Notorious US killer Charles Manson is to feature in a new television reality show about the families of infamous criminals.

"Sins of the Father" follows Manson's grandson Jason Freeman, a cage-fighter and oil rig worker as he struggles to come to terms with the stigma, production company Gil Formats told AFP.

Freeman's own father, Charles Manson Junior, killed himself in 1993.

"Am I doomed for life? Is there bad blood in me?" Jason asks in an excerpt from the new series being presented at the TV industry's top gathering, MIPTV, which runs to Thursday in the French Riviera resort of Cannes.

"No matter what he is, he is family," Freeman adds in another scene after talking to Manson on the phone from jail.

Manson, who at 82 is still behind bars, was the leader of a California cult called "The Family" which murdered several people, including the pregnant Hollywood star Sharon Tate.

In a bloody killing spree in August 1969, Manson and his followers killed seven people in two days.

Although he has been branded "America's icon of evil", Manson is not regarded as a serial killer, as others mostly carried out the murders he was initially sentenced to death for.

The producers said the families of infamous criminals were often also their victims and said in some episodes of the series "they will confront their parents".

A spokeswoman for Tel Aviv-based Gil Formats told AFP that they could not "as yet confirm the rest of the casting".

She said it would be up to their broadcast partners when "Sins of the Father" will be aired.