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‘Small Town Scandal’: New Zealand TV Show Features Comic Royalty

Published

1 hour ago

August 11, 2026

Welcome to Global Breakouts, Deadline’s strand in which, each fortnight, we shine a spotlight on the TV shows and films making a splash internationally. The industry is more global than ever and breakout projects are appearing in pockets of the world all the time, making it hard to keep track, so we’re doing the hard work for you.

This time round we head to New Zealand, the comedy powerhouse that introduced Flight of the Conchords and What We Do in the Shadows to the world. Comic Tom Sainsbury teamed up with some of New Zealand’s biggest names, plus Felicity Kendal, to reversion his hit true crime parody Small Town Scandal pod to the small screen, and the results were impressive. Now, BBC Studios is taking Small Town Scandal worldwide.

Name: Small Town Scandal
Country: New Zealand
Network: Sky New Zealand
For fans of: Only Murders in the Building, Flight of the Conchords
Producer: Miss Conception Films
Distributor: BBC Studios

The past decade’s cultural zeitgeist has in some ways been defined by the never-ending popularity of true crime podcasts, and these shows are of course ripe for parody.

New Zealand comic Tom Sainsbury knows this all too well. His iHeartRadio pod Small Town Scandal was a huge hit in his home nation and he subsequently took a step rarely trodden by creatives of his ilk, reversioning his podcast for the small screen.

The resulting TV series starring Rose Matafeo, Morgana O’Reilly and Felicity Kendal, along with Sainsbury himself as lead, has been a success for Sky New Zealand and distributor BBC Studios is hoping it can break out globally from the nation that gave the world What We Do in the Shadows and Flight of the Conchords. Small Town Scandal follows Toby (Sainsbury), who in another meta twist is a disgraced journalist turned podcast host. He returns to his rural hometown to investigate the bizarre death of his millionaire uncle – killed, suspiciously, by an automatic lawnmower. As Toby dives deeper into the case, he finds himself surrounded by a cast of quirky, eccentric townsfolk – all with secrets of their own.

Sainsbury, one of the writers and stars of What We Do in the Shadows spin-off Wellington Paranomal, can’t understand why more creatives don’t make podcasts with a view to turning them into TV. For Sainsbury, podcasts act as a perfect “proof of concept” when pitching ideas to TV commissioners, which was helped in the case of Small Town Scandal by coming armed with a number of national podcast awards.

“I’d recommend everyone to make their ideas into a podcast,” Sainsbury tells Deadline. “People can listen instantly to an episode and understand the world, the characters and tone. It was like a shorthand communication tool.”

Sainsbury was inspired to create the podcast after devouring hit true crime pods like Serial, The Teacher’s Pet and Amanda Knox’s Blood Money and realizing there was a clear parody angle.

New Zealand producer Georgina Conder devoured Small Town Scandal and immedaitely phoned her friend Carthew Neal, the Oscar-nominated exec behind Taika Waititi’s Jojo Rabbit, who got on board with a small screen adaptation. Not long after, the team had their Sky greenlight and BBC Studios jumped aboard to shop globally.

“Not all podcasts work but with this one you could easily see the adaptation,” says Neal. “Georgina and I loved the balance between comedy and whodunit. Even though it was parodying a whodunit, it left you wanting more at the end of every episode.”

The podcast was recorded in iHeartRadio’s “crummiest studio” and, incredibly, Sainsbury explains that he did all the circa-40 voices himself, but when it came to the TV show he needed to scale up.

While Sainsbury jokes that he briefly planned to play all the characters in the show, he landed a “gorgeous” cast including New Zealand comic royalty Matafeo and O’Reilly, both of whom he knew well from the comedy circuit, along with British acting legend Kendal, who has starred in some of the biggest UK sitcoms of all time including The Good Life. “I was besotted with her,” says Sainsbury. “And everyone in New Zealand knows each other so ringing up Morgana or Rose isn’t a big deal. We had such a shorthand and knew each other’s style so well.”

‘Only Murders’ provides the tone

Sainsbury had loved the DIY way in which he assembled the pod but putting together a fully-fledged TV show involved a hell of a lot of tinkering. And while the podcast was inspired by straight true crime pods, he looked to the tone of shows like Hulu’s Only Murders in the Building for his TV show.

“The difference in the medium was the biggest challenge,” he says. “When you’re making a podcast you have to keep all these ideas in the audiences head because you don’t have visual clues but we had to make changes to the story in the show because audiences can see someone acting shady. They will get it in one frame.”

For Neal, there was always a niggling concern that fans of the pod wouldn’t return to the series, but thankfully this couldn’t have been further from the eventual truth. The team hosted special screenings of the show for the pod’s super fans and were also able to attract an audience coming to Small Town Scandal cold.

“The commissioner was worried people would already know the story but actually it worked out really well,” adds Neal. “TV has a bigger marketing budget and is a bigger medium so we could bring that audience along with us.”

Having taken the show to last year’s MIPCOM and having previously struck a deal with Australia’s ABC, BBC Studios is now seeking more international sales.

Neal is confident the show could perform well in the States, a natural home for both What We Do in the Shadows, which was remade by FX, and HBO original Flight of the Conchords. He also reckons Small Town Scandal could work in the UK, where Sainsbury is due to tour over the coming weeks in a nation that has similar comic sensibilities to the small Australasian island with population of just over 5 million.

As with so many territories, landing that all-elusive greenlight is tricky in New Zealand today, Sainsbury and Neal explain, but their cause has been helped along by a new initiative that allows shows like Small Town Scandal to benefit from both the local New Zealand production rebate plus up to 25% of private funding from outside sources, in this case BBC Studios.

“We can expand out the world and locations where our projects are made,” adds Neal.

With such a glut of quirky comedy coming out of New Zealand, let’s hope this continues for as long as true crime remains ripe for parody.

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Damon Wayans Signs With Verve (EXCLUSIVE)

Published

3 minutes ago

August 11, 2026

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EXCLUSIVE: Fresh off a guest star role in an upcoming episode of NBC’s St. Denis Medical, Damon Wayans has signed with Verve for representation.

A writer, actor, producer, comedian, and patriarch of one of comedy’s most enduring dynasties, Wayans is best known as a co-creator and star of the groundbreaking sketch comedy series In Living Color — the first major network sketch series centered around a predominantly Black cast, which earned him four Emmy nominations for his writing and helped launch the careers of icons such as Jamie Foxx and Jim Carrey.

Wayans is otherwise perhaps best known for starring in the ABC sitcom My Wife and Kids, which ran for five seasons, winning him a BET Comedy Award. Most recently, he starred opposite his son Damon Wayans Jr. in CBS’s comedy series Poppa’s House, for which he won the 2025 NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Actor in a Comedy Series. Wayans and Wayans Jr. made history as the first father-son duo nominated together in the category.

Additional TV credits for Wayans include Lethal Weapon, Happy Endings, The Underground and Saturday Night Live.

On the feature side, his credits include Major Payne, The Last Boy Scout opposite Bruce Willis, Mo’ Money, Bamboozled for Spike Lee, Celtic Pride, Bulletproof opposite Adam Sandler, and Earth Girls Are Easy.

Earlier this year, Wayans joined siblings Keenen Ivory, Marlon, Shawn and Kim, along with son Damon Wayans Jr., as the Wayans family was inducted into the NAACP Image Awards Hall of Fame. This came in recognition, per NAACP president and CEO Derrick Johnson, of “trailblazing work in television, film, and stand-up [that] has transcended pop culture and cemented their legacy.”

Wayans reunites with former In Living Color castmate David Alan Grier in the Season 3 premiere of St. Denis Medical, airing November 2. In the episode, he plays Dr. Highland, a charming but pompous new doctor at St. Denis who’s filling in while Ron (Grier) is recovering from surgery.

Wayans continues to be represented by Dave Feldman at Brecheen Feldman Breimer.

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David Ellison Said Paramount Will Exit California If AG Refuses To Negotiate On WBD Merger Suit

Published

9 minutes ago

August 11, 2026

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Paramount CEO David Ellison told a group of the company’s top executives that he will start the process of exiting California on Oct. 1 if State Attorney General Rob Bonta will not negotiate to settle an antitrust suit around the merger with Warner Bros. Discovery.

Ellison made the remarks at a meeting last week. Details were first reported by Puck and confirmed by Deadline.

Bonta is leading a group of 20 State Attorneys General in the case that is set to go to trial in March of 2027. Oct. 1 is the day Paramount starts to accrue a so-called ticking fee of $7 million a day called for in the WBD deal terms if the transaction hasn’t. closed.

Deadline hears That Ellison was emphatic that he doesn’t want to relocate but doesn’t feel welcome in Paramount’s home state as the company and the AG wage a PR battle.

The suit is focused on antitrust concerns in three areas — wide release films, blockbuster films and cable network programming. Ellison has promised the combined studios will release 30 films a year with significant theatrical windows and said he approached the AG about a settlement. He’s accused Bonta of playing politics.

In an op-ed published in Deadline Monday, Bonda said that “Paramount and Warner Bros see the writing on the wall: that they will lose in a court of law. So instead, they are resorting to the court of public opinion. They want to talk about anything but the facts of this case. … As disingenuous as it may be, they are welcome to do so.”

Rumors had surfaced months ago that Ellison was considering an exit if the AG did not soften his stance. Destinations mentioned include Tennessee, Texas and Georgia.

More to come

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Toronto Film Festival Adds ‘Wild Horse Nine’, Mara Sisters ‘Bucking Fastard’

Published

17 minutes ago

August 11, 2026

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The 51st edition of the Toronto Film Festival rounded out its schedule today with 11 more films bringing this year’s count to 293 titles.

Of note, following the world premieres at Venice, Searchlight’s Martin McDonagh film Wild Horse Nine, Werner Herzog’s Rooney and Kate Mara movie Bucking Fastard, and Nanni Moretti’s It Will Happen One Night find their way to Toronto.

Wild Horse Nine stars John Malkovich, Sam Rockwell, Parker Posey, Steve Buscemi and Tom Waits in a story about two CIA agents who are facing a trust-testing mission from Santiago, Chile to Easter Island during 1973.

In Bucking Fastard, the Maras star as sisters Jean and Joan Holbrooke, who are so close that they speak in unison, love the same man, have the same dreams and event make the same slips of the tongue. Pic is based on a true-story. Given the designation of Canadian premiere for both Bucking Fastard and Wild Horse Nine it wouldn’t be shocking if we find these films showing up in Telluride’s lineup, which is unveiled shortly before that fest starts.

Moretti’s latest dramedy, centers around four tenants who live in the same building in an Israeli city. Each faces personal problems and emotional voids. Their lives intertwine as they search for fulfillment, connection, and redemption.

The Idiot(s) stars White Lotus’ Aimee Lou Wood, Johnny Flynn, Vicky Krieps, and Christian Friedel in a story about newlyweds’ European honeymoon which leads them to Baden, which turns into an unexpected and explosive years-long stay as they struggle and overcome obstacles in pursuit of one of them, Fyodor, writing his to-be masterpiece, The Idiot. With a Canadian premiere label here, we can figure it’s also going to Telluride.

Oscar winner Guy Nattiv arrives at TIFF with The Liberation also having a Canadian premiere. Pic stars Carrie Coon, Lily James, Bella Ramsey, Odessa Young, Tracy Letts, and Jaime Ray Newman. Coon plays Rita, a woman in midlife haunted by the weight of her past, encounters magnetic young spiritual leader Ricki (James) and leaves her family to follow her to an all-female commune. But when her daughters Ella (Ramsey) and Jo (Young) arrive unexpectedly and become drawn into the group’s seductive world, Rita is forced to choose between the family she left behind and the life she believes can save her.

Oscar winner Michelle Yeoh stars in Bai Xue’s It’s My Time receiving a North American premiere. The movie tells the story of a woman who always makes trouble in the nursing home, using her “nonsense” to fight against aging and prejudice. Unexpectedly, a small Rubik’s Cube becomes the fulcrum for her to pry open the future.

Getting a world premiere is actor Cody Fern’s directorial Closing Night starring Naomi Watts, Sarah Paulson and Odessa A’zion. The family drama follows a renowned actress who faces mounting pressure during show rehearsals when her estranged sister suddenly reappears after three decades.

Peter Ho-Sun Chan was previously at a festival, specifically Cannes, in 2024 with She’s Got No Name, and he’s coming to TIFF with the world premiere of The Road Not Taken.

Films announced today (in alphabetical order)

A Good Little Soldier | Stéphane Brizé | France
North American Premiere | Special Presentations

Bucking Fastard | Werner Herzog | USA
Canadian Premiere | Special Presentations

Closing Night | Cody Fern | Australia, Canada
World Premiere | Special Presentations

It’s My Time | Bai Xue | China
North American Premiere | Gala

It Will Happen Tonight | Nanni Moretti | Italy, France, Spain
International Premiere | Special Presentations

Neil Peart: No One’s Disciple | Scot McFadyen, Sam Dunn | Canada
World Premiere | Special Presentations

The Idiot(s) | Małgorzata Szumowska, Michał Englert | Poland, Germany
Canadian Premiere | Special Presentations

The Liberation | Guy Nattiv | USA
Canadian Premiere | Special Presentations

The Road Not Taken | Peter Ho-Sun Chan | China
World Premiere | Special Presentations

Trees are Watching | Bahman Ghobadi | Turkey
World Premiere | Centrepiece

Wild Horse Nine | Martin McDonagh | USA, Chile
Canadian Premiere | Special Presentations