News round-up: BBC calls ‘Gossip Girl’; ‘The Mole’ pops up in Italy; Lat Am lands Eccho’s ‘Legacy’

Gossip Girl

BBC calls Gossip Girl

The BBC in the UK has picked up rights to the new version of US drama Gossip Girl, which will be available as a premiere on BBC One and iPlayer later this year.

BBC iPlayer will also become home to the first six seasons of the show, which initially ran from 2007–2012. The new Gossip Girl explores how social media – and the landscape of New York itself – has changed in the intervening years.

It has been developed by showrunner Joshua Safran, a writer and executive producer on the original series, and is produced by Fake Empire and Alloy Entertainment in association with Warner Bros. Television and CBS Studios.

The Mole pops back up in Italy

Mediaset-owned Canale 5 in Italy has picked up remake rights to reality format The Mole, after an absence in the country of more than a decade.

The new season is expected to debut in the spring on Canale 5 and comes 12 years since Italia 1 last aired the show.

It marks the fourth revival of the format in the past year for distributor Primitives, with Discovery+ confirming the return of The Mole in Sweden recently.

Primitives’ Siobhan Crawford said: “The Mole is considered one of the best reality formats ever and there are established fan bases in many territories.”

The format has been produced in more than 20 countries, having originated in Belgium in 1998. It sees 10 contestants go to an unknown destination with the mission of identifying which member of their group is the mole, who is out to sabotage the group’s efforts.

Legacy

Albavision adds Eccho’s Legacy

Broadcasters including Latin America’s Albavision have picked up rights to Turkish drama Legacy from Eccho Rights.

The show, produced by Karamel Yapim, will air across 10 Central and Southern American territories following a deal inked with Albavision and has also been picked up by ATN in Afghanistan, Imedi in Georgia and SIA in Lithuania.

A second season has also been confirmed by Kanal 7 in Turkey.