Comedy

NextUp crowd-sources more funding

Stand-up comedy SVOD service NextUp has raised more than £260,000 (€290,000) through crowd-sourced equity platform Seedrs. The subscription service launched the funding round five weeks ago and has already surpassed its £240,000 funding target for 10.3% equity in the business. At the time of writing, its funding has reached £262,839 for 11.18% equity, based on a pre-money […]

BBC launches comedy series for smart speakers

The BBC has launched a nightly comedy series for smart speakers that will run for the duration of this month’s Edinburgh Fringe Festival. BBC Late Night Laugh will feature bitesize chunks of comedy across 25 episodes, focusing on new comedy talent appearing at the Edinburgh Festival. Comedy will be available from 6pm each evening by […]

Amazon cancels comedies as it steps up drama focus

Amazon is continuing its purge of comedies, now ridding of One Mississippi, I Love Dick and Jean-Claude Van Johnson. Last month Amazon Prime Video turned down all of its latest pilot season comedies including Sea Oak, The Climb and Love You More. Now, Tig Nataro’s One Mississippi will not continue on the service after two successful seasons. Jill Soloway’s I Love Dick has been cancelled after one season, while […]

Deutsche Telekom orders first original series

German pay TV provider Deutsche Telekom (DT) has commissioned its first original series, a French-coproduced comedy. The move into original production is a “logical step” for Deutsche Telekom following the launch of Ultra-HD services and its first exclusive acquisitions for its new Entertain TV streaming platform. The show, Germanized, is a 10x30mins comedy from Bavaria […]

Ampere: Netflix budget focused on drama and comedy

More than a third of Netflix’s original content spend to-date has been for drama titles, while nearly a quarter of its spend went on comedy series and stand-up shows. This is according to new estimates by research firm Ampere Analysis, which claims that drama has accounted for 36% of Netflix’s originals budget, comedy for 22% […]

Ampere: Snapchat video users love comedy and sport

Snapchat allows content companies to reach young viewers in a way that other social and video platforms cannot do with comedy, horror and sport among the key programming genres. New research from Ampere Analysis shows that Snapchat delivers a young audience that want to engage with content on mobile devices. It is better at reaching […]

‘Netflix of stand up comedy’ launches in the UK

A new subscription video-on-demand service for stand-up comedy has debuted in the UK. NextUp launched yesterday, offering comedy fans a collection of recorded stand-up performances for £3.50 per month. The team behind YouTube channel and live comedy night ComComedy and former BBC Worldwide director of comedy and 2Entertain managing director Stuart Snaith have launched NextUp. They […]

Seeso commissions Johnny Carson comedy

NBC’s comedy SVOD platform, Seeso, has commissioned a coming-of-age comedy set in the 1970s when The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson moved from New York to Los Angeles. There’s… Johnny! comes from writer Paul Reiser (Mad About You) and David Steven Simon (The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air), with David Gordon Green (Red Oaks) directing. The series will follow […]

Sky and FX agree comedy pact

Sky and FX Networks have announced plans to team up and develop new comedy aimed at audiences in the US and UK. The two-year deal will see the firms co-fund and co-develop new, post-watershed, half-hour scripted comedy. The firms said that the co-development deal will “involve the very best on- and off-screen talent from both […]