LA Screenings 2015: Major challenges & content twists

From 2014 to 2015, this is the time with more major TV series cancellations in many years. This can be due lack of creativity, performance or just luck, but above all, the buyer perception is that Hollywood is not matching the current content market.

For the European free TV broadcasters, for instance, it is very difficult nowadays to schedule many of the new shows, as they see them too alike to premium pay TV. Buyers say most of the series carry hot sex or dysfunctional characters. They are serialized (same story evolving through chapters) instead of episodic (plot starts and ends at the same episode). It is very hard to find procedural series (CSI, etc.) a genre that free TV loves very much.

In addition, stronger local fiction content is available at every region, competing hard and often surpassing Hollywood product. In fact, the big format titans (FremantleMedia, Endemol Shine, ITV, etc.) and top central broadcasters, are today looking for partners everywhere, as a good way to get fresh ideas.

To this, the U.S. studios answer, with good arguments, that TV must evolve to be in line with what millennials like, attracting young audiences. The new premium cable and OTT productions are the path to follow: HBO, Fox International Channels, Netflix, Amazon, Hulu, etc. Their series are justly serialized, frenetic, twisted, etc.

But then, a smarter mix must be found, to fit better both worlds. The existing cross-regional co-production projects are very good current solutions; the one announced at the recent MIPTV between NBCUniversal Productions, TF1 France and RTL Germany is a good example. They will co-produce procedural TV series in English in USA: that will be U.S. production, but with European taste. This is an opportunity time for creative and flexible producers from any region of the world, from Latin America to Asia.

A Hollywood studio executive argued, off the record: ‘The problem is not free TV or cable-alike. The matter is to sell or not to sell. The question to ask the studios is not What new do you have? It is Which fare that you sold last year, is still on air? With so many cancellations, content strategies must be reconsidered’.

Angel Lopez, acquisitions manager at Mediaset, Spain: ‘For free TV we need episodic series, or serialized if they start and finish at the same season, as Wayward Pines from FIC. If a serialized series lasts more seasons, people that get involved watch the next ones through other platforms, before we receive them’. Gabor Fisher, head of acquisitions at TV2, Hungary: ‘We liked CBS’ TV series Zoo, for instance, with the lions attacking; it’s more for all people. It is fine to target young audiences, but most of the people that now watch free TV are adults’.

Genre trends, at L.A. Screenings? Prensario has interviewed more than 100 buyers from all the world during the week; they mostly agreed that this year the Hollywood TV series proposal is once again dominated by supernatural, superhero, suspense-thriller stories, with many famous feature films translated to TV series. Since the studios are producing series for OTT platforms, there are more edging, twisted, violent, moving camera pieces.

This year, drama is ahead of comedy: the majority of buyer-preferred programs, have been dramas. Most of the comedies feature sex or hot matters, so they don’t appeal to family audiences. Sometimes, programmers stressed, the sex clichés are non-sense extras to the plot, but they lower the product perception. Medical dramas are back, with 3-4 good products cross studios, but they don’t promise to surpass E.R. or Grey’s Anatomy.

Specific products? Coming from Fox, the buyers stressed The Frankenstein Code and Damien, both thrillers with supernatural tips, and comedy Life in Pieces, shot with single camera. At CBS, the top product was Zoo, about lion attacks with good massive potential. Billions (Wall Street) and Limitless, a police drama, have been appreciated, too.

At NBCUniversal, Mr. Robot, thriller about Internet hacker, obtained very good reviews; medical series Heartbreaker was mentioned as a new Grey’s Anatomy; and, The Last Kingdom, a new Game of Thrones. At Disney, The Catch, a cat and mouse game thriller with Mireille Enos, the actress from The Killing; The Family, suspense where nothing is as it seems; and comedies Uncle Buck and Grandfathered.

Buyers at Sony remarked The Player, with the debut on TV of Wesley Snipes; Mad Dogs, extreme violent series for Amazon; and Dr. Ken, comedy with Ken Jeong (The Hangover). At Warner, police thriller Blindspot; Rush Hour, spin off of the Jackie Chan movie; and Containment, were the preferred products.

Is digital the future? Alexander Marin, Sony: ‘A key aspect today is Live + 7. TV series must be measured not only by their live emission, but also considering the catch-up services during the release week. Our hit series Blacklist uses to have about 35% extra audience during the week, and sometimes it reaches 50, 60%. Other series have 100% extra ratings at most of the episodes or when they have a sports event competing against during the live emission. The new media series, as our Outlander for Netflix, have strong audience on demand’.

Undoubtedly, the market is changing. A good proof of this may be watched ¡ just by driving through Los Angeles. On the public large advertisement spots, where once we used to noticee the U.S. networks’ product, now we watch billboards by Netflix, Amazon, Hulu, spotlighting their original production. OTTs are the new growth engine of the content market, and TVOD (transactional video on demand) is the big segment still to be developed systematically.

Nicolás Smirnoff and Fabricio Ferrara