EXCLUSIVE: HaloThe long way to the small screen has taken a final turn. Showtime’s highly anticipated series, based on the hugely popular Xbox video game franchise, will migrate to Paramount + and be available exclusively on the ViacomCBS streamer. The announcement will be made during the ViacomCBS Streaming event this afternoon.
Produced by Showtime in association with 343 Industries, along with Amblin Television, the series is in production in Budapest and will premiere on Paramount + in Q1 2022.
Halo has reinvented the way people think about video games and has become a global entertainment phenomenon, with more than 81 million copies sold worldwide. In the adaptation of the television series, starring Pablo Schreiber, Halo will take place in the universe that first emerged in 2001, dramatizing an epic 26th-century conflict between humanity and an alien threat known as the Covenant. The show will intertwine deeply drawn personal stories with action, adventure and a richly imagined vision of the future.
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“It delivers the visceral excitement of playing the game, along with a much deeper emotional experience around the Spartans, people who chemically and genetically alter their humanity,” David Nevins, Chief Creative Officer, CBS & Chairman and CEO, Showtime Networks, said about the series. “The story is about reclaiming what makes them human, which is why it’s a very powerful story.”
Steven Spielberg, Darryl Frank and Justin Falvey will executive produce for Amblin Television alongside Steven Kane, director Otto Bathurst and Toby Leslie for One Big Picture and Kyle Killen and Scott Pennington for Chapter Eleven. Kiki Wolfkill, Frank O’Connor and Bonnie Ross are executive producers for 343 Industries.
John Russo / Showtime
Halo, that had filmed 55% -60% of the first season when the coronavirus pandemic ended all production last March, for months as an opportunity for Paramount + at the ViacomCBS Content Council and in talks between Nevins and ViacomCBS president and CEO Bob Bakish.
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“We were on the hunt for signature shows outside of the Star Trek franchise on CBS All Access and thought, what could be a defining series for Paramount +, ”said Nevins. At the end of last fall, the top managers were shown the first completed images of Halo, which accelerated the idea of moving to Paramount +.Halo Always fit, but when we saw it we thought it would work, ”said Nevins.
He reached out to Showtime’s creative partners for the series, Spielberg and his team at Amblin, as well as 343 Industries, Microsoft’s video game developer behind the Halo universe. Nevins got them on board with a pitch as to why Halo would benefit from launch on Paramount +. “It could be a defining show for a new service that has all the firepower of an entertainment company behind it,” Nevins said.
Halo was originally developed “with a view to expanding the palette on Showtime to four-quadrant shows,” Nevins said.
But once ViacomCBS opted for a three lane streaming strategy – free ad supported, broad pay and premium pay – “we all felt that Halo is a show with a broad and premium salary, ”said Nevins.
Meanwhile, Showtime remains “a premium adult programming service” and the home of “advanced dramas” Your honor, Nevins said.
Skip Bolen / Showtime
The huge success of the Bryan Cranston starrer Your honor Showtime has given strong momentum, leading to the decision to host Halo go to Paramount + more easily. The audience for Your honor, which debuted in December, has already surpassed 8.1 million viewers across platforms in Showtime’s 27 million-28 million home universe, heading into the biggest debut season in the network’s history.
From that, “you’re going to see an IV of new stuff,” Nevins said. The first wave of high-profile new Showtime series is already coming together, with The curse comedy starring Emma Stone; The First Lady limited series headlining Viola Davis, Michelle Pfeiffer and Gillian Anderson; and the drama of Steven Zaillian Ripley awarded by Andrew Scott.
Showtime will continue to produce Halo Paramount +, and the network’s creative executive team, led by Gary Levine and Amy Israel, who worked on the series for years, will continue to oversee it. It is an example of the breaking down of silos at ViacomCBS, along with the production of a promising pilot by Paramount TV Studios American gigolo for Showtime.
With multiple content studios within ViacomCBS, “part of my goals and the goals of the Creative Council is to get the right piece of content on the right platform where the best money can be made,” Nevins said. “I think we’re making the smart decisions about what kind of brands we’re trying to build for consumers rather than internal politics.”
Along with George Cheeks, President and CEO of CBS Entertainment Group and Julie McNamara, EVP, Development and Programming for Paramount + Nevins oversees the pipeline of original content from CBS Studios on the way to Paramount +.
Halo stars Schreiber as Master Chief Spartan John-117; Natasha McElhone as Dr. Halsey, the brilliant, contradictory, and inscrutable creator of the Spartan super soldiers; and Jen Taylor as Cortana, the most advanced AI in human history, and possibly the key to the survival of the human race. Other stars include Bokeem Woodbine, Shabana Azmi, Natasha Culzac, Olive Gray, Yerin Ha, Bentley Kalu, Kate Kennedy, Charlie Murphy and Danny Sapani.
Amblin Television has been working on it Halo for nearly a decade. The series was originally announced in 2013 as one of the big series to launch Xbox original content. It moved to Showtime shortly after Xbox Entertainment Studios closed in 2014 and has been in the works on the premium cable network ever since. The adaptation was given the green light in June 2018. After another bump in the form of a director change a few months later, the series got on track and continued, only interrupted by the pandemic. Halo is distributed worldwide by CBS Studios International.
Paramount + is the latest streamer launched by the traditional media company to recruit high-profile new script series through one of its cable channels as one of its first offerings. Which include Raised by wolves, who migrated from TNT to HBO Max, and Brave new world, also produced by Amblin TV, which moved to Peacock from the US.