Amazon has given second season orders to Red Oaks starring Craig Roberts and Hand of God with Ron Perlman. The animated kids series Tumble Leaf earned a third season, and Amazon announced they’ve given series orders to five new shows aimed at adult audiences and three new kids shows.
The new adult shows include Highston with Chris Parnell, One Mississippi starring Tig Notaro, Z: The Beginning of Everything with Christina Ricci, Good Girls Revolt starring Anna Camp, and Patriot starring Michael Dorman.
The shows will all stream on Amazon Prime Video.
New Amazon Prime Series:
Highston – Highston Liggetts (newcomer Lewis Pullman) is a 19-year-old with a wide circle of celebrity friends—that only he can see. His parents, Jean (Mary Lynn Rajskub), and Wilbur (Chris Parnell) force him to get psychiatric help, but his Uncle Billy (Curtis Armstrong) thinks he’s just fine. Highston is a comedy about what it means to be normal in a world that’s anything but. The pilot guest stars Shaquille O’Neal and Flea, and is written by Oscar-nominee Bob Nelson, directed by Independent Spirit Award winners Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris, and executive produced by Sacha Baron Cohen, Todd Hoffman, Nelson, and Todd Schulman.
One Mississippi – A dark comedy, loosely inspired by Tig Notaro’s (Boyish Girl Interrupted) life, One Mississippi follows Tig as she deals with the complex reentry into her childhood hometown of Bay Saint Lucille, Mississippi, to deal with the unexpected death of her mother, the interminable life of the party, Caroline. Reeling from her own recently declining health, Tig struggles to find her footing with the loss of the one person who actually understood her, with help from her older but not always wiser brother, Remy, played by Noah Harpster, and her emotionally distant stepfather, Bill, played by John Rothman. A surprise visit from Tig’s girlfriend, Brooke, played by Casey Wilson only compounds the reality of how out of place Tig is in a world without her mother. A co-production with FX Productions, One Mississippi is written and executive produced by Notaro and Diablo Cody, executive produced by Louis CK, Blair Breard, and Dave Becky, with pilot directed and executive produced by Nicole Holofcener.
Z: The Beginning of Everything – Z: The Beginning of Everything is a bio-series pilot based on the life of Zelda Sayre Fitzgerald, the brilliant, beautiful and talented Southern Belle who becomes the original flapper and icon of the wild, flamboyant Jazz Age in the 20s. Starring Christina Ricci as Zelda Sayre, Z: The Beginning of Everything starts before she meets the unpublished writer F. Scott Fitzgerald, and moves through their passionate, turbulent love affair and their marriage—made in heaven, lived out in hell as the celebrity couple of their time. The series travels through the wild parties, the wicked jazz, the dissolute artists of the era, as well as the alcoholism, adultery and struggle with dashed dreams and mental illness that characterizes their later years.
Z: The Beginning of Everything dives into the fascinating life of a woman ahead of her time, an artist determined to establish her own identity in the tempestuous wake of a world-famous husband. The show pulls back the curtain on her triumphs and dark secrets. It’s a modern take on one of the most notorious love stories of all time, played out in salons and speak-easies from Montgomery, Alabama to the Cote D’Azur. Z: The Beginning of Everything is written by Dawn Prestwich and Nicole Yorkin, directed by Tim Blake Nelson, and executive produced by Pamela Koffler and Christine Vachon of Killer Films, as well as Ricci. The show also guest stars David Strathairn as Judge Anthony Dickerson Sayre, Kristine Nielsen as Minnie Sayre, Maya Kazan as Livye Hart, Sarah Schenkkan as Eleanor Browder, Jamie Anne Allman as Tootsie Sayre, and Holly Curran as Tilde Sayre.
Good Girls Revolt – In 1969, while a cultural revolution with a soundtrack to match swept through the free world, there was still one place that refused to change with the times: newsrooms. Good Girls Revolt follows a group of young female researchers at “News of the Week,” who simply ask to be treated fairly. Their revolutionary request will spark convulsive changes and upend marriages, careers, sex lives, love lives, and friendships. Good Girls Revolt stars Genevieve Angelson as Patti, Anna Camp as Jane, Erin Darke as Cindy, Chris Diamantopoulos as Finn, Hunter Parrish as Doug, Jim Belushi as Wick McFadden, Joy Bryant as Eleanor Holmes Norton, and Grace Gummer as Nora Ephron. A co-production with TriStar Television, Good Girls Revolt is written by Dana Calvo, directed by Liza Johnson, and executive produced by Calvo, Lynda Obst, Darlene Hunt, Don Kurt and Jeff Okin. The pilot is inspired by the landmark sexual discrimination cases chronicled in Lynn Povich’s book, The Good Girls Revolt.
Patriot – The political thriller Patriot follows the complicated life of intelligence officer John Tavner (Australian newcomer Michael Dorman). His latest assignment is to prevent Iran from going nuclear, requiring him to forgo all safety nets and assume a perilous “non-official cover” — that of a mid-level employee at a Midwestern industrial piping firm. A bout with PTSD, the Federal government’s incompetence, and the intricacies of keeping a day job in the “front” industrial piping company, cause a barrage of ever-escalating fiascos that jeopardize Tavner’s mission. The pilot also stars Terry O’Quinn as Tom Tavner, John’s State Department Director of Intelligence father, Michael Chernus, as John’s older brother Edward Tavner, a young Texas congressman, Kathleen Munroe, as John’s wife Alice, Aliette Opheim as Agathe, a brilliant young homicide detective from Luxembourg hot on John’s trail, and Kurtwood Smith as Mr. Claret, John’s stickler of a new “boss” at the piping firm. Patriot is written and directed by Steven Conrad, and executive produced by Conrad, Gil Bellows, Glen Ficarra, Charlie Gogolak, and John Requa.
Danger & Eggs – Danger & Eggs follows the endless adventures of fearless D.D. Danger and her ever-cautious best friend, a giant, talking egg named Phillip. D.D., an energetic future stuntwoman, is always chasing her next big thrill. Lucky for her, Phillip is always there with jerry-rigged safety mechanisms to more responsibly–and sometimes absurdly–make her thrill seeking dreams come true. Danger & Eggs is created by Mike Owens and Shadi Petosky, produced by Petosky and Chris Hardwick’s Puny Entertainment, and features the voice talents of comedians Aidy Bryant and Eric Knobel.
If you Give a Mouse a Cookie – When you give a mouse a cookie, he’ll probably ask for a glass of milk, and then…who knows what he’ll ask for next? If You Give a Mouse a Cookie follows the adventures of Mouse, Oliver and other familiar friends as they discover that when you’ve got a curious Mouse for a friend (not to mention a Moose, a Pig, a Cat and a Dog), one thing always leads to another, then another, and then another! You never know what to expect, but you do know it’s going to be fun—and maybe a little bit messy. Much like the books, the story will start in one place and lead to unexpectedly delightful twists and turns until we are back at home where we started. If You Give a Mouse a Cookie is based on the beloved books by Laura Numeroff and Felicia Bond and written and developed by Emmy Award-winning writer Ken Scarborough.
Niko and the Sword of Light – Niko and the Sword of Light is based on the motion graphic comic by Imaginism Studios, Inc., the studio behind character and concept designs for Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland and Men in Black 3, and Studio NX. Written by Rob Hoegee and animated by Titmouse, Niko and the Sword of Light follows ten-year-old Niko who is the last of his kind in a strange, fantastical world. He must embark on an epic quest to defeat the darkness and bring the light back to his land. Armed with his magic sword, brave Niko journeys to the Cursed Volcano, making new friends and powerful foes along the way, all while uncovering secrets about his mysterious past. Tom Kenny and Jim Cummings lend their vocal talent.
Amazon Prime – Renewals
Red Oaks – Created by Gregory Jacobs and Joe Gangemi, Red Oaks is a half-hour coming-of-age dramedy set in suburban New Jersey in 1985. Sundance award-winner David Gordon Green and Academy Award winner Steven Soderbergh join Jacobs and Gangemi as Executive Producers. Set in the 1980s in suburban New Jersey, Red Oaks tells the story of David Meyers (Craig Roberts), a college student and assistant tennis pro at the Red Oaks Country Club, as he struggles to figure out what his future holds for him. Season two picks up in 1986 as David deals with the fallout from his parents’ recent separation, and tries to define his relationship with the mercurial Skye (Alexandra Socha).
Hand of God – Created by Ben Watkins, and marking the television debut of renowned filmmaker Marc Forster, Hand of God is a drama centered around Judge Pernell Harris (Ron Perlman) who suffers a mental breakdown and goes on a vigilante quest to find the rapist who tore his family apart by relying on “visions” he believes are being sent by God through his son. Hand of God also stars Dana Delany as the Judge’s wife Crystal Harris, Garret Dillahunt as KD, the born-again sociopath who is exploited by Pernell, Andre Royo as the slick and greedy mayor Robert ‘Bobo’ Boston, Alona Tal as Pernell’s grieving daughter-in-law Jocelyn Harris, and Julian Morris as the questionable preacher, among others.
Tumble Leaf – Created by Drew Hodges and executive produced by Hodges and Kelli Bixler of the award-winning studio Bix Pix Entertainment, Tumble Leaf features voice work from Christopher Downs as Fig, Brooke Wolloff as Maple, Zac McDowell as Hedge, Addie Zintel as Pine, and Alex Trugman as Ginkgo. Tumble Leaf features lush worlds and playful stop-motion animation that garnered four Daytime Emmys and the Daytime Emmy for Best Preschool Series, earned the Jury Award for a TV series at the 2014 Annecy International Animated Film Festival, the 2015 Annie Award for Best General Audience Animated TV/Broadcast Production for Preschool Children, and a 2015 Parents’ Choice Gold Award.
