UK Comedy Pilot ‘Jonah Kills’ In Development At Showtime

Showtime is developing Jonah Kills, a comedy from creator and writer Clem Garritty, based in the United Kingdom. Jax Media UK commissioned relative newcomer Garritty to write four scripts before the comedy was pitched to the network.

Due to the writers’ strike, there’s no work currently being done on those scripts, but the goal is to cast and film the pilot once a deal is struck and the strikes (including that of SAG-AFTRA) end. Iain B. MacDonald, who has previously directed episodes of Showtime series like Episodes and Black Monday, has already been hired to direct. His recent work includes Shantaram and Peacock’s Poker Face.

Jonah Kills is about a gay London man trying to find love through sex and discovering that everyone he has ever slept with has died in a freak accident. Showtime, which while the linear channel did not rebrand exactly when the OTT merged with Paramount+, is still transitioning to do so under the new executive team led by Chris McCarthy, who has been looking to reinvent its comedy brand, as he starts with a somewhat fresh slate, with no ongoing comedies and only Uncoupled, picked up from Netflix, and the Nathan Fielder and Benny Safdie-starring and producing The Curse with Emma Stone, on the docket.

Garritty is the Artistic Director of comedy company Kill the Beast. He has directed all three of the company’s shows, The Boy Who Kicked Pigs, He Had Hairy Hands and Don’t Wake the Damp. All three shows toured the United Kingdom and since transferred to The Soho Theatre.

Jax Media, owned by Imagine Entertainment, is known for efficiently producing comedy series, including Showtime’s own Desus & Mero. Elsewhere they’ve done Broad City, Emily in Paris, Russian Doll, Search Party, and A Black Lady Sketch Show.

Source: Deadline

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