Paramount Plus has renewed its Taylor Sheridan-produced drama Lioness for a second season.

Lioness, formerly titled Special Ops: Lioness, stars Zoe Saldaña as a top CIA officer trying to balance her personal life while spearheading the country’s war on terror, according to the streaming service. Morgan Freeman, Nicole Kidman, Dave Annable, Jill Wagner, LaMonica Garrett and James Jordan also star in the series. 

The series debuted in July 2023 as the most-watched series premiere for the streaming service, with nearly 6 million viewers in its first week across Paramount Plus as well as for a preview episode on Paramount Network, said the company.

“Lioness captivated audiences around the world as one of the most-watched global series premieres on Paramount Plus last year,” said Chris McCarthy, office of the CEO, Paramount Global, and president and CEO, Showtime/MTV Entertainment Studios, in a statement. “Driven by Taylor Sheridan’s masterful storytelling and Nicole Kidman’s and Zoe Saldaña’s remarkable performances, season two promises to immerse audiences in yet another riveting, adrenaline-fueled journey.”

Lioness is executive produced by Sheridan, Saldaña, Kidman, Wagner, David Glasser, Ron Burkle, Bob Yari, David Hutkin, David Lemanowicz, Geyer Kosinski, Michael Friedman, and Keith Cox.    

The A+E Networks will team with a bevy of top celebrities including Kevin Costner, Morgan Freeman, Janet Jackson and Anthony Anderson for major television projects, the company announced Wednesday during its upfront presentation.

History Channel will partner with Costner on a new eight-episode series The West, which will capture the diverse, complex character and untold stories that defined the “Wild West” and that continue to shape our country today, according to the network.

Also: A+E Promises Advertisers at Upfront It Will Deliver Peak Content 

Freeman will helm the upcoming documentary Black Patriots: The 761st Battalion, which will tell the true story of the 761st Tank Battalion, the first Black tank unit to serve in combat during WWII. Bradley Cooper will executive produce FDR, a three-night documentary debuting on Memorial Day that will provide a portrait of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt. The network is also developing projects with Dan Aykroyd and Michael Imperioli.

Lifetime will again partner with Janet Jackson on a new documentary airing on both Lifetime and A&E that focus on her new concert tour and reunion with the Jacksons, said the network. Also simulcasting on both networks is TLC Forever, a documentary celebrating one of the top-selling female groups of all time. 

A&E will follow actors Anderson and Cedric the Entertainer on a new 10-episode documentary series, Kings of BBQ, in which the two actors will work together to build their own barbeque product empire.

"Our goal within this media evolution is to meet audiences wherever and however  they consumer content, by working with great worldwide storytellers to develop and execute their vision," A+E Networks Group President and Chairman Paul Buccieri said in a statement. "Over the last four years, we have been on a journey to expand our production capabilities in both scripted and factual, and we've established key relationships in the talent management space as well as continued creating compelling content across our brands to further meet the needs of our valued partners and viewers." ■ 

Amazon Studios has greenlit an original drama series based on James Patterson's Alex Cross book series.

The Cross series will star Aldis Hodge as Alex Cross, a detective and forensic psychologist uniquely capable of digging into the psyches of killers and their victims in order to ultimately capture the murders, according to Amazon Studios. The series will stream on Prime Video.

“James Patterson is among the best at captivating audiences with his undeniably enthralling novels and we are confident that with Ben Watkins’ artistic vision, Cross will do the same for our global customers,” said Amazon Studios head of global television Vernon Sanders. “We are proud to work with James and Ben alongside Paramount Television, Skydance, and the extremely talented Aldis Hodge, who we know will do an exceptional job of bringing Alex Cross to life.”

Also: ‘Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan’ Season Three on Prime Video December 21

The Alex Cross character has previously been portrayed by Morgan Freeman in such films as Kiss The Girls (1997) and Along Came a Spider (2001) as well as Tyler Perry in the 2012 Alex Cross film.

Cross is executive produced by Patterson, along with Ben Watkins, Sam Ernst, Jim Dunn, Craig Siebels, Bill Robinson and Patrick Santa. ■

Hollywood Friday paid tribute to iconic actor/director and civil rights activist Sidney Poitier, who died Thursday night at the age of 94. 

Poitier’s prolific movie career features such groundbreaking films as In The Heat of the Night, Raisin in the Sun, The Defiant Ones, To Sir, With Love and Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner that helped paved the way for Black actors in the 1950s and 1960s. Poitier was the first Black man to win the Academy Award for best actor for his role in the 1963 film Lilies of the Field.

Poitier also directed several hit films, including Buck and the Preacher starring Harry Belafonte, Uptown Saturday Night with Bill Cosby and Stir Crazy with Richard Pryor and Gene Wilder. In 2009, Poitier was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Barack Obama.

On TV, Poitier was nominated for Emmy Awards for his portrayals of Nelson Mandela in Showtime’s Mandela and De Klerk, and Thurgood Marshall in ABC’s Separate But Equal.

In tribute to Poitier, OWN on January 9 will present a day-long, Poitier programming tribute including re-airings of The Oprah Winfrey Show episodes in 2000 and 2007 and Oprah Winfrey Presents: Legends Who Paved the Way from 2015; and the 1967 film To Sir, With Love, said the network.

Weigel Broadcasting's retro services Movies! network and Decades network will feature Poitier-themed programming blocks over the next two months. Movies! will air Poitier’s first credited screen role in No Way Out on February 7, as well as three of his films -- No Way Out, Edge of the City and Blackboard Jungle on February 28, said network officials. 

Decades Network will air a 1972 episode of The Dick Cavett Show on January 10 featuring Poitier and Belafonte discussing their movie Buck and the Preacher, said the network.

Industry celebrities from Oprah Winfrey and Morgan Freeman as well as cable networks BET and TV One also paid tribute to Poitier on social media.

History will go behind the scenes of famous prison escapes as part of a new original docuseries, Great Escapes With Morgan Freeman, premiering Nov. 9.

The eight-part series, produced by Freeman’s Revelations Entertainment, will chronicle through dramatic recreations and cutting-edge visual effects how prisoners escaped from such notoriously secure prisons as Alcatraz, Clinton Correctional Facility in Dannemora, NY and the HM Maze Prison in Northern Ireland, according to network officials. 

 Great Escapes With Morgan Freeman executive producer James Younger recently spoke to me from a production shoot in Athens, Greece about the series as well as the overall viewer appeal of prison escape-themed content. Younger also talks about future Revelations Entertainment projects as part of the interview, an edited version of which appears below.

Picture This: What makes this series unique from previous shows focused on prison escapes?

James Younger: It's pretty different because it's a very active and direct type of storytelling. We're actually putting the viewer inside the prisons by rebuilding them using CGI -- we have this fantastic game engine called Unreal Engine that’s used in first person shooter games. We’re using it to rebuild the cells, the ventilation shafts, tunnels and walls of the prisons. We’re putting the viewer into the prison and sort of gameifying the escape, and really seeing it from the point-of-view of the people who were digging or cutting their way out.

PT: What’s behind the continued viewer fascination with the genre?

JY: The stories are amazing. How do people dig out of concrete with a spoon as they did at Alcatraz or cut through a concrete ceiling as I believe they did at Elmira [Correctional Facility]? It seems like impossible obstacles to us, and yet it was done by people who have nothing but time on their side and a whole bunch of ingenuity. They may not always be the best people in the world, but they're certainly resourceful and smart, and know how to solve problems. So I think that's just fascinating and makes for great stories.

PT: Is there one particular episode from the series that really caught your interest and fascination?

JY: The one that I thought was most remarkable was El Chapo's escaping from a prison that was basically designed to be inescapable. In fact, he didn't actually escape it, but somebody broke in to get him out. The remarkable precision of his team of engineers and excavators who were able to somehow break through the security of the Mexican authorities to get the precise coordinates of where the shower pan in his cell was fascinating. The shower pan was the only part of his cell that was not visible by CCTV camera, which was being watched 24 hours a day by the federal Mexican agents. Yey they got this tunnel exactly under his shower, which was just incredible. They got within like six inches of where they needed it to be after digging for hundreds and hundreds of yards underground. So that to me is mind blowing.

PT: What does Morgan Freeman bring to the table?

JY: He’s famous for being in one of the great prison films in the Shawshank Redemption, so people recognize him as someone who might be able to get into the mind of a prisoner. He’s an amazing storyteller and he makes you feel like you are there. He doesn’t seem like just a host telling you the facts; he’s telling you the story from the point of view of the people trying to get out. His name automatically brings a broader audience, so it’s our job to make sure the story is well told and compelling. If we tell a story well and Morgan is reading it, then I think people are very likely to get hooked and to be drawn to it.

PT: What other projects can we expect to see from Revelations Entertainment?

JY: We’re looking at bringing to the marketplace a new breed of historical stories that we really bring to life through storytelling. There are other areas like manhunts, for example, where we’d love to explore. I think in general Morgan has an immense curiosity for history -- everything from military to civil war to civil rights -- so there's many parts of history that Morgan and our company can explore.

History has teamed with actor Morgan Freeman on an unscripted series that looks at the greatest prison escapes.

Great Escapes with Morgan Freeman will feature dramatic recreations that showcase infamous prison breaks by unearthing every step of an inmate’s meticulous plan, the escape route and the intense manhunt that immediately followed, said network officials. 

Episodes will feature escapes from prisons ranging from Alcatraz, Clinton Correctional Facility in Dannemora, NY, the HM Maze Prison in Northern Ireland, and the Brushy Mountain State Penitentiary in Tennessee, said History.

History also announced that it will offer seven hours of new documentary programming to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks, including one-hour special 9/11: The Legacy premiering Sept. 10 that focuses on extraordinary stories of resilience and healing from the children impacted on Sept. 11.

Also Read: Magnolia Network to Debut Three New Series, Sets 9/11-Themed Documentary

Amazon Prime has released the first video trailer for its new sci-fi series Solos, which debuts on the streaming service May 21.

The series follows seven characters who are seemingly alone but realize that even during their most isolated moments, they are all connected through the human experience, said network officials. 

Solos stars Uzo Aduba, Nicole Beharie, Morgan Freeman, Anthony Mackie and Anne Hathaway. 

Read also: 'Thursday Night Football' to Amazon in 2022

The second season of National Geographic’s The Story of God With Morgan Freeman debuts Monday, Jan. 16, the network said.

Season one was its most-watched series of all time, according to National Geographic, which said actor/producer Freeman “will again take viewers around the world on a quest for interfaith understanding and connectivity through the lens of the world’s major religions, science, anthropology and archaeology.”

Season two features three episodes. The series will go global this spring on National Geographic channels in 171 countries. Freeman said he hopes the series will continue "to open dialogue that will allow us to understand our neighbors both here in the U.S. and around the world.”

Read more at broadcastingcable.com.

Discovery Communications and National Media Group signed a deal to form Media Alliance, a limited liability company that will distribute Discovery’s 11 pay TV networks and its Eurosport TV portfolio in Russia.

The transaction is expected to be completed in the coming weeks.

“The agreement to form Media Alliance is a further example of Discovery’s global strategy to extend the reach of our high quality content across all categories and platforms. Russia remains an important market and we are confident that this deal will allow us to continue our growth there,” said Discovery Networks Central & Eastern Europe, Middle East and Africa president and managing director Kasia Kieli in a statement.

According to Discovery, its portfolio of educational, scientific and factual channels are popular across Russia, with local favorites including Discovery Channel, TLC and Animal Planet. Eurosport, Discovery’s latest addition, is the leading pay TV sports channel in the market. In recent years, Discovery has increased the number of local channels and productions in Russia and hit shows include Through the Wormhole with Morgan Freeman, MythBusters as well as the forthcoming Racing Extinction,  recently featured at the Moscow International Film Festival.

Discovery North East Europe senior vice president and country manager Olga Paskina will become general director of the Media Alliance General Director in addition to her Discovery responsibilities. She has extensive experience in strategic leadership and operational management, having previously held leadership positions in Russian and international companies. 

“With this arrangement, Discovery will keep providing Russian citizens with the scientific, educational and factual content that we have broadcast for 17 years,” Paskina said in a statement. 

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National Geographic Channel will team with veteran actor Morgan Freeman to create a new series, The Story of God, the network announced Thursday (June 11).

Freeman will serve as host and executive producer of the series, which will examine religious experiences and rituals around the world, according to network officials. Each episode of the series will center on one big question about the divine, from the mystery of creation to the true power of miracles to the promise of resurrection, said the network.

The Story Of God, which will premiere in 2016 on National Geographic Channel and Nat Geo Mundo in the US as well as in 171 countries, will be produced by Revelations Entertainment.  

“We’re partnering with Revelations Entertainment and the talented, multifaceted Morgan Freeman to produce an epic and very personal journey to understand mankind’s religious devotion,” said Courteney Monroe, CEO, National Geographic Channels in a statement. “Blending science, history, anthropology and personal experience, we’re harnessing the power of the National Geographic brand and our unparalleled global reach to tell a meaningful and awe-inspiring story of religion and spirituality, across disciplines and faiths.”