News: Amazon Announces Lineup for its 2016 Comedy Pilot Season

In a press release:

Amazon Announces Lineup for its 2016 Comedy Pilot Season

Three new half-hour pilots will debut August 19 on Amazon Video and customers are once again invited to stream and review the shows to help determine which will become an Amazon Original Series

Pilots come from noted creators including Peter Atencio, Ben Edlund, Barry Josephson, Ridley Scott, and Jill Soloway, and star prominent actors including Kevin Bacon, Jean-Claude Van Damme, Kathryn Hahn, andJackie Earle Haley

SEATTLE–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Jul. 21, 2016– (NASDAQ: AMZN)—Amazon today announced the lineup for its 2016 comedy pilot season which will debut August 19 in the US, UK, Germany, Austria, and Japan. Amazon customers can expect more variety than ever in an Amazon pilot season, including shows I Love Dick, based on the renowned feminist novel about a couple’s marital struggles in the artistic and academic community of Marfa, Texas; Jean-Claude Van Johnson, where martial arts film star Jean-Claude Van Damme operates under the alias of “Jean-Claude Van Johnson” to serve as the most dangerous undercover private contractor in the world; and The Tick, an offbeat and dark superhero tale based on the acclaimed comic.

All Amazon customers are invited to stream and review the pilots in order to help choose the next Amazon Original Series that are then available to Prime members. The pilots will be available via the Amazon Video app for TVs, connected devices including Fire TV, and mobile devices, or online at Amazon.com/amazonvideo. Amazon customer feedback on pilots have helped make some of the most critically-acclaimed and popular series to date, including multi Golden Globe– and Emmy-winning series Transparent, multi Golden Globe-winning series Mozart in the Jungle, and the most-streamed Amazon Original Series ever by Prime members globally, The Man in the High Castle.

The new pilots feature prominent actors that include Kevin Bacon (The Following), Griffin Dunne (Dallas Buyers Club), Kathryn Hahn (Transparent), Jackie Earle Haley (Watchmen), Phylicia Rashad (Creed), Peter Serafinowicz (Guardians of the Galaxy), and Jean-Claude Van Damme (JCVD). They come from noted creators that include Peter Atencio (Key and Peele), Ben Edlund (Supernatural), Barry Josephson (Bones), Ridley Scott (The Martian), and Jill Soloway (Transparent).

“Nowhere else will voices as influential as Jill Soloway and Jean-Claude Van Damme share a stage,” said Joe Lewis, Head of Half-Hour Series, Amazon Studios. “And that’s just the Js. We’re excited to bring such a diverse slate of pilots to customers and we can’t wait to hear what they think.”

Amazon’s fall comedy pilot season includes the following shows:

I Love Dick

Adapted from the cult classic I Love Dick—referred to as “the most important book about men and women written in the last century” (Emily Gould, The Guardian)—is set in a colorful intellectual community in Marfa, Texas. Chris (Kathryn Hahn, Transparent) and Sylvere (Griffin Dunne, Dallas Buyers Club), arrive in Marfa when Sylvere is offered a fellowship to finish a book he’s been writing on the Holocaust. When they meet Dick (Kevin Bacon, The Following), he taunts their imaginations and upends their preconceptions about love and monogamy. An exploration of the female gaze and how we tell stories about love and desire, I Love Dick charts the evolution of a marriage, the awakening of an artist and the deification of a writer named Dick. I Love Dick is executive produced by Jill Soloway (Transparent), Andrea Sperling (Transparent), and Sarah Gubbins (Ten Aker Wood). The pilot is directed by Soloway and written by Gubbins.

Jean-Claude Van Johnson

If you need to eliminate a political rival, debilitate a multinational corporation, or overthrow an entire government—and you need it done with the utmost secrecy—there’s only one person to turn to: one of the most internationally recognizable movie stars in the history of film. Jean-Claude Van Johnson stars Jean-Claude Van Damme (JCVD) playing “Jean-Claude Van Johnson,” a global martial arts and film sensation…and, operating under the simple alias of “Johnson,” the most dangerous undercover private contractor in the world. Lucky for the world’s bad guys, he’s been retired for years…unlucky for them, a chance encounter with a lost love is about to bring him back to the game…and this time, he’ll be deadlier than ever. Probably.

Jean-Claude Van Johnson stars Van Damme along with Kat Foster (Your Family or Mine), Moises Arias (The Middle), and Phylicia Rashad (Creed). The show is executive produced by Peter Atencio (Key and Peele), Ridley Scott (The Good Wife), David W. Zucker (The Man in the High Castle) and Van Damme. From Scott Free Productions, the pilot is directed by Atencio and written by Dave Callaham (Mortal Kombat).

The Tick

In a world where superheroes have been real for decades, an underdog accountant with zero powers comes to realize his city is owned by a global super villain long-thought dead. As he struggles to uncover this conspiracy, he falls in league with a strange blue superhero. The Tick stars Peter Serafinowicz (Guardians of the Galaxy), Griffin Newman (Vinyl), Jackie Earle Haley (Watchmen), Valorie Curry (House of Lies), Yara Martinez (Jane the Virgin) and Brendan Hines (Scorpion). The Tick is executive produced by Ben Edlund (Supernatural), Barry Josephson (Bones) and Barry Sonnenfeld (A Series of Unfortunate Events), directed by Wally Pfister (The Dark Knight), and written by Edlund. The Tick is a co-production with Sony Pictures Television.

About Amazon Video

Amazon Video includes tens of thousands of movies and TV episodes available on Prime Video at no additional charge to Prime members, as well as access to hundreds of thousands of titles to buy or rent. Amazon Video is the only service in the world that brings customers both of these options in one place.

Prime Video, available on Amazon Video, lets Prime members enjoy binge-worthy TV shows including Amazon Original Series airing now such as the multi-Golden Globe-winning and Emmy-winning seriesTransparent, Hand of God, Bosch, Catastrophe and Mozart in the Jungle as well as hit series like Sex and the City, Veep, Girls, The Sopranos, Entourage, Curb Your Enthusiasm and The Wire. Prime Video also offers members blockbuster movies such as Transformers: Age of Extinction, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit, Star Trek Into Darkness and The Hunger Games: Catching Fire, among others. Prime members have access to a collection of kids shows including Amazon Original Series Annedroids, Gortimer Gibbon’s Life on Normal Street and the Annecy, Annie and multi-Emmy Award-winning Tumble Leaf, as well as popular shows from Nickelodeon and Nick Jr. including SpongeBob SquarePants, Dora the Explorer, Team Umizoomi, and Blue’s Clues.

Prime members can look forward to several new upcoming original series premiering this year, with the coming-of-age dramedy Red Oaks premiering on October 9, followed by the much anticipated adaptation of Philip K. Dick’s The Man in the High Castle on November 20, and season two of Emmy-winning Transparent December 4. Coming in 2016 will be the second seasons of Mozart in the Jungle,Bosch and romantic comedy, Catastrophe, along with the debut season of The New Yorker Presents.

In addition to tens of thousands of titles to instantly stream on Prime Video, the Amazon Prime membership (www.amazon.com/prime) includes more than one million songs, more than a thousand playlists and hundreds of stations through Prime Music, unlimited Free Two-Day Shipping on millions of items, early access to select Lightning Deals, unlimited photo storage with Amazon Photos, and access to borrow from more than 800,000 books for Kindle owners-all for $99 a year.

Amazon Video can be accessed through the Amazon Video app on TVs, connected devices and mobile devices, or online at Amazon.com/amazonvideo. Prime Video titles can also be downloaded for offline enjoyment–the only subscription streaming service to offer this functionality. Customers who are not already Prime members can sign up for a free trial at Amazon.com/prime.

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Greg Staffa

I provide testosterone to the site. You won’t be reading about how nice a actress looks in a dress or how much of a hunk Matt Bomer is in my reviews. I describe colors using words like brown, not taupe. My twitter name is @staffaroadtrip because I love road trips and have done two different 48-state road trips since 2008. My favorite show is White Collar.