For anyone who doesn’t think Amazon Studios is capable of producing content as engaging as Netflix’s original series – or anything proper television networks put out there, for that matter – the service’s newest series Transparent will knock those perceptions right out of your minds. Two parts emotionally scattered drama and one part edgy comedy, this is a show that takes what could have been just a gimmicky plotline and spins it into something greater than its parts.

Jill Soloway, who wrote and directed the soon-to-release indie Afternoon Delight, is also writing and directing the pilot. Soloway has written and produced for such shows as Six Feet Under, United States of Tara and Grey’s Anatomy.

We're so close to the premiere of Arrested Development on Netflix that it's almost to the point where the show is the only thing I want to think about or talk about. Fortunately, series creator Mitch Hurwitz and stars Jessica Walter (Lucille) and Jeffrey Tambor (George Sr.) were kind enough to take the time to sit with the press on a conference call and talk about the show's approaching Netflix revival. That's happening this Sunday (May 26), in case you didn't pencil it into your calendar, or whatever it is people do to keep track of dates these days.

A couple more award winners are joining Al Pacino and David Mamet in HBO Film's bio-pic on music icon Phil Spector. The Hollywood Reporter reports that Bette Midler and Jeffrey Tambor have both been cast in the project which will also re-team Pacino with Barry Levinson (who will exec produce here just as he did with You Don't Know Jack, which, won Emmys for basically all involved).