Australia's Lantern Pictures Inks First-Look Deal With Fremantle

Oct 15, 2024

By 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. But we’ve got definitely got some things moving forward with broadcasters, and other entities,” Sarah Lambert told Variety. These projects pre-date the Fremantle agreement but could still possibly see Fremantle become involved.

“We are really looking at having quite a strong slate. What would be ideal is to be having two or three projects going forward per year. I really see Lantern Pictures operating in that premium drama space. We’re not particularly genre dependent, but the things that I’ve always loved doing to date, have been fairly female centric. We want to do dramas that can really play not just here [in Australia] but worldwide and what we are looking at currently are fairly genre driven,” she said.

The Lantern trio stressed their previous working relations with Heaton and see that as defining the caliber of content being sought under the deal. “Carly and I worked together a long time ago on ‘Lambs of God.’ That was the first time I had felt like it was the show that I could really explore my voice as a writer and make something that I was incredibly proud of. We worked together on that when Carly was back at Foxtel,” said Sarah Lambert. “We’re trying to really push the boundaries and make something that no one thought you could do out of Australia. So, we have a shared passion to make distinctive, brave, bold, dynamic television.”

They are keen to develop the role of showrunner in Australia, a process which currently lags that in the U.S.

“What happens in in our [Australian] system is that, basically, once you’ve written and delivered [your script], you kind of just hand it over to your directors and producers. Then you might get a chance to see a cut or two. But [we are interested in] creating a system where we have that [involvement] all the way through [..] it is starting to happen that the head writer will be on set, but it’s also about bringing your whole team of writers through, to be able to rewrite, if necessary, on the fly, being able to kind of have an eye across things, right till the very end and hold that [original] vision,” said Sarah Lambert.

Christian Vesper, CEO Global Drama, Fremantle, said: “Fremantle welcomes this strategic new partnership with Sarah and the Lantern team as part of our ongoing commitment to discovering and producing award winning drama content from all around the world. We are collaborating at a pivotal time for the new company.”

Other creative deals under the Fremantle banner include: Kristen Stewart’s Nevermind Pictures; BAFTA-winning Me+You Productions; Pablo and Juan de Dios Larraín’s Fabula; Ash Atalla’s Roughcut Television, Luca Guadagnino, Paolo Sorrentino, Angelina Jolie, Rachel Weisz and Polly Stokes’ Astral Projection; Edward Berger and his label Nine Hours; Johan Renck and Michael Parets’ Sinestra; Patrick Daly’s Caledonia Productions; and a collaboration with U.K. writer and director Michael Winterbottom.

Fremantle will soon begin shooting series three of the worldwide hit Netflix series ‘Heartbreak High’ and recently wrapped a second season of the top-rating Australian Broadcasting Corporation series “Bay of Fires,” alongside Archipelago Productions, and a third series of ‘Rock Island Mysteries,” for Nickelodeon.