Fremantle Banner signs first-look deal with ‘August: Osage County’ producer Patrick Daly’s Caledonia

Caledonia Productions, the banner of Patrick Daly, the theater and film director whose feature films have been shot, among others August: Osage County, UNA And Galvestonhas signed a first-look deal with Passenger, led by founder Richard Brown (This England, True Detective, Catch-22).

Under the two-year deal with Passenger, now part of Fremantle’s Global Drama division, Daly and Brown will collaborate on select existing film and television projects in Passenger and Caledonia, in addition to building a new batch of projects to co-produce. Fremantle will handle worldwide distribution.

Both Passenger and Caledonia are based in New York and London.

“I’ve known and admired Richard Brown and Fremantle’s Christian Vesper for many years, so when this collaboration opportunity arose it was a really easy decision to make,” said Daly, whose 15 years of experience producing theater in the U.S. and the UK. has included productions of Lucy Kirkwood’s Chimerica, Katori Hall’s Olivier Award-winning The mountaintopby Nina Raine tribes and Lucy Prebble’s The effect.

“As we continue to bring bold and original work to the stage, we will try to do the same for the screen. The expertise, support and global infrastructure of this deal provide Caledonia with the springboard to do just that, and we look forward to what we cook together.”

Upcoming projects from Caledonia include the feature film Marshall Street, currently in development at Film4 and directed by Nadia Latif. Meanwhile comes the eight-part comedy series SHRINKdeveloped and executive produced by Daly, is currently streaming on Peacock.

“I have long been excited to work with Patrick, he is a very talented producer with excellent taste and invaluable creative instincts,” said Brown. “As Fremantle has become the permanent home of Passenger, we have started looking for exciting opportunities to ramp up and expand our capacity to produce a growing number of high-quality film and TV projects. This deal with Patrick and Caledonia is a big step towards that goal.”

Aside from the first look deal with Passenger, Daly will continue his live theatrical stage work as a producing consultant overseeing EON Productions’ live division. Recent EON credits include the Broadway production of Macbeth (starring Daniel Craig and Ruth Negga) and the stage musical Sing street adapted from the John Carney movie.

In December 2022, Fremantle announced the acquisition of Passenger, with the independent production company becoming a wholly owned label. As part of the deal, Brown has also taken on a new creative role within Global Drama to boost Fremantle’s efforts in the development and production of high-value TV and film projects. A recent example is a collaboration on Michael Winterbottom’s new drama series Fall of the god of cars, which tells the incredible story of Carlos Ghosn, the Brazilian-Lebanese CEO of Nissan and Renault, who was arrested in Japan and orchestrated his own escape to Beirut a year later, hidden in a music case on a private jet.