HBO Acquires TV Rights to ‘David Bowie: The Last Five Years’

In today’s roundup, HBO will air “David Bowie: The Last Five Years” this summer after acquiring the U.S. TV rights, Cartoon Network’s “Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs” set to premiere in March, and more.

DEALS

HBO has acquired the U.S. TV rights to documentary “David Bowie: The Last Five Years.” Directed and produced by Francis Whately, the film spotlights the legendary singer and actor’s last two albums and Broadway musical, offering new insights into the final five years of Bowie’s life through rarely-seen interviews of the man himself, archival footage, audio from the recording sessions for “The Next Day” and “Blackstar,” and unprecedented access to Bowie’s closest friends and artistic collaborators. Earlier this month, Bowie posthumously swept the 2017 Grammy Awards with five wins for his final album “Blackstar.”

CASTING

Celebrated chef and restaurateur Aarón Sánchez will join Gordon Ramsay and Christina Tosi as the third judge for the upcoming eighth season of “Masterchef” on Fox. Sánchez previously co-starred on “Chopped” and “Chopped Junior,” and is the author of two cookbooks — “Simple Food, Big Flavor: Unforgettable Mexican-Inspired Recipes from My Kitchen to Yours” and “La Comida del Barrio.” He was a also guest judge on season seven of “Masterchef,”and the network has announced he will be featured in upcoming episodes of “Masterchef Junior.”

Former “The Mindy Project” actor Santiago Cabrera has been cast in CBS‘s summer series “Salvation,” a new suspense drama series that centers on an MIT grad student and a tech superstar who discover that an asteroid is just six months away from colliding with Earth. Cabrera will portray Darius, a charming self-made tech billionaire whose greatest project will be an audacious plan to save the human race from an incoming asteroid. Academy Award-nominated director Juan Carlos Fresnadillo is in place to direct and serve as exec producer. The show previously announced Jennifer Finnigan, Charlie Rowe, Jacqueline Byers and Ian Anthony Dale as series regulars.

DATES

Cartoon Network has set the premiere of new animated series “Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs” for Monday, March 6. The series is based on Sony Pictures Animation’s 2009 animated feature of the same name, and its 2013 sequel, “Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2.” The new incarnation takes place before giant food rains down on Swallow Falls, with the original’s central character Flint Lockwood returning as a teenager trying to change the world, one invention at a time.

The world’s most innovative cosplayers are set to go head-to-head each week in Syfy’s new transformation competition series “Cosplay Melee,” premiering Tuesday, March 21 on Syfy. The hour-long battle is hosted by actress Yvette Nicole Brown and each week, four cosplayers compete to create fully-formed characters that they must bring to life through their own realistic performance. Guiding and critiquing them will be a panel of judges including cosplayer LeeAnna Vamp and “The Hunger Games” costume creator Christian Beckman.

Pegged to World Water Day on March 22, National Geographic has announced two new projects from Academy Award-winner Alex Gibney that will air throughout the month of March. First, following its debut at the 2017 Sundance Film Festival, is the feature documentary “Water & Power: A California Heist,” directed by Marina Zenovich with Gibney as exec producer. The film unfolds like a real-life version of the 1974 film noir “Chinatown,” as it peels back the layers of California’s history of water manipulations, and will air on March 14. Second, beginning on Tuesday, March 21, National Geographic and Jigsaw Productions will present “Parched,” a three-part companion series narrated by Gibney that investigates water wars, from West Virginia and Michigan to Syria and India. The series explores the corporate, political and social interests that are responsible for our water-limited future.