ABC Family, continuing to strengthen its originals roster, will present event program Samurai Girl this summer and ordered a second season of fraternity series Greek.
Production on the six-hour Samurai Girl, starring Jamie Chung (MTV’s Real World: San Diego), is set to begin this spring in Vancouver. ABC plans on running the program over one weekend in August.
Based on the series of popular young adult novels, Samurai Girl chronicles the saga of an adopted 19-year-old Japanese girl named Heaven, who discovers that her wealthy businessman father is really the head of Yakuza, the nation’s mafia, and may have killed her mother. Heaven breaks from her family and begins samurai training, and with the assistance of new American friends endeavors to take down her duplicitous dad.
ABC Family, which has leveraged original event fare in the past with limited series like Fallen, should also get a bump as Chung (I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry) stars in the live-action Fox featureDragonball, set to bow Aug. 15.
ABC Family has also ordered a 12-installment sophomore season of Greek, production on which is set to begin in early April for airing during the 2008-09 TV season. The second-half of the show’s first season is set to premiere on March 24, following its debut last summer. The series follows Rusty, a freshman at a fictional college, where he wants to put behind his geeky by becoming a frat brother.
“We’re very proud of Greek and are thrilled to be bringing it back,” said ABC Family president Paul Lee in a statement. “And Samurai Girl is just perfect for us. We believe Jamie Chung has real break-out potential.”
