AMAZON CHANGES PLANS
Posted: 030618

Amazon Studios plans a major shift in the way it does original series. The plan is to produce big scale, high-end drama series with global appeal. That’s a shift from making comedies and US centric projects. Some projects that were in development are going to be scrapped. New projects include a comedy starring Fred Armisen and Maya Rudolph and another Seth Rogen-produced comic book adaptation that will go straight to series. One major project already in development is Paul Attanasio and Wong Kar-wai’s Tong Wars, a period drama blending the history of Chinese immigration to the U.S. and a crime saga. Mad Men’s Matthew Weiner’s The Romanoffs anthology series is a go but David O. Russell’s untitled crime drama starring Robert De Niro and Julianne Moore has been scrapped. The Russell project is rumored to have spent $40 million without shooting a single frame of film and only a few scripts having been turned in.