Paris – Screenwriter, director and producer M. Night Shyamalan, Doctor Who, executive producer and lead writer Steven Moffat and Intruders Glen Morgan will head a MIPCOM conference session on original content creation.
Held in the Grand Auditorium of the Palais des Festival on 15 October, Film and TV Crossroads will feature a line-up of creators exploring what drives the best in entertainment content these days.
As part of a panel entitled From Cult to Mainstream: Film & TV Crossroads Case Studies, Shyamalan will present the 10-episode event series Wayward Pines, which is being debuted in Cannes by Fox International Channels, the newly-established content sales division. The series stars Oscar nominee Matt Dillon, who will also attend MIPCOM to promote the show. Based on a best-selling novel by Blake Crouch, Wayward Pines follows an agent who arrives in the bucolic town of Wayward Pines, Idaho, on a mission to find two missing federal agents.
Shyamalan will be joined by Moffat, who besides being the man behind the Doctor Who reboot, is also co-creator and executive producer of Sherlock – two of the BBC’s most acclaimed current shows – Glen Morgan, showrunner/writer of the paranormal series Intruders, who also co-wrote The X-Files and Ben Donald, executive producer, BBC Worldwide, who is currently working on the UK-Spain sci-fi drama The Refugees.
The panel will look at the growing popularity of sci-fi programming across the globe, and will discuss how the genre has changed with the times and what part technology has played in enhancing storytelling possibilities.
The conference programme also features a keynote delivered by Kevin Beggs, Chairman of Lionsgate Television Group, who oversees all scripted and non-scripted programming for broadcast, cable, and digital platforms worldwide. Under his leadership, Lionsgate Television has become a leading supplier of programming, including the iconic multiple Emmy and Golden Globe winning series Mad Men, the award-winning Nurse Jacky and the multiple Emmy award winning Orange is the New Black.
A second Film & TV Crossroads keynote will come from Axel Kuschevatzy, head of international film production at Telefonica Studios, and noted film, TV producer and scriptwriter. He will unveil the studio’s strategy and present its slate of upcoming films including Welcome to Harmony, starring Matthew Fox, Regression, with Emma Watson and Ethan Hawke, and
El Ardor, starring Gael Garcia Bernal and Alice Braga.
