French TV festival and industry event Series Mania has unveiled the line-up for its 2025 edition, which runs from March 21-28 in Lille.
Apple TV+’s French-language drama series Carême about the world’s first celebrity chef from The Three Musketeers director Martin Bourboulon starring Benjamin Voisin will open the festival that will feature 26 world premieres and 12 international premieres from 19 countries including new territories Brazil and Algeria.
Nine series have been selected for the international festival competition.
These include Israeli-American series The German about the 1970s hunt for Nazi criminals and European co-production Kabul about the Western scramble in 2021 Afghanistan.
Family-focused dramas include Danish series Generations that deals with infanticide, Spanish series Querer about consent and marital rape, and US series Hal & Harper about a single father and his children and from Coper Raiff starring Mark Ruffalo and Lili Reinhart that got a world premiere at Sundance.
Other highlights include female-driven series like the French premiere of Peacock’s Long Bright River starring Amanda Seyfriend from Liz Moore and Nikki Toscano and Quebecois series Empathy about a young borderline psychiatrist working in a prison hospital.
Italian-French drama Mussolini: Son Of The Century and Switzerland-France-Luxembourg-Belgium co-production The Deal round out the competition.
US creator, screenwriter, producer and actress Pamela Adlon chairs year’s jury alongside French musician and composer Victor Le Masne, Argentinian-American actor Ignacio Serricchio, British director Minkie Spiro, and French actress Karin Viard.
Parallel French, international panorama and short form competitions return, including BBC series for Reunion written and produced by William Mager that will get a world premiere in the international panorama competition.
The festival will close with episodes of the fifth and rumored to be final season of Lille-based series HIP (HPI) starring Audrey Fleurot. Netflix animation Asterix & Obelisk: The Big Fight created by Alain Chabat also gets a gala screening.
Series Mania forum
The Northern French scripted TV festival is this year positioned between MIP Content London and April’s Southern series festival Canneseries that will be without the scrapped MIP TV.
The parallel Series Mania forum runs March 25-27. New this year is the Series Mania Buyers’ Upfront ahead of Forum kickoff giving top buyers from broadcasters and streamers exclusive access to 10 anticipated series. It will end with an inaugural buyers choice award selected by a jury.
The Forum’s central co-pro pitching sessions allow rising talents to pitch projects to TV decision-makers with a €50,000 prize to help develop the series. The 2025 edition will highlight 15 series seeking international funding among 406 submitted projects from 75 different countries.
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