Nickelodeon Unveils Two Brand New Shows And Orders Pilot For Third New Show For 2012

From C21Media:

Nick drops Rock on iTunes

US cablenet Nickelodeon will launch its new live-action musical series How to Rock on Apple iTunes, and has unveiled new programming for this year.

High school comedy How to Rock will launch on iTunes and Nick.com this month before the show premieres on television next month with back-to-back episodes on February 4.

The show’s theme song, performed by the series’ star, Cymphonique Miller, is already available for download on the Apple online store. Further content and promotional videos, including a doc called Cymphonique: Ready to Rock, will launch on Nick’s website, online sites, iTunes and Facebook before the television TX.

It’s the first time Nick has premiered a show online before its television bow – a clear sign the Viacom-owned kidsco’s top brass sees digital distribution as increasingly key to its future.

Nick produces How to Rock in association with Alloy Entertainment, which acquired US digital production and talent studio Generate earlier this month.

In further news, Nick has given the go-ahead to a 21×11’ season of new shortform live-action comedy Fred: The Show, which features YouTube star Lucas Cruikshank.

The show will follow the comic adventures of Cruikshank’s Fred Figglehorn character, a six year-old boy with anger issues. It follows on from previous Nick telemovies Fred: The Movie and Fred: Night of the Living Fred.

Production has begun in LA and the series will premiere early this year. Cruikshank exec produces, along with Gary Binkow and Evan Weiss of Beverley Hills-based talent and production house The Collective, plus Brian Robbins and Sharla Sumpter Bridgett of Varsity Pictures.

Cruikshank and The Collective are also attached to another new Nick commission, half-hour comedy pilot Marvin [Marvin, Marvin]. The programme comes from Jon Ross (10 Things I Hate About You) and has show-runner Jeff Bushell (Beverley Hills Chihuahua), Binkow and Weiss attached as exec producers.

The multi-camera pilot will star Cruikshank as a “quirky” intergalactic school kid who tries to adapt to his new life as a human teenager.

Jesse Whittock
16-01-2012
C21Media