London – Independent UK based distributor DCD Rights has announced further international sales of the Australian drama series The Code. Arte for France, Germany and French and German speaking Europe; RUV Iceland, ARTV Canada and Lumiere Benelux have all acquired the (6 x 60’) series starring Lucy Lawless and Aden Young.
The Code, which premiered on September 23, was aired on ABC in Australia. It has previously been acquired by the UK’s BBC Four, DirecTV for Audience Network in USA and Sundance Channel Latin America, is produced by Playmaker for the ABC.
DCD Rights has had global sales success with high end Australian produced series such as The Slap, Rake and The Moodys among others. At the recent prestigious Australian Writers’ Guild Awards The Code was the winner of both the Original Television Mini-Series Award and the Major AWGIE – given to the best of the best in all mediums – with Rake and The Moodys also picking up Best Television Series and Best Comedy Narrative AWGIEs.
DCD Rights will launch a brand new drama The GODS of Wheat Street at MIPCOM in October. The (6 x 60’) series with a touch of supernatural is an intimate journey into the lives and humour of the Freeburn clan, a modern Aboriginal family of local legends. The GODS of Wheat Street boasts a cast of some of Australia’s finest actors and is produced by Every Cloud Productions for the ABC and Screen Australia in association with the Screen NSW Regional Filming Fund.
Other brand new Australasian productions from DCD Rights available for the first time at MIPCOM include two new (1 x 90’) dramas from Screentime New Zealand, a Banijay Group company. How To Murder Your Wife is the true story of Alf Benning a seemingly mild mannered animal welfare inspector who prowled 1970’s Wellington for feral cats and stray dogs before becoming one of New Zealand’s most infamous murderers and Venus & Mars, which tells of one of the most shocking crimes in contemporary New Zealand history. It involved a deception of the highest order, a man willing to sacrifice almost anything, including his career as a well-respected fraud detective, in order to escape his marriage, all the while watching as his friends and colleagues families lived in fear, while they investigated a fictional attacker he himself created.
Nicky Davies Williams, CEO, DCD Rights, said, “Australian drama has certainly come of age as a valuable contender for sought-after drama slots with leading broadcasters all over the world. Over recent years there has been a real and obvious lift in production values and creative talent across the board – writing, production, acting – and we are extremely pleased to be part of this dynamic movement.”
