An international coalition of four studios have signed together to produce the 13-episode series, “Defying Gravity.” Fox TV Studios, Canada’s CTV, Germany’s ProSieben and the BBC are teaming up to produce “Gravity.”Â
The series is, set in the near future, revolving around eight astronauts from five countries who take on a mysterious six-year mission through the solar system.  American actor Ron Livingston and German actress Florentine Lahme have signed on to the series according to the Hollywood Reporter.
The idea for the series came from James Parriott, who worked on “Bionic Woman” and “The Incredible Hulk” during his career.  Parriott will also serve as the executive producer on the show with Michael Edelstein. The inspiration for the show came in Christmas of 2006 when Edelstein saw a repeat of the BBC docu-drama “Space Odyssey: Voyage to the Planets” on the Discovery Channel. Edelstein liked the premise and contacted Parriot about teaming up to write and develop an international series around the concept.Â
“I was blown away by it,” Edelstein said.
“Throw in a little bit of ‘Grey’s’ and ‘Lost’ and you have a pretty good international TV show,” Parriott said.
Fox TV Studios has teamed with Canada’s CTV, Germany’s ProSieben and the BBC for “Defying Gravity,” a 13-episode adventure drama series starring Ron Livingston. Brian Hamilton and Michael Chechik will also serve as producers from Vancouver-based Omni Film Productions.
The first episode is scheduled to begin production in Vancouver on January 19, 2008 and will be directed by David Straiton. .
As with its other internationally produced series, Fox TV Studios will be shopping “Gravity” to the U.S. networks as a finished product. Having strong international presales gives the studio flexibility and a relatively low threshold of an U.S. license fee that would make its series profitable.
It sounds interesting.
With “Star Trek” not on TV anymore, “Battlestar Galactica” canceled, and the “Stargate” series turning towards DVD movies, there needs to be more space-travel type shows. At the moment, the only space series that’s still going strong (on TV) is “Doctor Who”, and that’s not even American.
So, this new series is welcomed by me.
This sounds really really cool. I hope it all comes together well.
It’s nice to see the Americans getting into a truly international production. This show seems to come from the same general concept as Moonbase 3, Star Cops, Jupiter Moon and Space Island One — only this time with a budget! It will be interesting to see what they do with the idea. I hear Christina Cox has joined the cast. Will she be playing the Canadian?