Ex-head of BBC Films launches company

Origin pacts with Fremantle for TV distribution

By ALI JAAFAR

Former BBC Films topper David Thompson is launching film and TV shingle Origin Pictures.

The start-up, which starts operating in June, has inked a first-look development deal with Fremantle Media Enterprises to handle its international TV distribution.

Origin will also receive significant backing from Anant Singh's international production and distribution shingle Distant Horizon.

Thompson and Singh previously worked together on Whoopi Goldberg starrer "Sarafina."

Thompson has tapped former BBC colleagues Ed Rubin and Nicola Blacker to join as head of development and development executive respectively.

Coin from Distant Horizon will also allow Origin to finance some projects it develops.

"We're not after world domination," Thompson told Variety. "The aim is to become a powerhouse of development.

Origin has already commissioned Michel Faber's bestselling novel "The Crimson Petal and the White." Project will be developed as a four-part TV skein.

Thompson, who ankled his post at BBC Films last year but continued to work with the company as exec producer on several existing projects, hopes to tap his formidable contacts to book and nurture new talent at Origin.

Among the projects on which he will be exec producer are Jane Campion's "Bright Star," Saul Dibb's "The Duchess," Martin Campbell's "The Edge of Darkness," Andrea Arnold's "Fish Tank," Pawel Pawlikowski's new project and an adaptation of Jon Ronson's book "Men Who Stare at Goats."

"The idea of the company is to keep alive and burning what we were doing at BBC Films by working on quality projects that were distinctive and marked with some edge from new talent and established writers," Thompson said. "Starting small but looking to grow to where we can make one or two significant films a year and a number of TV projects."

Origin will not be looking to ink an output deal with a U.S. studio for distribution for the time being, with Thompson preferring to deal with each project on an individual basis.