Hong Kong filmmaker Herman Yau has been attached to direct “The Cinematographer,” a biographical feature on the life of pioneering Chinese-American cinematographer James Wong Howe.
The attachment was made during the recently concluded Hong Kong FilMart.
Award-winning art director and costume designer Man Lim Chung, best known for “In the Mood for Love,” has also joined the production, taking on both design roles. His reputation for meticulous period work will be central to recreating the world Wong Howe inhabited across more than five decades in Hollywood, from the silent era through the Golden Age of cinema.
Yau, whose credits span more than 100 films including the “Shock Wave” and the “White Storm” franchises, brings a career defined by versatility across drama, action, historical and socially conscious filmmaking. His attachment marks a significant step forward for what is being positioned as an international co-production aimed at global audiences.
“The Cinematographer” would be the first-ever biopic devoted to Wong, a two-time Academy Award winner who collected 10 nominations for best cinematography over the course of his career, winning for “The Rose Tattoo” (1955) and “Hud” (1963). His other nominated films were “Algiers” (1938), “Abe Lincoln in Illinois” (1940), “Kings Row” (1942), “The North Star” (1943), “Air Force” (1943), “The Old Man and the Sea” (1958), “Seconds” (1966) and “Funny Lady” (1975) – his final film as cinematographer. Members of the International Cinematographers Guild have ranked him among the 10 most influential cinematographers in film history.
Wong was born in Guangdong, China, and went to the U.S. at the age of five, eventually settling in Washington state. As a teenager he competed as a professional boxer before finding his way to Hollywood, where he first sought work carrying equipment for Jesse Lasky Studios in 1917 – only to be redirected to lighter duties, given his slight frame. He became a slate boy for Cecil B. DeMille, working his way up through the ranks while nurturing a parallel passion for still photography. He shot his first features as cinematographer in 1923. He was billed simply as James Howe until 1933, when MGM added “Wong” to his screen credit.
Over the decades that followed, Wong redefined the visual grammar of American cinema through his mastery of wide-angle lenses, low-key lighting techniques and his development of the crab dolly. His collaborators included some of the most significant directors in Hollywood history, among them Michael Curtiz, John Frankenheimer, Sidney Lumet and Martin Ritt, with a roster of stars stretching from Humphrey Bogart and James Cagney to Paul Newman, Rock Hudson and Barbra Streisand.
His professional ascent came at considerable personal cost. Wong was unable to obtain U.S. citizenship until the Chinese Exclusion Act was repealed in 1943, despite having lived in the country for nearly four decades. His marriage to novelist Sanora Babb – the couple wed in Paris in 1937 – went legally unrecognized in California until 1948, when the state’s anti-miscegenation law was lifted. Even then, the union could not be publicly acknowledged, as mixed-race marriage ran afoul of the morality clauses in his studio contracts. During World War II, Wong took to wearing a button reading “I am Chinese” to make clear he was not Japanese.
“When I did my research for my PhD thesis, I learnt that there were a number of Chinese filmmakers, including actors/actresses and behind-the-scene filmmakers (Anna May Wong, Esther Eng, etc.), who were so remarkable in Hollywood before and after WWII in the last century. They were the pioneers in the wild west, to fight for representation on screen and off screen, and to showcase their talent,” Yau told Variety. “James Wong Howe was one of them, perhaps the highest achieved one. Maybe it’s also because I worked as a cinematographer for many years as well as a director, I’m particularly interested in his journey and how he navigated Hollywood at that time with his cameras and vision. It’s a story that needs to be told with authenticity.”
“The Cinematographer” was created by Hiu Man Chan, who will serve as executive producer and leads NGO U.K.-China Film Collab. Chan’s credits include the upcoming “My Indian Boyfriend: the Golden Mile” and a Bertrand Russell biopic. The project was selected for the AFM market pitch in 2020 but faced prolonged development setbacks during the pandemic, with casting remaining the central challenge.
“The most difficult part for this project is its casting; the lead actor is crucial for the film. I have been casting for the past few years, but have yet found the right actor to play ‘Jimmie’,” Chan said.
The FilMart meeting with Yau, Chan added, gave the project fresh footing. “Meeting Herman Yau in person during FilMart this month for the first time provided some new grounding to the project. The legendary story left behind by ‘Jimmie’ is so important that I want to do it with justice. Even though it has come a long way, I am thankful to FilMart where new lights were shed in Hong Kong,” Chan said.
The production plans to shoot across multiple locations tracing Wong’s journey from China to Hollywood. Casting and international co-production partners are expected to be revealed in the coming months.
Duffy, the Welsh singer-songwriter who had a massive hit with “Mercy” in 2008 and then retreated from the limelight, is set to tell her story in a new Disney+ documentary.
The announcement was made at Series Mania on Wednesday by Angela Jain, Disney+’s head of content for EMEA, in a keynote address. In 2020, Duffy revealed in a social media post that she had stepped away from music in 2011 after being kidnapped and raped.
Duffy “disappeared off the face of the earth and hasn’t really spoken about what happened in that time, other than about five or six years ago in a social media post,” Jain said, calling the feature-length doc a “really powerful project.”
“She has entrusted us with her story, so we really have a huge responsibility to handle this with care and sensitivity, because she’s speaking about what happened to her for the first time,” she added. Production is starting soon on the documentary.
After the initial revelation, Duffy shared details of the kidnapping in a 3,000-word post on her website. “It was my birthday, I was drugged at a restaurant, I was drugged then for four weeks and travelled to a foreign country,” she wrote. The perpetrator, whose name she did not reveal, “made veiled confessions of wanting to kill me.”
Duffy continued: “It didn’t feel safe to go to the police. I felt if anything went wrong, I would be dead, and he would have killed me. I could not risk being mishandled or it being all over the news during my danger. I really had to follow what instincts I had.”
She eventually did tell the police, but said in the post that she has felt “petrified” ever since. Of a potential return to music, Duffy said at the time: “I’m doing this to be freed, for all of me to be freed. What follows remains to be seen.”
Alex Rodriguez, Tom Brady, Jason Kelce, Richard Sherman, J.J. Watt and Charles Barkley are among the on-screen sports talent landing nominations for the 47th Annual Sports Emmy Awards. The full list of nominees, announced Wednesday by the National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences, is led by ESPN, which earned 62 nominations (bolstered by programs including “E60”).
This Sports Emmys eligibility period covers the calendar 2025 year.
“From the intensity of live competition to the depth of long-form storytelling, this year’s Sports Emmy nominees capture the full spectrum of what makes sports television so powerful,” said Amy Schmelzer, Head of Sports Emmys, in a statement. “These creators are not only advancing the craft through technical and creative excellence, but also deepening the connection between fans and the moments that define our culture. We look forward to celebrating the meaningful impact they continue to have on audiences everywhere.”
The Sports Emmys’ 47 categories include Outstanding Live Special, Outstanding Studio Host, Event Analyst, and Emerging On-Air Talent, among others.
“This class of Sports Emmys nominees showcases the dynamic evolution of sports television, pushing creative boundaries and redefining how stories are told on and off the field,” said NATAS president/CEO Adam Sharp. “As sports programming continues to rank among the most popular and valuable content in media — dominating television viewership and driving streaming growth — these nominees represent the best of the industry. Whether through groundbreaking technical innovation or compelling, character-driven storytelling, we are proud to recognize their outstanding achievements at this year’s Sports Emmy Awards.”
Host and lifetime achievement honoree will be announced later. The Sports Emmys will take place on Tuesday, May 26, at Jazz at Lincoln Center’s Frederick P. Rose Hall in New York.
Here are this year’s nominations:
Outstanding Live Sports Special: Championship Event College Football Playoff: National Championship (ESPN [Two Circles]) Fox MLB: World Series – Toronto Blue Jays vs Los Angeles Dodgers (Fox) The Masters (CBS) NBA Finals (ESPN) Super Bowl LX (NBC | Peacock)
Outstanding Live Sports Special: Non-Championship Event Fox MLB: The 95th All-Star Game (Fox) 151st Kentucky Derby (NBC | Peacock) Monsters Funday Football (ESPN [Beyond Sports | Pixar | NFL]) NHL in ASL: 2025 Navy Federal Credit Union NHL Stadium Series (NHL Productions) NHL on ESPN: 4 Nations Face-Off (ESPN)
Outstanding Live Sports Series Fox NFL (Fox) Monday Night Football (ESPN | ABC) Monday Night Football with Peyton & Eli (ESPN [Omaha Productions]) Sunday Night Football (NBC | Peacock) Thursday Night Football (Prime Video [Amazon MGM Studios])
Outstanding Sports Playoff Coverage College Football Playoff (ESPN) Fox MLB: The American League Playoffs (Fox | FS1) Fox NFL: The NFC Playoffs (Fox) NBC NFL Playoffs (NBC | Peacock) NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament (CBS | TNT)
Outstanding Edited Sports Event Coverage 4 Nations Face-Off: Unveiled (NHL Productions [NHL Productions | Radan Films | NHLPA]) NFL Game Day All Access: Super Bowl LX (YouTube [NFL Films]) Official Film of the 2025 Masters (CBS) Road To The Super Bowl (NBC [NFL Films]) UFC The Walk: Topuria vs Oliveria (UFC)
Outstanding Edited Sports Special E60: Paid to Play – Understanding College Sports in 2025 (ESPN) The Hall of Fame Knocks Class of 2026 (NFL Network) The Madhouse – NASCAR’s Return Into Bowman Gray Stadium (FS1 [Fox Sports Films | NASCAR Studios]) Not So Fast, My Friend: A Lee Corso Special (ESPN) Welcome to the NHL: Meet The Prospects (NHL Productions)
Outstanding Edited Sports Series: Hosted E60 (ESPN) Eli Manning Presents: The Undercovers – Baker Mayfield | Justin Jefferson | Micah Parsons (Prime Video [Amazon MGM Studios | Range Media | Ten Till]) NFL Films Presents (FS1 [NFL Films]) Pablo Torre Finds Out (Meadowlark Media) TNT Sports Conversations (TruTV)
Outstanding ESports Championship Coverage 2025 Apex Legends Global Series Championship (ESL FACEIT Group) 2025 Call of Duty League Championship Weekend – OpTic Texas vs Vancouver Surge (ESL FACEIT Group) League of Legends Worlds 2025 Final – T1 Esports vs KT Rolster (LoL Esports [Riot Games]) VALORANT Champions 2025 Grand Final – NRG vs Fnatic (Valorant Esports [Riot Games])
Outstanding Sports Documentary: Short Final Finishers (East 89th St Productions [Tribeca Studios | Bluff Road Films]) Home Turn (NASCAR Productions [Bluefoot Entertainment]) NFL Explained: Kendrick Lamar’s Super Bowl LIX Halftime Show (NFL Media Group) NFL Films Presents: The Arctic Challenge (FS1 [NFL Films]) The Shuffle (HBO Max [NFL Films])
Outstanding Sports Documentary: Long Butterfly in a Blizzard (Bracing For Impact, LLC [Flagship Independent | Big Lift Media]) Champions Of The Golden Valley (Olympics.com [XTR Studios | Sturgefilm | Tideshift | Optimist | Taleem]) Clemente (The History Channel [Vinegar Hill | Uninterrupted | Vantage Pictures | Cookie Jar & a Dream Studios | APX Content Ventures | The History Channel]) E60: Southpaw – The Life and Legacy of Jim Abbott (ESPN) Elway (Netflix [Skydance Sports | NFL Films | Omaha Productions | MakeMake Productions]) Surviving Ohio State (HBO Max [Sports Illustrated Studios | 101 Studios | Smokehouse Pictures])
Outstanding Sports Documentary Series Alex vs ARod (HBO Max [Religion of Sports]) Allen Iv3rson (Prime Video [Amazon MGM Studios | Unanimous Media | NBA Entertainment | Jersey Legends (a division of Authentic Studios)]) America’s Team: The Gambler and His Cowboys (Netflix [Skydance Sports | NFL Films | Stardust Frames Productions | Netflix]) Believers: Boston Red Sox (ESPN [Religion of Sports | Artists Equity]) Cocaine Quarterback: Signal-Caller for the Cartel (Prime Video [Amazon MGM Studios | Unrealistic Ideas])
Outstanding Sports Documentary Series: Serialized Built in Birmingham: Brady & the Blues (Whisper TV [Religion of Sports]) The Clubhouse: A Year with the Red Sox (Netflix [One Potato Productions | Boardwalk Pictures]) Formula 1: Drive to Survive (Netflix [Box to Box]) Full Court Press (ESPN [ESPN | Omaha Productions | Words + Pictures]) Quarterback (Netflix [NFL Films | Omaha Productions | 2PM Productions]) WWE: Unreal (Netflix [Omaha Productions | NFL Films | Skydance Sports | WWE])
Outstanding Sports Studio Show: Daily First Things First (FS1) NBA Today (ESPN) NFL LIVE (ESPN) The Pat McAfee Show (ESPN) SportsCenter (ESPN)
Outstanding Sports Studio Show: Weekly College GameDay (ESPN) Inside the NBA on TNT (TNT) Monday Night Countdown (ESPN) The NFL Today (CBS) Thursday Night Football (Prime Video [Amazon MGM Studios])
Outstanding Sports Studio Show: Limited Run College GameDay – College Football Playoff (ESPN) Football Night in America: NFL Postseason (NBC | Peacock) Fox MLB: The Postseason (Fox | FS1) Inside the NBA Playoffs on TNT (TNT) Road to the Final Four (CBS | TNT)
Outstanding Sports Journalism Aspiration: Pablo Torre Finds Out (Meadowlark Media) Kobe: The Making of a Legend (CNN Originals) Save: The Katie Meyer Story (E60 [ESPN]) What Is Riley Gaines Hiding?: Pablo Torre Finds Out (Meadowlark Media)
Outstanding Sports Feature: Short Form All Heart — Fox CFB: Big Noon Kickoff (Fox) Behan Strong — NCAA March Madness (CBS) Faces Forever Young — World Figure Skating Championships (NBC | Peacock) Just Getting Started — Fox CFB: Big Noon Kickoff (Fox) Luckie — College GameDay (ESPN) RJ — Fox MLB: The Postseason (Fox) A World Away — College GameDay (ESPN)
Outstanding Sports Feature: Long Form Chuskit & Saldon: Frozen Dreams of Ladakh (Olympics.com [XTR Studios]) Girl Climber (Red Bull Studios [Louder than Eleven]) Imillaskate: The Cholita Skaters of Bolivia (Optimist [Pachamama Sabia]) Ride With Me (Golf Central Live from The Open [Golf Channel]) SC Featured: Love, Abby (SportsCenter [ESPN]) Tim Green – A Voice Reclaimed (NFL Films Presents [FS1])
Outstanding Sports Open/Tease America’s Game — Super Bowl LX (NBC | Peacock) America’s Team: The Gambler and His Cowboys (Netflix [Skydance Sports | NFL Films | Stardust Frames Productions | Netflix]) Brick by Brick — Fox IndyCar: The 109th Indianapolis 500 (Fox) Celtics City (HBO Max [Ringer Films | Words + Pictures | Left/Right | NBA Entertainment]) The Harder Choice — The 126th Army-Navy Game (CBS) Nerves at Augusta National — The Masters (CBS)
Outstanding Interactive Experience: Sports Fan Optionality on Prime Video (Prime Video Sports [Prime Video | Amazon MGM Studios]) NASCAR Driver Cam on HBO Max (HBO Max) The NBA Experience on Peacock (Peacock) NHL in ASL (NHL Productions) SportsCenter For You (ESPN [WSC Sports | Google])
Outstanding Digital Innovation: Sports MLB App in XR (MLB) NFL on NBC Madden NFL Cast (Peacock) Prime Insights (Prime Video [Amazon MGM Studios]) VIP — Yankee Stadium (Apple TV [SoHi Media]) World of Red Bull in Apple Immersive (Red Bull Media House, NA [Apple])
Outstanding Technical Team: Sports Event College Football Playoff National Championship (ESPN) Fox IndyCar: The 109th Indianapolis 500 (Fox | FS1) Fox MLB: World Series – Toronto Blue Jays vs Los Angeles Dodgers (Fox | FS1) The Masters (CBS) Super Bowl LX (NBC | Peacock)
Outstanding Technical Team: Sports Studio College GameDay – College Football (ESPN) Fox NFL (Fox) NBA on Prime Video (Amazon MGM Studios) NFL Draft (ESPN)
Outstanding Sports Camera Work: Short Form Brick by Brick — Fox IndyCar: The 109th Indianapolis 500 (Fox) The Harder Choice (The 126th Army-Navy Game [CBS]) 151st Kentucky Derby (NBC | Peacock) A Parisian Rhythm with Omar Sy — Roland-Garros on TNT Sports (TNT | TruTV) Silent Super Bowl — NFL Films Presents (FS1 [NFL Films])
Outstanding Sports Camera Work: Long Form America’s Team: The Gambler and His Cowboys (Netflix [Skydance Sports | NFL Films | Stardust Frames Productions | Netflix]) Celtics City (HBO Max [Ringer Films | Words + Pictures | Left/Right | NBA Entertainment]) Cocaine Quarterback: Signal-Caller for the Cartel (Unrealistic Ideas [Amazon MGM Studios | Unrealistic Ideas]) I Skied Down Mount Everest (Red Bull Media House GmbH [East Studio]) Raise The Flags: 50 Years of Buccaneers Football (Heroes & Fables [NFL Films | Skydance Sports | Prime Video Sports | Tampa Bay Buccaneers]) Training Camp with the Buffalo Bills — Hard Knocks (HBO Max [NFL Films])
Outstanding Sports Editing: Short Form 4 Nations Face-Off: For Crest and Country — NHL on ESPN (ESPN) The Bay — NBA All-Star on TNT (TNT) Brick by Brick — IndyCar: The 109th Indianapolis 500 (Fox) It’s Time — NHL Stanley Cup Final on TNT (TNT) A Parisian Rhythm with Omar Sy — Roland-Garros on TNT Sports (TNT | truTV) Stanley Cup Playoffs Opening Round: Devils vs Hurricanes – Snap Shot (NHL on ESPN [ESPN])
Outstanding Sports Editing: Long Form American Thunder: NASCAR at Le Mans (NASCAR Studios [Amazon MGM Studios | NASCAR Studios]) America’s Team: The Gambler and His Cowboys (Netflix [Skydance Sports | NFL Films | Stardust Frames Productions | Netflix]) Butterfly in a Blizzard (Bracing For Impact, LLC [Flagship Independent | Big Lift Media]) Celtics City (HBO Max [Ringer Films | Words + Pictures | Left/Right | NBA Entertainment]) Saquon (NFL Films [Amazon MGM Studios | NFL Films | Skydance Sports | Expanded Media | LBI Entertainment | Vision26 Studios]) We Beat the Dream Team (TNT | HBO Max [USA Basketball | NBA Entertainment | Blue Ox Films]) WWE: Unreal (Netflix [Omaha Productions | NFL Films | Skydance Sports | WWE | Netflix])
The Dick Schaap Outstanding Sports Writing Award: Short Form Brick by Brick — IndyCar: The 109th Indianapolis 500 (Fox) Choices – Lee Corso’s Final Headgear Pick — College GameDay (ESPN) It’s Time — NHL Stanley Cup Final on TNT (TNT) 151st Kentucky Derby (NBC | Peacock) In Motion and Memory — IndyCar: The 109th Indianapolis 500 (Fox) Wimbledon (ESPN)
Outstanding Sports Writing: Long Form Above the Tide: 20 Years After Katrina — E60 (ESPN) Celtics City (HBO Max [Ringer Films | Words + Pictures | Left/Right | NBA Entertainment]) Going Inside (TNT) In Season with the NFC East — Hard Knocks (HBO Max [NFL Films]) The Superdome At 50 — NFL Films Presents (FS1 [NFL Films])
Outstanding Music Direction: Sports Hard Knocks: In Season with the NFC East (HBO Max [NFL Films]) Home Turn: Daytona Beach, FL (NASCAR Studios [Bluefoot Entertainment]) Memphis to the Mountain: Acclimatization | Elevation (Andscape [Sender Films]) NCAA Final Four: San Antonio – Unwritten Reimagined (CBS [Sony Music]) NHL Stanley Cup Final on TNT: It’s Time (TNT) Surviving Ohio State (HBO Max [Sports Illustrated Studios | 101 Studios | Smokehouse Pictures]) Thursday Night Football (Amazon MGM Studios [Amazon MGM Studios])
Outstanding Sports Audio/Sound: Live Event Apple TV: Friday Night Baseball (Apple TV [MLB Network]) Fox MLB (Fox | FS1) Fox NASCAR (Fox | FS1) Fox NFL (Fox) Sunday Night Football (NBC | Peacock)
Outstanding Sports Audio/Sound: Post-Produced Believers: Boston Red Sox (ESPN [ESPN | Religion of Sports | Artists Equity]) Cocaine Quarterback: Signal-Caller for the Cartel (Unrealistic Ideas [Amazon MGM Studios | Unrealistic Ideas]) E60: Above the Tide – 20 Years After Katrina (ESPN) Earnhardt: Dale (Imagine Documentaries [Amazon MGM Studios | Imagine Documentaries | Everyone Else | NASCAR Studios | Dirty Mo Media]) Hard Knocks: Training Camp with the Buffalo Bills (HBO Max [NFL Films]) NHL Stanley Cup Final on TNT: It’s Time (TNT)
Outstanding Sports Graphic Design: Event/Show Fox NFL (Fox) Monsters Funday Football (ESPN [Beyond Sports | Big Studios | Pixar]) NBA on NBC & Peacock (NBC | Peacock) NBA on Prime Video (Amazon MGM Studios [Amazon MGM Studios]) Thursday Night Football (Amazon MGM Studios [Amazon MGM Studios])
Outstanding Sports Graphic Design: Specialty Believers: Boston Red Sox (ESPN [ESPN | Religion of Sports | Artists Equity]) MLB Now Open (MLB Network) NFL on CBS: The Evolution of the Big Head – Merging Human Artistry with AI Innovation (CBS) NFL Slimetime (Nickelodeon) WWE: Unreal (Netflix [Omaha Productions | NFL Films | Skydance Sports | WWE | Netflix])
Outstanding Studio Or Production Design/Art Direction: Sports Celtics City (HBO Max [Ringer Films | Words + Pictures | Left/Right | NBA Entertainment]) Fox NFL Sunday: Case of the Missing Best Team | The Dynasty Blueprint | The Waiting Room (Fox) Monsters Funday Football (ESPN [Beyond Sports | Big Studios | Pixar]) NBA on Prime Video (Amazon MGM Studios [Amazon MGM Studios]) NFL Slimetime (Nickelodeon) The NFL Today: The Virtual Time Machine – Rebuilding the Legacy of The NFL Today (CBS)
The George Wensel Technical Achievement Award College Football – POVORA Wireless Tilt Control CapCam: Stabilized CapCam with Remote Tilt Control (ESPN [Povora]) Fox IndyCar: Augmented Reality (Fox | FS1) Fox MLB: The Postseason – UmpCam AR Strike Zone System (MLB | Major League Baseball [Fox Sports | Bolt6 | Virtual Eye]) The Last Crescendo – The 4th Judge: First-Ever AI Power Boxing Judge (DAZN) TGL Presented by SoFi: SmartPin Cam (ABC | ESPN | ESPN2 | ESPN+) 2025 Wrangler National Finals Rodeo – AIQ: Where Data Meets Dirt (Teton Ridge)
Outstanding Promotional Announcement: Sports City of Fury – Fatal Fury in Times Square (BigTime Creative Shop [Truffle]) ESPN Sports Forever (ESPN | ESPN+ [Butler, Shine, Stern & Partners | ESPN Creative Studio | Division7 | The Herd]) Fastest Racing on Earth — Fox IndyCar (Fox | FS1 | FS2 | Fox News | Fox Business | BTN | Deportes | [Special Group | Biscuit Filmworks | Cabin Edit | Eleven Sound | Ethos | Pariah | New Math]) Milan-Cortina Olympics on NBC & Peacock (NBC | Peacock) NBA on NBC & Peacock (NBC | Peacock) Unforgettable Awaits – 2025 NBA Finals (Warner Brothers Discovery)
Outstanding Public Service Content: Sports Champion – Super Bowl LX (National Football League [72andSunny | Morton Jankel Zander, Inc.]) ESPN Take Back Sports Movement (ESPN) Line ‘Em Up (JOAN Creative [JOAN Studios]) Notre Dame: What Would You Fight For? (NBC | Peacock)
Outstanding Sports Personality: Studio Host Rece Davis (ESPN) Rich Eisen (NFL Network) Ernie Johnson (TNT | CBS) Scott Van Pelt (ESPN) Laura Rutledge (ESPN) Kate Scott (CBS | Paramount+)
Outstanding Sports Personality: Studio Analyst Charles Barkley (TNT) Clark Kellogg (CBS | TNT) Mina Kimes (ESPN) Pedro Martinez (TNT) Candace Parker (TNT | TBS) Alex Rodriguez (Fox | FS1)
Outstanding Sports Personality: Play-By-Play Joe Buck (ESPN) Joe Davis (Fox | FS1 | NFL Network) Ian Eagle (CBS | TNT | Netflix | Amazon) Jim Nantz (CBS) Mike Tirico (NBC | Peacock)
Outstanding Sports Personality: Sideline Reporter Tom Rinaldi (Fox | FS1) Holly Rowe (ESPN) Laura Rutledge (ESPN) Lisa Salters (ESPN) Tracy Wolfson (CBS | TNT)
Outstanding Sports Personality: Emerging On-Air Talent Andraya Carter (ESPN) Katie George (ESPN) Jason Kelce (ESPN) Matt Ryan (CBS | Paramount+ | Netflix) Richard Sherman (Prime Video) J.J. Watt (CBS)
Outstanding Sports On-Air Personality In Spanish Andrés Cantor (Telemundo | Universo | Peacock) Carolina Guillén (ESPN) Miguel Gurwitz (Telemundo | Universo | Peacock) Fernando Palomo (ESPN) Sammy Sadovnik (MLS Productions)
Outstanding Sports Studio Show In Spanish Ahora o Nunca (ESPN) ESPN FC (ESPN) Fútbol Picante (ESPN) Linea de 4 (Univision | TUDN) Premier League Extra (Telemundo | Universo | Peacock) Rumbo Al Mundial (Telemundo | Universo | Peacock)
Outstanding Sports Feature Story In Spanish Atxa Delgado — Mundo Originals (Mundo NFL [SWAY | Cobra Films]) Greenland: Venezia (ESPN) Los Colores del Istmo — Mundo Originals (Mundo NFL [SWAY | Cobra Films]) María Llena Eres de Fuerza (ESPN) SC Reportajes: Rafael Campos — SportsCenter (ESPN)
Vincent D’Onofrio is calling for Marvel and Sony to clear out the red tape so that his “Daredevil: Born Again” character, the villainous crime lord Kingpin, can face off against his longtime comic book nemesis, Spider-Man, on the big screen.
In a reply to a fan on social media calling for a live-action showdown between Spidey and Kingpin, D’Onofrio wrote, “If Sony and Marvel ever get their sh*t together maybe. It’s a complicated rights issue. Hope so.”
While D’Onofrio’s Kingpin is part of Disney and Marvel’s IP machine, Sony owns the film rights to the red and blue wall crawler. However, the studio lends out the character to Marvel so he can appear in films like “Avengers: Infinity War.”
Kingpin and Spider-Man have technically appeared in a movie together, but it was the 2018 animated film “Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse.” Liev Schreiber voiced Kingpin, who faced off against Shameik Moore’s Miles Morales.
D’Onofrio was most recently seen as Wilson Fisk, aka Kingpin, in the new season of “Daredevil: Born Again,” which premiered on Disney+ Tuesday night. In the new season, Fisk is the mayor of New York City, stirring civil unrest with the help of his ultra-violent Anti-Vigilante Task Force.
The highly anticipated “Spider-Man: Brand New Day” will mark the next appearance of Holland’s web-slinging hero. Hitting theaters on July 31, the film also stars Zendaya, Sadie Sink, Jacob Batalon, Jon Bernthal and Mark Ruffalo. It’s directed by Destin Daniel Cretton and written by Chris McKenna and Erik Sommers. The sequel picks up after the events of 2021’s “No Way Home,” which saw the whole world forget that Peter Parker is Spider-Man.
Sony’s released the trailer for “Brand New Day’ on March 17. In just four days, it crossed 1 billion views, becoming the first movie trailer ever to reach the milestone.
Kuku, which has built a substantial presence in Indian digital entertainment through its audio and short-form video platforms, is stepping into theatrical cinema for the first time with “Indian Institute of Zombies,” a Hindi-language horror comedy due in cinemas on May 8.
The film unfolds on an elite engineering campus, weaving together zombie horror, youth comedy and social satire. Kuku is positioning it as a genre first for Indian cinema, with the theatrical setting central to its strategy – the company sees the communal big-screen experience as distinct from, rather than an extension of, its existing digital offerings.
The ensemble cast includes Jessie Lever, Anupriya Goenka, Mohan Kapur, Ranjan Raj, Shivani Paliwal, Shantanu Anam, Rose Sardana, Sachin Kavetham and Tanishq Chaudhary, among others. The screenplay was written by Hussain Dalal and Abbas Dalal, whose previous credits include “Brahmāstra: Part One – Shiva” and “Farzi.” Direction is by Gaganjeet Singh and Alok Dwivedi of Low Gravity Productions, a team with a background in streaming series and ad films.
The story originated internally at Kuku, with the project framed as the opening move in what the company intends to be a growing theatrical slate.
Kuku’s two main platforms occupy distinct corners of the Indian digital market. Kuku FM has scaled into a major destination for audio storytelling, while Kuku TV has carved out a following among younger audiences through the microdrama format, delivering narratives built for mobile viewing.
“Kuku has always been obsessed with how India consumes stories,” said Lal Chand Bisu, CEO of Kuku. “We built scale in personal consumption through Kuku FM and created a new microdrama category in India with Kuku TV. Theatres for us represent the next frontier and we are excited to make our first steps in it. ‘Indian Institute of Zombies’ marks the first of our many, rooted in youth culture, genre innovation and mass Indian tastes.”
Alongside its creative ambitions, the company is also making a case for artificial intelligence as a structural part of how it makes films. Rather than deploying AI at the margins, Kuku says it has built the technology into the project’s foundations – informing how the story was developed and structured, how production logistics were modelled, and how creative decisions were tested and refined throughout the process.
Kunj Sanghvi, senior VP at Kuku, explained the thinking behind both the genre choice and the technology strategy. “‘Indian Institute of Zombies’ is a film for everyone who has ever been on a college campus. We hope our audiences get to experience their adventurous and brave side as they watch this hilarious film on zombies. We observed the success rates of horror comedies at the cinemas, the lack of a breakout Indian zombie film yet and the insatiable appetite for campus stories across age groups in India,” he said.
“We don’t see AI as a replacement for creativity, but more as an amplifier. By deeply integrating AI into our filmmaking process, we’re able to iterate faster, visualize better and make sharper decisions earlier,” he added.
“NCIS” has not been shy about letting some of its tertiary characters die a dramatic death, but when it comes to letting any of the show’s main cast come to a sad end, there’s been more of a historical hesitation there. So the fandom was little prepared when the big surprise of the show’s 500th episode Tuesday night turned out to be Director Leon Vance, portrayed by Rocky Carroll, going gentle into that good night.
Much of the episode focuses on Vance flashing back on recent events to a seemingly antagonistic interrogator, who eventually reveals himself to be a young version of Ducky, the coroner whom, of course, the director knows to have gone on to the great beyond. At that point, Vance slowly but surely comes to accept his fate, even cracking a joke as he wonders whether having a blinding white light is a little bit “on the nose.”
Will the audience accept it as readily as Vance? And more importantly for our immediate purposes, has Rocky Carroll? With pun definitely intended, Carroll has been a rock of the show through his 18 seasons, gradually being built up from a recurrent player to a mainstay few fans imagined they’d have to learn to live without. But the actor says he is fully reconciled, having had a few months to consider it. Plus, he didn’t have to have a tearful farewell when he filmed his final shots; Carroll is a frequent director on the show, and already has returned to the set to film an episode yet to air in this, season 23.
Carroll got on with Variety for an in-depth exit interview, showing much of the good humor and grace that endeared him to “NCIS” showrunners for 18 years (and possibly more seasons to come, if, in true “NCIS” fashion, he is likely to return in flashbacks or as someone’s conscience).
First off, when did you film this farewell episode, and was it hard to keep it a secret in the weeks or months since?
As we get closer to the air date, my biggest concern has been, because of the advent of social media, being able to keep a secret like this, when sometimes leaks come from the most unsuspecting sources. So the fact that this hasn’t been blasted over the internet so far, or that the majority of people outside of CBS and a small circle of people still don’t know about it, is pretty cool. I think it’s gonna be a huge shock for people. I’ve been able to wrap my mind around it and come to terms with it because I’ve known about this since November, when I was first told about what was going to happen. And the last scene, where Director Vance realizes that he’s been talking to basically the grim reaper, the angel of death, and walks toward the light, that was shot on Dec. 11. And we’re in the middle of March, so I’ve had a little time to wrap my mind around it and come to terms with it.
Brian Dietzen, Rocky Carroll and Gary Cole in episode 500 of NCIS
CBS
And how do you feel now, having had that little bit of time to accept it?
I’ve been able to kind of come full circle with it. And I really think it’s a great episode. I’m not just saying this to be a team player, but if you’ve gotta send a character off, what a way to go. It really is exactly what our executive producer, Steven D. Binder, said. He wanted to write not only a great episode, but a real love letter to the character that really summarized his journey and his impact on the show, and I think we achieved that.
For selfish reasons, I have to remind people: I’ve been a character on this series for 18 years. Most Hollywood careers don’t last 18 years. So to be able to play one character on one of the most popular shows in the world for 18 seasons, that’s the equivalent of living to be 105. You know, if you’ve known somebody who lived to be 105, when you go to that funeral, there’s a part of you that’s like, “OK, yeah, this is sad, but I mean, geez! The guy lived to be 105.” So I feel that way with my character.
With the series, eventually all things do come to an end, and my character’s end came before the end. It would be wonderful to say, “Yeah, I was there for the the very last take of ‘NCIS’ when they finally boarded up the windows and said, ‘OK, that’s it. No more. Everybody go home.’” But, you know, the show was already on the air for five seasons before I started. And I’ve said this many times before: When I came on the show at the end of season 5, I literally thought to myself, “Well, at least you made it on the tail end of the series. It’ll probably go seven seasons — if you’re lucky, maybe eight — and at least you will have gotten a couple good seasons out of it.” That was literally my thought process when I joined the cast. So by that math, the last 16 years have basically been overtime for me.
For people who are O.G. “NCIS” viewers, there may still be a few of them who think of you as one of the new guys, even though you have been around for at least 80% of the series’ life. That’s partly because it wasn’t clear at all when you came in that you were going to be a key cast member.
It was a slow feeling-out process, because when my character came in, he was very, very much an unknown character. He and Gibbs, Mark Harmon‘s character, were very adversarial. You didn’t know: Is this a wolf in sheep’s clothing? Is this a bad guy that’s eventually going to wreak havoc? So the fact that this character, who originally kind of in as the boss from hell, like the stepdad nobody wants, suddenly over the years has become a real member of this “NCIS” family, is a real testament to the writing. And when Steve Binder, the executive producer, told me what the storyline is, he said, “One of the reasons why we selected Vance to meet his demise is because of who you are and what you mean and how significant your character is. As macabre as this sounds, who better to kill off than somebody that everybody would go, ‘Oh no, not him’? You got the most ‘Oh no, not him’ votes. And that’s when we knew we had to do it.”
You sound like you had understandable moments of doubt about whether you were ready to go.
All this happened pretty quickly. I was told in November that “two episodes from now, we’re shooting this episode where your character meets his demise.” And I was like, this is happening in two episodes? So I’ve got basically about four weeks to get ready to do this.” So I had this kind of knee-jerk response, where I remember one of the first things I was saying to our executive producers was: “We lose characters all the time, but we sent Gibbs off to Alaska. Tony and Ziva, Bishop, all these characters, they were all able to kind of go on their own free will, always with the thought that they’re gone, but not not dead. So if you wanted this character to go, why are we being so final about it, when everybody else just gets sent off to another country?” So, yeah, that was my rebuttal.
And what was the answer to that? Obviously, they had to be telling you that it would not have the same impact just to make you another character we imagine retired and living happily ever after.
Yes, absolutely. And again, it’s the 500th episode — the studio, the network, everybody involved said, “We don’t have to put this show on the map — it’s on the map — but we have to remind people why it is one of the most watched shows in the world and has been on as long as it has. Let’s do something spectacular for the 500th episode. And this is what we’ve come up with.” Once the creative in me and the director in me read the script and got a real good gist of it, I was like, “It actually is a great idea.” It’s a terrific storyline. And you know, actors love dying on camera anyway. And I would say the great thing about dying on camera is that weeks later, you get to sit and do an intervie and talk about it.
Look, if this had happened in my third season playing this character, I’d be devastated. But if somebody had told me 18 years ago, “Here’s the deal: We’re gonna hire you to play this character. We’re gonna give you 18 consecutive seasons of work on the most watched show in the world. At the end of season 18, something’s gonna happen to your character. Will you accept this offer?” — there’s not a single actor on the planet who wouldn’t say, “Oh, hell yeah. Sign me up. Eighteen years of work. Are you kidding me?”
From talking to Steve Binder before speaking with you, it sounds like this idea had been brought up a long time ago and they just couldn’t pull the trigger, so to speak.
NCIS – 23-504 – “All Good Things” – Rocky Carroll on NCIS, Tuesday, March 24 (8:00-9:00 PM, ET/PT) on the CBS Television Network.
CBS
It was a very macabre compliment, but he said, “Because of who you are, Rocky, and because of what you brought to the character, we’ve been talking about killing off Vance for the last 10 years. This idea didn’t just come about in 2025. We’ve been thinking about killing this character or having this character meet some sort of untimely death for over a decade. But we couldn’t because it was you.” And I think they figured, “Look, 23 seasons in, who knows how much more time we have. If we don’t do it now, there may not be a season that allows us to do something of this magnitude, because we’re in overtime here.”
They were clearly trying to figure out a way to make it a happy ending, in its fashion. having set up the death of Vance’s wife so long ago…
If your grandfather precedes your grandmother in death, then once your grandmother goes, the first thing we say is, “Oh, they’re together now.” Or it’s “Ronnie and Nancy are together again.” It’s the first thing we think whenever somebody that we love dies: they’re gonna be with the other people that we’ve lost and cared about in the circle, together on the other side now.
What did you think of the idea of having a young Ducky break you the news? The things that it brought to mind were kind of a combination of “It’s a Wonderful Life” with the “Twilight Zone” where Robert Redford turns out to be the very nice angel of death.
Yeah, my mind went immediately to “It’s a Wonderful Life.” Were David McCallum still with us, he would’ve been the ultimate. But I love how Steve Binder structured it. We brought back Adam Campbell, who plays young Ducky, because in the spirit world, you get to pick how old you want to be when you come back. It worked on so many different levels, and just having that little bit of a plot twist of saying that in the afterlife you get to come back whatever age you want. It’s like how you can eat what you want and not gain weight — there’s some upsides to being on the other side.
Let’s talk about the evolution of your character a little bit, which also goes back to the question of the longevity that was not anticipated by any anyone.
Even to this day, I’ve never been in all the shows produced [in a season. Because Don Bellisario, who creatied this show, basically commissioned the writer at the time, Jesse Stern, to create this character. There had already been two other NCIS directors, one played by Alan Dale and the other played by Lauren Holly. It’s one of those posts where, in real life, the NCIS director, their tenure is about three years. So in the real NCIS world, the running joke is, “You are the longest tenured director in history.”
The character was meant to be this character who occasionally would come down from his office and whip people into shape. It was never supposed to be a key component to the show. And part of the thing that I had going for me — I tell people this all the time — was that I didn’t know much about the show and didn’t know 99% of the people connected to the show. But the one person I did know was Mark Harmon, because we had done “Chicago Hope” together, so if you’re only gonna know one person on a hit show, it’s good that it’s the lead actor, and somebody that you had a great relationship with. And I think whatever chemistry we were generating as these characters, once that started to make itself apparent, the writers said, “Hey, this is fun to play off of. There are so many unspoken elements about the dynamic — the male dynamic, the race dynamic, all the different things that we don’t even have to hang a light on, that just are.”
Showrunners past and present have described a warmth you have that was too good to ignore in terms of bringing the character forward. And it’s fun for audiences to see someone who you think of as a badass warm up.
Yeah. Over time is, we were able to craft it so the character didn’t just become this stock “here comes the boss from hell; here comes Mr. Slate from ‘The Flintstones,’ breathing fire.” I tried to infuse it with an undercurrent of humor, where it’s the boss from hell who kind of does it with a wink and a nod. He kind of relishes it, and he only uses it when he has to, but if you catch him in a candid moment, you know you might actually get something funny out of it. So we played with that. And you know, my first foray here in Hollywood was doing a sitcom, so that was the world I came from, so I wanted to kind of ride the rails with this character.
There has always has been so much comedy in the show with the wisecracking of the core cast. But of course, you were not doing one-liners initially. Do you remember when the point came where you were finally allowed to be a little bit funny too?
I think one of the first episodes where we did that was an episode called “Knockout.” It might have been the first or second full season of my character, where you got to see his home life and his family and his wife and kind of see him in domestic bliss. And the wife is the one that when he walks in the door, it’s like, “Hand me the toothpick, take it outta your mouth.” We domesticated the character a little bit, and Vance got to see him in the world where he didn’t rule his house with an iron fist the way he does NCIS. That was the beginning of it, and we just started to kind of have more fun with it.
I thought as this character went on, it’s gonna get old very quick if he’s just adversarial with everybody. But if there’s a wry sense of humor behind it, where he kind of enjoys putting people in the hot seat and has has fun with it… just an undercurrent of that where it’s less about really trying to undress somebody verbally and more about, “Just remember who’s the boss. Remember who has the upper hand. When all is said and done, you may win the argument, but I could still reassign you to the NCIS desk in Alaska if I wanted to. So just take that with you.” You always had that kind of quirk about it, and we started to revel in that and allow the character to be much more three-dimensional and humorous and candid.
But I think the biggest thing that gave us the longevity with the character is that once Vance’s wife died, he and Gibbs now had the same tragedy in common. They both lost their wives, and any issues between them were sort of secondary now because of the grief and tragedy of sharing that. Suddenly it humanized that character more than anything else could have.
Do you have a favorite episode, or is that too tough?
Because I’m well over 300 episodes, it’s hard. It’s like asking Tom Brady, “Do you remember your favorite pass?” Like I said, it’s 18 years of being able to go to work and having a great job doing what you love to do.
I think it’s baked into our business: When you’re an out-of-work actor, or when you’re auditioning and you’re trying to land a show, or you’re on a show and you don’t know if it’s gonna go more than one season, or it may go six episodes and get canceled, there’s always such uncertainty. And when something like this happens, and finally there’s a bit of stability — we’re around for five years; we’re around for 10 years; now, we’re in season 15; now we’re in season 20 — it’s so easy to self-sabotage in our business. Because when you finally get into a scenario where the grass is green, either the actor or somebody who represents the actor suddenly plants the seed that maybe there’s a shade of green that’s even nicer. “I know this is what you think is your dream job, but maybe you’re not as happy as you think you are. Maybe we need to push all our chips in the middle of the table and say, ‘I can’t work under these conditions! Even though I’ve been begging for this job for my entire life.’” We do this to ourselves. Or all of a sudden, our agent goes, “OK, we know you love your job and you love the cast and the writing, you love everything about it, but you must be miserable. They’re just not servicing you enough. You’re not getting enough lines …”
So having for the last 18 years I have been able to say, “You know what, I’m doing exactly what I love to do, and I love my job. And I’m sorry for the people who work for me or who represent me, but I’m not that guy who wakes up every day and goes, ‘How can I get a bigger trailer? How can I get more lines? How can I get more? How can I have a greener pasture than the one that I’m I’m sprawled in right now?” I’ve been able to just really be present and enjoy it. And I think for most creative people, it’s just baked into the business: Very seldom do you realize just how good something is until it’s over. And I was determined to really enjoy and relish this and be present while I was doing it, not 10 years after the show when I’m doing some retrospective with the cast and I’m going, “Man, that was a really good time. I wish I had really embraced it.” It’s like, no, no, that wasn’t gonna be me.
At “NCIS” they like their ghosts and apparitions. So do you think the door would certainly be open for your return on that level? Because they have brought Mike Franks back for cameos and people like that who suddenly pop up. Do you foresee that happening with you, or would you rather just be done with it?
Oh, I think we coined the term ghost stars. We have more ghost stars on our show than anybody. So I absolutely foresee it. And I also direct three, sometimes four episodes every season. And I think that will continue. So for me, it’s really goodbye for now. It’s not as final as as it feels. Even when I shot the final scene on Dec. 11, when we finished the episode and shot the final scene, and all of us as a crew were all saying goodbyes and hugs, I just remember saying, “Guys, I’ll be back in a month to start doing prep work and pre-production for the episode that I’m directing.” So, I’m not here for every meal now as a relative, but I come back for Thanksgiving and Christmas. I’ll be around.
So you have already been back to direct?
The answer is yes. Literally a month after we shot this show, I was back in January to direct what I think is maybe the third-to-last episode of this season.
Do you have the impulse to try to jump into another series as a regular, at all?
No, my impulse now is to is to do exactly what I did while I was on the show. … I’ll be in New York when the episode airs doing a live Q&A at the SAG screening room in midtown Manhattan. There’re gonna be 150 SAG members who’ve not seen the episode; it’s gonna air in real time at 8 p.m. and then the lights are gonna come up and I’m gonna walk out and go, “Well, that just happened. What do you guys think?” And we’re gonna talk about it and I’m just gonna have fun with it.
And I’m gonna be able to do what most actors never get to do, and have the luxury and the wherewithal to not worry about “God, I hope the phone rings and somebody calls me. I gotta get another gig.” If the next six months or five years go by and I’m not on a call sheet, working 12-hour days, it’ll be okay. You know, fortunately, 18 years of consistent work on the most watched show in the world gives you a little bit of cushion. I might be doing a production in a 50-seat theater somewhere in Hollywood and having the time of my life. For the last 18 years, I’ve had the best part-time job in Hollywood. So there’s not a whole lot to be upset about.
Disney+ has begun production on “The Koreans,” a reimagining of the acclaimed FX series “The Americans,” with Lee Byung-hun and Han Jimin set to star as North Korean spies living undercover in South Korea.
Set against the wave of democratization and cultural modernization that swept through South Korea in the early 1990s, the series centers on a middle-class family concealing a treasonous secret. Though appearing to be ordinary citizens to their friends, neighbors and even their own children, both parents are in fact elite North Korean operatives working to destabilize the South from within. The series will track the pair as they are pulled between allegiance to their homeland, their sense of self and their bonds as a family, while a relentless Korean counterintelligence agent edges closer to exposing them.
Lee Byung-hun, known for “Squid Game” and “No Other Choice,” and Han Jimin, of “Heavenly Ever After” and “Love Scout,” lead the cast. Ahn Gilho, whose credits include “The Glory” and “Memories of the Alhambra,” directs. The series is produced by Imaginus, behind “Tempest,” “Typhoon Family” and “Can This Love be Translated?,” alongside Studio AA, a co-producer on “Tempest.”
The screenplay is adapted by Park Eunkyo, known for “Made in Korea” and “Mother,” from the original FX series created by Joe Weisberg and showrun by Weisberg and Joel Fields, which starred Keri Russell and Matthew Rhys. The original series took home the Golden Globe for best drama in 2019 and earned AFI TV Program of the Year honors in each of its first five seasons, from 2014 to 2018.
“The Koreans” will release exclusively on Disney+ internationally and on Hulu in the U.S..
The announcement positions the series as the latest addition to Disney+’s expanding Korean content slate, which currently includes “Made in Korea,” “Tempest” and “The Tyrant.” The streamer also has several further Korean originals in the pipeline, among them “Perfect Crown” starring IU and Byeon Wooseok, “Portraits of Delusion” (working title) with Suzy and Kim Seonho, and “The Remarried Empress” starring Shin Mina, Ju Jihoon, Lee Jongsuk and Lee Seyoung, as well as second seasons of “A Shop for Killers” and “Made in Korea.”
The O2 Silver Clef Awards have revealed this year’s first honorees: Lily Allen, Sam Fender, Max Richter and Ludovico Einaudi.
Put on by Nordoff and Robbins, the U.K.’s largest music therapy charity, the 2026 ceremony will bestow Allen with the Icon Award (sponsored by Barclays), Fender with the Best Live Act Award (sponsored by Uber Eats Music Hall), “Hamnet” composer Richter with the Contemporary Music Award (sponsored by PPL) and Italian pianist Einaudi with the Innovation in Music Award (sponsored by Oak View Group).
This year’s O2 Silver Clef Awards will take place at London’s Royal Albert Hall on July 9. It is consistently Nordoff and Robbins’ biggest fundraising event and has raised over £17 million ($22.7 million) since 1976.
As a press release states: “Funds raised from the event have played a key part in fueling the charity’s growth from a London-based operation delivering music therapy to hundreds of people, to a nationwide organization that supported 15,500 people through 48,000 music therapy sessions in 2025, partnering with over 300 organizations including schools, hospitals and care homes across the U.K.”
Past recipients of the O2 Silver Clef Awards include David Bowie, Annie Lennox, Ed Sheeran, Stormzy, Shirley Bassey, Paul McCartney, George Michael, Kylie Minogue, the Rolling Stones, Oasis and Coldplay.
“I’m honored to receive the Icon Award at the O2 Silver Clef Awards, especially as it marks their 50th anniversary,” Allen said in a statement. “Music therapy is such an essential resource and I’m proud to support something that has such a profound impact on people’s lives.”
Added Fender: “It’s an honor to receive the Best Live Act Award at this year’s O2 Silver Clef Awards. I’m so lucky to do this as a job. This award is especially meaningful because of the incredible work in music that Nordoff and Robbins do.”
Sandra Schembri, CEO of Nordoff and Robbins, said: “It is a real honor to have such an eclectic mix of talented artists receiving O2 Silver Clef Awards in this special anniversary year. Right now, with rising costs and a difficult fundraising landscape, the O2 Silver Clef Awards are more important than ever for us. Through the support of these amazing artists and our music industry peers, we can keep raising awareness of our mission and hope to raise as much money as possible, helping us continue training music therapists and supporting people through music therapy. We look forward to seeing you all at the Royal Albert Hall this July.”
Two years ago, when news anchor Huw Edwards – one of the BBC’s highest paid and best known journalists – was convicted of making indecent images of children, some believed to be as young as 7, almost the entirety of the U.K. was stunned.
Edwards, who’d spent his entire career of almost 40 years at the broadcaster by the time of his arrest, had been one of the most reliable faces on television: the man who was trusted to tell the world Queen Elizabeth II had died in September 2022.
But his arrest and conviction in 2024 had been preceded a year earlier by a strange story that appeared in the press and then disappeared almost as quickly. In July 2023 British tabloid The Sun published a scoop that an unnamed senior BBC presenter had been paying a teenager for sexual images. The rumor mill went into overdrive with numerous household names accused on social media before eventually Edwards’ wife made a statement on his behalf in which he admitted to being the perpetrator and saying he had checked into an inpatient facility on mental health grounds. The public quickly turned on The Sun for effectively outing Edwards.
Now a new drama from Paramount-owned U.K. network Channel 5, “Power: The Downfall of Huw Edwards” shows that in fact the story of the teenager and the conviction for making indecent images are linked by a convicted pedophile whom Edwards knew. It was the pedophile who sent Edwards the images of children being sexually abused in exchange for monetary gifts (Edwards denied he was paying for the images) and it was the pedophile who introduced him to 17-year-old “Ryan” (Ryan’s real identity has never been revealed).
The 90-minute film is produced by Wonderhood Studios, written by Mark Burt (“The Trial”) and directed by Michael Samuels (“The Windermere Children”). “Wuthering Heights” star Martin Clunes plays Edwards.
Ahead of the show airing on Channel 5 on March 24 (it will also be available on Paramount+), Variety sat down with the network’s commissioners Guy Davies and Paul Testar to find out how – and why – they decided to bring the downfall of Huw Edwards to the small screen.
Where did the idea for the film come from?
Guy Davies: Wonderhood came to us with the idea of doing the Huw Edwards story. And then that developed into a conversation about how you do it, bearing in mind that one of the key sources can’t be identified. And I think we came around to the idea that a dramatic treatment of the story was the way to progress.
Did you approach it almost like a piece of factual content?
Davies: Well, I think in the sense that there was clearly somebody at the heart of this, the Ryan character, who was vulnerable, who was traumatized. And I think one of the great things that Wonderhood had managed to do is to keep that relationship and the duty of care to Ryan and that is the thing you do in a factual show.
Paul Testar: Mark Burt took the same approach and shared the same mentality as Wonderhood, of putting Ryan and his and his story and his perspective and his wellbeing right at the center of this story… This is such an emotional story, and one of the most important things about telling it as a drama was to convey the emotion of what this grooming experience was like for this poor boy, and Mark took that incredibly seriously.
The debacle was hugely embarrassing for the BBC, particularly the fact they continued to pay Edwards after his arrest while he was awaiting trial. Was there any consideration internally about doing this story given that the U.K.’s broadcasting scene isn’t very big?
Davies: I don’t think there was, to be honest. The story was always the story for us, about power, about grooming, about how that process happens. The BBC investigation is a confidential inquiry, we didn’t have access to that. And we didn’t want to make a drama about the BBC. We wanted to make a drama about a powerful person and how they came to be involved with a young man in this way and who abused their power. And also the other story, of Edwards’ conviction, was again not a BBC story.
Testar: I think it was quite an early editorial decision as well that this story reaches a broader audience when its focus isn’t on the BBC. Because I think as much as would interest us who work in television, it’s less likely to be of interest to the broader public. The story of how a vulnerable person is groomed by a powerful person, and what it’s like for the family of that boy as well, is something that gives the story a broader reach.
Because the story is told in that way, there might be some criticism that you’ve gone too soft on the BBC, particularly given what they knew about Edwards’ arrest months before the public became aware. What would your response be to that?
Testar: Editorially, I think it would have stuck out quite awkwardly at the point at which the arrest takes place in the drama, I think to then start, at that point, to interrogate what the BBC may or may not have known and when, I think just wouldn’t have worked in the story.
Davies: I think it’s how you create the part of the story which is about not being heard. And I think that Mark was very perceptive in using what we knew about the frustration that the family felt, particularly in Wales, when they tried to complain and found the BBC putting up all sorts of conditions as to wanting to get information about it and [so] they just went to the papers.
Testar: It’s the frustration of an ordinary person trying to navigate a complex bureaucracy.
Let’s talk about some of the legalities of making the show. First the disclaimer credit, which reads: “This drama is based on extensive interviews with the victim, his family and the journalists who revealed his story. Some scenes, characters and text messages have been dramatized.” In a post “Baby Reindeer” era, do you have to be more careful of exactly how you’re phrasing that?
Testar: I think you do have to be careful how you phrase it. And I think there isn’t a one size fits all disclaimer for every show. I think each one is dependent on the story and the and the source material. Personally, I think it’s something people were very careful about before the “Baby Reindeer” scandal.
At the end there is also a credit noting Edwards was offered the opportunity to comment and declined. Were you expecting him to make a statement?
Davies: Well, we didn’t make it as a collaboration with him, had never intended to.
Did you see the statement he put out on Monday in which he condemned the dramatization? Is there anything you’d want to add to the statement Channel 5 already put out in response?
Davies: I don’t think so. Because I think that statement is about our position, really, that [the film] was based on the research, and that ourselves as the channel, our legal team Wonderhood’s legal team, were all happy that this has been made in accordance with Ofcom and the Broadcasting Code, which I know Huw has mentioned in his statement, and that we were very clear to give all of the allegations that would be looked at in the film in ample time, when it came to the Ofcom rules, which is what we did. So I think that’s it.
He has said he is also planning to “produce his own account.” Is that something that Channel Five might be interested in?
Davies: No.
Did making the film give you any insight into why he did what he did?
Davies: I don’t think I can comment on that, you’d have to ask him. … I mean, the insight from the psychiatric reports is his explanation to a degree. But I wouldn’t want to try and interpret his psychology.
Did you pay Ryan for his life rights?
Davies: I don’t think we should talk about that to be honest. I think that any relationship we have with him, or Wonderhood has with him, to be accurate is a matter that is between them. I don’t want to get into that. I don’t think we need to expand on that. I know Huw has asked about it.
The film opens with Edwards reporting Queen Elizabeth’s death and ends with him announcing his own conviction, which was obviously a dramatic license. Why did you choose to start and end there?
Testar: It was one of the very first things that Mark reacted to in this story, which was that there is no more trusted emblem of the establishment in our society than the person who’s given the responsibility of telling the public that the Queen had died. … And also somebody who is responsible for not just the Queen’s death, but had reported many other stories and scandals and convictions.
Davies: [He was] incredibly trusted by the public, and in a way, that trust became a bit of a metaphor in the film, because that’s also about power and the abuse of power. And that’s why I think it’s such an interesting story, hopefully for viewers, because I think they will be taken aback by some of the texts, for example. The other side to that figure of trust, that’s why it’s such an interesting story to explore that idea of power and trust. Because you’ve got it there in the actual research.
Did you always know the film was going to end with him reading out his own conviction as a news reader?
Testar: It was pretty early on, but it wasn’t in the very first draft… it felt like a very important thing to end the story on, to remind the audience what the scale and detail of Edward’s crimes were.
Davies: And being, you know, finally accountable to the public in the medium which he worked in.
I remember from covering the conviction and the court case that it was such a strange thing that this guy who for so long had been the face of the news had become the news.
Testar: I think that this story and this scandal was quite a significant moment in the public’s general view of its institutional and establishment figures. I think it has contributed to a questioning of establishment figures, simply because of what the role that Edwards had and all of that. So I think that was another part of why that device was important.
Katy Arnander, director of programming at SXSW London, teased this year’s conference program Tuesday evening at an event at a hip bar in the uber-cool neighborhood of Shoreditch, East London, where the festival is staged. The bar’s name, Equal Parts, neatly reflected the nature of SXSW London, as outlined by Arnander.
The festival, whose second edition runs June 1-6, revealed its live music component last week, and on Thursday it’ll be the turn of its conference lineup, with speakers drawn from the worlds of business, tech, politics and the arts. The film and series program will be unveiled next week.
Its programming chiefs – Katarina Sherling, head of conference, Anna Bogutskaya, head of screen, and Adem Holness, head of music – were all present at Tuesday’s stylish shindig.
First, for the uninitiated, Arnander drew a distinction between the London festival and the original in Austin, Texas, which celebrated its 40th edition this month.
“Essentially, we’re not exactly a clone from Austin – so we haven’t transported the full Austin vibe to London, but what we have done is we’ve decided to create our own vibe here in Shoreditch,” she said.
“That means that we’re leaning very heavily locally, not only Shoreditch, but also East London and London generally, which means that our program has got this flavor, if you like, that comes through being in this part of London, which is a highly convergent part of London. We have music, screen, there’s the City of London down the road [the financial district], big business; there’s Silicon Roundabout [Old Street], tech; there’s designers, creativity, fashion and, of course, visual artists, and all of those are based heavily in this part of London.”
She added, “What we like to say is that South by Southwest provides a lens by which you can look into all of these areas that I’ve just mentioned. So, it’s not just a festival of tech, it’s not just a festival of music, it’s not just a festival of screen, not just a festival of business, but it actually transcends and transgresses all of those areas, and that’s why we’re doing it here in Shoreditch.
“It’s the kind of lens around convergence that brings the energy to the work that we do, and this creates an ecosystem around the festival, which means that our delegates have this experience that allows them to travel across the neighborhood, across our various venues, and have these different experiences.”
Looking back at last year’s edition, Arnander said that they had over 25,000 audience visitors, delegates and companies from over 86 countries, 34 venues, and over 1,000 speakers.
Speakers last year included Deepak Chopra, Jane Goodall, Idris Elba, Wyclef Jean, Nile Rodgers, Björn Ulvaeus of ABBA, Asif Kapadia, Julian Lennon, Joseph Fiennes, Katharine Hamnett and Sophie Turner, and VIP guests included Tom Hiddleston, Orlando Bloom, Bryce Dallas, Nick Mohammed and King Charles.
Looking ahead at this year’s edition, Arnander said, “We’re doubling down on what we did last year in terms of the content that we’re leaning into, but what we discovered last year was there are areas where we’re going to lean much more deeply into. One of them that we know is very important for an event like South by Southwest is connecting, networking, putting people together. Putting people from the film industry together with the tech industry, putting people who work in AI together with fashion designers. Putting musicians together with fintech. All of these are opportunities to mix and mingle and share and create ideas.”
From listening to their audience and drawing from their learnings from last year, the programmers have zeroed in on six themes “that are pertinent and that people really want to hear about,” she said.
One theme is about “AI and the new power structure,” Arnander said. “Last year, we were all about AI. Everybody wants to know about AI. This year, we now know AI is here to stay, and we’re all using it. So we’re actually delving a little bit deeper into what that means,” she said. “What does AI mean in terms of government? What does it mean in terms of information, misinformation?”
Another theme is “living longer, living better,” Arnander said, pointing to discussions about “the development of new drugs, high-speed R&D processes with AI,” among other related topics.
Yet another theme is: “How culture can save humanity,” she said. “I think a lot of us here are connected to the cultural sector, and I think more and more culture provides us with a lens by which we can manage and cope with AI, because one will not exist without the other.”
Other themes include the importance of free speech, creativity in the algorithm age, and futurism in practice, including areas like robotics and space travel.
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