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RIPON, England — Samuel West was limping. “A cow stood on my foot,” he said. “Again!” Errant hooves are among the occupational hazards on the set of “All Creatures Great and Small,” the pastoral series that unfolds in 1930s Yorkshire. But on an intermittently sunny day here in late June, they presented a particular problem for West, who plays the veterinary surgeon Siegfried Farnon and was preparing to shoot a cricket sequence.

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‘All Creatures Great and Small’ Renewed for Seasons 3 and 4 at PBS Masterpiece, Channel 5 →

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“All Creatures Great and Small,” the wholesome reboot of the popular British veterinarian drama, is returning for Seasons 3 and 4.

U.K. broadcaster Channel 5 and PBS Masterpiece in the U.S. have officially signed on for two more seasons of the Playground-produced drama. Each season will get a 6-episode order, along with a Christmas special. PBS Masterpiece, which will debut Season 2 on Sunday (Jan. 9), is co-producing along with distributor All3Media International selling the series globally.

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‘Hoop Dreams’ Scripted Drama Set as Lena Waithe’s First Project in New Warner Bros. TV Deal →

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Lena Waithe’s Hillman Grad Productions — the company the actor/writer/producer founded with Rishi Rajani — now has an exclusive, multi-year deal with Warner Bros. Television Group. At WBTVG, Waithe and Rajani will develop television projects for, according to the announcement, “all platforms, including WarnerMedia’s HBO Max, external streaming services, cable and the five broadcast networks.”

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'Dangerous Liaisons’: Lesley Manville, Carice Van Houten, Paloma Faith, Michael McElhatton, Kosar Ali, 9 More Cast In Starz Prequel Series →

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Oscar nominee Lesley Manville (Phantom Thread), Emmy nominee Carice van Houten (Game of Thrones), Paloma Faith (Youth) and Michael McElhatton (Game of Thrones) and BAFTA nominee Kosar Ali (Rocks) are among 14 cast in Starz’s original series Dangerous Liaisons, a reimagining of Pierre Choderlos de Laclos’ classic 18th century novel. Also joining leads Alice Englert and Nicholas Denton in the prequel series are Nathanael Saleh (Mary Poppins Returns), Hakeem Kae-Kazim (Godzilla vs. Kong), Hilton Pelser (Moffie), Mia Threapleton (A Little Chaos), Colette Dalal Tchantcho (The Witcher), Lucy Cohu (The Queen’s Sister), Fisayo Akinade (The Personal History of David Copperfield), Maria Friedman (Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat) and Clare Higgins (Ready Player One). The series hails from Lionsgate TV, Colin Callender’s Playground Entertainment and Tony Krantz’ Flame Ventures.

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‘Dangerous Liaisons’: Alice Englert & Nicholas Denton To Star As Merteuil & Valmont In Starz Prequel Series →

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Alice Englert (Ratched) and Nicholas Denton (Glitch) have been cast as the notorious lovers Merteuil and Valmont in Starz’s original series Dangerous Liaisons, a reimagining of Pierre Choderlos de Laclos’ classic 18th century novel, from Lionsgate TV, Colin Callender’s Playground Entertainment and Tony Krantz’ Flame Ventures.

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‘All Creatures Great and Small’ Heals Cows and Soothes Souls →

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A young veterinary surgeon begins to practice in the remote Yorkshire Dales in 1937, treating abscesses in horses’ hooves and milk fever in cows and prescribing diets for overfed lap dogs.

It hardly sounds like the stuff of bestsellerdom. But James Herriot’s first book, “All Creatures Great and Small” (first published in Britain in 1970 under the title “If Only They Could Talk”), and the seven books that followed became enormous hits worldwide, selling over 60 million copies by the time the author — whose real name was James Alfred Wight — died in 1995.

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Starz Developing Eleanor Of Aquitaine Series With Susie Conklin & Playground Entertainment →

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Starz is developing a slate of series inspired by “extraordinary women of history” and has set a drama about Eleanor of Aquitaine from A Discovery Of Witches writer Susie Conklin and Playground Entertainment as the first in the strand.

The network has optioned the rights to historian Alison Weir’s biography Eleanor of Aquitaine: A Life and its companion novel Captive Queen for the first series.

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Playground Options Documentary ‘The Dog’ For TV Series Development →

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EXCLUSIVE: Colin Callender’s Playground (Wolf Hall, Howards End) has acquired the television rights to award-winning documentary The Dog to develop as a drama series.

Directed by Allison Berg and Frank Keraudren, The Dog tells the extraordinary back-story of the late John Wojtowicz, the bank robber whose antics inspired Al Pacino’s character in Sidney Lumet’s 1975 classic Dog Day Afternoon.

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