Leading independent distributor all3media International continues to sign new deals for Lion Television’s factual entertainment epic East to West as broadcasters in Italy, the US and Australia pick up the award-winning series that traces the true story of the origins of civilisation.

Produced in partnership with Bahcesehir University for TRT, Turkey and winner of the Culture and Arts Grand Award from the Presidency of the Republic of Turkey, East to West is now heading to Italy following a deal with Rai 5, the public broadcaster’s dedicated cultural channel. The 7 x 1 hour series is also set to air on the Smithsonian Channel in the US, adding to its recent broadcast on Netflix, and on SBS in Australia, which has also picked up DVD rights.

These new deals add to recent acquisitions by Arte France, SVT Sweden, LTV Latvia, Foxtel for Australia and New Zealand, Viasat for its Nordic, Central and Eastern Europe feeds and Discovery Networks in Asia Pacific.

Louise Pedersen, Managing Director at all3media International commented, “With its high production values, expert insights, accessible presentation and globally relevant theme, Lion Television’s East to West is a series that performs well across a diverse range of platforms and territories. We’re very pleased to announce this latest round of deals as our international clients continue to recognise the strong appeal of this intelligent, critically acclaimed series.”

Prof. Bekir Karliga owner and author commented, “East to West came to fruition as a result of the 20 year long works of Prof. Dr. Karlığa, who has been giving lectures on comparative east-west philosophies in various universities for 30 years, and the series production took 5 years. Mr. Karlığa, being a pioneer in Turkey regarding the concept of dialogue between cultures and civilizations, endeavors to depict the untold stories of civilizations in documentary series ‘River Flowing Westward’ targeting Turkish audience and in the 7 episodes long ‘East to West’ targeting international audience. With these series, he has also committed himself to develop new common civilization awareness”

Today and every Thursday, ‘East to West’ is broadcasted at 17:20 Turkish local time on French-German common channel ARTE in German and French languages..

East to West tells, for the first time, the true story of the birth and flourishing of civilisation in the Middle East and its huge influence on the West. The series looks at how history that starts from an ancient Greek perspective distorts the true patch of civilisation – for much that happened in the West was only on the margins of the real engine room of civilisation. For crucial phases in world history, the political, economic and cultural centre was the Middle East – from the foundation of science, monotheism, commerce, justice, civil rights and artistic expression.