Arte gets on board Spanish adventure drama series Alatriste

Franco-German cultural broadcaster Arte has joined upcoming Spanish period drama series Alatriste as a coproduction partner, TBI has learned.

Arte will serve as the French/German copro partner on the Tudors-esque series, which is being produced by DLO and Germany’s Beta Film for Spanish free-to-air broadcaster Telecinco.

Set in early seventeenth century Madrid, the drama will follow Diego Alatriste, a mercenary who gets caught up in personal and political battles. It is based on a series of bestselling books from Arturo Perez-Reverte.

Filming of the series starts, in Spain, this summer. Beta Film is handling international sales.

Separately, the German producer and distributor has picked up rights to HBO Europe’s Czech drama series Burning Bush.

The miniseries, set in Prague in the late 1960s, will be sold internationally by Beta, which likely means it will not be airing on HBO in the US. If it was scheduled to go out on the US channel, HBO’s distribution arm would have been expected to take international rights.