Studio Babelsberg will co-produce two German feature productions Matti Geschonneck's Boxhagener Platz and Cyrill Boss and Phillip Stennert's Jerry Cotton.
The announcement follows Studio Babelsberg's recent partnership on Quentin Tarantino's Inglourious Basterds and Roman Polanski's The Ghost.
Tragicomedy Boxhagener Platz which has just started principal photography, is a $4.8m (Euros 3.5m) co-production between Munich-based Claussen+Wöbke+Putz Filmproduktion with Studio Babelsberg/Babelsberg Film and broadcasters WDR, RBB and Arte.
The production will shoot scenes on the Berliner Strasse outside set which was used earlier this year by Tarantino for Inglourious Basterds. Production designer Lothar Holler will transform the street into Boxhagener Platz in the East Berlin of 1968.
Boxhagener Platz has been adapted by Torsten Schulz from his novel of the same name and stars veteran actress Gudrun Ritter, Michael Gwisdek, Jürgen Vogel, Meret Becker, Horst Krause and 14-year-old Samuel Schneider in his first feature film role.
Pandora Filmverleih will release the film theatrically. It has been supported by MDM, Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg, Filmstiftung NRW, German Federal Film Board (FFA), BKM, and German Federal Film Fund (DFFF).
Babelsberg's second German project will be the tongue-in-cheek action comedy Jerry Cotton. It will partner with Munich-based Rat Pack Filmproduktion, B.A. Produktion and Constantin Film Produktion from April 21 this year.
The screenplay by is based on the cult novels from the 1960s centred on FBI agent Jerry Cotton, who was Germany's answer to James Bond.
According to Rat Pack's Christian Becker, the screenplay will be 'a fantastic new interpretation which will be like the way people approached Starsky & Hutch. It won't be a parody because we take the character of Jerry Cotton very seriously but we see him a bit like Inspector Drebin in The Naked Gun. The film industry as well as the fans and readers are already all very enthusiastic,' Becker said.
Cotton will be portrayed by Christian Tramitz, who starred in Rat Pack's The Vexxer and Michael 'Bully' Herbig's Manitou's Shoe. He will be joined by Christian Ulmen as partner Phil Decker, with other parts taken by Monica Cruz, Christiane Paul, Heino Ferch, Herbert Knaup.
Interiors on Jerry Cotton will be filmed at the Babelsberg Studios with some location work in Hamburg and New York.
Backing has come from FilmFernsehFonds Bayern, Bayerischer Bankenfonds, German Federal Film Board (FFA), FilmFoerderung Hamburg Schleswig-Holstein, and German Federal Film Fund (DFFF).
Constantin Film will release the film theatrically, with international sales handled by Beta Film.
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