Keshet International (KI) has opened submissions for the third year of its Greenlight: Factual & Formats commissioning initiative by announcing a further raft of partnerships with producers who pitched at its second Producer Pitch event.
Having already commissioned Woodcut Media’s “Catch Me If You Can” (10x60’) and Perpetual Entertainment’s “Hitler’s Treasure Hunters” (6x60’) for distribution, KI is now optioning and entering into a three-phase development deal with The Connected Set for its innovative dating format “Too Good To Be True.” Powered by cutting-edge AI technology, this arced series sees a cast of catfished singletons attempt to correctly identify and select real-life human love matches from a line-up of AI-generated deep fake suitors.
In addition, the global content producer and distributor has signed four shopping agreements: two with Woodcut Media for the returnable true crime docuseries, “Hotel Horrors” (10x60’) and “Captive Calls” (10x60’); a second with Yeti Television for its docuseries “Secret Royal Homes”; a third with Flicker Productions for “Million Dollar Alien Hunters,” and a fourth with Hello Mary for “Subterranean Secrets”.
Kelly Wright, KI’s MD of Distribution said: “We are so pleased to invite submissions for our 2024 Producer Pitch event by announcing this next wave of Greenlight: Factual & Formats’ partnerships – including our first option, development deal, and round of shopping agreements. The quality of projects pitched at our Producer Pitch last November generated a great deal of interest from the nearly 50 buyers who took part, but these six shows from The Connected Set, Woodcut Media, Yeti Television, Flicker Productions, and Hello Mary really stood out from the crowd. We can’t wait to introduce them to buyers at MIPCOM 2024.”
Anke Stoll, KI’s SVP of Acquisitions and Co-productions added: “For our third Producer Pitch event, we are looking for a wider variety of factual genres and entertainment formats than last year, when we had more than 200 projects submitted. We are being a little more specific with our entry requirements this year, and also asking producers to complete a submission form for each project that can be found on our website. Our aim is to create our strongest line-up of pitches for buyers to choose from at our Producer Pitch event in London on Monday 2 December.”
Meanwhile, KI is broadening the scope of the genres it is looking for submissions for its 2024 intake of KI’s Greenlight: Factual & Formats to include specialist factual alongside premium factual and true crime content; and reality and social experiments formats alongside entertainment ones. Officially launched in September 2023 with the announcement of its first commission, KI's objective with its Greenlight: Factual & Formats’ commissioning initiative is to greenlight up to three English-language projects a year for distribution - either fully funded by KI or co-funded in partnership with at least one broadcast or streaming partner.
Of the 200+ ideas originally submitted to KI for consideration in 2023, 30 shortlisted projects were pitched by 15 producers to an audience of nearly 50 international buyers, who were either in the room or taking part remotely in KI’s Greenlight: Factual & Formats’ Producer Pitch 2023 event via a live-stream video link on November 27 last year.
The four new producer partnerships announced here complement two others signed this year: a co-development deal with SandStone Global for two new premium ancient history documentary series Seven Wonders of the Ancient World and Vikings, both of which will be presented by award-winning historian and presenter Professor Bettany Hughes OBE; and a partnership with impact studio Ritual Arts and Orlando Bloom’s production company Amazing Owl to bring the premium factual docuseries Earthbound, narrated by Bloom, to international audiences. 2024 has also seen the global content producer and distributor enter a non-scripted formats alliance with the Satisfaction Group.
KI will be shopping all seven of these unscripted shows - “Are They For Real?,” “Hotel Horrors,” “Captive Calls,” “Secret Royal Homes,” “Seven Wonders of the Ancient World,” “Vikings,” and “Earthbound” - alongside its first two fully funded Greenlight: Factual & Formats commissions - “Catch Me If You Can” and “Hitler’s Treasure Hunters,” which are both fully produced and delivering now - to buyers at MIPCOM 2024.