ITV has announced commissions for a new sitcom starring Brenda Blethyn and a doc featuring boxer Tyson Fury.
In Kate and Kolo, Brenda Blethyn will take on the title role of Kate in the studio sitcom with Jimmy Akingbola taking on the role of Kolo.
Further casting for Kate and Kolo will be announced nearer transmission.
Kate and Kolo centres around a working-class woman who runs an old-fashioned café in a neglected seaside town and who develops a strong, if sometimes volatile, friendship with an asylum-seeking African doctor.
Kate and Kolo is a Hat Trick production. It is written by Guy Jenkin and Andy Hamilton, who will also supervise a trainee writer under the Comedy 50:50 scheme.
Jimmy Mulville, Managing Director at Hat Trick Productions said “ITV is the perfect home for Kate and Kolo, written by two of the country’s top writers and with two great actors like Brenda and Jimmy, it’s a wonderfully funny and sometimes touching comedy about real people coping with life at the sharp end.”
Kate & Kolo has been commissioned for ITV by Saskia Schuster, ITV’s Comedy Controller.
For Meet The Furys, ITV has secured exclusive, behind-the-scenes access to film Tyson Fury and his larger than life family.
Filmed over several months, Meet The Furys [WT] follows the Gypsy King and his nearest and dearest as he fulfils his childhood dream of defending his heavyweight boxing lineal championship in Las Vegas and prepares to take on his arch-rival Deontay Wilder for a second time.
The series, produced by Optomen Television, will have a ringside seat inside Tyson’s Morecambe home and at the Gypsy King’s family site, candidly capturing him amongst his inner circle of family and friends who have lived through Tyson’s mental health and addiction issues with him.
Wife Paris and their five children, Dad John, who trained him to become a champion boxer from when he was eight years old, Tyson’s brothers and a rich cast of friends and the broader Fury clan all feature in this four-part series.
Meet The Furys [WT] was commissioned by Kate Teckman, Head of Development Factual Entertainment, and Sue Murphy, Head of Factual Entertainment, at ITV. Executive producers for Optomen are Tina Flintoff & Nick Hornby. The series Producer is Demi Doyle and the series director is Phil Turner.
Staff Reporter
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