Australia’s Lantern Pictures Inks First-Look Deal With Fremantle: ‘It’s an Alliance of Similarly-Minded Creatives and a Distribution Network’ (EXCLUSIVE)

variety.com:

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Established only six months ago, Australian premium TV production outfit Lantern Pictures has struck a first-look content supply deal with global distributor Fremantle.

Lantern Pictures was established by multi-award winning writer and showrunner Sarah Lambert – the name behind critically acclaimed and popular series “Lambs of God,” “Love Child” and Amazon’s “The Lost Flowers of Alice Hart” – director Jane Manning and TV executive Andrew Lambert.

At launch, the company said that its mission is to be Australia’s first showrunner-centric, female-focused production company. “We’re launching a creative partnership between the two companies, one that we’re very excited about, which gives us access to the larger of corporate entity of Fremantle, it’s an alliance of similarly minded creatives and its distribution network,” Andrew Lambert told Variety. “Fremantle and Lantern are creatively aligned so this partnership feels natural and right.

I am excited to see what we can create together,” said Fremantle’s head of scripted Carly Heaton. No projects were announced, but the companies expect to unveil their first joint efforts by the end of the year or early 2025. “It’s been an interesting year, in terms of that worldwide slowdown and trying to get that infamous green light.