MIPTV 2013 NEWS 1

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Monday 8 April 2013 www.miptv.com DA VINCI’S DEMONS

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Showrunner David S Goyer and stars of Da Vinci’s Demons are in Cannes for the World Premiere TV Screening of the series produced by Adjacent Productions for Starz Entertainment, and distributed by BBC Worldwide

GENE SIMMONS

32 The Kiss frontman is in Cannes with eOne to launch new reality series Busted, and to interview eOne CEO Darren Throop, today at 11.40 in the Grand Auditorium

MIPCUBE We report from Sunday’s one-day think tank MIPCube Plus, a prelude to four days of MIPCube, which is now at the heart of MIPTV

8 MIPFORMATS PITCH

16 Australia’s Hatch Entertainment wins the MIPFormats International Pitch, sponsored by Warner Bros.

4K TV

80 The word is that producers need to start preparing to future-proof content for the next technological revolution: Ultra-HDTV or 4K

BOOTH R38.09 sonarent.com

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INSPIRING ENTERTAINMENT

www.fremantlemedia.com

Original programming from FremantleMedia

FremantleMedia PRODUCTION Please contact us at FremantleMedia Village Stand RB1 Riviera Beach Cannes

T: +33 (0)4 92 99 89 11 F: +33 (0)4 92 99 89 13 E: formats@fremantlemedia.com

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Contents Conference & Events Programme

NEWS

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Full programme, including keynotes,

8 Including: reports from MIPCube Plus, MIPDoc and MIPFormats; World Premiere TV Screening; early MIPTV deals; and MIPTV 50th anniversary memories

screenings, case studies and competitions

PRODUCT NEWS 48 Content for sale in Cannes

FEATURES 80 ULTRA-HDTV Producers need to futureproof content for 4K

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97 CO-PRODUCTION Drama co-production is becoming a major force creatively and financially

109 BUYERS Buying for kids in the digital age

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miptv neWs 1 ®

The official MIPTV daily newspaper Monday 8 April 2013

The MIPTV Newsroom is located in the Gare Maritime (registration area)

Director of Publications Paul Zilk Director of Communication Mike Williams EDITORIAL DEPARTMENT Editor in Chief Julian Newby Sub Editors Neil Crossley, Sarah Kovanzich Deputy Editor Debbie Lincoln Contributors Ben Cooper, Andy Fry, Juliana Koranteng, Max Leonard, Rachel Murrell, Gary Smith, Joanna Stephens, Chris White Editorial Assistant Hannah Stephens Editorial Management Boutique Editions Technical Editor in Chief Herve Traisnel Deputy Technical Editor in Chief Frederic Beauseigneur Graphic Designers Muriel Betrancourt, Veronique Duthille, Carole Peres Head of Photographers Yann Coatsaliou / 360 Media Photographers Christian Alminana, Olivier Houeix, Michel Johner, Yohann Mortier.

PRODUCTION DEPARTMENT Publishing Director Martin Screpel Publishing Co-ordinators Nour Ezzedeen, Emilie Lambert, Amrane Lamiri Production Assistant, Cannes Office Eric Laurent Printer Riccobono Imprimeurs, Le Muy (France).

MANAGEMENT & SALES TEAM Director of the Entertainment Division Jerome Delhaye Director of the Television Division Laurine Garaude Director of Market Development Ted Baracos Sales Director Frederic Vaulpre Conference Director Lucy Smith Marketing Director Stephane Gambetta Programme Director Tania Dugaro Director of the Buyers’ Department Benedicte Touchard Sales Manager Europe excluding Scandinavia & Eastern Europe, Buyers Cyriane Accolas Sales Manager Latin America, Middle East, Africa, Buyers Andry Ramilia Sales Manager Eastern Europe, Oceania, Asia excluding Japan & Korea, Buyers Yi-Ping Gerard Managing Director (UK / Australia / New Zealand) Peter Rhodes OBE Sales Manager David Hedges Vice President Sales and Business Development, Americas Robert Marking Sales Director Latin America Jose-Luis Sanchez Vice President Business Development, North America JP Bommel Sales Executive Panayiota Pagoulatos Sales Managers Paul Barbaro, Nathalie Gastone Regional Sales Director Fabienne Germond Sales Executives Liliane Dacruz, Cyril Szczerbakow Sales Manager Samira Haddi Digital Media Sales Manager Nancy Denole New Media Development Manager Bastien Gave Australia and New Zealand Representative Natalie Apostolou China Representatives Anke Redl, Tammy Zhao CIS Representatives Alexandra Modestova, Igor Shibanov English Speaking Africa Representative Arnaud de Nanteuil India Representative Anil Wanvari Israel Representative Guy Martinovsky Japan Representative Lily Ono Middle-East Representative Bassil Hajjar Poland Representative Monika Bednarek South Korea Representative Sunny Kim Taiwan Representative Irene Liu Germany Representative (Digital Media Sector) Renate Radke Adam ADVERTISING CONTACT IN CANNES Christine Mendes: tel.: +33 (0)1 79 71 99 89

Reed MIDEM, a joint stock company (SAS), with a capital of €310.000, 662 003 557 R.C.S. NANTERRE, having offices located at 27-33 Quai Alphonse Le Gallo - 92100 BOULOGNE-BILLANCOURT (FRANCE), VAT number FR91 662 003 557. Contents © 2013, Reed MIDEM Market Publications. Publication registered 2nd quarter 2013. ISSN 19675178. Printed on 50% recycled paper

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MIPTV Opening Night Party GUESTS attending the MIPTV Opening Night Party tonight at 19.30 in the Martinez hotel should be sure not to miss the 50th Anniversary fireworks display courtesy of the City of Cannes at 22.00. The Party, supported by the European Commission’s MEDIA programme, features entertainment including a performance by the China National Peking Opera Company at 21.00. The Party also includes the International Digital Emmy Awards ceremony, where CSI franchise-creator Anthony E Zuiker will receive the Pio-

PORTAL APP IS SET TO THRILL PORTAL Entertainment, the UK-based venture capitalfinanced start-up, has unveiled a new app that could radically alter the way people choose a video to watch. Thrill Me is a cloudbased app that can tell what type of video users want to see by monitoring their facial response to a text description of the action.

Portal’s CEO/founder Julian McCrea told a MIPCube Plus audience that the app worked on the basis that “no two users in the world have the same level of thrills. It works out who is in a room, looks at their faces and comes back with recommendations in real time,” he said. “If we understand how an audience takes part in a story we de-risk the content and increase the level of loyalty. From a commercial point of view, you increase the average revenue per user because they will pay premium for immersive entertainment.”

Accompanying the launch are two shows using the technology, including a thriller entitled The Craftsman, a paid-for five-day app for Apple’s iPad. Also speaking on the panel was Paul Bennun, chief creative officer at UK digital agency Somethin’ Else. He said the future of audience measurement would be based on numbers gathered from digital data. “Today’s audiences are measured by voodoo,” he said.

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neer Prize. Aviva Silver, MEDIA’s head of unit at Creative Europe/MEDIA said: “We have been part of MIPTV and MIPCOM for many years because TV is a medium that we’re very interested in, but it’s also one that is very hard to get into, and our objective is to help both first-timers and companies that are already established to be more visible and better adapted to the ways in which the industry is evolving.” Stars will walk the red carpet into the Martinez at 19.30 before joining the celebrations.

Kung Fu can-do inspires Morel in TV content survival guide

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V CONTENT creators and distributors will survive in their increasingly disrupted business if they follow the principles of martial arts legend Bruce Lee, said Accenture senior manager Guillaume Morel at yesterday’s MIPCube Plus event.

The executive from the management consulting giant told yesterday’s audience of 150 digital gurus from 26 countries that the most successful companies in the next five to 10 years would be those who adopted Lee’s work ethic.

“As the martial arts king, Lee was revolutionary in the 1960s,” Morel explained. “He advised his students to practice not only Kung Fu or Karate. ‘Don’t stick to only one style,’ Lee said. ‘You should learn from every style and

Accenture’s Guillaume Morel

create your own.’”

Morel continued: “That’s also my vision. The successful companies will be those with their own creative and business models written in their DNA.” He was the keynoter for the con-

ference on innovation and new markets at MIPCube Plus. The event, moderated by Gray Digital director Chris Thompson, examined the industry’s future challenges, and looked at how to create, engage and monetise an audience.

Turning finders into keepers

Blip’s Kelly Day

GATHER the best original content, create a quality-viewing experience, and build a robust community-and-sharing platform to engage an audience once you’ve

found one, said Kelly Day at the MIPCube Plus session How To Engage An Audience Of Users.

The CEO of US-based Blip, the web-entertainment content platform, argued that the days of worrying about scale are over.

“People have been talking about scale and about how big you can get,” she said. “YouTube gets one billion unique users a month. But if scale was the only metric that mattered, why would (advertisement) buyers go anywhere else?”

“There is more content being cre-

ated today than there are aggregated audiences for. So we help our audience find shows they’ll fall in love with because content discovery is a big challenge,” she added.

She was followed by Ian Wharton, a partner at UK-based mobile-publishing company Zolmo, who emphasised the importance of getting the interface of mobile delivery right. “Engaging users on mobile lives or dies based on the decisions you make about the interface,” he said.

miptv

neWs Co-production partners present Giant Squid’s big success story HEN NHK’s Hiromichi Iwasaki set out to capture on film the elusive giant squid, he wasn’t to know that he would discover something nearly as rare: a co-production where all four partners emerge at the other end happy, satisfied and ready to go again.

At the MIPDoc Co-Production Case Study on the production, delegates heard how Giant Squid: The Monster Is Real brought together NHK, Discovery Studios, ZDF Enterprises (ZDFE) and ARTE France. It required marine research, expensive R&D to design submersibles capable of diving to 1,000 metres, ultraHD underwater cameras, new red lights invisible to giant squid — and exceptional levels of trust.

“The risk was huge,” said Iwasaki. “It would cost a lot and there was no guarantee of success. So the day before I pitched it to the boss of NHK, I had a conference call with Clark Bunting, Discovery’s boss. I told him that if he said yes, we’d get NHK’s approval. He said yes that day. My boss said yes the next.”

Discovery Studio’s Lee Bartlett said: “That yes was unusual, and a testament to Hiro’s credibility.”

Bartlett held a ‘squid summit’ in DC to cement the relationships, and they were ready to go.

Delegates then heard how the dive, scheduled for March 2011, was delayed, first by the tsunami and then by ‘the Korea Problem’.

But when it finally happened, and the cameras captured an enormous three-metre squid, eerily golden under the red lights, the long wait was over.

“Both NHK and Discovery had crew onboard,” said Bartlett.

“We both cut our own versions, and we both had access to everything the other crew had shot.”

When ARTE and ZDF saw the footage, they both wanted in.

“We knew we would have to air

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very quickly after NHK did, or our viewers would have seen it online,” said Catherine Alvaresse of ARTE France. To achieve this, ARTE and ZDF made a joint offer, and ARTE agreed to waive its usual demand for six months exclusivity. But they still needed their own versions of the show.

And fast.

“NHK trusted us to make a version, and ARTE agreed to use our cut,” said Kristina Hollstein of ZDF Enterprises. “We knew this would be complex, but it turned out perfectly. NHK was so help-

ful. No email went unanswered.

Every request for material, administrative help, financial information was met.”

Bartlett described this as his best co-production experience ever, and Alvaresse reported that it got ARTE’s best share ever for primetime on a Sunday. “It shows that with good partners, anything is possible,” Alvaresse said. “When there’s a story like this, go for it.”

All four partners are co-producing NHK’s next documentary, Legends Of The Deep: Deep Sea Sharks.

NHK’s Hiromichi Iwasaki: “the risk was huge”

ARGENTINIAN producers have brought 70 new documentary series to market this year under the auspices of INCAA, the country’s National Film Board. Among the eight series previewed at INCAA’s Snack & Screen event on Sunday were: 8W: Extreme Women (8 x 26 mins), about women in boxing, football and motocross; Entrepreneurial Homeland (8 x 26 mins), about how co-operatives are confronting the economic crisis; Photos, Portrait Of A Country (8 x 26 mins), which reveals the powerful stories behind some historic photos; and Joy And Dignity, which follows a young Buenos Aires slum dweller as he uncovers the painters, musicians, rappers and circus performers in his community.

Biographies of Latin America’s presidents and Argentinian footballer Lionel Messi also featured.

Pictured at the MIPDoc event were: INCAA’s Alejandro Righini (left) and Bernardo Bergeret, with Ventana Sur’s Silvina Cornillon, the Ministry of External Relations and Culture’s Tobias Breton and INCAA’s German Calvi.

A TOTAL of 1,325 titles were registered in the MIPDoc DVD library this year, and the projects seeking partners numbered 159 — 17% up on last year. Gordon Main of Barefoot Rascals was among producers who took the opportunity afforded by the new Commissioners’ Meet Up sessions to discuss his projects oneto-one with top international commissioning editors. Main is pictured with France Televisions’ head of international development, documentaries, Ann Julienne.

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Winter Olympics provide winning formula for doc THIS year’s MIPDoc inter-

Members of the China National Peking Opera Company entertained guests at the MIPDoc Networking Lunch sponsored by CCTV Documentary Channel to mark the opening of MIPDoc.

CCTV Documentary Channel’s managing director Liu Wen at the MIPDoc Networking Lunch. He welcomed guests and congratulated Reed MIDEM’s Laurine Garaude on the 16th annual MIPDoc and the 50th MIPTV. “CCTV Documentary Channel has brought nine documentaries to MIPTV this year,” he said. “We hope to become a good partner, investor and close friend to you all.”

Argentine passion was on full display at the MIPDoc/MIPFormats Opening Cocktail. Tango dancers Armando and Mayra performed an authentic milonga as the audience toasted with Patagonian wine. The evening was sponsored by INCAA, the Argentine National Film Board.

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national pitch was won by Putin’s Olympics (Saxonia Entertainment), a documentary about how the International Olympic Committee came to award the 2014 Olympic Winter Games to Sochi, a sub-tropical Russian city with little snow and no infrastructure.

Organised with the European Documentary Network (EDN), the MIPDoc award is given to the project that best demonstrates originality, editorial expertise and international appeal. Putin’s Olympics was commended for excellent access, being timely, important and using humour to good effect.

“We hope that winning this prize will help us make presales, particularly in Canada and the UK,” said Saxonia producer Simone Baumann.

“The budget is €350,000 and we have to find gap finance of €30,000.”

Jurors Ann Julienne (France TV), Catherine Olsen (CBC News Network Canada),

Axel Arno (SVT), Olaf Grunert (ZDF, formerly ARTE) and Jenny Westergard (YLE) had offered useful feedback to the four other shortlisted projects.

The international relevance of Philippa Kowarsky’s documentary about the 1973 October War was, jurors felt, made clearer by changing its title from The October War to The Avoidable War. Jurors told Paul Thiltges that his pitch for Initio, about the potential and pitfalls of micro-finance, needed stronger characters to make it compelling.

They argued about whether Gordon Main of Barefoot Rascals was right to pitch his dog training documentary Elite Force K9 - The Danger Dogs as a 12-part series or whether it should be a one-hour special. And they queried the choice of interviewees in Elder (Left Turn Films), about a gay Mormon missionary facing a choice between faith and desire.

MIPDoc International Pitch winner Simone Baumann (left) with Reed MIDEM’s director of the television division Laurine Garaude and EDN’s Ove Rishoj Jensen, chair at the event.

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Viacom Int’l (VIMN) @VIMN_PR “Unscripted content is bigger & better than ever before. That’s a reality” Caroline Beaton, SVP Intl Prog. Sales, Viacom Intl #mipformats

SMITHSONIAN’S BIG PICTURE THE SMITHSONIAN Channel embraces a wide range of topics, said executive vice-president programming and production, David Royle.

Alongside big budget science programmes like Titanoboa about a giant fossil snake, the channel makes music shows about Dr John and Johnny Cash, and even L.A. Frock Stars, a character-led documentary series about vintage fashion. Royle divides his factual output into signature programmes, specials and series, and popular formats. All are financed differently.

“For the huge budget shows like Titanoboa, audiences demand compelling storytelling, which means big partners,” he said. With specials such as The Shot Felt Around The World from Steel City Entertainment, about the fight against polio, a rare interview with Bill Gates will help to raise the profile. And with Secrets/ Treasures Decoded, Blink Productions developed the idea and found partners to put the deal together.

Presales account for about 40% of the total, US channels are worth 30% to 40%, and where producers are covering the deficit, the channel often helps put the deal together to reduce the financial risk. “We will not go ahead with a project that doesn’t have all its funding,” Royle said. The channel co-produces a lot with the UK and Australia — provided there’s a US angle — and also acquires programming internationally, making its own US versions.

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Be sure to follow MIPTV & MIPCube 2013 live on MIPBlog - http://bit.ly/ MIPTV13Live - and on Twitter, via @mip, #MIPTV & #MIPCube!

Scientific storytellers should aim to explain and entertain “

w

E BELIEVE in the power of story to get the science across,” said Michael Rosenfeld, head of television and film at Tangled Bank Studios, in his MIPDoc keynote. In the face of a decline in science journalism, and a growing anti-science lobby in the US, Rosenfeld is convinced that science television can — and must — entertain.

Launched last year, Tangled Bank is a studio funded by the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) in the US. It aims to produce “great science content” primarily for TV broadcast, but also as digital, theatrical, and giant screen productions.

The initial focus is on event-level specials and mini-series, and

he’s aiming at 12 hours-a-year to start. First off the blocks are Your Inner Fish (34 x 60 mins), tracing the human body back to its prehistoric ancestors, and The Quest To Map The World, co-produced with National Geographic, about the history of cartography.

Tangled Bank is funding development “at a deeper level” for most of its projects, added Rosenfeld.

“Just giving producers more time to dig in to a subject, talk to the right people, think about it, plan it, and come up with creative ideas.

I think the combination of better budgets and more time, and a real commitment to quality, is going to make a difference.”

He’s also taking pitches from other producers. So what’s he looking for?

Tangled Bank Studios’ Michael Rosenfeld

“We’re an American company, so we start with the premise that we need to reach the US audience.

But international is also really important.” He suggested that producers research the studio on its website, and seek his colleagues out at events like MIPDoc.

Documentaries thrive on archive SOME dismiss archive-only documentaries as old-fashioned, but Smithsonian Channel’s executive vice-president programming and production David Royle, calls them “very now”. Speaking in a case study on MLK: The Assassination Tapes (1895 Films), Royle Tom Jenning described local news footage as “the YouTube of 1968”, and said it gave a totally new take on an event we all think we know.

Royle described how 1895 Films’ Tom Jennings convinced him that mining local news footage, radio recordings and police radio of the time, and using it without narration or interviews, could tell a well-known story in a deeper, richer way.

Local news footage was crucial.

“We wanted the things CBS News wouldn’t take,” said Jennings. “We wanted to make it feel fresh, even for people who had lived through it. Tom had done this before with the story of JFK’s assassination, so we had proof of concept.”

Finding the footage wasn’t straightforward. Local news channels didn’t archive their news footage, and often re-used tape to save money. The National Civil Rights Museum directed Jennings to an archive at the University of Memphis which had been documenting a local strike when the assassination took place. That footage still had to be licensed from the originating news companies.

The programme won a Peabody

Award. Indeed, it was so successful that Royle has commissioned another. 9-11: The Heartland Tapes combines local radio and television reports, air traffic control recordings and first-responder calls from September 11 to look at how the rest of the US perceived the attack.

Once again, there is no narration and no interviews. It’s archive pure — but never simple.

1895 Films’ Tom Jennings

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Hatch’s pop songs perfectly pitched to win format prize TV3’s Jeff Ford

CAUTIOUS BUYERS REVEAL WISH LISTS CAUTION was still the word on buyers’ lips at C21’s Schedule Watch: What Do Buyers Want? panel discussion. The panelists, representing four countries, said that keeping financial risks to a minimum was a high priority. But that did not mean these buyers had closed their doors to acquisitions.

For Natalia Egorova of Russia’s Channel One Worldwide, prudence meant concentrating on buying finished shows. Top of her shopping list for the Carousel channel, which has more than 50 formats in production, were scripted comedy formats for pre-teens: “We can’t find any of these in Russia right now, so we’re looking for international formats.”

“You can still push the edges, but you have to know your brand,” Jeff Ford said, outlining his agenda for acquiring formats six weeks into his job as director of content at TV3 Ireland. He added that daytime “presents an important part of what a channel is, it’s very relatable to Irish audiences.”

“We will focus on entertainment formats, and also humour formats,” Eivind Landsverk of TV Norge said. The Norwegian company was looking to spend more at the weekends, to keep up with rivals.

Bernhard Sonnleitner of ProsiebenSat.1, was looking to fill schedule weaknesses in daytime and access prime. “We’re trying to find our own scripted reality show, which is big in Germany now. We’ve learned it’s a hard environment and people maybe aren’t expecting it on a family channel,” he said.

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HE MIPFormats International Pitch promised new ideas, new talent and new formats, and Big Again, a music-based format from Australia’s Hatch Entertainment, beat a strong field of five finalists to the €25,000 development funding from sponsor Warner Bros. International Television Production.

The idea takes pop stars from the 1970s and 1980s and gives their music a new lease of life, when they surprise a young unsigned artist and ask them to re-interpret their music. The artist then records the star’s top three songs, and performs them live on TV; audiences can vote for their favourite performance and also download the tracks introducing a social, transmedia element. The series culminates in a concert featuring all the artists and stars performing together, where audience votes and downloads will reveal who is truly big again.

“It’s a nostalgia show that’s not old fashioned, said Hatch’s Greg Logan, who made the pitch and accepted the prize.

Narrowly beaten were Master Guesser (Norddeich TV, Germany) a studio show where contestants are tested in vari-

Greg Logan of Hatch Entertainment

ous situations on their powers of estimation; Nightmare Situation (TVF International, UK), a hidden camera show in which a studio-based contestant guesses their loved one’s reaction in a staged crisis; Tic Tac Boum (Fat Program, France), a quiz show based on a popular board game, where contestants pass a ticking time bomb between them using quick-fire word skills; and The Bad Girls And Boys School For Old People (TV Formats, Swit-

zerland), an unscripted reality social experiment trying to bring together old-aged pensioners and unruly kids by asking the troubled teens to teach their elders something new.

Poppy Delbridge of Wall To Wall Media (UK) announced the winner: she was part of the international judging panel that praised Big Again’s cross-generational appeal. Ninety formats from 35 countries entered the 2013 MIPFormats International Pitch.

Lambert loves instant feedback STEPHEN Lambert used his MIPFormats keynote last night to hail the increasing role of social media in producing formats.

The head of Studio Lambert and chairman of All3Media America, declared that it was “wonderful” to be so immediately in touch with an audience. “In the old days we’d get a few cranky letters … now we have this direct relationship, second-by-second feedback!”

He made it clear he welcomed good verdicts, and bad. “If people don’t like a show and they tell you on Twitter, that’s important,” said Lambert flatly. “But we’ve also had

shows where people are very positive. The Twitter audience doesn’t represent [everyone], but British broadcasters are more interested in younger audiences anyway.”

Lambert noted how marketing had also changed dramatically.

Using tools like YouTube to promote shows was more important than ever, he explained, and he revealed that his next project would “be launched on social media long before it appears on TV”.

Marketers must also be more mindful of timing, he warned.

There’s no longer this attitude that “the big marketing push should

be new shows in their first series.

Now they push them out, and if the audience finds them, they’ll market hard in the second series.”

Studio Lambert/All3Media’s Stephen Lambert

Visit us at MIPTV 2013: Booth No. 21.02 - 23.01 Sales, Merchandising and Coproductions | Erich-Dombrowski-Str. 1 | 55127 Mainz | Germany Phone: +49 (0) 6131 - 991 0 | programinfo@zdf-enterprises.de | www.zdf-enterprises.de

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neWs SECOND SCREEN’S FIRST PRINCIPLES THE GREATER the conceptual integration between the second screen and the first, the greater the number of people who will take part in the second-screen experience.

So said Tom McDonnell, founder and commercial director of second-screen specialist Monterosa at Saturday’s MIPFormats/EMC session, How To Make Your Format Transmedia.

“That rule is true across all genres,” McDonnell said. “But there’s a caveat: that integration has to be simple, urgent and explicable in one sentence. But if you get it right, you’ll get the hits.”

McDonnell also dispelled some myths about the “hyped and confused second-screen space”.

Rather than seeing it as “annoying” that viewers are distracted from TV content by other devices, producers should see it as an opportunity to add extra layers of value and engagement to their formats. “The really interesting thing — and where the real excitement is — is when viewers are connecting to your format and doing something related to it on the second screen,” he added.

As for the second screen’s return on investment, McDonnell suggested it had an artistic function in terms of entertaining audiences and making their TV experience as enjoyable as possible. “But that doesn’t always wash financially,” he acknowledged.

A more commercial point was that sponsors were now asking for more bangs for their bucks, specifically in terms of digital connection.

Monterosa’s Tom McDonnell

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Japanese broadcasters unveil a treasure trove of formats

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UYERS have reacted to a series of exciting new Japanese formats being showcased at MIPTV by a group of eight broadcasters in Cannes under the banner Treasure Box Japan.

The new shows were unveiled at a Treasure Box Japan workshop on Sunday, which is returning to Cannes after holding the first event of its kind at MIPCOM 2012. The workshop took place amid a busy MIPFormats schedule being held at the weekend.

The eight companies involved are the Japan Broadcasting Corporation (NHK), Nippon Television Network Corporation (NTV), TV Asahi Corporation (TV Asahi), Tokyo Broadcasting System Television (TBS), TV Tokyo Corporation (TV Tokyo), Fuji Television Network (Fuji TV), Asahi Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) and Yomiuri Telecasting Corporation (YTV).

Speaking to MIPTV News after the session, Dario Turovelzky, programming manager at Argentinian broadcaster Telefe

Telefe programming manager Dario Turovelzky

Yang Xu, COO at IPCN

said: “I loved the new formats, they’re fantastic. There are many different possibilities, from feel-good shows to funny shows. It’s impressive that Japanese broadcasters can offer different types of feelings, not just funny shows. The workshops are very useful; it’s a tight schedule but it’s great that, in half an hour, you can see lots of different shows.”

Also attending the workshop was Yang Xu, COO at IPCN, who said: “They have a lot of very interesting show ideas. They’re not necessarily Saturday night shows but could be a very good fit for the midweek. They’re fresh and they relate to your own life.”

Xu said that the Chinese broadcaster is at MIPTV looking for new formats including talent and singing shows.

Finding the format in information IN TOUGH economic times, people want to be diverted — but they also want to be emotionally engaged and educated.

“What they want, in other words, is to be entertained and to learn something at the same time,” said Jan Salling, chief operating officer and sales director of Nordic World. “They want what we call in Scandinavia ‘entertainment with a purpose’.”

Salling was introducing Saturday’s MIPFormats session showcasing the best new indie formats from Scandinavia and the Nordic region — content, as he put it, that succeeds in creating “that magical moment of real feeling” in audiences from Oslo to Osaka.

The eight formats screened

Nordic World’s Jan Salling

ranged from a celebrity rickshaw race around Sri Lanka to an edgy improv comedy set in a mansized dolls’ house. Epitomising ‘entertainment with a purpose’ was STV Production’s powerful social-change format Bye Bye Bullying, which proposes a new approach to the global problem of schoolyard victimisation. Freeport Media’s Speedomania also

had a serious social mission — to prevent dangerous young drivers from endangering their own, and other people’s lives.

On a lighter note, Baluba/Nice Group’s Little People Big Questions raised several laughs as an expert panel of kindergarten kids debated such weighty issues as the reason for the global financial meltdown and why the prime minister can’t find himself a girlfriend.

Salling closed the showcase with a “special present” for the audience in the form of Gangster Boss — a brand new concept that sees reformed criminals bring their ruthless but surprisingly effective skills to bear on failing businesses.

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Format frenzy as China hears call of The Voice Scripps Networks’ Jonathan Sichel: “Our new spring programming is fresh”

SCRIPPS FRESH FOOD ON SHOW SCRIPPS Networks International is whetting the appetites of cuisinethemed content buyers at Cannes with three new series currently scheduled for Scripps’ own Food Network channels.

Pizza Italiana With Thom And James (6 x 30 mins) follows two brothers who run Pizza Pilgrims, a “Napoli-inspired street food” stall in London’s trendy Soho. In the show they travel in a Piaggio Ape van across Italy, meeting personalities along the way. Food Network UK is also scheduled to air Recipes That Rock (6 x 30 mins), that tracks UK music celebrity Alex James and Australian chef Matt Stone as they explore cuisine traditions in Australia’s Margaret River region.

In Singapore, the English-language Food Network Asia has taken Mobile Chef (8 x 30 mins), starring one of the region’s most popular hautecuisine chefs, Ryan Clift.

“From British rock stars to street food super heroes, our new spring programming is fresh,” said Jon Sichel, Scripps Networks Interactive EMEA’s managing director.

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HE VOICE is not only the most successful format ever to air in China, peaking at an audience share close to 17%, or some 200 million viewers, but it has also been a game-changer for the Chinese formats industry.

This was the message from Saturday’s MIPFormats/FRAPA panel session, which examined the reasons behind the recent explosion of format licenses in China.

“The huge success of The Voice has convinced Chinese broadcasters not only that international formats work but that they work very well,” said Summer Zheng of Zhejiang Satellite TV, which airs the John de Mol singing contest in China. “It has served as a role model. Broadcasters have seen our results and they want to copy our success.”

Moderator Michel Rodrigue of The Format People said that The Voice and Got Talent had also

Endemol Asia’s Fotini Paraskakis

had a positive financial impact.

“Six or seven years ago, I was getting $500 (€386) an episode in licence fees,” he said. “Now, we’re looking at about $25,000 per episode.”

Endemol Asia’s Fotini Paraskakis agreed that negotiating licence fees with Chinese broadcasters had been “a real struggle before format fever caught fire”.

She added: “But The Voice has opened the door for everybody.

Our clients in China now realise the value of this IP and that’s

Star China International Media’s Vivian Yin

driven up prices.” Vivian Yin of Star China International Media observed that the explosion of Western superformats had also revolutionised China’s approach to production. “We have learned and digested and absorbed the nutrition from these international formats,” she said. As a result, concluded Red Arrow Entertainment Group’s Michael Schmidt, the Chinese had reached a level of format execution in just two years that it had taken the West five or six years to achieve.

Canadian honour drives deal-making CANADA was Country Of Honour at MIPCOM 2012 and Focus On Canada’s partners — the Canada Media Fund (CMF) and Telefilm Canada — return to Cannes this MIPTV to capitalise on the initiative that spotlighted the creativity of Canada’s content production industry.

Telefilm Canada’s executive director, Carolle Brabant, said that Canada Country Of Honour was hugely successful in creating net-

Telefilm’s Carolle Brabant

working platforms to drive dealmaking with Canadian companies: “Some of the most notable highlights include the 252 Canadian companies that were present at MIPCOM, an increase of 12% over the last edition; media coverage that established a record for all of Reed MIDEM’s Country Of Honour campaigns; the participation of two major industry players, Pierre Karl Peladeau and Wade Oosterman, as keynote speakers; and deals stemming from the presence of the Canadian delegation, such as the sale of Canadian police drama Cracked to Canal Plus in France,” said Brabant.

Valerie Creighton, president and CEO of the CMF (Canada Media Fund), said it will be showcasing at MIPTV more innovative content poised for sales in several markets: “Meet great minds

that are forging the future of screen-based entertainment and learn about all that Canada has to offer as a co-production partner or filming destination,” said Creighton. “We want to demonstrate to the world how big Canadian talent truly is.”

CMF was created by Canada’s cable and satellite distributors, as well as the Government of Canada. The organisation champions the creation and promotion of successful, innovative Canadian content and software applications for current and emerging platforms through financial support and industry research.

Telefilm Canada is a team of some 200 enthusiasts of Canadian cinema, dedicated to the cultural, commercial and industrial success of Canada’s audiovisual industry.

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Toho breaks out of film to turn talents to monster-size TV plan Robert Chua and Betty Ting Pei

SHOW CELEBRATES LIFE OF BRUCE LEE THE 40TH anniversary of the death of martial arts legend Bruce Lee is the catalyst for a proposed six-hour TV/internet programme Betty Reminiscences Bruce Lee (working title), narrated by Betty Ting Pei. Pei was a close friend of Lee — he died in her home in 1973 — and is executive producer and rights owner of the programme. As well as her own reminiscences about Lee, other friends and associates of the late star pay their respective tributes in the show.

Viewers will also be able to ask Pei questions during the event via text messaging or webcam.

Asian TV industry veteran Robert Chua, the show’s consultant, is at MIPTV this week to finalise deals for the project. Chua said: “Betty Ting Pei will appear throughout the show, which will include a Q&A session, and her demonstration of Bruce Lee’s own unique style of martial arts. There will also be an auction of Lee’s personal items.”

Chua added: “Bruce Lee is internationally recognised as the pioneer who elevated martial arts in film to an art form, and he was voted one of the most important people of the 20th century in Time Magazine’s Time 100 poll.”

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Toho general manager Yukio Kotaki: “new contacts in new markets”

OR L D -fa mo u s Japanese movie producer and distributor Toho is making its firstever appearance at MIPTV in a bid to make a greater mark on the international television industry.

Toho, which shot to fame in 1954 when it released iconic monster film Godzilla, has taken a stand at the conference for the first time in its history.

It was responsible for distribut-

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ing a number of hit sci-fi and action films in the 1950s, including Seven Samurai and The Hidden Fortress, since when it has been a dominant player on the international movie scene.

Now Toho is hoping to break into TV circles with a raft of new television formats which it is showcasing this week in Cannes.

Speaking to MIPTV News, Toho general manager Yukio Kotaki, who has recently moved into the role, said: “We want to make

new contacts in new markets. We haven’t been big in TV markets before so this is a good chance to get to know the TV people.

“Last year we just had titles, but now we’ve got completed series to show to the market.”

Kotaki said that Toho is particularly keen to speak to European distributors and broadcasters about series such as teenage sci-fi show Majestic Prince, which is already being distributed in the US, and new girls’ series Fantasia Doll.

Peace Point makes move into scripted PEACE Point Rights, part of Canada-based lifestyle-content specialist Peace Point Entertainment Group, is unveiling its move into the scripted-content space this week.

The company is launching a catalogue of 40 feature films of various genres including thrillers, comedies, documentaries and romantic dramas.

Acquired from UK-US company Stealth Media Group, the catalogue gives Peace Point another revenue source to add to its core traditional lifestyle content production business.

“We’re still focusing on lifestyle in terms of production,” said Julie Chang, Peace Point Rights’ vicepresident acquisitions & business affairs. “But we’ve a great sales team and their focus has been on scripted content.”

One of the scripted titles is Belle Du Seigneur, a 97-minute movie starring British actor Jonathan Rhys Meyers (The Tudors). Chang said the fact that the movie had been specially edited into a miniseries version is part of a growing trend in international TV sales.

“There is always a demand for content with well-known actors, not just the big blockbusters. And TV movies are also being adapted into mini-series. It broadens our revenue options.”

From Peace Point Rights’ portfolio of lifestyle shows is Mercenaries, a 6 x 60-minute documentary that follows the adventures of real-life soldiers of fortune.

Mercenaries is narrated by English Hollywood star Sean Bean (Game Of Thrones). It is produced by UK-based Eyeline Entertainment and Stealth Media

Group for Discovery Communications. Peace Point Rights has worldwide distribution rights in all territories except for parts of Europe and the Middle East.

Peace Point Rights’ Julie Chang: broadening revenue options

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LeWeb Founder Loic Le Meur

Alfred Haber

ALFRED HABER first came to MIPTV in 1973. The founder of Alfred Haber Distribution remembers his first Cannes experience…

We were on the lowest rung of the ladder, because we were late registering. I remember we had the space next to the janitor’s closet… I also remember the parties. There were literally 50 parties a night and people would go up and down the hills from one chateau to another. We didn’t know a lot of people, so we used to work the lobbies, the bars and, if necessary, the men’s rooms.

We used to literally stand outside them so we could see people’s badges.

Also, all the executives were men and all the workers were women. That was just the landscape then.

How has it changed for you?

It’s kind of like the Big Bang theory.

It’s exploded out in all directions.

New media is just one of those directions; another is geography.

Back then, you had a dance card and the top 20 territories were 95% of your dance card. Now, we do a tremendous amount of business in markets 20 to 100. Another change is time. Now, if you don’t manage your time at MIPTV, you’re dead. Years ago, people lingered at meetings, and one meeting kind of rolled over into another. Also, everybody knew each other back then. The chances were better than 50/50 that the person leaving the meeting knew the person coming into the next meeting. Today, the people from ZDF don’t know the people from ARD… What’s the best thing about MIPTV for you?

I enjoy meeting new buyers immensely and I enjoy meeting strangers immensely, and I’m selling entertainment — what a triple play that is! And then there’s Cannes. It’s a big plus just being able to do business in a place like this.

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Who shares wins: LeWeb London to explore internet revolution

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UROPE’S leading internet conference and networking event, LeWeb, has unveiled ‘The Sharing Economy’ as the central theme for this year’s LeWeb London.

“Before the digital network era, selling a service or a product was the main economic transaction,” said LeWeb founder, Loic Le Meur.

“The internet and the endless possibilities for people to connect together, have given rise to a new marketplace — The Sharing Economy,” he said. “’Digital Hippies’ are behind this economy, which includes creations like Wikipedia, Airbnb and Lyft, and beyond these products and platforms lie the core values supporting the rise of this movement,” he added.

Launched in 2004 and 2012 respectively, LeWeb Paris and LeWeb London bring together industry leaders looking to develop their digital strategies. They include companies from diverse sectors including food and beverage (Kraft Foods), the automobile industry

(Renault), sports equipment (Rossignol) and entertainment (France Televisions).

Firms meet digital start-ups, entrepreneurs, app developers, investors and visionary thinkers to examine the digital future. Topics to be discussed at LeWeb London include the effect of sharing on the mainstream economy, the emerging leaders in the new movement, and the way companies might adapt to a new, emerging marketplace.

“The entertainment industry, especially in music and television, has experienced both the benefits and challenges of a society that is moving towards a sharing economy. The aim of LeWeb is to help companies, including those who attend MIPTV, to get a better understanding of the possibilities that the internet offers and avoid some of the eventual pitfalls,” Le Meur said.

Part of the Reed MIDEM portfolio of international events, LeWeb London will take place June 5-6 in Central Hall Westminster.

Shaftesbury lines up web hit WEB SERIES Long Story, Short has been acquired by North American distributor Shaftesbury Films.

Funded by the Independent Production Fund, it follows three young women as they go through a catalogue of drunken exploits and hopeless relationships. It was written by Canadian actor Katie Boland and co-produced and directed by Gail Harvey of Murdoch Mysteries and Lost Girl fame.

Boland also plays the show’s main character, Kristen Harvey, a beautiful 21-year-old woman who is forced to move back to Toronto

and her parents’ home after dropping out of art school in New York.

Shaftesbury CEO Christina Jennings said: “Katie captures the zeitgeist of her generation in this funny, honest and moving series.

Beautifully directed by Gail, Long Story, Short expresses the vulnerability, longing and hope of young adults who are struggling to find their place in the world.”

Shaftesbury is at MIPTV offering rights to the series, which was filmed in Toronto, either in its original format of 11 five-minute episodes or as two half-hour episodes.

Katie Boland in Long Story, Short

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20th Century Fox tips-off buyers on next year’s headline shows Sideline’s Billy McGrath: “some real gems”

SIDELINE BOOST FOR IRISH COMEDY DUBLIN-based producer Sideline is launching The Comedy Division at MIPTV, in response to Irish comedy’s growing popularity with international broadcasters. According to Billy McGrath, creative director of Sideline, the initiative has generated massive interest within Ireland’s comedy fraternity, with 176 scripts already submitted for the new division’s consideration.

“The astonishing response goes to show that Irish comedy writing talent has been out there all the time, just waiting for support,” said McGrath. “We have only read a fraction of the scripts but we have already uncovered some real gems.”

McGrath said that Irish and UK broadcasters, including TG4, the BBC, Channel 4 and Sky, had shown interest in The Comedy Division’s output. “We have also had brilliant feedback from ICM Partners in LA, which is keen to see if there are any scripts that can be pitched into the US,” he said. Recent Irish comedies to have made their mark abroad include Mrs Brown’s Boys (BBC) and Moone Boy (Sky). In November, Sideline produced a pilot with The Rubberbandits for Channel 4, and also agreed an option with CBS to produce the classic US sitcom Cheers for Irish-language channel TG4. The new version is based in a bar in the West of Ireland, owned by a retired hurling star.

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TEVE Cornish, senior vice-president and managing director of Twentieth Century Fox Television Distribution, said that MIPTV comes right at the start of the annual product cycle for his company.

So it’s a chance to tip-off key buyers about next year’s headline shows: “By the time we get to MIP, it’s five to six weeks before the LA Screenings,” he said.

“We’re about to get a whole bunch of new shows… so we’re starting to talk to people about projects coming up, some of which they won’t have heard about yet.”

That conversation will gather pace

at MIPCOM in October, at which point Fox is ready to put some serious marketing muscle behind key shows: “We did a screening at MIPCOM 2012 for our series The Americans and that was really successful. It achieved exactly what we wanted which was to cut through,” he said.

MIPTV also has a useful role to play in on-going business, said Cornish. “It’s a useful touchpoint with clients. We’ve got deals in negotiation so we will try to move those forward, and start off new ones.” In terms of trends, Cornish noted that now is a strong period for drama. “US cable channels are producing

really high quality stuff. “We’re producing shows for FX, A+E, TNT and Bravo as well as the big US networks. So there’s a lot more drama to look at.”

As for technological changes, he said: “I’ve been doing this [TV distribution] for 30 years and it’s changed beyond all recognition.

Now, because broadband speeds have moved on, I can stream a show on my iPad and the quality is fine, no buffering problems or anything like that. There are lots of different windows, different means of broadcasting, it’s a different landscape and I’m sure it will keep developing and keep us all on our toes.”

Passion diversifies into drama and comedy PASSION Distribution is bringing 720 hours of new shows to MIPTV. The company merged last year with Mentorn International, and Passion CEO Sally Miles said the enormous experi-

Passion’s Sally Miles: “Much more leverage”

ence of the Mentorn staff has enabled the company to branch out into new genres such as drama and comedy.

“We’re very excited about our new programming, which in-

cludes Derek, the new series featuring Ricky Gervais, plus a three-part drama called The Politician’s Husband from Daybreak Pictures. And, of course, we are also continuing our relationship with the Scripps Networks, with Baggage Battles and Cupcake Wars doing particularly well,” said Miles.

The merger between Passion Distribution and Mentorn International has created a company with 8,000 hours of programming. Miles highlights the fact that all the Mentorn staff are still with the company. “And of course, we feel like we have much more leverage than previously.”

The growing popularity of the Oprah Winfrey Channel is also generating new sales for Passion, but the biggest hit of recent months is Oscar Pistorius – What Really Happened?

— the quick-turnaround documentary covering the shooting of Pistorius’ girlfriend.

“It’s been a very high earning documentary, generating over €300,000 gross revenues in its first month,” said Miles.

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World Premiere TV Screening

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RITER and showrunner David S Goyer has turned Leonardo da Vinci into something of a superhero for Starz Entertainment’s new drama series Da Vinci’s Demons — tonight’s World Premiere TV Screening. The writer of Christopher Nolan’s Batman trilogy brings some of the altruistic heroism of the caped crusader to the character, turning on its head the indelible image of a grey-bearded old man.

“Well, you know, he wasn’t just a painter, he really wasn’t,” Goyer said. “And I also don’t think that he wanted to be remembered as a painter. I think he wanted to be known as an inventor or scientist, but it was painting that got him the money to pursue those interests.”

He added: “Some people said ‘Oh, you’re turning him into an action star!’ If you read the biographies of him, he was tall and a strapping guy… he was known to be a very good horse rider, he was ambidextrous and a very good swordsman.”

British actor Tom Riley plays the young Leonardo. “I knew the high-school version of who he was — this figure frozen in stasis in his 60s, incredibly wise, having lived a long life, having seen an incredible amount of things and created these beautiful works of art. And that image has lived on through generations,” Riley said. “What I didn’t know was so much of the other stuff that he was involved in that wasn’t art-based.”

I think he wanted to be known as an inventor or scientist, but it was painting that got him the money David S Goyer 30

He added: “If I was at school or if I was having to study that old man with a beard who painted the Mona Lisa, this would certainly give me more of an incentive to do so.”

The Batman connection came well before Goyer got involved in the series. “Bob Kane who invented Batman based the designs of Batman’s cape on da Vinci’s glider,” Goyer said. “So he cited da Vinci as being one of the leading influences for Batman.”

The World Premiere TV Screening of Da

Vinci’s Demons takes place in the Grand Auditorium tonight at 18.15. The screening will be followed by an on-stage discussion with Goyer, Riley and his co-star Lara Pulver who plays Clarice Orsini.

After that they will walk the red carpet to the Opening Night Party of the 50th MIPTV. At this morning’s Creators’ Masterclass at 10.05 in Auditorium A, Goyer speaks about the making of Da Vinci’s Demons.

Tom Riley as the ambidextrous Leonardo Da Vinci in Da Vinci’s Demons

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ENE Simmons — rock god, Kiss cofounder, serial entrepreneur and reality star — is in Cannes to pitch his latest project, Busted, to the international market.

Produced with Entertainment One (eOne), the new hiddencamera reality/comedy series will go out on the road with some of the world’s biggest rock bands. Hosted by Simmons, the series will give viewers a backstage pass into the world of rock stardom, introducing them to the band’s families, roadies and crew while staging elaborate and hilarious practical jokes.

Simmons said the idea for Busted occurred to him while he himself was on tour. “You’re like a band of travelling gypsies,” he said.

“You’re trapped in these covered wagons going from city to city, and boredom soon sets in.

So what do you do? You start pranking each other, just to get

a laugh. And that’s where Busted came from.”

International interest in the series, which is also formattable, is already strong, Simmons added.

“They’re lining up,” he said, citing potential local versions in Hungary, Germany and the UK. So how is Simmons intending to persuade his fellow rock stars to have pranks played on them in front of millions of viewers? “They’ll be no persuasion needed,” he said. “I shall just say you’re going to be my bitch and they’ll do it…”

Busted executive producer and CEO of eOne Television, John Morayniss, agreed. “Gene is a compelling and dynamic individual and he can convince anybody to do anything,” he said.

“After all, he convinced us to do the show…”

Morayniss added: “Busted is a very simple, straightforward format, which we definitely think has huge appeal for global audiences and global buyers.”

Thandie’s Grace under fire AN ORDINARY woman

in an extraordinary situation stands at the heart of the Canadian/UK suspense drama Rogue, brought to Cannes by Entertainment One (eOne).

The part of Grace Travis, however, is played by anything but an ordinary woman — the award-winning British actress and campaigner Thandie Newton (Mission Impossible 2; Crash), who is at MIPTV to help promote the eOne Television/Greenroom Entertainment co-pro.

Produced in partnership with DirecTV’s Audience Network in the US, and The Movie Network and Movie Central in Canada, Rogue tells the story of Grace Travis, an undercover detective who is on a mission to discover the killer of her y q five-year-old son — a quest at leads her into that artnership with a partnership ime boss. crime Her son is “Her dead, so t h e r e’s

Gene Simmons

Thandie die Newton on

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no happy ending,” Newton said. “Grace has to go right outside her comfort zone — in fact, right outside everything she knows — to pursue justice. But she needs to discover the truth because that’s all she’s got. That’s the only positive to be gained.”

The powerful drama, created by Matthew Parkhill, was executive produced by Nick Hamm, John Morayniss and Michael Rosenberg.

Newton added: “One of the things I love about the show is that it has an uncompromising woman at the centre. That just ticks all the boxes for me. I love the fact that, even though the circumstances are appalling, Grace discovers her own strength and power as a result.

I think that’s a lesson for life.

The most difficult situations are the ones that teach you and make you grow.”

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Aschberg dares television to take a leap in the dark

R Pierre Roy: “It was eye-opening”

PIERRE ROY’s first MIPTV was in 1978. Here, the president of Chaines Tele Astral remembers his introduction to Cannes…

I was young and the parties were a fascinating way to connect with a new group of people from around the world. It was eye-opening. We were in the old Palais at this time and video product was a novelty. Many programmes were still on 16 mm and you had to reserve a screening room to project your show.”

Who were you working for at the time?

I was president of Spectel Video, which was a production company producing variety shows.

What changes have you observed since 1978?

The arrival of the VHS cassette was a real improvement for small production companies like mine.

That made it much simpler and less costly to show progammes to potential buyers. You could also send screening cassettes for evaluation without incurring prohibitive costs.

Looking forward, how do you believe MIPTV will evolve?

I think we will still need to meet our partners in person and continue to build relationships. We will still need to listen to the leaders of our rapidly evolving industry to try to understand the changes and how best to adapt the new trends to our local reality. The business will become more and more ‘de-materialised’ — everything will be accessible on the web. And it will be the same for consumers. Mobility on a wide variety of media, smartphones, tablets, etc will be the way we will access content, which will come from many new sources, not only from traditional broadcasters.

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OBERT Aschberg, broadcaster, producer, award-winning journalist and co-founder of Sweden’s format powerhouse Strix Television, would like to see more risktaking in television.

“We need to shake things up,” he told MIPTV News in an exclusive interview to mark Strix’s 25th anniversary this year. In the new era of broadcasting, “the fight will be over IP and creative genius” as media players strive to create distinctive programming on dwindling budgets.

The formats market has “ripened” enormously since Strix erupted on to the scene in the late Eighties with its edgy, controversial programming for TV3 Sweden. “That’s good and bad,” Aschberg said. “The good side is that the competition is a lot tougher, so the quality is generally better and people are more professional.

But the bad side is that there’s less room for bravery and wild experiments because everybody’s chained up by the competition. We need more cowboys out there. The early pioneering days were much more fun.”

Strix continues to push the creative boundaries, however — as its MIPTV anniversary slate demonstrates. Priority titles include 5 Things I Hate About Your Home, The Ti-

Strix’s Robert Aschberg: “We need more cowboys out there”

ger Mum — How To Create A Winner and 10 Commandments. Aschberg is also gratified that several of Strix’s “stone-age formats” from the early 2000s, such as The Bar and The Farm, continue to sell well.

As for the next 25 years, Aschberg predicts that the traditional TV model is set to change dramatically — and rapidly — as the power shifts to the new platforms. “But the brilliant thing is that, for a relatively small amount of money, creative content will always have the power to affect large numbers of people,” he added.

MarVista’s marvellous year MARVISTA Entertainment is celebrating both its own 10th anniversary this year, and the 20th anniversary of Power Rangers. Saban Brands appointed the company MarVista CEO Fernando Szew exclusive international television distributor for Power Rangers Samurai and the classic Power Rangers library of over 700 episodes in July 2010. The relationship deepened when MarVista was also chosen to represent international distribution rights for the Saban Brands live-action kids’ television series Ninja Turtles: The Next Mutation — the only live-action version of the brand in the market — as well as Beetleborgs and VR Troopers. “2013 is a big year for us and Saban Brands but at MarVista we’ll be doing what we always do, putting our best foot forward,” MarVista CEO Fernando

Szew, said. “We are planning to do something special at MIPCOM to crown all our efforts throughout this year.”

Although MarVista was already a successful company before the Saban Brands deal, working with such a huge, global brand had an impact on company culture: “It certainly changed our relationships with some buyers,” Szew said. “And it increased our know-how because we also started working with toy company Bandai, plus with Saban Brands’ agents around the world.”

MarVista is bringing several new series and films to MIPTV as well as launching Power Rangers Megaforce internationally and representing Julius Junior. “We’ll be bringing several original productions including the thrillers Gone Missing and The Nightmare Nanny, plus Nicky Deuce, A Star For Christmas and A Perfect Christmas, alongside some acquisitions such as Twist of Fate, A Second Chance, Ghoul, Bad Behavior and Stonados,” Szew said.

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IndiaCast brings Young Bride INDIACAST, a 50-50 jointventure between TV18 & Viacom18, is in Cannes on a mission to grow the TV18, Viacom18, A+E Networks/TV18 and Eenadu group (ETV) channels.

As well as driving distribution and syndication both domestically and globally, the company is mandated to drive placement services and ad sales, alongside new media (digital) distribution and content syndication.

IndiaCast distributes in over 75 countries across the globe, and has an extensive product catalogue of over 15,000 hours. It syndicates content in over 100 countries in 20-plus languages.

In 2008, when general entertainment channel Colors — a joint venture between Viacom Inc and the Network18 Group — was launched by Viacom18, there were several high-profile reality shows on offer, but the series that caught everyone’s

attention was Balika Vadhu — The Young Bride, the story of Anandi, married off to a rich family as a child. Its simple story and real emotions captured the hearts of millions, making it the number one show in its timeslot. It is the longest running drama series on Indian television and still going strong as one of the highest rated shows on primetime.

Balika Vadhu has been instrumental in the success of the Colors brand. It was amongst the first shows to feature social messaging. Since its launch in 2008, the protagonist Anandi has become a household name, with the show regularly generating discourse around social issues including child marriage, adult literacy and female empowerment.

Balika Vadhu — The Young Bride: instrumental in success of Colors

Asi-B Films to foster new partnerships in Cannes

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OUTH African film, television and multimedia producer AsiB Films is at MIPTV for the first time, after what executive producer Asivhanzhi Mathaba called a “rollercoaster” year.

T he Joha n nesbu rg-ba se d c om pa ny h a s b e en i n t h e i ndust r y for more t ha n 12 yea rs, ma k ing shor ts, specials and long-running series in the documentary and kids’ sector.

“MIPTV has a renowned reputation all over the world. It is a great opportunity to meet people who we can par tner with and open doors that we never k new previously existed. We have a catalogue of work that we have brought along and we would be interested in forming partnerships with people who can

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Asi-B Films’ Asivhanzhi Mathaba: looking forward to making great relationships

help contribute either by coproducing, buying formats or buying some of our projects to share with their market,” Mathaba sa id. “Com ing to M I P T V is a g reat honou r and I look forward to making great relationships that will bear fruit for everyone.”

Asi-B Films is about to begin the fifth season of children’s series Rivoningo (for public broadcaster SABC 2), a magazine format that aims to support reading and writing skills with the help of friendly robots Keke and Lelo.

In the documentary genre, the company is planning a series of one-hour films for free-toair channel ETV. “We want our presence to begin being felt and place African film and television on the map in bold letters,” Mathaba said.

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neWs 50TH ANNIVERSARY

Deal-making is still name-of-thegame in ZDFE’s landmark year

G Dick Lippin

Dick Lippin had just founded The Lippin Group when he first came to MIPTV in 1986. Here, the company’s president and CEO talks about the differences between then and now…

I love going to MIPTV and MIPCOM. As a guy from Brooklyn, I never thought I’d visit the South of France once, let alone go there twice a year.

I’ve witnessed the growth of new entertainment platforms, the merging of entertainment and technology, and the enormous expansion in the importance of countries from around the world in a space once dominated by America.

Do you have a favourite MIPTV anecdote?

At my first MIPTV in 1986, I decided to take clients to dinner to express my appreciation. A restaurant called Tetou in Golfe-Juan was highly recommended, so I made a reservation for eight people. Wonderful service and wonderful food — and then the check came. I looked at the bill and my only thought was, I could have made a down-payment on a new car...

But we’d had a terrific time so I whipped out my trusty credit card and handed it to the waiter. His facial expression told the story — they didn’t accept credit cards. Oh no!

There I was with virtually no cash in my pocket. I had visions of washing dishes for a month.

Fortunately, my clients were also my friends, so we pooled our money and when I got back to LA, I wrote them all cheques.

What are your plans for this MIPTV? Business or pleasure?

Business. We represent many clients that attend MIPTV on a regular basis.

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ERMANY’s ZDF is marking a wealth of achievements at this market. Like MIPTV, the public broadcaster is 50 this year. Its distribution arm, ZDF Enterprises (ZDFE), is celebrating its 20th anniversary, and ZDFE president and CEO, Alexander Coridass, has reached his own landmark of 30 years in television this year.

“At MIPTV, we close deals — both buying and selling — in the three-digit million euro range,” said Coridass, who is using MIPTV to debut ZDFE’s new genre-based company structure, which has seen it remodelled into four divisions: ZDFE.junior, ZDFE.drama, ZDFE.factual and ZDFE.entertainment.

“For us rights-dealers, MIPTV and MIPCOM are the most important international showcases for our main activities of programme acquisition, sales, co-production and merchandising,” he said.

Reflecting on this market’s focus on premium content, including high-end dramas with built-in marketing potential, Coridass said: “Premium content has always been a big theme, but in the past people simply called it programming! Jokes aside, ZDFE has always been known for its top-quality programmes in all genres.”

Drama, in particular, has long been a ZDFE forte. “It began with our global marketing of ZDF thrillers, before we discovered Scandinavian crime shows for the German, European and worldwide markets,” Coridass said. “Wherever there are new trends, you can be sure that we’re not far away. For example, we’re distributing the hacker series Cybergeddon by CSI creator Anthony E Zuiker.”

Looking to the future, Coridass said: “In 10 years, we will still be watching TV exactly as we are today, yet

ZDFE’s Alexander Coridass: “premium content has always been a big theme”

very differently. ‘Exactly as today’ because such a deeply ingrained custom will not be changing fast and because we will still want to be where the action is for important news coverage, big shows and sports events. And ‘very differently’ because TV-on-demand will by then be a common component of television. We will have lots more choices of programmes, which is why fewer and fewer people will be watching the same thing at the same time. They’ll be using a variety of devices too. So our consumer habits will change, but one thing will remain the same: we will need professionals to produce and sell moving images that capture our attention.”

THANDIE NEWTON MARTON CSOKAS

Visit eOne at RIVIERA BEACH RB.43 Watch the trailer at eOnetv.com tvinfo@entonegroup.com

Drama / Suspense Series 10 x 60 minutes

miptv

neWs

Visiware celebrates success of its second-screen social TV program

S Andrew Eborn (left), president of Octopus TV, and RTRW’s Anthony Gould celebrate the MIPTV pact

OCTOPUS DIVES INTO RUSSIAN ARCHIVE IN AN early MIPTV deal, Russia TeleRadio Worldwide (RTRW) and the UK’s Octopus TV have announced a strategic alliance that will see Octopus’ award-winning cloud-based digital content management and delivery platform enable RTRW to present and distribute content from one of the most precious and concealed archives in the world, the Russian State Archive.

Octopus and RTRW aim to unite their assets and create a Russian Hub, which will become the main source for searching anything Soviet/Russian in origin.

The two companies believe that the new alliance offers a “new and unique opportunity” to capitalise on the growing demand for high-quality content being made easily available to all broadcasters, programme makers and others around the world.

The platform will initially feature unique items such as lost ballet performances of the Bolshoi Theatre as well as classical concerts and operas, and will then expand the diversity of content available.

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IX months after winning the Best Multiscreen Experience Award at MIPCOM 2012, Visiware is at MIPTV 2013 celebrating the broadcast of the 1,000th TV show featuring its second screen technology.

Visiware’s white label second screen system for channels, producers, operators and advertisers, allows clients to rapidly deploy immersive interactive experiences for their shows or spots, either through the web, iPhones, iPads or Android smartphones and tablets.

Initially used to create synchronised interactivity for international game-show formats for its clients Endemol and Sony Pictures Television, Visiware’s technology has also been used on both sports and talent shows.

“Thanks to our clients and the expertise gained through the first 1,000 shows, we can offer a very rich and robust platform that supports all the interactivity

from a single show, up to a complete network or operator second screen strategy,” Visiware executive chairman Laurant Weill said.

This week, Visiware has unveiled a B2B line-up covering almost all genres from talent shows to news shows, and from sports to music.

Visiware’s system also offers advertisers the opportunity to reach consumers with rich, interactive brand experiences during the airing of TV spots.

“The second screen is a fastgrowing trend that no-one in the media industry can afford to ignore. Our ambition is to help channels, producers and advertisers create additional value around their programmes with a powerful, innovative and reliable set of tools,” said Weill.

“Reliability and creativity have always been part of Visiware’s DNA and we believe that our robust and flexible platform, along with our deep understanding of the user experience, is a key success factor.”

The Visiware technology in action

Korean TV channel buys in to gadgets

The Gadget Show’s Jason Bradbury: heading to Korea

MAGAZINE entertainment series The Gadget Show — which created a splash at MIPCOM 2012 when the market was asked to register its first talking robot as an official attendee — was picked up by Korea on the eve of MIPTV. Through a deal with All3Media International’s Stephen Driscoll, the show has been picked up by

Korea’s Channel IT, part of Korea HD Broadcasting Corp.

The Gadget Show, produced by North One Television, is one of Channel 5’s most successful TV shows and last year, presenters Jason Bradbury and Pollyanna Woodward were in attendance at MIPCOM to promote the show to international buyers.

The show has always had a big online and digital presence and its latest technology is currently being showcased at Gadget Show Live, which takes place in the UK this week. Based around the TV show, the live event brings the TV programme to life and features the most cutting edge technology including the latest tablet PCs and hybrid laptops. It is often noted that many of the items featured started life in Korea.

Korea HD Broadcasting has also picked up two more series from All3Media International on a similar gadget theme, both also produced by North One. They are Stephen Fry’s 100 Greatest Gadgets and six-part series Stephen Fry: Gadget Man, in which Fry shows how the humdrum of our daily lives can be spiced up with an injection of awe-inspiring gadgetry.

Korea HD Broadcasting Corporation’s CEO, Sung-Gil Moon, said: “We are thrilled to launch All3Media International’s new gadget series on Channel IT, the only IT-speciality channel in the world. We’re also glad to establish new partnerships with All3Media International, and looking forward to licensing quality programmes continuously.”

Visit eOne at RIVIERA BEACH RB.43 Watch the trailer at eOnetv.com tvinfo@entonegroup.com

Entertainment Reality/Format (2013) 10 x 60 minutes 8 x 60 minutes - US version

miptv

neWs ABC deal spells success for Cinedigm’s big push

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INEDIGM has acquired the digital and VOD rights for the US, Canada and Latin America to over 1,000 television episodes from the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) library. The deal, for both existing episodes and future inventory, includes all genres spanning contemporary and classic programmes, and represents a major push into the international marketplace for Cinedigm. “We import great programming from around the world for the US market, and we export US programming abroad too,” Cinedigm’s vice-president acquisitions, Mark Kashden, said. “So MIPTV is a very important part of our strategy, because there is so much great TV out there

looking for a home, and a big demand for unusual shows.”

The ABC deal includes such brand name titles as Correlli (starring Hugh Jackman); the classic An Audience With Dame Edna series; Outland, the outrageous 2012 series about a gay science fiction fan club; Double The Fist, the acclaimed Australian slapstick comedy and At Home With Julia, the romantic comedy/political satire about Australia’s first female Prime Minister.

“ABC Commercial is delighted to be working with a company with the experience and market reach of Cinedigm and we look forward to audiences in the US, Canada and Latin America having access to our award-winning, quality ABC productions,” Robert Patterson, director of ABC Commercial, said.

Buyers flock to snap up Matt MATT HATTER Chronicles, the cuttingedge animated boy’s adventure series from Platinum Films, launched at MIPTV two years ago, has since become an internaMatt Hatter Chronicles (Platinum Films)

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tional success, having been snapped up by ITV/CiTV and Nickelodeon UK, Canada’s Teletoon, Nickelodeon ANZ, Network Ten Australia, TVNZ New Zealand, RTE in Eire, SABC South Africa, and JCC Middle East Region. In addition, Spanish public broadcaster RTVE has scheduled the series as a flagship show for its Clan TVE channel while Canal Panda has finalised a dual territory pay-TV deal for both Spain and Portugal.

Matt Hatter Chronicles is produced by Platinum and Toronto-based studio Dream Mill Inc. and animated by Canada-based studio Arc Productions. More TV deals are being finalised at MIPTV, further strengthening the show’s global presence.

Platinum Films CEO Nigel Stone said: “International business for Matt Hatter has gone crazy and we’re now in the fortunate position of broadcasters approaching us about the show. They’re loo-

Cinedigm’s vice-president acquisitions, Mark Kashden

king for high-quality series with a distinctive hook and the added bonus of innovative digital content for their flagship programming, and Matt Hatter definitely falls into that category.”

Stone added: “Matt Hatter offers young fans a revolutionary TV viewing experience called Multivision (3D without the need for glasses) and it’s this USP that is inspiring broadcast and commercial partners to come on board. It combines great storytelling with brilliant visual effects.”

On the licensing front, the Matt Hatter brand is being spearheaded by ITV Studios Global Entertainment. A dedicated consumer products programme, online activities, and retail promotions launch later this year with the international licensing and merchandising roll-out scheduled for 2014 under the management of licensing giants Exim in LatAm, Biplano in Iberia, and Revolution in South Africa.

Stone, and Platinum’s head of international programming Natalie Llewellyn, are at MIPTV to further Matt Hatter’s international endeavours.

“MIP has always resulted in great business for us,” Stone said. “Our BAFTA nominated pre-school series Dream Street and kids adventure cooking format Planet Cook both started their respective roads to international success at the MIP markets, and Matt Hatter Chronicles is more than emulating that success.”

Visit eOne at RIVIERA BEACH RB.43 Watch the trailer at eOnetv.com tvinfo@entonegroup.com

Comedy Series (2013) 13 x 30 minutes

miptv

neWs FRESH IDEAS FROM FILM COMMISSION THE ITALIAN Riviera Alpi Del Mare Film Commission is holding daily Producers’ Hub sessions at MIPTV, the latest innovation by an organisation that makes a habit of breaking new ground.

“We always try to do things differently,” film commissioner Alessandra Bergero, said. “Alongside tracking new trends in the audiovisual market by coming to MIPTV and MIPCOM, we also create tools that adapt what a film commission does for the new media industry.”

Constant updating of potentially useful events in the Italian Riviera region is one such tool.

“We offer comprehensive information on anything happening that could be interesting for documentaries, or TV shows and news reports,” Bergero said. “We have also prepared a library of topics concerning this area, across all categories, including nature, lifestyle, fashion, travel, ghosts and legends, as well as local history. And we are presenting a new book of images at MIPTV, which contains all of this research alongside great locations, stories, local people and products, food, wine, etc. Putting it together we drew on our many years of experience of coming to MIPTV to make it as useful as possible to the TV industry. A digital version will be online soon, but we liked the idea of a really elegant book as a keepsake and a souvenir of MIPTV’s 50 th edition.“

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Brights seeks out new kids for Mega Channel’s block

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R EEK dist r ibution and licensing company Brights is working with local broadcaster Mega Channel to source free-toair animated content for a new kids content block which will premiere in the third quarter of this year, broadcasting animation series for pre-schoolers, kids and tweens at weekends. Brights will manage the merchandising and licensing rights to all the featured series, including Platinum Films’ adventure comedy Matt Hatter Chronicles, action-comedy hit Slugterra from Nerd Corps for Disney XD, and Moonscoop’s Code Lyoko. “We have most of the licenses in place for the first year of the block, but I’ll be at MIPTV looking for series for the second year,” Brights president Clemente Pinedo said.

Last year Brights was appointed as the licensing representative for Warner Bros. Consumer Products in Greece and Cyprus, licensing

Code Lyoko (Moonscoop)

the complete animation and live action catalogue including titles like Looney Tunes and Scooby Doo, plus new films such as The Hobbit and the upcoming Superman feature Man Of Steel.

Brights has recently reached an agreement with Spanish company SelectaVision to represent an array of teen and tween novela titles for Greece and Cyprus, including Suena Conmigo, Carros-

sel and Miss XV. The company is also expanding to other countries in the region.

In Greece, Brights manages Elastic Rights’ properties, and is also moving into Romania and Bulgaria, having recently reached an agreement with Moonscoop to represent the series Chloe’s Closet and Code Lyoko plus Code Lyoko Evolution in those territories.

Rabbit deal set to breed success SILVERGATE Media has concluded a deal with France Televisions for the television, home entertainment, licensing and merchandising rights to its new animated series Peter Rabbit, which has already debuted on

Nickelodeon US and will shortly air on CBeebies in the UK. Silvergate Media has also appointed Paris-based France Televisions Distribution (FTD) as international sales representative for Peter Rabbit and hit pre-school

Peter Rabbit (Silvergate Media)

show Octonauts, both produced

by Brown Bag Films in Ireland.

“Our commercial team is looking forward to sharing these two series with our worldwide partners,” Geraint Marsh, executive vice-president, television and consumer products at France Televisions said. Mary Durkan, CEO at Silvergate Media, added: “Both Peter Rabbit and Octonauts have captured the imagination of audiences internationally and we are delighted that France Televisions Distribution will now be working with us to bring on board more broadcasters. They have a fantastic track record in taking shows globally so we look forward to expanding the reach of both these properties.”

miptv

neWs GREAT BAKE OFF: A FORMAT ON A ROLL THE GREAT Bake Off is on its way to Italy, following a deal between Discovery Italy and BBC Worldwide.

The Love Productions format, which sees amateurs compete for the title of the nation’s best home baker, has now been licensed to France, Australia, Poland, Belgium, Ireland, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, the Netherlands, Finland and Ukraine. CBS is also set to make a US version of the BAFTA-winning show, featuring Paul Hollywood as one of the judges.

Meanwhile, Sweden, Norway and Poland have come back for a second helping of The Great Bake Off. The first season was the highest rating series ever on Sweden’s TV7/Sjuan.

Success is on the cards for Nelvana’s Mysticons deal

GARBAGE IN 3D FRIMA Studio announced a new co-production agreement with Image-In for Phoenix Park (52 x 7 mins) on the eve of MIPTV. The deal follows its recent agreement to co-produce the Squids series with Moonscoop.

“This latest partnership agreement with Image-In continues the breakneck expansion of our animation capabilities,” Christine Cote, executive producer at Frima Studio, said. “The series is exactly the sort of technically challenging and aesthetically lofty project our team is working to be known for worldwide.”

The series, aimed at seven- to 10-year-olds, follows the comedic adventures of a gang of beach garbage, struggling to reach the recycling centre, Phoenix Park, in the hope of saving themselves from the incinerator. The show will blend 3D animated characters with live-action landscapes.

Phoenix Park (Frima Studio/Image-In)

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Multiplatorm series Mysticons

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ORUS Entertainment’s Nelvana is to develop a new animated boys’ action series in partnership with Michael Eisner’s media investment firm The Tornante Company and Topps, the Tornante-owned sports-card, entertainment and confectionery company.

Aimed at six- to 11-year olds,

Mysticons (26 x 22 mins) will be produced by Nelvana Studio and written by Sean Jara, whose credits include RedaKai, Hot Wheels: Battle Force 5 and The League Of Super Evil.

The multiplatform series centres on four kids who lead heroic double lives as Mysticons — a group of oath-bonded warriors whose mission is to prevent a trio of evil warlords from destroying mankind.

Eisner said: “Nelvana has a strong history of success in building and launching hit boys’ action properties and the partnership with Topps sets the stage for Mysticons to be the next big global boys’ action franchise.”

Doug Murphy, president of Corus Television added: “Leveraging the Topps brand will enable us to build game-play into the DNA of the series.”

SheZow has wow factor for DHX

SheZow (DHX Media)

CANADIAN iindependent producer/ distributor and licensor DHX Media has announced two t deals for SheZow, a new HD kids’ animation a series (26 x 30 mins) available availab at MIPTV. Lagardere A Active TV Channel Division has acq acquired the French rights for the first season of the series for Canal J, th the children’s network for six- to 112-year-olds. Additionthe Italian kids’ ally, Frisbee, F channel operated by Discovchann ery Communications’ Co subsidi-

ary Switchover Media, has bought SheZow in a five-year deal.

The comedy animation follows the adventures of Guy, a young boy who gets hold of a ring that transforms him into a superhero, but only when he is dressed as a girl.

The series, currently in production, is co-produced by Australia-based Moody Street Kids and US-based Kickstart Productions. DHX Media has the global TV, licensing and merchandising rights, outside Australia.

product neWs ELECTUS INTERNATIONAL

HIGHLIGHTS from the unscripted programme slate from New York distributor Electus include: 72 Hours, in which teams are dropped from a helicopter into the wilderness to find hidden money; America Unearthed, which looks at ancient symbols, religious relics, and unexplained artifacts; Bet On Your Baby, a game show where parents predict their child’s next move; Car Lot Rescue, in which an auto industry expert advises ailing dealerships; and bounty hunter show Dog & Beth: On The Hunt .

OPTOMEN INTERNATIONAL DISTRIBUTION

THE UK’s Optomen is prioritising two titles at MIPTV. In Gordon Ramsay’s Ultimate Home Cooking: Breakfast, Lunch & Dinner (20 x 30 mins) the wellknown chef concentrates on family food, as he cooks with his children and eats with his family. In Brendan’s Love Cruise (20 x 30 mins) travel expert Brendan Sheerin invites 70 single men and women to find romance on board a luxurious cruise ship sailing the Mediterranean. In each episode, one man and one woman choose three potential shipmates.

If their date is a success they’ll continue the romance on board; if there’s no spark, their date is left behind at the next port.

TRICON FILMS & TELEVISION

MARON (10 x 30 mins) is a new comedy series based on comedian and podcaster Marc Maron’s struggle to maintain relationships other than with his trio of cats. Marc stars as himself, and joining him is Judd Hirsch as his father, Nora Zehetner as his girlfriend, Andy Kindler as his friend and Josh Brener as his assistant. Also launching is the food series Donut Showdown (14 x 30 mins) a competition pitching three pastry chefs per episode in competition for a $10,000 (€7,750) prize.

Ultimate Home Cooking: Breakfast, Lunch & Dinner (Optomen International Distribution)

NHK

Marc Maron, star of Maron (Tricon Films & Television)

ZEE ENTERTAINMENT ENTERPRISES

INDIA’s biggest dance talent show, Dance India Dance (35 x 65 mins/HD), is brought to MIPTV by Zee Entertainment Enterprises.

Upcoming talented dancers compete alongside undiscovered professionals, and are guided by three well-known Bollywood choreographers.

In drama series Punar Vivah (275 x 22 mins/ HD) a couple who have remarried embark on an emotional journey with their family.

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NEW FROM Japan’s public broadcaster comes drama series Yae’s Sakura (50 x 45 mins/first episode 74 mins), about 10th century tomboy Yae who fights in a civil war, champions education for women, and then becomes a nurse in the war with Russia. In Secrets Of The British Museum (3 x 52 mins) NHK was granted access to the vast collection of relics from ancient civilizations unavailable to the public.

The Kamaishi Miracle (1 x 49 mins) tells the extraordinary tale of 184 children from a school, who looked after each other when the devastating tsunami struck, and BrainFlash! is a new game show.

Yae’s Sakura (NHK)

Peg + Cat (9 Story Entertainment)

9 STORY ENTERTAINMENT

TORONTO-based 9 Story Entertainment’s MIPTV slate includes: new animated series: Peg + Cat (80 x 11 mins), a pre-school series about Peg and her Cat, and their adventures while learning the magic of numbers; and Nerds And Monsters (40 x 11 mins) which follows a group of nerdy kids on a fantastic island with a tribe of dim-witted monsters. Cache Craze (10 x 60 mins) is a new competition, part treasure hunt, part comedic adventure challenge.

The company also brings new episodes of animations Camp Lakebottom (26 x 22 mins/52 x 11 mins), Daniel Tiger’s Neighborhood (40 x 22/80 x 11 mins) and Arthur (20 x 22 mins/40 x 11 mins).

product neWs TV ASAHI

JAPAN’s TV Asahi, which celebrates its 55th anniversary this year, brings a range of programming to MIPTV, including: season 11 of detective series Aibou, set in Tokyo; new drama The Mother Strikes Back, about 50-year-old Asako, who begins to have suspicions about her daughter-inlaw; Doctor-X (2 x 69 mins and 6 x 54 mins), about a genius freelance female surgeon who takes on the hospital director; and mini-series The Farthest Galaxy, about a retired detective who reopens a case that has haunted him.

SONUMA

SONUMA offers thousands of hours of programming and footage from public broadcaster for French-speaking Belgium, RTBF. Footage includes Russian tanks in Prague in 1968, the last interview with Salvador Allende in 1973, and the fall of Saigon, as well as entertainment with concerts from Louis Armstrong, Ella Fitzgerald, Ray Charles, Black Sabbath, U2, Genesis, and interviews with movie stars including Romy Schneider and Alain Delon.

Sonuma’s catalogue also includes RTBF’s daily programming, covering news, current affairs, nature and lifestyle.

ZODIAK KIDS

Aibou (TV Asahi)

ABC COMMERCIAL

A FEATURE-length documentary from BAFTA award-winning director Alex Holmes tops the MIPTV slate from Australia’s ABC Commercial. King Of Cheats tells the unauthorised story of cyclist Lance Armstrong, how he worked to fulfil his ambition, and how this was unmasked as the greatest sporting fraud of all time. New revelations and new witnesses feature in this documentary, which examines the human cost of Armstrong’s ambition — friendships broken, careers destroyed, ordinary people vilified and hounded by lawyers and by Armstrong himself.

King Of Cheats (ABC Commercial)

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ZODIAK Kids, in partnership with France Televisions and Disney Channel (France), is launching Lolirock (52 x 26 mins), which follows a teenage girl with a beautiful voice who joins girl band Lolirock — changing her life forever, and pushing her into a world of music, mystery and magical powers. They discover their destiny as magical princesses and battle for justice. Five Lolirock videos are to be launched on social media and YouTube before the debut of the TV show and local Lolirock bands will be formed in key markets.

Zodiak also brings: live-action show featuring record-breakers Officially Amazing (13 x 30 mins), and animation Totally Spies! Season 6 (26 x 26 mins).

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FREMANTLEMEDIA INTERNATIONAL

MULTIPLATFORM comedy Fetching tells the story of Liza (Collette Wolfe), who ditches her lucrative law career to pursue her dream of owning a doggieday care centre. Attracted to dog walker Matt, she worries about a relationship even though her dog loves him. Hollywood Help follows Max, a struggling actor who lands the position of personal assistant to two actresses and close friends. These are the first two titles to come out of the original programming partnership between international distributor FremantleMedia International and US multiplatform studio Vuguru. The shows are adaptable for linear and non-linear platforms and are available in a variety of time lengths from fiveminute chapters, to half-hour episodes, to a 1 x 90-minute TV movie. FremantleMedia International also launches a re-imagining of classic drama Prisoner Cell Block H, Wentworth (10 x 60 mins).

Fetching (FremantleMedia International)

MEDIATOON DISTRIBUTION

THIS year Mediatoon is launching the third season of Yakari (26 x 13 mins). The story of a young Sioux native American who can communicate with animals, has been pre-acquired by France Televisions for France 5 and ARD-Degeto for KiKA. Now comprising 104 episodes, the series has already sold in over 30 territories.

The company also brings new episodes of Quiz Time (104 x 4 mins), commissioned by Disney EMEA, including 26 episodes dedicated to deaf and hard of hearing children.

Lolirock (Zodiak Kids)

Yakari (Mediatoon)

Director Eli Roth and creators Brian McGreevy & Lee Shipman redefine our favorite gothic legends.

Director Nicolas Winding Refn and writers Neal Purvis & Robert Wade transport you to a world never before seen on TV. Setting The Universe On Fire.

Mads Mikkelsen, Hugh Dancy and Laurence Fishburne star in Bryan Fuller’s reinvention of the iconic villain.

Canal+

Feed Your Fear.

NBC and Sony AXN

The Monster Is Within.

Netflix

See us at MIP-TV in Booth #LR3.01 Attend our Hemlock Grove Panel on Tuesday, April 9 at 3:00pm in the Palais, Auditorium A with Eli Roth, Famke Janssen and Bill Skarsgård. sales@gaumontinternationaltv.com

product neWs

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BALUBA

BALUBA’s new family entertainment format, Little People, Big Questions (2 x 75 mins), sees kids tackling problems that defeat grown-ups, including the real reasons for the global financial crisis, and why the prime minister can’t find himself a new girlfriend. An adult host leads the panel of kids, who share humorous but often perceptive views on health, economics, leisure and relationships. The show from the Swedish company also includes sketches and letters from viewers asking them for advice.

Little People, Big Questions (Baluba)

BOPAUL MEDIA WORLDWIDE (BMW)

BMW BRINGS a varied slate to MIPTV, including: drama Scream Of Stone (1 x 105 mins), directed by Werner Herzog, which is the story of two fiercely competitive climbers in Patagonia; documentary Ray Harryhausen: Special Effects Titan (1 x 90 mins), about the influential special-effects auteur, famous for stop-motion animation in The 7th Voyage Of Sinbad and Jason And The Argonauts; Une Femme Fidele (1 x 89 mins), a tragic period drama; Blood And Sand (1 x 113 mins); and thriller House Of Bad (1 x 95 mins).

ATLANTYCA ENTERTAINMENT/MOONSCOOP

PRODUCTION and distribution partners Atlantyca Entertainment and Moonscoop, with the participation of Rai Fiction, France Television and M6, have joined forces to produce season three of animated children’s series Geronimo Stilton, bringing the total number of episodes to 78 x 23 mins. The series is scheduled to be completed by the third quarter of 2014. The first two series are showing in over 100 territories, and books, games and even stage shows support the brand.

Geronimo Stilton (Atlantyca Entertainment/Moonscoop)

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FIRST HAND FILMS

FILMMAKER Jean-Philippe Tremblay takes a journey through the darker corridors of the American media landscape in documentary Shadows Of Liberty — The Media Monopoly In American Journalism (1 x 53/93 mins). Journalists, activists and academics give insider accounts of censorship, cover-ups and corporate control. The programme features Danny Glover, Julian Assange, Dan Rather and Roberta Baskin among others, and is brought to MIPTV by Switzerland’s First Hand Films.

Julian Assange in Shadows Of Liberty — The Media Monopoly In American Journalism (First Hand Films)

ONLY LIFESTYLE

ogramming Great Pr Programming ogramm ogram Great Distribution Grre r reat Distribut Asia a is i Our Strength Stren

ONLY Lifestyle brings 200 new hours of design, cooking, environment and science programmes to MIPTV. Priorities for the Paris-based company include: Serial Testers (On N’est Pas Que Des Cobayes/50 x 52 mins), where a group of presenters do experiments to confirm or debunk popular beliefs; A Chef On The Road (Le Chef En France/10 x 52 mins), a culinary road trip around France; Weddings, The French Touch (Mariages!/8 x 52 mins), that follows four different marriages in Paris; From Big Apple To Green Apple (1 x 52 mins), a look at attempts to reduce pollution by 30% in New York; The Club 55, A Legend (Le Club 55 Une Legende/1 x 52 mins), a documentary about the famous bar in St Tropez; and interiors series La Maison (135 x 40 mins).

ARES FILMS

PARIS-based producer/distributor Ares Films brings fantasy adventure animation GGO Football (52 x 22 mins) to MIPTV. The HD series features football players who are artificial intelligence robots manipulated by their young human controllers. A second season of 52 x 22 minute-episodes is set for delivery later this year, well-timed ahead of the 2014 World Cup.

info@lightninginternational.net info@lightninginternational.net +852 2851 7481 www .lightninginternational.net www.lightninginternational.net

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Come and meet us Stand: 15.30

GGO Football (Ares Films)

product neWs GONG MEDIA AROMATV

UNIT 9 tells the story of a housewife in her late forties who is convicted of attempted murder and imprisoned. She learns to survive in this hostile environment, as well as supporting other women and helping them take back their lives.

Munich-based AromaTV brings the show to the international market after a successful run on Canadian pubcaster Radio Canada. A second season is in production.

AB INTERNATIONAL DISTRIBUTION

SPIRAL (40 x 52 mins), which airs on France’s Canal+ and BBC Four in the UK, is a series focused on the inner workings and characters in the Parisian justice system and its day-to-day dealings with murders, abuse, organised crime and terrorism.

A MIPTV highlight from the French distributor’s children’s catalogue is Cheeky Missy (78 x 5 mins/102 x 1 min), about a naughty girl and her imaginary friend, a green sheep.

Spiral (AB International Distribution)

ITV STUDIOS GLOBAL ENTERTAINMENT (ITVS GE)

ITVS GE launches two new factual series from UK indie The Garden at MIPTV, both available as finished shows and formats. Keeping Britain Alive (8 x 60 mins) is a medical observational documentary that follows 24 hours in the life of the world’s biggest free health care system — the UK’s NHS. In it, over one hundred camera crews cover hospitals, doctor’s surgeries, ambulances and helicopters in Britain.

Baby Makers: The Fertility Clinic (1 x 40 mins) uses exclusive access to one of the largest IVF clinics in Britain, to follow the stories of patients.

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DRG

THE CELEBRITY Tuk-Tuk Challenge, a new format from Nice Group’s Gong Media, sees a race over nine days and 1,400 kilometres of rough terrain, with 20 teams from around the world — including three teams of celebrity couples — in a Sri Lankan tuktuk, a three-wheeled auto-rickshaw with a maximum speed of 60 km an hour.

The Danish company also brings new factual entertainment format Comeback Kids (8 x 25 mins), in which a once-bullied celebrity comes to terms with their own past while helping a group of children to break free of their own persecutors. Six young victims of bullying take part in the exercises and fun activities in which the celebrity aims to rebuild the children’s self-esteem with the help of a professional child psychologist. The aim is to prepare the kids to face their bullies.

DRG BRINGS a range of HD factual and entertainment shows to MIPTV, including: drama Underbelly - Squizzy (8 x 60 mins), which spans the adventures of master criminal Squizzy from 1915 to 1927; Heston’s Fantastical Food (7 x 60 mins), in which chef Heston Blumenthal creates supersized versions of meals and treats, inspired by nostalgia for childhood food; Choccywoccydoodah: Starstruck (10 x 60 mins), features celebrities challenging chocolatiers in the UK and the US with bespoke cake designs; and The Work Experience (6 x 30 mins), a set-up series that follows two interns who begin a week of work at a new fashion PR agency, unaware that the agency is fictional and the employees who try to drive them crazy with demands are actors. At the end of each episode all is revealed and they are rewarded by a full month’s paid placement at a real fashion PR agency.

The Celebrity Tuk-Tuk Challenge (Gong Media)

Underbelly - Squizzy (DRG)

STUDIO 100

MUNICH-based children’s production and distribution company Studio 100 is launching new CGI/3D animation series Super Mega Hyper Pets (52 x 12 mins) at MIPTV. Targeted at preschoolers, the series is produced by Studio 100 Animation in association with Flying Bark Productions. The series features eight-year-old Timmy who teams up with an intergalactic gang of alien pets — Super Zee the dog, Hyper Harrier the Rabbit and a cat called Megakat Thunderpaw.

Super Mega Hyper Pets (Studio 100)

product neWs A+E NETWORKS

EDEBE AUDIOVISUAL LICENSING

A+E brings its catalogue of Lifetime Original Movies to MIPTV. Highlights include Ring Of Fire which features four-time Grammy Award-nominee, Jewel, as country artist June Carter Cash in the story of her life from its beginnings in rural Virginia to her enduring marriage to Johnny Cash. Another movie tells the story of two extraordinary women, Coretta Scott King (Angela Bassett), wife of Martin Luther King Jr, and Dr Betty Shabazz (Mary J Blige), wife of Malcolm X. When their husbands were assassinated, they not only inherited the mantle of the civil rights movement, they were also single mothers. Betty & Coretta was produced by Universal Music Group for Lifetime.

DCD RIGHTS

LONDON-based distributor DCD Rights brings new drama series Mr & Mrs Murder (13 x 60 mins) to MIPTV. Starring Shaun Micallef and Kat Stewart as Charlie and Nicola Buchanan, crime scene cleaners whose quirky talents solve the most baffling murder mysteries. Having Charlie and Nicola clean murder scenes suits Detective Peter Vinetti (Jonny Pasvolsky), who turns a blind eye to their methods, just as long as they supply a watertight chain of evidence and he can take the credit. The series is produced by FremantleMedia, Australia in association with Bravado Productions.

Cocorico (Edebe Audiovisual Licensing)

Mr & Mrs Murder (DCD Rights)

Ring Of Fire (A+E Networks)

COCORICO (26 x 13 mins) is a new animation series brought to MIPTV by Spain’s Edebe. The stopmotion series, from studio OQO Filmes, is targeted at 3- to 9-year-olds and is based on a book telling this traditional story from Myanmar. Cocorico is a mischievous little chicken who discovers the strength of friendship and the danger of enemies.

Edebe also brings Four And A Half Friends (26 x 26 mins) and Jonas, The Imaginary Adventures (104 x 5 mins)..

BETA FILM

SCORPION TV

LONDON’s Scorpion TV brings a raft of documentaries to MIPTV. Wolves Unleashed (1 x 90 mins) follows worldrenowned animal trainer, Andrew Simpson as he travels to one of the coldest places on earth. Together with his Canadian crew and his pack of wolves, he sets out to witness the bond between man and wolf.

In Erasing Hate (1 x 90 mins) Bryon Widner undergoes the painful removal of racist tattoos on his face, neck and hands and struggles to escape from a life of addiction, bigotry and hatred. It’s A Girl (1 x 52/65 mins) looks at the plight of women under threat around the world, and World On A String (1 x 52 mins) looks at the world of competitive yo-yoing.

GERMANY’s Beta Film’s catalogue of mini-series and series includes: new sixhour drama series Hotel Adlon – A Family Saga, about the luxury hotel in Berlin; Generation War (6 x 60 mins), which follows five adolescents whose friendship is changed by the Second World War; family adventure Baron On The Cannonball, featuring the fantastic stories of Baron Munchhausen; and Cedar Cove, starring Andie MacDowell, a heart-warming series about a judge who works hard to bring justice to her hometown.

Hotel Adlon - A Family Saga (Beta Film)

NEPTUNO FILMS

CATALAN producer and distributor Neptuno Films brings Katakune (260 x 2 mins) to MIPTV, from Singaporean producer Character Farm. The 3D series, aimed at children aged 2- to 5-years-old features Katakune the silkworm in stories emphasising mutual respect, friendliness, understanding and forgiveness and curiosity. Neptuno holds worldwide rights excluding China.

Katakune (Neptuno Films)

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product neWs History Hunters (Beyond International)

BEYOND INTERNATIONAL

MIPTV launches from the Beyond kids’ slate include: History Hunters (26 x 30 mins), looking at weird and fascinating aspects of history; Junior Vets (10 x 30 mins), in which six kids battle it out to succeed as the first junior vets to enrol at a high-tech Vet School; Totally TECHNICOLOR DIGITAL PRODUCTIONS

TECHNICOLOR, with its partners Canada’s Mercury Filmworks and Teletoon Canada, brings Atomic Puppet (52 x 11 mins) to the international market. The group is currently in development on the 2D animated comedy series targeting 6- to 11-year-olds. In Atomic Puppet, when Model City’s fearless superhero is transformed into a powerless puppet by his disgruntled sidekick, the hero’s powers are accidentally transferred to his biggest fan 12-year-old Joey Felt.

miptv

NORDIC WORLD

NORDIC World highlights three series at MIPTV. In Speedomania (5 x 30 mins), from Denmark’s Freeport Media, five young ‘speedomanics’ are put through five intensive days of road tests focusing on the five main causes of fatal car crashes. SVT Production’s new social-change format Bye Bye Bullying (8 x 50 mins) sets out to identify and reprogramme the patterns that cause conflicts and bullying among kids. With the help of an expert advisor, the host — a well-known Danish actor, in the original DR1 series — shows the class that bullying is not about mean children, but dysfunctional classroom communities. Danish improv comedy Hotel Zimmerfrei (7 x 30 mins) is a youth-oriented series, which mixes physical and verbal comedy with improvisation and a surreal sitcom storyline.

Rubbish (10 x 30 mins), an art show where presenters Michelle and Nigel turn worthless trash into creative and useful artifacts; and Get Squiggling Letters (26 x 7 mins), featuring Squiglet who shows the viewers how to have fun learning by squiggling letters.

CCI ENTERTAINMENT

TORONTO-based CCI brings 26 new episodes of Candice Tells All. After selling over 200 hours of seasons I and II, the new series from interior designer Candice Olson looks at her suppliers, furnishings and inspired renovations. Another show featuring Olson, Divine Design, is also available. CCI Entertainment and Really Real Films have also produced family holiday movie, Anything But Christmas, starring Christopher Lloyd and Elaine Hendrix. Grace, the single-mother of nine-year old Zachary has finally found love but as the holiday season approaches she realises that he doesn’t like Christmas. Can the holiday season melt his cynical heart?

Speedomania (Nordic World)

TEMPLE STREET PRODUCTIONS

ORPHAN Black is a new 10-episode drama, brought to MIPTV by Toronto-based Temple Street Productions, starring Tatiana Maslany as Sarah, an outsider and orphan whose life changes dramatically after witnessing the suicide of a woman who looks just like her. Sarah assumes the dead woman’s identity, her boyfriend, and her bank account. But instead of solving all her problems, she is caught in the middle of a deadly conspiracy, racing to find answers.

Atomic Puppet (Technicolor Digital Productions)

CINTV

SPAIN’s CinTV has joined forces with TVE on a new natural history project, and other partners are pending. The Tale Of The Magpie (1 x 52 mins/working title) is the story of the azure magpie, a bird only found in China and the Iberian Peninsula. It was commonly believed in Spain that it was an introduced species, but a discovery in a Gibraltar cave has posed new theories and DNA analysis reveals a deeper mystery.

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Candice Tells All (CCI Entertainment)

Orphan Black (Temple Street Productions)

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product neWs AK ENTERTAINMENT

STEEL Route (3 x 50 mins), is an HD series about the rise and fall of nations with an industry and consumption of steel, across 3,500 years of history.

The Korean company also brings Salt War (2 x 55 mins), a new two-part HD documentary about the importance of this mineral around the world for medicine, health and trade. At a time when we know how bad consuming too much salt can be for our health, the industry is diversifying.

COMAREX

TIMELESS Love (Vivir A Destiempo) is a new telenovela brought to MIPTV by Mexico’s Comarex, the sales agent of network Azteca. Starring Edith Gonzalez, Humberto Zurita and Ramiro Fumazoni, the 120 x 60-minute series is immersed in passion, intrigue and conflict, as old lovers meet again after many years. The telenovela is produced by Azteca and Fides Velasco. Comarex also brings Ultimo Ano (Senior Year), on behalf of MTV Networks, a 70 x 60-minute thriller set in a high school. The story follows a friendship between Benjamin and new-boy Martin that becomes embroiled in jealousy and rivalry.

miptv

DW TRANSTEL

A WINDOW On... (13 x 30 mins) takes a look at some of the most beautiful and fascinating cities in the world, as seen through the eyes of people fortunate enough to live in them. The series, available in Arabic, English and Spanish, looks at the cultural and leisure activities, restaurants and places to shop and browse, as well as a place to live and work. The show is brought to MIPTV by DW Transtel, part of German broadcaster Deutsche Welle.

A Window On... (DW Transtel)

Steel Route (AK Entertainment)

TELEMUNDO

FLORIDA-based Telemundo’s MIPTV highlights include telenovelas La Patrona (120 x 60 mins), Pasion Prohibida (120 x 60 mins), and El Senor de los Cielos (65 x 60 mins); comedy drama Separados (100 x 60 mins); Historias De La Virgen Morena (120 x 60 mins), featuring real-life stories of people who have turned to Our Lady of Guadalupe for aid; wordgame format Letris, which is also available as tablet and mobile applications; and daily music show format Minuto De Gloria.

Timeless Love (Comarex)

YOMIURI TELECASTING CORPORATION (YTV)

TOKYO’s YTV brings anime series Gargantia On The Verdurous Planet (13 x 30 mins) to MIPTV. Available with English subtitles, the story is set in the far future where the Galactic Alliance of Humankind is fighting a war for survival against a bizarre race known as the Hideauze.

After being caught in a rift in time a young soldier wakes to find himself on Earth, which is now almost entirely covered in water. A huge fleet of ships, called Gargantia, holds thousands of people who make their living by salvaging relics from ancient civilisations.

TWENTIETH CENTURY FOX TV DISTRIBUTION

BASED on Melissa de La Cruz’s best-selling novel, Witches Of East End follows Joanna Beauchamp (Julia Ormond) and her two adult daughters, Freya (Jenna Dewan-Tatum) and Ingrid (Rachel Boston), who are unknowingly their family’s next generation of witches. When one of the daughters becomes engaged to a wealthy newcomer, a series of events forces her mother to admit to her daughters that they are immortal witches. The series is produced

by Fox 21 and 3 Arts Entertainment. Ensemble drama Graceland tells the story of FBI, DEA and US Customs agents who are obligated to live together undercover in a beach house in Southern California.

The roommates work to solve cases for their respective agencies while also trying to keep the peace in their own household. This series is produced by Fox Television Studios.

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Witches Of East End (Twentieth Century Fox TV Distribution)

Gargantia On The Verdurous Planet (YTV)

Stop by the MEDIA stand to meet European independents WE’RE AT H4.35 IN THE PALAIS DES FESTIVALS

product neWs CAKE

SPACE Racers (50 x 11 mins) is a CGI series aimed at pre-schoolers and set in the Stardust Space Academy where cadet friends make up a space-bound task force known as the Space Racers, brought to MIPTV by London-based Cake. NASA is attached as a technical consultant on aspects of science and technology, and real space sounds and images are used in the programme.

miptv

BREAKTHROUGH ENTERTAINMENT

TORONTO-based Breakthrough’s HD slate includes: Boundless (20 x 60 mins), which follows two friends and competitors in their world-travelling quest to challenge their limits; business show Going Global (11 x 30 mins); Rustic Adventures (8 x 30 mins), a tour of Italy with two young chefs; Shameless Idealists (5 x 30 mins), in which celebrities share how they converted fame into a force for change; food road trip American Food Battle (12 x 30 mins); live-action kids show Zerby Derby (13 x 30 mins); Supervolcano (1 x 60 mins), about the danger hidden under Yellowstone; animation Rocket Monkeys (26 x 30 mins/52 x 11 mins); and youth comedy Less Than Kind (39 x 30 mins).

MARVISTA ENTERTAINMENT

Space Racers (Cake)

GAD DISTRIBUTION

GAD IS at MIPTV seeking international pre-sales for: When Ticks Attack: Lyme Disease, a 52-minute documentary about this spreading disease; and Massage, Age-old Tradition, Worldwide Phenomenon (52 mins), which looks at massage therapy, including a technique that allows self-massage, and baby massage. GAD also brings: The Tales Of Hoffmann by Jacques Offenbach at the Gran Teatre del Liceu in Barcelona (1 x 180 mins); and Bejart Ballet Lausanne (1 x 100 mins).

The Tales Of Hoffmann (GAD Distribution)

PEACE POINT RIGHTS

CANADA’s Peace Point Rights brings a new film catalogue of over 40 titles to MIPTV, as well as documentary and lifestyle shows, including: Belle Du Seigneur (1 x 97 mins/3 x 45 mins), a tragic love story; Mercenaries (6 x 60 mins), narrated by Sean Bean, which profiles soldiers of fortune; feature Iron Sky (1 x 92 mins) feature), about a secret Nazi space programme and moon hideout; Frontier Vets (13 x 30 mins), in which eight vet students try to run an animal clinic in the Kruger National Park; The DNA of GSP (1 x 90 mins/2 x 60 mins), a documentary about UFC’s reigning welterweight champion, Georges St-Pierre; Superbodies Sochi (12 x 2 mins), looking at athletes’ performance levels; and the reality series about a family of more than 25 disadvantaged kids who are looked after at The Bulloch Family Ranch (7 x 60 mins).

The DNA of GSP (Peace Point Rights)

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HIGHLIGHTS from MarVista’s slate of original TV movies include: Stonados, about a series of stonethrowing tornadoes that threaten to destroy Boston, and the scientist who is forced to find a solution and save his family; and family drama Twist Of Fate, starring singer Toni Braxton as Nina, a single mother and the lead singer of a small gospel choir in rural Alabama, who meets a mysterious stranger.

MarVista brings four new thrillers: The Nightmare Nanny, Gone Missing, Assumed Killer and Bad Behavior; and supernatural drama Ghoul.

Stonados (MarVista Entertainment)

FLAME DISTRIBUTION

AUSTRALIA-based distributor Flame is launching a raft of documentaries at MIPTV, including: First Footprints (4 x 60 mins), that tells the story of the original pioneers of humankind, beginning in Australia 50,000 years before modern humans reached America and Europe; The Story Of Australia (6 x 30 mins), that captures the stunning Australian landscape and people of contemporary Australia; Dinosaurs Of The Outback (1 x 60 mins) which uses live action and 3D animation to create reconstructions of the dinosaurs; and Nothing On Earth (1 x 60 mins), which follows artist Murray Fredericks to a melting glacier on the Greenland ice cap under the solar storms of the Aurora Borealis.

product neWs CINEFLIX RIGHTS

UK DISTRIBUTOR Cineflix Rights launches more than 200 hours of new programming at MIPTV, headed up by a documentary produced to mark the 50th anniversary of the death of President John F Kennedy. The Day Kennedy Died (1 x 60 mins/HD) includes rare archive footage alongside neverbefore-seen interviews with those who were at the centre of events. Cineflix also brings: docu-drama Murder In Paradise (6 x 60 mins/HD); Trauma Investigators (4 x 60 mins), following a crime investigation team; reality trucker series Loaded (6 x 30 mins/HD), and Season Two of crime drama Copper (13 x 60 mins/HD).

PBS INTERNATIONAL

PBS INTERNATIONAL has acquired the worldwide television and home video rights for Makers: Women Who Make America (3 x 54 mins), narrated by actress Meryl Streep, which looks at how women have claimed their fair share of political power, economic opportunity and personal autonomy. The Central Park Five (1 x 117 mins) chronicles the famous New York Central Park jogger case, from the perspective of the five teenagers affected by this miscarriage of justice. The US pubcaster also brings Kind Hearted Woman (5 x 60 mins), about a divorced single mother and Oglala Sioux woman. The film follows her struggle to raise her children, further her education, and heal herself from the wounds of sexual abuse, find a worthy man and career, and fulfill her goal of returning to her reservation to help prevent the abuse of women and children.

miptv

HAT TRICK INTERNATIONAL (HTI)

HTI BRINGS comedy drama Nixon’s The One, a fiveepisode series starring Harry Shearer (The Simpsons) and introduced by Sir David Frost, who famously interviewed Nixon about his time in office.

The series is a deadpan comedy based on audio tapes secretly recorded by Nixon in the Oval Office, with Shearer playing President Nixon. The UK company also brings: a new version of improv format Whose Line Is It Anyway? (12 x 30 mins); Room 101, in which three celebrities compete to banish their top peeve to Room 101; new documentary Terry Pratchett: Facing Extinction, portraying the authors battle with Alzheimer’s; and one-hour special Victoria Wood’s Nice Cup Of Tea.

The Day Kennedy Died (Cineflix Rights)

LIONSGATE

PRODUCED by Lionsgate and Rogue State Productions, Family Trade is a new 7 x 30-minute documentary series for the GSN Network. The series looks at how the system of barter is alive and well in New England in the US, specifically a unique car dealership where they trade anything for an automobile. The Stone family runs G-Stone Motors and they will trade a new car or truck for anything that they can sell.

Makers: Women Who Make America (PBS International)

7YACCION

SPANISH company 7yAccion brings hidden camera show Camera Kid to MIPTV. The format, which is aimed at the whole family, focuses on the naivety and spontaneity of young children as they have fun and create mischief.

Nixon’s The One (HTI)

OHM:TV

GERMAN format distribution company ohm:tv brings reality format Celebrity Salon to MIPTV. Created and produced by Dublin-based Straywave Media, in Celebrity Salon (6 x 30 mins) six celebrities enter a beauty boot camp to learn the skills of the trade in a challenge to become beauty professionals in 12 days.

Family Trade (Lionsgate)

NERD CORPS ENTERTAINMENT

SLUGTERRA, brought to MIPTV by Canada’s Nerd Corps Entertainment, is a sci-fi comedy animation series set in an underground world where Eli collects and trains an army of little slugs, who when fired out of a high-powered blaster transform into battle beasts. Eli and his friends challenge rivals and each other to duels and upgrade their cool gear. The brand is supported globally by a toy line, DVDs and a game app.

Celebrity Salon (ohm:tv)

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advertorial

The STEEL BUTTERFLY For five years Total Content has been actively working in the market of TV- and cinema content distribution for all kinds of media platforms.

The company cooperates with the leading international and domestic producers; among its clients are the largest Broadcasters in Russia, CIS and Baltics.

Total Content practices a serious approach in choosing the content for distribution focusing on high quality foreign TV series.

In 2012 good ratings were shown by the Canadian series “The Kennedys” (Muse Entertainment) premiered by Channel One Russia, and the French series “A Series of Little Murders by Agatha Christie” (France Television Distribution), which is in the Top 10 programs on “Domashniy” (“Home”) channel. In 2013 Total Content concentrates on distribution of the “Bomb Girls” female-oriented TV series. At the same time the company went out internationally offering feature films (such as “The Steel Butterfly”, “Short Stories”), TV series, TV programs and formats produced in Russia and CIS. “The Eskimo Girl”- the animated series about the adventures of a charmingly beautiful Inuit girl in the fabulous Arctic, is the most popular of its animated content. Apart from distribution Total Content successfully develops its own TV programs production. In February 2013 the company started the first children’s cooking show “The Little Chef” on “Karusel” (the Merry-Go-Round) channel. For over quite a short period, the show made by the format “Mum, I’m the chef!”, has won the sympathies of both children and their parents.

K Country: Russia Genre: psychological thriller Language: Russian Length: 102 minutes Format: 35 mm, 2D Current status: completed Release in Russia: november, 2012 Director: Renat Davletyarov Writers: Yuri Korotkov,

Natalia Vorozhbit Producer: Renat Davletyarov, Alexander Kotelevsky

hanin is a senior officer in a criminal investigation squad at one of Moscow’s regional police stations. He is about forty, single, without any savings, without promotion, and with almost no friends. The meaning of his life is work, in which he immerses himself.

He does not notice that he gradually loses the most basic human feelings and is no longer able to empathize with his surroundings.

An emergency governs the district when a serial murderer is going round. Khanin cannot predict his actions. Unexpectedly an orphan girl by the name of Chuma comes to his aid. She is like Khanin in her indifference to the world around: there is nothing left in her soul but embitterment about the world. But their mutual goal narrows the gap between a young orphan girl and a hard-boiled cop.

SHORT STORIES

A

Country: Russia Genre: drama, comedy Language: Russian Length: 105 minutes Format: 35 mm, 2D Current status: completed Release in Russia: november, 2012 Writers & Director: Mikhail Segal Producer: Anastasia Kavunovskaya,

Andrey Kretov

t the beginning of the film, an author approaches a publishing house with a selection of stories and is told there is no market for them. However, as various people open the book, they each find themselves drawn into an imaginary reality. The first story tells of a wedding organiser who can fix anything, including the future, while the second traces a course from petty bribery to political duplicity. In the third, the librarian of the Pushkin Library assists the police with her psychic powers ‘just like on television’, while in the fourth, a middle-aged man’s encounters with a sexually voracious young woman are interspersed with a discussion on the history of the Soviet Union.

She loves Animal Planet but knows very little about Trotsky. Director’s elliptical satire is achieved with precision and style – a nice counterbalance to the dark masterpieces of his contemporaries.

product neWs STRIX

EXPLORA FILMS

KESHET INTERNATIONAL

THE TIGER Mum – How To Create A Winner (6/12 x 60 mins) follows a Chinese coach — the tiger mum — who helps parents improve their children’s performance with a new regime, including increasing homework time and working harder on spare-time activities. Scandinavia’s Strix, a subsidiary of MTG Studios, also brings new factual comedy 10 Commandments (6/12 x 60 mins). Each episode focuses on a specific environment — anything from a prison to a swingers club — and the host goes through 10 commandments based on unwritten rules and stories from that environment.

EXPLORA’s MIPTV catalogue of new programming covers history, wildlife and travel, including: Cuba, An Utopian Tropic (2 x 52 mins), which takes an alternative trip to the heart of The Antilles; Last Hunters (5 x 52 mins), portraying different hunting methods used by five ethnic groups; and Wild Team (1 x 52 mins) looking at three animal armies trying to colonise three different territories. The Spanish company also brings Tuareg, The Warriors Of The Dunes (1 x 52 mins), Spirits Of The Congo (1 x 52 mins) and The Moche Route (1 x 52 mins).

ISRAEL and UK-based Keshet is launching two new shows at MIPTV. Documentary Remember Me? (1 x 60 mins) takes a person back to aspects of their younger selves when they were very different. Game show Sure Or Insure (1 x 45 mins) sees families play together for a cash prize, one member answering 10 trivia questions, while the others buy insurance if they are unsure of the answers. The company also brings dating reality show Girlfri3nds (11 x 60 mins), youth talent show Master Class (11 x 90 mins), drama The A Word (26 x 35 mins), and drama Mice (12 x 60 mins).

The Tiger Mum - How To Create A Winner (Strix)

Cuba, An Utopian Tropic (Explora Films)

Master Class (Keshet International)

e m o c Wel

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8-11 April 2013

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SELECTA VISION

SELECTA specialises in production and distribution of programming for children and teens and is at MIPTV with two priorities. La CQ features eight youngsters learning to deal with some of the challenges teens have to cope with, including meeting a first love, confronting exam cheats or finding the true meaning of friendship. Miss XV is a drama series which tells the story of two best friends who dream of their 15th birthday party and becoming girlfriends to their crushes. Music is central to the series as a band, EME15, is formed by the main characters.

TELEVISION ESPANOLA (RTVE)

A HIGHLIGHT of RTVE’s slate at MIPTV is Isabel, a 13-part drama series that recreates the reign of Isabella I of Castile, one of the most important women in Spanish history, and has become one of Television Espanola’s top hits this season.

RTVE, which represents the programmes of TVE Internacional and 24 Horas, also brings dramas Vintage, set among two winemaking families in Rioja, Love In Difficult Times, and Mom Detective.

Isabel (RTVE)

ILTV

LONDON- and Paris-based producer I Love Television (ILTV) brings new episodes of Which Is Witch? (26 x 30 mins) to MIPTV, as well as high-school action comedy Tracers. The company has also begun production on My Bleeping Life (26 x 30 mins), a new sitcom that mixes live action and CGI characters. The story follows Bleep, a robot built by an alien civilisation as a home-helper, who has been mistakenly delivered to 14-yearold Charlotte. The series is set for delivery in the third quarter of 2014, and has secured a coproducer in Belgium’s Be-Film.

ILTV is looking for co-production, distribution and merchandising deals for the series at MIPTV.

Which Is Witch?

(I Love Television)

Tonight 9:45pm Don’t miss the MIPTV 50th Anniversary ďŹ reworks courtesy of the City of Cannes

Tomorrow, Tuesday April 9, 11:00am Join us for a MIPTV 50th Anniversary Champagne and Birthday Cake celebration on the Parvis of the Palais des Festivals courtesy of the City of Cannes and local partners*

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product neWs CELESTIAL TIGER ENTERTAINMENT (CTE)

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GLOBAL SCREEN

CTE IS at MIPTV with rights for TV series and films from Lionsgate in Greater China and South East Asia as well as Japan and Korea. The Hong Kong-based company has closed deals for Mad Men Season 5 to Fox International Channels, Anger Management to Comedy Central Asia, Boss to HBO Asia and Nashville to beTV and Sony Entertainment Television, and a slate of current and upcoming feature films to HBO Asia and FIC.

MIPTV highlights for German distributor Global Screen include, from the movie catalogue: new science fiction film Heroes; thrillers Mantrailer, Stolen Ransom and Sixteen Oaks; romantic comedies Who’s Kissing Doc? and Omamamia; and dramas The Lumber Queen and Fidgety Philipp. Series include Storm Of Love, Alarm For Cobra 11, Zoo Doctor - My Mom The Vet, and The Con Squad; and family series Yoko and Legends Of Valhalla - Thor.

Documentaries from Global Screen include The Medici Files and Charlemagne, both docu-dramas; and Food Savers, The Silence Of Pandas - What The WWF Isn’t Saying, and Churchill’s Secret Corpse.

GLOBO

NOVOVISION

NOVOVISION, the specialist in short-format, non-verbal comedy programming, signed a co-production agreement with Greymatter Entertainment, based in Mumbai, for the production of new shows for the Junior Hidden Camera series, in which kids play pranks on other kids or adults. In total, 1,200 gags will be filmed locally with Indian participants. The Paris-based company launches a new series of Junior Hidden Camera at MIPTV (52 x 22 mins), made up of gags filmed in North America, Europe and Asia, including the Indian productions.

©globoesporte.com Marcos Ribolli

Mad Men (CTE)

BRAZIL’s Globo brings a range of documentaries to MIPTV. Neymar – The Heir To The Crown follows the young football prodigy who became a professional at 17, and is now promising to be one of the best footballers in the world. The company also brings the second season of Extreme Planet, following challenges across four continents, including the Marathon des Sables in the Sahara, an ascent of a 200-metre icefall in Canada, and rapids in the Zambezi River. After The End portrays the stories of families that survive on the waste of the Gramacho Landfill in Rio de Janeiro.

Junior Hidden Camera, India (Novovision)

NPO SALES

SCANDINAVIAN distributor NPO Sales brings a range of documentary and reality programming to MIPTV. Hill Of Pleasures (1 x 57 mins) looks at one of Rio’s largest favelas where a Police Pacifying Unit has taken over control from organised criminals. With Love, From Russia (1 x 52 mins) focuses on people who travel to St. Petersburg in Russia for egg donation treatment. From the arts catalogue comes Hebreo: The Search For Salomone Rossi (1 x 52 mins), about the influential 17th century Jewish violinist in Italy, and The Ballet Masters (1 x 58 mins), about two stars of The Dutch National Ballet. Titles in the Backlight current affairs series include The Africa-China Connection, Go North, Young Man!, Inside The Hill Of Pleasures Banker’s Brain and Capitalising (NPO Sales) Happiness.

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Neymar - The Heir To The Crown (Globo)

AARDMAN RIGHTS

BRISTOL, UK-based Aardman is in production on a fourth series of Shaun The Sheep, along with partners CBBC and WDR Germany, scheduled for release early in 2014. The new series of 20 x 7-minute episodes takes the total to 120. The series is now seen in 170 territories worldwide across traditional broadcast and DVD, digital platforms and online, and Shaun has almost three million fans on Facebook.

MONDAY 8 APRIL GRAND AUDI

PRODUCERS’ HUB

DOCUMENTARY CONTENT MAKERS’ SHOWCASE 8.30-9.15 I Foyer Balcon Grand Audi, Level 3 Discover new Documentaries and Factual content from: U.S.A., Finland, Germany, France and South Africa.

Followed by matchmaking with the audience.

Open to registered buyers only.

PRODUCERS’ HUB

MIPTV MEDIA MASTERMIND KEYNOTES 11.40-12.10 I Grand Audi, Level 1

GENE SIMMONS IN CONVERSATION WITH DARREN THROOP, President & CEO, ENTERTAINMENT ONE

© Courtesy of eOne

PRODUCERS’ HUB

Darren Throop

WORKSHOP: MAKING IT AT MIP: HINTS & TIPS FOR FIRST-TIMERS 9.30-10.00 I Foyer Balcon Grand Audi, Level 3 Speaker Jason DaPonte, Managing Director & Executive Producer, THE SWARM, UK

MIPTV MEDIA MASTERMIND KEYNOTE 12.15-12.45 I Grand Audi, Level 1

PRODUCERS’ HUB

CREATORS’ MASTERCLASS: FEATURING DAVID S. GOYER

Interviewed by Kate Bulkley, Presenter and Commentator, UK

10.05-10.40 I Audi A, Level 3

© Courtesy of Endemol

TIM HINCKS, President, ENDEMOL GROUP Tim Hincks

Moderator Julian Newby, Editor in Chief MIPTV News, Boutique Editions, UK

FRESH TV FROM AROUND THE WORLD

Speaker David S. Goyer, Creator, Writer, Executive Producer, USA

13.00-14.00 I Grand Audi, Level 1 David S. Goyer

GRAND AUDI

In partnership with

Speaker Virginia Mouseler, CEO, The WIT, Switzerland

SCREENINGS

ORIGINAL ONLINE CONTENT SCREENINGS 10.45-11.30 I Grand Audi, Level 1

The April edition of Virginia Mouseler’s selection will provide an exclusive glimpse of some of the most talked about formats on the planet.

In partnership with

FLOW Presented by Tim Shieff, star, Flow, The Parkour Network, UK GOLDEN MOUSTACHE Presented by Adrien Labastire, Deputy General Manager Goldenmoustache, GM6, France JAMIE OLIVER’S FOOD TUBE Presented by DJ BBQ aka Christian Stevenson, presenter, Jamie Oliver’s Food Tube PIXIWOO Presented by Sam and Nic Chapman, Creators, Pixiwoo, UK PONK Presented by Philip Laude, Creator, Ponk, Germany STUDIO BAGEL Presented by Lorenzo Benedetti, President, The Social Company Production – Studio Bagel, France

MIPTV MEDIA MASTERMIND KEYNOTE 14.10-14.40 I Grand Audi, Level 1 © D.R

Hosted by Michael Stevens, Founder, Vsauce, UK

Virginia Mouseler

ANTHONY E. ZUIKER, Creator of The CSI Franchise Interviewed by Brian Seth Hurst, CEO, The Opportunity Management Company, USA

Anthony E. Zuiker

OFFICIAL CONFERENCES & EVENTS ESTEREL

AGORA TALKS

SQUARE

MORTAL KOMBAT: BUILDING A SPLIT-SCREEN BLOCKBUSTER

TV HACK LAUNCH

9.30-10.00 I Esterel, Level 5

10.45-11.15 I Agora, Level -1

Powered by BeMyApp

Moderator Jesse Cleverly, Creative Director, Connective Media, UK Speakers Lance Sloane, Head of Digital Programming and Development, Warner Bros. Digital Distribution, USA Kevin Tancharoen, Director / Producer, Warner Bros., USA

SQUARE

MATCHMAKING: MEET THE BROADCASTERS’ HEADS OF DIGITAL 11.30-12.00 I Agora, Level -1

EXPAND THE CONTENT EXPERIENCE 10.10-10.40 I Esterel, Level 5 Moderator Jesse Cleverly, Creative Director, Connective Media, UK Speakers Adam Gee, Multiplatform Commissioning Editor, Channel 4, UK Kim Moses, Principal, Sander/Moses Productions, SLAM & Creator, The Total Engagement, USA Scott Nocas, Head of Distribution and Marketing, Vuguru, USA

Christopher Barry Adam Gee

Kim Moses

Julie Bristow

Fabienne Fourquet

Lam Swee Kim

Marisa Lloreda

Isa Ostertag

Scott Nocas

SQUARE

AGORA

SNACK & SCREEN - MARSEILLE, HUB OF TRANSMEDIA & DIGITAL INDUSTRIES Sponsored by Ville de Marseille

12.30-14.00 I Agora, Level -1

SQUARE

CONTENT 360 PITCH: FOR TRANSMEDIA PRODUCERS AND CREATIVE AGENCIES Sponsored by CTC Media & MTS

9.30-10.30 I Agora, Level -1 Jury Members Ekaterina Nazarova, Head of Business Development, New Media, CTC Media Yaroslav Smirnov, Head of direction, Mobile Internet & Financial Services, MTS Anna-Maria Treneva, Director of Digital Media, CTC Media Oxana Trofimova, Head of BTL and Communication Department, MTS Oleg Zhdanov, CEO, Ailove

Moderator Erik Fackeldey, Media industries, Provence Promotion economic development agency, France Speakers Sylvia Andriantsimahavandy, General Director, PRIMI, France Jean-Michel Albert, Producer & New Media Specialist, France Benjamin Faivre, Producer Telfrance Serie, Project ANARCHY, France

Sylvia Andriantsimahavandy

Jean-Michel Albert

Benjamin Faivre

©Holger Meier

TALKS

Speakers Christopher Barry, Managing Director, International Strategy & Digital Media, A+E Networks, USA Julie Bristow, Executive Director, Studio & Unscripted Content, Olympic Content, Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, Canada Fabienne Fourquet, Director of Digital Content, Canal+, France Lam Swee Kim, Group General Manager, Media Prima Digital, Malaysia Marisa Lloreda, Content Acquisitions Manager & Film Festival Relations, bigstar.tv, USA Isa Ostertag, Managing Editor, ZDF, Germany

©Rafael Gómez

Kevin Tancharoen

©Maxime Bruno, Canal +

Lance Sloane

Presenter Marc Goodchild, Managing Director & Chief Creative, IpDipSkyBlue.tv, UK

MONDAY 8 APRIL PRODUCERS’ HUB

GRAND AUDI MIPTV MEDIA MASTERMIND KEYNOTE

RAISING FUNDING THROUGH NEW PARTNERSHIPS

16.30-17.00 I Grand Audi, Level 1

15.00-15.40 I Foyer Balcon Grand Audi, Level 3 Moderator Chris Forrester, Journalist and Industry Consultant, UK

SOPHIE TURNER LAING, Managing Director, Content, BSKYB Interviewed by Steve Clarke, Media Writer and Editor, Variety and Television, Journal of the Royal Television Society, UK

ABU DHABI FILM COMMISSION Presented by Wayne Borg, President International and Chief Commercial Officer, Media Zone Authority - Abu Dhabi, UAE

© Courtesy of S. Turner Laing

PRODUCERS’ HUB

Sophie Turner Laing

Wayne Borg

CANADA MEDIA FUND Presented by: Stéphane Cardin, Vice-President, Industry and Public Affairs, Canada Media Fund, Canada

RIOFILME Presented by: Adrien Muselet, COO, RioFilme, Brazil

In partnership with Keshet International

17.15-18.00 I Grand Audi, Level 1 © D.R

Stéphane Cardin

SESSION UPDATE Monica Galeriu

Adrien Muselet

“THE WHITE QUEEN” SCREENING

BERT SALKE, President, FOX 21 and GIDEON RAFF, Creator, Writer and Director, “PRISONERS OF WAR” / Executive Producer, “HOMELAND”

Bert Salke

Interviewed by Gideon Raff Ran Tellem, VP Programming, Keshet Broadcasting / Executive Producer, “Homeland”

Presented by Starz

15.00-16.30 I Audi K, Level 4 Presenter Gene George, EVP Worldwide Distribution, Starz Media, USA

MIPTV WORLD PREMIERE TV SCREENING: “DA VINCI’S DEMONS” Produced by Adjacent Productions for Starz, sold internationally at MIPTV by BBC Worldwide.

18.15-19.30 I Grand Audi, Level 1

INTERNATIONAL DRAMA CO-PRODUCTION SUMMIT 15.00-18.00 I Majestic Hotel By invitation Moderator Katrina Wood, Founder and CEO, MediaXchange, UK

PRODUCERS’ HUB

WORKSHOP: ALL YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT VOD OPPORTUNITIES & DEALMAKING 15.50-16.20 I Audi A, Level 3 Speaker Wendy Bernfeld, Managing Director, Rights Stuff BV, The Netherlands Wendy Bernfeld

The screening of “Da Vinci’s Demons” will be followed by an on-stage conversation with creator and showrunner David S. Goyer, along with the series’ principal cast members Tom Riley, Laura Haddock, Lara Pulver and Blake Ritson. The panel will be moderated by Julie Gardner, Executive Producer of “Da Vinci’s Demons”.

© D.R

EUROPEAN COMMISSION (Education, Audiovisual And Culture Executive Agency EACEA) Presented by: Monica Galeriu, Project Manager, European Commission - EACEA Education, Audiovisual and Culture Executive Agency, Belgium

MIPTV MEDIA MASTERMIND KEYNOTES

OFFICIAL CONFERENCES & EVENTS ESTEREL

AGORA TALKS RD

STORYTELLING IN THE 3 DIMENSION 14.45-15.15 I Esterel, Level 5

SQUARE

MIPCUBE LAB: HEAR FROM THE VCS & TV DECISION MAKERS 14.15-15.00 I Agora, Level -1

Moderator Jason DaPonte, Managing Director & Executive Producer, THE SWARM, UK Speakers Steve Lloyd, Director of Product Innovation, SphereVision®, Arithmetica, UK Simon Whalley, Executive Producer, Framestore, UK Paul Whitehead, Commercial Director, We R Interactive, UK

Steve Lloyd

Simon Whalley

Paul Whitehead

MIPCUBE LAB PITCH FOR START-UPS ½ 15.00-16.00 I Agora, Level -1 Jury Members Jesse Draper, creator and host of The Valley Girl Show, USA Olivier Ezratty, Digital Media Strategy Expert, Jesse Draper France Marie-Christine Levet, Partner, Jaïna Capital, France Emma Lloyd, Director of Corporate Business Development & Investments, BSKYB, UK Anne-Marie Roussel, Executive in residence, Illuminate Ventures, USA

TALKS

FROM PRODUCER TO START-UP 15.20-15.50 I Esterel, Level 5 Moderator Jason DaPonte, Managing Director & Executive Producer, THE SWARM, UK Speakers Nuno Bernardo, Managing Director, beActive Entertainment, Portugal Alex LeMay, CEO, The Shadow Gang, USA Jim Stewartson, CEO, RIDES.tv, USA

SQUARE

DIGITAL PRODUCERS: MEET THE 2013 INTERNATIONAL DIGITAL EMMY® AWARD NOMINEES Sponsored by The Bell Fund

16.15-16.45 I Agora, Level -1 Presenter Catherine Warren, Founder and President, FanTrust Entertainment Strategies & Member, Board of Directors, Bell Fund, Canada

Catherine Warren

SQUARE Nono Bernardo

Alex LeMay

4K: TOMORROW’S TV

Jim Stewartson

In partnership with

17.00-17.40 I Agora, Level -1 TALKS

CREATING KILLER SOCIAL EXPERIENCES 16.00-16.30 I Esterel, Level 5 Moderator Jason DaPonte, Managing Director & Executive Producer, THE SWARM, UK Speakers Jay Bennett, Vice President, Digital and Creative Director, Shaftesbury/Smokebomb Entertainment, Canada Richard Welsh, Creative Director, Bigballs Films, UK Petter Westlund, Chief Creative Officer, B-Reel, Sweden

Jay Bennett

Richard Welsh

Petter Westlund

Moderator Chris Forrester, Journalist and Industry Consultant, UK Speakers Barry Bassett, Managing Director, VMI.TV, UK Berti Kropac, DoP and Founder, KROPAC MEDIA, Germany Thomas Morrod, Senior director, consumer electronics & media technology, IHS Global, UK

Barry Bassett

Berti Kropac

Thomas Morrod

TODAY’S EVENTS 10.00-10.30 I Parvis Riviera MIPTV 50 th official inauguration

11.00-11.45 I Auditorium J – Blue Lounge

16.00-17.00 I Auditorium J – Blue Lounge STARZ ENTERTAINMENT (sold internationally by BBC WORLDWIDE): Da Vinci’s Demons – press conference

17.30-18.30 I Auditorium J – Blue Lounge

NEWEN DISTRIBUTION press conference: La Source MAGINE press conference

12.00-13.30 I Auditorium K International Academy of Television Arts & Sciences press conference and International Digital Emmy® Awards: Nominee Medal Ceremony press conference

14.30-15.30 I Auditorium J – Blue Lounge ENDEMOL presents new US crime drama: Low Winter Sun

15.30-17.00 I Auditorium H KESHET INTERNATIONAL press conference: Prisoners Of War

18.00-19.00 I Palais des Festivals – Level 1 Stand 02.10 TELEFILM CANADA – Your Big Canadian Friends invite you to a networking reception

19.00-20.30 I Hotel Martinez MIPTV 50 th Red Carpet

19.30-22.00 I Hotel Martinez MIPTV 50 th Opening Night Party

MAKE THE MOST OF MIPTV

Pick up your MIPTV 2013 GUIDE now

The “who’s-who” of the global industry.

A year-round networking tool, enriched with a new dedicated section for National & Regional Pavilions

DISTRIBUTION POINT LOCATED AT THE REGISTRATION AREA (GARE MARITIME)

product neWs ACCENT FILMS

ACCENT Films International is on a MIPTV mission to secure further co-production and pre-sale deals for two historic documentaries. The first, Hello, I’m Johnny Cash, is directed by Emmy Award-winner Ray Muller and due to be broadcast on ZDF/ARTE this September, 10 years after the death of the American music icon. In The Dunes will be ready to air in 2014, marking the 70th anniversary of the end of World War II.

miptv

RED ARROW

DETECTIVE Johan Falk and his special unit investigate in a shady world where lives are cheap.

Starring Jakob Eklund and Joel Kinnaman, the second series of Johan Falk (6 x 90 mins) is brought to MIPTV by Red Arrow International, and is inspired by real-life case files, investigations and covert operations. Other programming highlights from Red Arrow include 7 x 30-minute comedy series Hellfjord, cooking competition show The Taste and reality series Idiot Proof.

NEWEN

FRENCH independent producer Newen, a specialist in international co-productions, has brought the multi-territory series Harry to MIPTV. The show is currently airing in Turkey and has been optioned in Italy, Spain, Germany and the US, and is being broadcast daily on France 3. Newen’s Can You Feel Love? is currently airing in the Ukraine and has been optioned in the US, the UK and Canada.

The company is also launching two new formats, The Big Day and One Day To Move Out, this week.

ZED

FRENCH producer and distributor Zed is boosting its history catalogue with Napoleon — The Campaign Of Russia (2 x 52 mins HD), a new docudrama presenting one of the most memorable and mythical military campaigns and defeats of recent history: the invasion of Russia by Napoleon.

Other historical highlights include: Namibia, The Genocide Of The 2nd Reich; Life Without JFK, a portrait of Jackie Kennedy after her husband’s death; Stalin — In Color; and Racial Hygiene, the untold story of eugenics and how racial purification went on in the US and Europe until the 1970s.

Hello, I’m Johnny Cash (Accent Films International)

TERRANOA

FACTUAL production company Terranoa is launching Animal Doctors (Animaux Medecins), a 52-minute documentary, at MIPTV this week.

The programme investigates what healthcare strategies animals use in the wild, how they are able to transmit these to the next generation and whether these can be adapted for human medicines. Also new from Terranoa is another 52-minute documentary, Super Funghi.

Johan Falk (Red Arrow International)

G&G ENTERTAINMENT

SOUTH Korea’s G&G Entertainment is at the market to launch the second season of Little Wizard Tao (52 x 15 mins), which tells the extraordinary school-life story of little wizards who board a green turtle, allowing them to fly through the clouds and polish their powers. The first series aired on Disney India, Pop TV in the UK and Disney Korea, and has also been sold to 20 other territories around the world. The new series has already aired on KBS in Korea.

Little Wizard Tao (G&G Entertainment) Napoleon: The Campaign Of Russia (Zed)

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miptv

feature ULTRA-HDTV

The long road to Ultra-HDTV The word is that producers need to start preparing to future-proof content for the next technological revolution: Ultra-HDTV or 4K. Chris Forrester reports

T

HIS year’s MIPTV 50th Anniversary is in part

a celebration of past achievements, but MIPTV is also looking forward to broadcasting’s next major move. And it is Ultra-HDTV, or U-HD in all its forms that is making consumer headlines around the world. While much of the buzz is being generated from the display manufacturers and the usual early adopters, there’s now little doubt that the technology is far from just being driven by the usual hype cycle, there’s genuine enthusiasm from all the main industry players.

For example, the Japanese government is planning the world’s first ultra-high definition 4K TV broadcasts as early as the middle of next year, in time for the Rio soccer World Cup competition. The news comes as the High Efficiency Video Codec (HEVC/H.265) compression standard was officially ratified by the ITU earlier this year. This new TV standard is expected to drive U-HD, as well as over-the-top video delivery of video

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content down telephone and cable wires. Japan’s pubcaster NHK is still on track to launch ‘full’ 8K U-HD/2 broadcasts in 2016 and tested 8K from London’s Olympic Park last summer.

U-HDTV/1, also known as 4K, offers definition four times higher than that of current HDTV. The technology was one of the main talking points at this year’s giant Consumer Electronics Show (CES), where all the major TV manufacturers showed U-HDTV-capable models.

The BBC and Sky have undertaken trials of sporting events, including the Olympics and football from Arsenal’s Emirates stadium, although with no commercial services announced so far. Satellite operators SES and Eutelsat have demo channels on air for Europe, and Sky Deutschland is expected to make what it describes as a major announcement at this year’s August IFA consumer electronics show in Berlin. South Korea’s KBS is testing 4K terrestrial transmissions. Similar tests are taking place in Spain and Italy.

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miptv

The Rio Carnival shot in 4K (Courtesy: TV Globo)

Meanwhile, the display manufacturers are ramping up production of ever-larger TV sets ready for receiving broadcasts. These 4K displays, despite their current ‘Oligarch-only’ prices, are already selling, and savvy Hollywood producers — as well as those closer to home — are actually producing 4K content in readiness for the technology’s introduction as well as future-proofing popular material for packaging into next-generation 4K Blu-ray discs.

However, let’s be clear: Ultra-HDTV: believe the hype?

4K transmissions are not quite yet in sight. But the degree of planning The ‘hype cycle’ is happening, but in truth there are key elements that now going on is surhave to be lined up to make 4K and 8K transmission a reality. prising. Berti Kropac, s )MAGE CAPTURE AFFORDABLE CAMERAS AND DATA STORAGE who heads up Kropac s #ONTENT CREATION Media and who shot Sky s $ISPLAYS AT AFFORDABLE PRICES s "ROADCASTERS TRANSMITTING 5 ($ Deutschland’s 4K soccer s 3ET TOP CONVERTER BOXES SUITABLE FOR + test-footage, says: “Sport looks wonderful in 4K. It’s breathtaking and you see things that you normally would only realise if you are on the location of the recording, standing next to the cameraman. It is amazing to see a close-up of a tiger, the fur, the whiskers, the eyes. For me it is like watching 3D without glasses.”

It is the same with the BBC. The BBC’s Natural History Unit (NHU) is busy filming Survival, an epic six-part series, partly in 4K. Mike Gunton is creative director at

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the NHU with a spectacular pedigree at the BBC and an enthusiasm for 4K, especially when taken holistically as part of potential theatrical and IMAX-type releases of its output. The BBC, working with Japan’s NHK also trialled the ‘full-fat’ version of 8K at last year’s Olympic Games.

The message is echoed in Europe where the 4EVER consortium, backed by the French Ministry of Industry, look to make the current TV production and delivery chain capable of handling next-generation 4K content.

The government support is helping a number of Francebased companies, including compression experts ATEME, Orange Labs, France Televisions, Technicolor, TeamCast, Doremi, GlobeCast, and Institut Telecom ParisTech, all figuring out how to make 4K workflows and distribution a practical reality. 4EVER’s aim is to wrap a complete production and transmission chain by the end of this year. In Spain, transmission company Abertis trialled 4K transmissions during Mobile World Congress in Barcelona at the end of February.

Most industry observers expect 4K to first appear in a pay-TV environment, and it is no surprise that established players such as DirecTV in the US as well as Sky in Europe are paying attention to the new technology. DirecTV’s CEO Mike White, speaking on an analyst’s call in February was candid: “In terms of 4K I don’t want to get into the details on our longer-

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miptv

A young tiger in Bandhavgarh in India, shot in 4K by the BBC’s Survival team

Ultra-HDTV: unravelling the acronyms s + FOR CINEMA COVERS A PIXEL FORMAT OF X MEGAPIXELS s $#) + .ATIVE RESOLUTION COVERS X MEGAPIXELS s $#) + #INEMASCOPE CROPPED COVERS X MEGAPIXELS s + FOR 46 COVERS A PIXEL FORMAT OF X MEGAPIXELS s + FOR 46 COVERS A PIXEL FORMAT OF X MEGAPIXELS s 5($ n SAME AS + FOR 46 s 5($ n SAME AS + FOR 46 s 3UPER (I 6ISION n SAME AS + FOR 46 Data: SMPTE/ITU

term product strategies but DirecTV has a heritage of wanting to have the best sound and pictures. We are continuing to invest in the next generation of both sound and picture. [The content has] to be shot in 4K. So, again, I think you’re probably a couple of years out.

But it’s a very exciting technology, and frankly, we’re very interested in kind of how fast it will [impact] with consumers and certainly taking that into consideration in our longer-term product plans.�

In Japan we have their conďŹ rmation that 4K will be a reality in 2014, helped by a Japanese government initiative, and more than two years ahead of the already accelerated 2016 test-transmissions of 8K. The key question is: Will this government initiative lead to a faster or earlier development of the market cycle as well as improve U-HD take-up rates? Northern Sky

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Research says: “The [Japanese] government initiatives on the supply side will have some positive effect on the ecosystem. Developments in next-generation compression standards, which in NSR’s view is one of the most important to truly jumpstart the market, should proceed at a faster rate.�

Futuresource’s research consultant David Watkins admits that 4K still has some serious obstacles to overcome, not least the lack of content, and an addressable audience in the shape of 4K displays. “Despite these barriers most major TV [display] brands will likely launch 4K models over the next 12 months. Looking to the broadcast industry and pay TV, the primary challenge is the increased bandwidth required to transmit 4K. Futuresource believes that there is a positive commercial scenario for consumer 4K.�

The European Broadcasting Union’s David Wood is also positive: “Ultra-HD is not just an idea or someone’s dream. The technical standards were agreed by all the nations of the world last August. Ultra-HD trials have already begun in Korea for terrestrial broadcasting, and these will continue. SES and Eutelsat are making trial transmissions with satellites. We could look forward to Ultra-HD internet trials later this year.

But, no one is going to provide serious broadcast or broadband services until the Ultra-HD displays are in the public’s hands, Wood says. “They will need to be within reach of the public ďŹ nancially. There are some sets available today, but they are very expensive. To be

Be part of the celebrations at the MIPTV th th 50 anniversary opening party and firework display!

Fireworks courtesy of

Monday, 8 April, 2013 from 19.30, Martinez Hotel Official Partner MIPTV®, MIPDoc®, MIPFormats®, MIPCube® are registered trademarks of Reed MIDEM – All rights reserved

miptv

Shooting the Audi A3 Sportback commercial in 4K

realistic, the prices are probably not going to lead to volume sales until 2015/16. I think that’s the time we may see the first serious Ultra-HD broadcast services.”

He adds: “For Europe and the US these will probably be pay-TV services. For Japan and Korea, which are leading the world in Ultra-HD, the services may be rather wider in nature.”

Pushing the ‘go’ button on 4K needs, at least, 4K-suitable cameras. For a couple of years the Red Epic camera has been in use for Hollywood productions (which enables shooting in 3K, 4K and 5K) and more recently Sony has been stunning the world with its impressive F65 camera system, which exceeds the resolution (exposure latitude, dynamic range, wider colour gamut) of any model on the market.

Broadcasters are already tapping into the technology even though the prospect of them transmitting in 4K is perhaps some time off. One example is NBC which has used Sony Pictures Television (SPT) to shoot/test 4K on its Save Me comedy show with Anne Heche. Showtime’s Masters Of Sex drama series (starring Michael Sheen and Lizzy Caplan) was shot on an F65. SPT’s Culver City Colorworks facility has been created in part to ensure that episodic TV can be produced in 4K at the same pace as regular HDTV. M. Night Shyamalan’s upcoming After Earth, scheduled for release next year by SPT’s Columbia Pictures, is the first major motion picture to be shot using Sony’s F65 camera. MIPTV’s 4K Super Session will be showing a clip from the movie.

Celebrating 20 years of premium travel programming, IMG proudly presents a worldwide marathon of adventures in this 8 x 52min special edition series.

Globe Trekker Series 15 also now available.

Stand 02.34 on Level 01 of the Palais. Contact: alex.maldini@imgworld.com

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Seoul, South Korea, shot in 4K for KBS. (Courtesy, David Wood)

Guillaume De Saint Marc, office of the CTO, Service Provider Video Technology Group, Cisco, UK, says the answer to when 4K will be ready is “dependent upon the demand created for Ultra-HD content and how successful the TV manufacturers are in selling Ultra-HD screens to the public”. He adds: “The demand for Ultra-HD content is likely to increase rapidly over the next two years but may first be met by non-broadcast means, be it Ultra-HD games, down-

loaded or streamed OTT content, or even user-generated content from consumer cameras (Go Pros etc). In terms of true broadcast we are likely to see a roll-out start slowly in 2014 as High Efficiency Video Codec chipsets and encoders become available. Traditionally a major global broadcast event, such as the Olympics, has been used as a catalyst for the broadcast industry to adopt new technologies. Ultra-HD broadcast will probably follow the same pattern.”

SWIM EXPLORES AND DEVELOPS THE FIELD OF TRANSMEDIA

LAB FORUM CONFERENCE THINK TANK

SWIMBABYSWIM.DK

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Join our conference/forum 13-15 Nov in Copenhagen during CPH:DOX

THE EUROPEAN UNION The European Regional Development Fund

SHOOTING IN

DCRP Ville de Marseille - Semi-piétonnisation aérienne © MDP-Michel Desvigne Paysagiste - MPM

MARSEILLE

A

city of global exchange for 2600 years and a bridge between Europe and the Mediterranean and the rest of the world, Marseille combines the richness of a unique heritage with modernity that places it legitimately amongst the top 20 European cities.

Its rich cultural life and the art of living together, cultivated over thousands of years, attracts more and more newcomer to Marseille who appreciate the carefully preserved environment at its true value.

Marseille 2013 it is also, the European Capital of Culture, more than 500 cultural events will mark this year, all unique and

different, but imbued whith a common goal : to bring together the enthusiasm of all the people of Provence and the 10 million visitors expected with a high-standard-artistic threshold.

Marseille flaunts a real go-ahead attitude for the creative industries, particularly cinema and audiovisual business. As the 2nd leading city in France for filming, Marseille has many advantages to attract audiovisual industry professionnals such as 300 days of sunshine, varied landscapes, an active network of SME’s and key facilities like the Belle de Mai Media Park.

A unique place in Europe where the cinema, audiovisual and multimedia professions maximise synergies.

miptv

feature ULTRA-HDTV

Cameraman Barry Britton filming Langurs in 4K, in India, for the BBC’s Natural History Unit

Mike Gunton, head of the BBC’s Natural History Unit in Bristol, talks to Chris Forrester about shooting in 4K, the costs involved, and how he sees the format’s future

W

HEN will 4K transmission start?

“Looking to the future the meaning of transmission is becoming a bit blurred.

Audiences now receive content in so many ways; in the living room, in the cinema, on smart phones, their laptops or elsewhere — at different resolutions and bit rates, what is meant by transmission is no longer a straightforward description. However, crucially for us in shooting nature sequences on large format cameras we can deliver content and innovation in the pictures we produce which will be appreciated on whichever screens our audiences get to see it.”

Shooting in 4K. Is the extra cost worthwhile?

“The team didn’t jump straight into the world of 4K, in fact quite the opposite. We were cautious and a bit nervous — would the cameras be robust enough? What would the aesthetic of the images be like? And how about all the extra data generated? Frankly, was it worth it for just more pixels? But lots of camera testing (meticulously done by members of the Survival production team; Rupert Barrington, Tom Hugh-Jones and cameraman Paul Stewart) gradually convinced us we were on to something new in terms of a look.”

What was the first experience of shooting in 4K like?

“Taking courage in our hands we set off on our first 4K shoot ‘in anger’ — filming elephants for Survival with veteran cameraman Martyn Colbeck. So nervous were we that we took a P2VariCam along just in case — but half-way through Martyn emailed back saying,

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in colourful language, he loved the camera and what’s more the images it was producing. Sure enough back at base the reason for his enthusiasm was there to see — the textures, the subtle and flexible application of slowmotion and the astonishing detail made it feel like you could step into the frame and touch the skin, feel the mud the elephant was wallowing in and all the water spraying around. Most excitingly it suited the editorial ambition of survival perfectly — an extra dimension of connection with our subjects. But as well the expansive range of frame rates and the dramatic ‘look’, it’s fair to say that we have seen benefits in many other areas — the improved dynamic range, light sensitivity and greater colour palette, and the potential to grade the RAW images has been welcomed by the photographers and proved of real benefit to our producers.”

Are there other practical benefits of shooting in 4K? “Shooting at 4K opens up creative flexibility in the cutting-room because of the amount we can zoom into a 4K shot, and still get an HD shot out of it. This allows us to get greater close-ups, create two shots sizes from one shot, to create zooms, or to go in on a static shot and pan across it to create a more dynamic image.

This really hit home when we worked on a shot of a tiger chasing deer from a shoot in India. In the original 4K shot the tiger pounds across the plain, and occupies perhaps 1/3 of the frame. By zooming in, we can now create a shot in which the tiger is running at full speed, completely filling the frame from nose to tail. An otherwise impossible shot to film.”

What would the aesthetic of the images be like?

And how about all the extra data generated?

Frankly, was it worth it for just more pixels?

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feature ULTRA-HDTV

4K: we ask the experts Experts from all areas of the industry give their views on 4K The living room of the 4K-future?

(Courtesy Cisco-NDS)

“DirecTV has a heritage of wanting to have the best sound and pictures. [The content has] to be shot in 4K. We are continuing to invest in the next generation of both sound and pictures.”

Mike White, CEO DirecTV, US

“Over a third (36%) of those questioned said they expected to begin filming some content in 4K within the next 12 months, and a further 13% within 24 months.”

John Brennan, managing director, Procam TV, UK

“The primary challenge is the increased bandwidth required to transmit 4K. Futuresource believes that there is a positive commercial scenario for consumer 4K.”

“Everyone who’s seen 4K knows it will become a part of [our] offer. I can’t put a time scale on our 4K efforts. What we’ve done is a proof of concept and we’re monitoring the whole chain to see when the content and screens are available.”

David Watkins, senior researcher, Futuresource, UK

Oliver Lewis, vice-president, strategy, Sky Deutschland

“Many of us won’t be distributing in 4K, but it’s starting to feel inevitable that we’ll be shooting in 4K very soon.”

“We forecast five Ultra-HD (4K) channels in 2013 growing to 135 by the end of 2017. From the HDTV launch in the late Nineties/early 2000s the number of HDTV channels grew to 548 in 2010, after roughly 10 years, and reached 797 by the end of 2011. The roll-out of Ultra-HDTV could, in our view, be quicker than the roll-out of HDTV once we have had a broader launch in 2015-16.”

Alex Buono, DP, Saturday Night Live, NBC

Credit-Suisse report, Sept 14, 2012

“It is too early to predict precisely when 4K transmissions will start because even though TV screens are starting to become available on the market, 4K production is far from common yet and is tending to target the cinema industry. Besides, we think that moving towards Ultra-HDTV does not only involve spatial definition, but also temporal and colour definitions, so we can’t tell now if 4K on its own is enough to evolve towards “beyond HD” transmissions.

More studies are needed, especially subjective evaluations of perceived quality. Last, but not least, compression is a crucial element in the TV transmission chain; we think that HEVC (High Efficiency Video Coding) standard first has to be deployed to envisage U-HDTV transmission. We are also confident that current extra cost of 4K production will decrease when more equipment becomes available, especially TV production equipment like broadcast cameras at least.”

“All kind of sports are wonderful to see in 4K, it’s like looking through a window into the stadium, or the racetrack.

You really get the feeling of being on location. But also documentaries about nature and wildlife are absolutely terrific in 4K — and movies, of course, as well as drama. And not forgetting the commercials. What I don’t yet see in this new ultra resolution is soaps or talk shows, because you need time to create breathtaking pictures with this extreme resolution.”

Maryline Clare-Charrier, 4EVER collaborative project leader, Orange Labs, France

Berti Kropac, managing director, Kropac Media, Germany

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“Many of our customers are looking hard and/or trialling U-HD this year. This has been pre-empted by enabling technologies developing, such as: U-HD camera technologies, compression technologies and the commercial availability of TV screens. It is clear that for some the World Cup 2014 and the 2016 Olympics remain key broadcast events to target trials.

Considering the end-to-end content flow process it is likely to become mainstream 2015+.”

Darren Fawcett, chief technical engineer, set-top box maker Pace, UK

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feature CO-PRODUCTION

It’s all about teamwork

Jean Reno, Orla Brady and Celyn Jones in Atlantique Productions’ Jo

There was a time when co-production in Europe was more a political concept than something based on financial good sense or even creativity. But as Marlene Edmunds reports, that’s all changed

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RAMA co-production, driven by some of the oldest and some of the newest media players in the world, is increasingly becoming a major force both creatively and financially.

With series like Borgia selling easily around the globe — and being picked up by Netflix, the world’s largest on-demand internet streaming service — there’s no question drama co-production has come a long way from its Euro-pudding days.

The internet, and the universality of the lives we live, are changing the narration, production and marketing of drama co-productions, particularly in Europe and North America. Take Jo, one of the latest co-productions from Lagardere Entertainment’s Atlantique Pro-

ductions produced for TF1 in association with Red Arrow International. It boasts Jean Reno in his first TV role for four decades and a superb line-up of talent — but the superstar isn’t just Reno, it’s Paris. Created by Rene Balcer, Franck Ollivier and Malina Detcheva, Jo is the first English-language series to be shot entirely on location in the French capital.

“In Jo, Paris and its key locations give it both universal as well as local and regional appeal,” says Olivier Rene Veillon, CEO of Ile de France Film Commission. He adds that when it was in development, the idea was that the project had to have a strong international impact and location could be one of the elements that created that impact. “So the locations in Paris are not acciden-

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Kim Bodnia and Sofia Helin in The Bridge (Courtesy DRTV)

tal: they are integrated in a very strong and original way and are a key element in the narration itself,” says Veillon, who added that the Paris backdrop was also an important marketing element for the series.

Atlantique had greenlit the third season of Borgia well before the second season had even aired on Canal+ in mid-March.

“It was a ground-breaking situation for us, to begin working on a third season without the second one having been aired,” says Olivier Bibas, managing director of Atlantique Productions. And the fact that Borgia has had the same partners on board from the very beginning, including Canal+, EOS Entertainment and Beta Film, “shows the level of confidence we have built since starting developing this series four years ago”. Directed by US showrunner Tom Fontana and shot in the Czech Republic and Italy, the co-production has more than 30 different nationalities working on it.

It was a groundbreaking situation for us, to begin working on a third season without the second one having been aired Olivier Bibas

It’s no big surprise that the US is increasingly a musthave partner for Euro players and working with America is a significant part of the overall strategy of Lagardere and Atlantique to increase production values through talent and financing. “We are able to do both

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working with the US,” Bibas says. “Tom Fontana is an example of the kind of talent we can tap into. Someone like Jean Reno draws serious interest from the US as well.” At the same time, he adds, European elements very much influence the productions. Borgia is about European history and Jo is a contemporary Paris police procedural.

The French took some time to climb aboard the international drama co-production train but they are now not only on board but changing the very dynamics of the landscape.

In September of 2011 the 118-year old Gaumont launched Gaumont International Television (GIT) in Los Angeles. The aim, says Christophe Riandee, viceCEO of Gaumont, was to create a TV studio that is more “nimble, global and creative.” He adds: “Considering the number of projects on board, the talent and the partners we are involved with, I’d say we’ve succeeded.”

Barbarella is the latest co-production to come out of the GIT stables. And with British writing team Neal Purvis and Robert Wade, whose credit list includes five of the James Bond series — including the biggest-ever, Skyfall — Danish-born Nicolas Winding Refn directing, American Martha De Laurentiis executive producing, and Canal+ on board as a co-producer, it is truly an international one.

“In the short period of time since GIT has been in exis-

feature DRAMA GOES OTT NETFLIX generates drama of its own but time will tell how much is about co-production. Netflix has $300m earmarked for original content over the next few years but no announced strategy for co-production. It has, however, come aboard as a co-producer for the unlikely hit series Lilyhammer.

The internet streaming service last month [March 14] announced it would stream all 12 episodes of the third season of The Killing, three months after the AMC finale. The US co-production remake of the wildly successful Danish series Forbrydelsen (The Crime) had been cancelled by AMC, then brought back for a third season by AMC and Fox Television Studios.

Netflix’s move was considered integral to its return.

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tence, we’re working for major broadcasters in the US as well as Netflix. I think I can say that we have not only been nimble and global but also creative,” Riandee says. “Co-production today is a complex matter in that one needs to marry the interests of the producers and the broadcaster. In the case of Barbarella, Canal+ was very interested in the project.”

He says that at GIT there is no predefined scheme or strategy in terms of where talent should come from. It’s the project and the partners that determines the direction it will go. Horror-thriller series Hemlock Grove, for example, in high-profile at MIPTV this year, relies heavily on American talent — but is nonetheless a significant project for the company. “It was important to show the market that GIT could produce and deliver a US show,” Riandee says.

Back in LA, Katie O’Connell, CEO of GIT, says drama co-production is an “absolute priority for us”. GIT currently partners with, among others, Sony International Channel’s AXN, NBC and Canal+. Having such partners early on in the process, she adds, “helps ensure we are creating series that will have a global footprint from the get-go”.

Netflix’s involvement in Hemlock Grove is also a sign of the times. “Each series has its own rhythm and we work to find the perfect home for each narrative,” she says, adding that Hemlock Grove, which is based on the series co-creator Brian McGreevy’s novel “really

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lent itself to the Netflix format. Each episode, like each chapter in a good book, propels you into the next episode. What I love about Netflix is allowing the viewer to decide the pace at which they watch a series and serialised dramas lend themselves to this format.”

And as consumers exercise those preferences there will be a need for new production strategies. “Sending a message that multiple seasons of a series will be produced is very encouraging to viewers,” says O’Connell, adding: “Viewership of series has as much to do with the audience feeling the commitment as it does the quality of the series. The quick failure rate of series has created an environment of sceptical viewers who may not commit until they know that a full season has been produced.”

Germany’s Beta Film always has a pack of co-productions on the front burner that involve multiple European partners. Eric Welbers, managing director of Beta Film, says international players are now creating new co-production models. “In the older model, the co-production partners sit around at a table and have input into the creative side,” he says. However, newer projects like Alexander, co-produced by Beta Film, Gruppe 5 and ZDF Enterprises (ZDFE) the commercial arm of German public broadcaster ZDF, can’t really work that way.

“A co-production between horizontally scripted events like Alexander requires something different.”

Alexander is being seen as a ground-breaking project for a number of reasons. To begin with, it is the first

miptv

feature Isolda Dychauk at Lucrezia Borgia in Borgia

time that Beta Film, Gruppe 5 and ZDFE have come together on such a large production. “The project had been on the table for some time now but within the context of a mini-series,” Welbers says. “However, the [full-length] TV series allows us the time to develop the characters a bit more.”

Welbers says that today European channels are more comfortable with the modern multi-national co-production model and feel less inclined to get involved creatively where they are not required to be. “We bring them the projects that they might not be able to do themselves,” he says, adding that it was Canal+ that wanted to bring Tom Fontana on board for Borgia, but not in order then to tell him how to write the script. “The basis for this new kind of production is that you agree on a showrunner and the channels say ‘wow, if you have that guy, we trust you to carry on’.”

The Adventures Of Captain Alatriste, which begins shooting in June or July of this year with Spanish commercial broadcaster Telecinco on board the project, is the first series Beta Film has co-produced with Spain.

Welber says Telecinco is an active co-producer with creative input and The Adventures Of Captain Alatriste is a good example of a European channel requiring an event series that it can’t afford to do alone. “You can see this in every country in Europe, every channel is trying to do something that is an event, something they will be remembered for. And our job is to help them bring the money so that they can do it.”

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Gaumont’s Christophe Riandee

ZDFE Drama’s Tasja Abel

The Killing received an early investment from ZDFE

Nice Drama’s Patrick Nebout

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ZDFE was among the earliest investors in Scandinavian co-productions, including The Millennium Trilogy, The Killing and The Bridge. Tasja Abel, vice-president, ZDFE Drama, says ZDFE looks for programmes that stand out and “Scandinavian productions set new standards, in storytelling, quality and innovative approach”.

Most of the ZDFE co-productions with Scandinavia have been crime series, which Abel says work s particularly well in the German market and internationally.

ZDFE, is now at work in collaboration with commissioning partner ZDF on The Bridge II, a continuation of the successful crossover original crime-thriller co-production The Bridge, co-produced with Filmlance and Nimbus Film for public broadcasters SVT in Sweden and DR in Denmark. Delivery is set for October 2013.

“The drama co-production world has changed and become very open and collaborative on the creative side,” Abel says. “Projects like The Bridge are an example of a creative situation in which the need for co-production is innate in the concept.”

The changes on the European co-production landscape are welcome to companies like Scandinavia’s Nice Drama, part of the Nordic territories Nice Entertainment Group.

As potential for growth in the local Nordic environment is limited due to the size of the market, alliances

with larger and dedicated production groups such as Lagardere are becoming essential for Nice Drama’s ambitions, says Patrick Nebout, executive producer international projects for nice Drama.

Nice Drama inked a co-development deal in midMarch that has Lagardere co-funding the development of a number of TV-series, and holding first option for co-production and international distribution.

Among projects covered by the deal and currently in development is the eight-episode series Valhalla, a coproduction tapping France’s Viking history at the time when Normandy was invaded by the Vikings at the end of the ninth century. The TV series will be filmed in English with international talent on board from the US, UK and Scandinavia.

Lagardere and nice Drama are also working on the development of a thriller series, Midnight Sun, a coproduction for Canal+ and SVT. Lagardere, especially, is an ideal partner for the kind of co-productions his company is looking to develop, Nebout says, adding: “Lagardere, of all the companies in Europe, comes the closest to the real studio model.

They work on both in-house projects and with independent producers and third parties on the development of new properties.”

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feature BUYERS

How the kids have changed Kids’ buyers face the challenge of finding programming that is entertaining, empowering and fresh for an audience that has been profoundly changed by the digital era. Gary Smith reports

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VER THE last six to eight years children’s programming needs and expectations have evolved beyond all recognition, with the demographic segments that used to be arranged in neat gaps of four to five years now compacted and, in some cases, irrelevant. For example, few producers would now even bother to try and make a cartoon series that appealed to tweens: “Animation series work with kids up to the age of around seven years-old, but even kids as young as five are now being drawn to live action, which has become the staple of the seven-to-12 segment,” Dermot Horan, director of broadcast and acquisitions at Irish state broadcaster RTE, says. “The other big change is that children from around eight- or nine-

We are coming to MIPTV this year hoping to find at least three or four more great animated shows Subhadarshi Tripathy years-old expect their channels to be varied in the same way that the channels their parents watch are, with some reality series and non-fiction alongside the pure entertainment.”

Last year Horan acquired all four series of V&S Entertainment’s pre-school show Everything’s

Wizards vs Aliens, co-developed with FremantleMedia and the BBC

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Tree Fu Tom (FremantleMedia/BBC)

Even kids as young as five are now being drawn to live action, which has become the staple of the seven-to-12 segment Dermot Horan

Rosie, the live-action Danni’s House spinoff Danni’s Castle from Zodiak, as well as renewing DreamWorks’ Penguins Of Madagascar and other popular series including Viacom’s Big Time Rush, iCarly and Disney’s The Wizards Of Waverley Place.

“MIPTV for me is often the market where I’ll be doing a lot of research, picking up series bibles and early animation demos, then by September many of those shows

are on air, so by MIPCOM we can get some idea of how they are performing,” he says. “And I’ll typically have around 70 meetings over the four days, starting at 08.00 and going through until dinner.”

RTE is launching a bespoke channel for the under-sevens on April 19. “We recognise that up to the age of four, it’s mainly the adults controlling the remote, and then from four to seven years the parents really need to be able

to trust the channel brand. We’re launching RTE Junior because it’s already established through being part of our kids’ block,” he adds. “We’re commissioning Tilly And Friends for the new channel, which is a co-production between ourselves, Jam Media and CBeebies. For MIPTV we’ll be debuting our tween live action series Mission Beach USA where local kids are taken to Florida in order to learn to be lifeguards.”

Caterina Gonnelli, acquisitions manager, EMEA for Disney France, often has to buy several years ahead in order to make sure of

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Marathon Media’s Lolirock

getting the best new shows — for example, Marathon Media’s Lolirock, a new animated series featuring magic, mystery and music, developed in partnership with France Televisions and Disney France. Music features heavily in the series; prior to the TV launch five animated Lolirock videos will be launched on social media and YouTube. Additionally, local Lolirock bands will be formed in each key territory, generating a hugely important secondary platform.

“We have been aware of Marathon’s Lolirock since 2009, but it won’t be on our channels until 2014, so we have to wait a long time to be able to see how our acquisitions work with the audience,” she says. “But Lolirock has the sort of mix that we like. It has a lot of aspects that teenagers will hook into including the band and their music, some excellent supporting characters, and a lead who is flawed but very likeable indeed.”

It is, says Gonnelli, just one of several Marathon series that play well with the Disney France audience.

“Although we often find that in-house series are our best rated shows, we have a long-term co-operation with the company and have acquired all six series of Totally Spies! which is superb and a very consistent performer. Also the French series Lou!, based on the popular comic books, performed extremely well for us last year.”

At MIPTV 2013 Gonnelli has quite a shopping list: “I’ll be looking for comedy shows for both boys and girls, as well as for live action shows that compli-

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feature RTE’s Dermot Horan

Zee Learn’s Subhadarshi Tripathy

BBC Children’s Joe Godwin

FremantleMedia Kids & Family Entertainment’s Sander Schwartz

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ment our in-house hits such as Jessie and Good Luck Charlie. And I would love to repeat the success of the kids’ telenovela Violetta, which was hugely popular in France and Italy, but that series set the bar very high,” she adds.

Indian kids’ channel Zee Learn is divided up into two main segments with content divided into animated series for the four-to-seven age group and locally produced content tailor-made for Indian kids in the eightto-14 year-old demographic. According to Subhadarshi Tripathy, Zee Learn’s head of business, MIPTV 2012 saw some acquisitions, and a few offers: “We bought the Jim Henson Company’s Dinosaur Train and we also made an offer on Fraggle Rock spin-off Doozers which is still in production. I also saw Zou from Cybergroup for the first time, and after we got back to India and discussed it, we made an offer on that show as well,” Tripathy says. “We also closed deals for The Happets and Saari with Imira Entertainment.”

Zee Learn is positioned as an edutainment channel with a remit to improve human capital through both its channels — Zee Learn and ZeeQ — and its over 1,000 pre-school centres around India. The centres have already received over 300,000 pupils. “This does of course limit the type of content we can consider,” Tripathy says. “But over the last year many acquisitions that we have made have been very successful, including another Henson Company show, Sid The Science Kid, alongside Nelvana shows such as Franklin & Friends, Babar And The Adventures Of Badou, The Backyardigans, The Magic School Bus and Cyberchase. We have also had good results with Daniel Tiger’s Neighbourhood from 9 Story and Portfolio’s The Cat In The Hat Knows A Lot About That. Every one of those series worked exceedingly well with our audience, and we are coming to MIPTV this year hoping to find at least three or four more great animated shows that will compliment our existing line-up.”

Just three years since its inception, FremantleMedia Kids & Family Entertainment is ramping up its market presence. Last December the company hired Joss Duffield as its vice-president of distribution for EMEA. Duffield was most recently eOne Family’s head of international sales, and began her new position in February 2013 reporting to FremantleMedia’s president of kids and family entertainment, Sander Schwartz. On top of that, a recently signed production partnership between BBC Children’s and FremantleMedia will see the two companies develop and produce a continuous sequence of new programmes aimed at children of all ages.

FremantleMedia and BBC Children’s will be codeveloping, co-producing and co-funding a number of new children’s shows over the course of the next five years, and investing tens of millions of pounds in order to fulfill the production requirements of the agreement. “As a producer you absolutely have to pay attention to what is being bought at any given market but both we and the BBC always try to be different, and you can’t do that by paying too much attention to what others are doing,” Schwartz says. “For example Strange Hill High, a co-production between the BBC, Factory Transmedia and FremantleMedia, is currently

Market visits are a great way to get a sense of what’s what, and being there feeds into what we do in various ways Joe Godwin

showing on CBeebies, and is like nothing else on the market. That’s partly down to the show’s Japanese creators, Yoshimi and Katoi, who invented a new style of stop-motion animation called Hypervynorama, combined with the scriptwriting talents of Joe Weinstein (The Simpsons, Futurama) and some fantastic voiceover talents.” A second series of the show was commissioned in February.

Director of BBC Children’s Joe Godwin agrees with Schwartz about observing, but not copying: “Market visits are a great way to get a sense of what’s what, and being there feeds into what we do in various ways,” he says. “Of course there’s usually some off-the-shelf buying, and whatever’s going on at the market inevitably registers with us, but both FremantleMedia and the BBC like to think that we’re in the vanguard, and we know that we need to produce shows like previous collaborations Wizards vs Aliens and Tree Fu Tom that are distinctive.”

Godwin agrees with RTE’s Horan about the changes in kids’ viewing habits: “In a general sense the notions that we had about genres no longer mean that much, and the tween audience definitely does expect a mix of reality, factual and entertainment,” he says. “In fact the genres are so mixed up these days that we’ve changed our structure because factual and entertainment are much more merged. Consequently we are much more focused on finding the best possible shows, and that means sourcing the best concepts and stories and then, when you have that, you figure out who is likely to watch it.”

Strange Hill High was a perfect example of this new process. “Despite the fact that the show has an amazing and distinctive look that is unlike anything else, or rather because of that, when we were first showing it to buyers a lot of them were rather baffled and unsure how they would place it,” Schwartz says. “But it’s normal that it would take them a bit of time to get into the concept, because it’s bold.” Godwin agrees: “Over the last two years we’ve backed several shows that we thought could become flagship series, but the truth is that finding the next Horrible Histories is not easy. You can make judgements on paper, but until they’re on the air you can’t answer the big question, which is ‘do we make more or not?’, it’s a very binary business in that way.”