TV Real October 2014 by World Screen

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TVREAL

WWW.TVREAL.WS

OCTOBER 2014

MIPCOM EDITION

Wildlife Docs / Reality TV Families / Anthony Bourdain / Nat Geo’s Ward Platt

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CONTENTS FEATURES

Ricardo Seguin Guise Publisher Anna Carugati Editor Mansha Daswani Executive Editor Kristin Brzoznowski Managing Editor Joanna Padovano Associate Editor Joel Marino Assistant Editor Simon Weaver Online Director Victor L. Cuevas Production & Design Director Phyllis Q. Busell Art Director Cesar Suero Sales & Marketing Director Faustyna Hariasz Sales & Marketing Coordinator Terry Acunzo Business Affairs Manager

Ricardo Seguin Guise President Anna Carugati Executive VP & Group Editorial Director Mansha Daswani Associate Publisher & VP of Strategic Development TV Real © 2014 WSN INC. 1123 Broadway, #1207 New York, NY 10010 Phone: (212) 924-7620 Fax: (212) 924-6940 Website: www.tvreal.ws

Seeing Stars

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Channel surf through some leading factual networks and you’ll find a who’s who of Hollywood A-list celebrities.

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A bevy of well-known stars are front and center in the latest productions for factual channels. Oscar-winning actor Adrien Brody plays the famed illusionist Harry Houdini in the HISTORY miniseries Houdini. Dean Norris, of Breaking Bad and Under the Dome fame, is also doing a project for HISTORY, the six-part Sons of Liberty. Movie legend Martin Sheen leads Animal Planet’s Moby Dick prequel The Whale. And this list goes on. Alongside these examples of star-powered scripted productions, there is a wealth of straightforward factual fare that also has celebrities at the center. Documentaries have increasingly been looking to charismatic celebrity leads to reach out to a younger generation. Soccer stud David Beckham stepped into the spotlight in the BBC One doc David Beckham Into the Unknown, while British royal Prince Harry embarked on an adventure in Harry’s South Pole Heroes. There are a number of celebs taking part in reality shows, from being the main focus of a docuseries to serving as judges and mentors on talent competitions. Brothers Nick and Drew Lachey, best known from the ’90s boy band 98 Degrees, are starring in a new A&E docuseries. A&E is also home to Wahlburgers, which features actors/pop singers/producers Mark and Donnie Wahlberg. One of the features in this issue of TV Real explores the popularity of family-based reality programming, a slew of which center on celebrity broods. There are also instances where the series’ popularity has been the launchpad for stardom—the ubiquitous Kardashian clan is among the examples. Anthony Bourdain was already a star in the culinary world, but his travel series are what made him a globally recognized face. We hear from him in this issue about his CNN hit Anthony Bourdain Parts Unknown. With so much factual programming placing an emphasis on largerthan-life characters, it’s no wonder that these intriguing personalities are able to become stars in their own right. But many subjects in the factual landscape are so captivating that celebrities need not apply. The stars of the animal kingdom come out to play in nature and wildlife programming, a genre we examine in-depth in another TV Real feature. Look for the celebrity trend to continue for factual channels, though networks have also not forgotten about the power of audacious documentary storytelling. Indeed, fusing entertainment and education is at the heart of many doc networks, among them National Geographic Channel, as Ward Platt tells us in this edition. —Kristin Brzoznowski

From blue-chip specials to long-running series, the wildlife genre is a hot commodity.

Family-based reality shows are enabling broadcasters to create brand-defining, longrunning franchises.

12 INTERVIEWS

Anthony Bourdain

Nat Geo’s Ward Platt

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A+E Networks Wahlburgers / Tiny House Nation / Love Prison The Wahlberg family is front and center in A+E Networks’ Wahlburgers. The show looks at the family-owned restaurant they run in Boston. “The series is a lot of fun,” says Joel Denton, the managing director of international content sales and partnerships at A+E Networks. “The family dynamic is fantastic, and there’s a new breakout star in mom Alma.” A+E Networks also has a new lifestyle series, Tiny House Nation, which explores the movement of extreme downsizing. “We are also debuting Love Prison, a series that has generated a lot of buzz in the U.S.,” says Denton. Love Prison is a social experiment where couples that have been dating online meet for the first time in a tiny shack on a remote island. After spending seven days there, they decide whether to leave together or call it quits.

“Our main goal for the market is to unveil our new lineup of programming to buyers and further extend our reach internationally, so we continue to strengthen our position as a leading supplier of premium content.” Wahlburgers

—Joel Denton

ARTE Sales Let’s Dance / Looking for the Hobbit / Voyage of the Continents The three-part Let’s Dance, a top title from ARTE Sales, traces the history of dance in the 20th century. ARTE Sales is also presenting Looking for the Hobbit. The series sees John Howe, the illustrator of J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings novels and the conceptual artist for Peter Jackson’s companion films, going in search of the legends that inspired these works and the places that gave rise to them. “Our series Looking for the Hobbit will match the release of the new worldwide blockbuster film by Peter Jackson The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies,” says Cédric Hazard, the company’s head of international sales and acquisitions. Another ARTE Sales highlight is the second season of Voyage of the Continents.

“We’re looking to establish ourselves as the ultimate reference in documentary distribution, providing creative programs to all platforms that can rely on ARTE’s strong brand with its high public profile and excellent image.” Let’s Dance

—Cédric Hazard

Canamedia A Look at Luxury / Teens 101 / Of Oozies and Elephants Canamedia’s lifestyle series A Look at Luxury takes viewers on a journey into the very highest levels of the luxury sector. The company’s Teens 101 series touches on the major issues facing young people today. In the way of documentary fare, Of Oozies and Elephants focuses on the relationship between Burmese working timber elephants, their daily handlers and the international scientists who travel through Myanmar to investigate whether working in this way could potentially save this endangered species from extinction. “We’re constantly on the lookout for unique stories that resonate throughout different cultures and have an evergreen appeal,” says Andrea Stokes, the managing director of international sales and acquisitions at Canamedia.

“Although we deal in very diverse genres of factual programming, they all have the common thread of a solid narrative story to tell.” A Look at Luxury 502 World Screen 10/14

—Andrea Stokes

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NHK Enterprises Raging Earth / The Supernatural: A Scientific Perspective / Survival in the Ice Kingdom: Polar Bears NHK Enterprises’Raging Earth uses cutting-edge science to explain the mechanisms behind the mega-quakes, supertyphoons and other severe natural disasters that have been occurring around the world in recent years. For The Supernatural: A Scientific Perspective, an NHK science-program team took an objective look at psychic phenomena, reincarnation, telepathy and other aspects of the occult. “We believe these series will appeal to international buyers because they take new, ambitious approaches to subjects that interest people all over the world,” says Noriko Aratani, the company’s deputy general manager for international sales. Survival in the Ice Kingdom: Polar Bears is the latest program in NHK’s international best-selling Wildlife series.

“We’re going to release finished documentaries in 4K for the first time.” Survival in the Ice Kingdom: Polar Bears

—Noriko Aratani

Off the Fence Tareq Taylor’s Nordic Cookery / Castle Builders / Little Matters From Lucky Day Productions comes Tareq Taylor’s Nordic Cookery, which looks on as the titular Swedish chef explores Nordic cuisine. “Through its immersive talent and amazing production value, Tareq Taylor’s Nordic Cookery truly brings the Nordic region alive,” says Bo Stehmeier, the managing director of distribution at Off the Fence. “The recent explosion of Nordic imagery into mainstream TV seems to be doing for Scandinavia what The Lord of the Rings did for New Zealand.” Another highlight from the company is Castle Builders, a Green Bay Media production spotlighting medieval buildings and the men who built them. Off the Fence is also showcasing Little Matters, a nature and wildlife program made by Alvaro Mendoza Productions.

“We want to help new DTT, OTT and other digital players launch factual, educational and learning offerings.” Tareq Taylor’s Nordic Cookery

—Bo Stehmeier

Passion Distribution Man Finds Food / Charlie Luxton’s Homes By the Sea / So You Think You’d Survive In Man Finds Food, the well-known TV personality and food enthusiast Adam Richman travels to major U.S. cities to discover culinary secrets. “Adam’s passion, knowledge and enthusiasm have been a hit with audiences throughout the world, and he brings huge global appeal following his success in series such as Man V. Food,” says Sally Miles, the CEO of Passion Distribution. “And staying with talent-led series, Passion is excited to unveil Charlie Luxton’s new series for Channel 4 from True North, Charlie Luxton’s Homes By the Sea. It takes an inspiring look at exceptional dream homes along the coast.” With a new 100-hours-a-year output deal signed with The Weather Channel, Passion is showcasing four new series at MIPCOM, including So You Think You’d Survive and American Supernatural.

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“We are extremely excited to be coming to MIPCOM with a number of really strong factualentertainment and talent-driven series, targeting the key genres and demos that appeal to our buyers for primetime slots.” —Sally Miles

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TCB Media Rights Jacked! / Closing Time / World’s Richest Dogs Jeremy Patterson and his team of ex-cons travel across the U.S. ‘jacking up’ houses and lifting spirits in Jacked!, which is being distributed by TCB Media Rights. “It’s a strong co-viewing show,” says Paul Heaney, the company’s managing director. “Guys like the danger and jeopardy and problem-solving aspects, while women respond to the emotion of a home and family under threat.” TCB’s Closing Time spotlights individuals who work in late-night occupations that keep the city running, from cab drivers to paramedics to owners of takeaway spots. “It’s fascinating to go behind the scenes to see how cities work to keep danger off the streets,” says Heaney. World’s Richest Dogs, about canines who have it all, is “a story about excess, which always makes for great entertainment,” Heaney notes.

“This programming slate is our strongest and most diverse yet.” —Paul Heaney Closing Time

Terranoa Moon / Freedom, An Eagle Takes Flight / Forgotten by History The transmedia project Moon has a dedicated website, app and coffee-table book in addition to the miniseries for TV broadcast. “Using 4K shots of the moon and a great cinematic approach, this landmark program will be particularly topical for all TV programmers on March 20, 2015, when the full eclipse of the sun occurs in the northern Atlantic region,” says Isabelle Graziadey, the head of international sales and acquisitions at Terranoa. The company is also presenting Freedom, An Eagle Takes Flight, a documentary that features the encounter between a sea eagle living in the Alps and a captive eagle. Forgotten by History offers new insights into the history of the 20th century, spotlighting the often-overlooked men and women who helped to define the times.

“Freedom, An Eagle Takes Flight has a great uplifting story with stunning visuals that will stand out in the schedule.” Freedom, An Eagle Takes Flight

—Isabelle Graziadey

Tricon Films & Television Human Resources / Dining INNvasion / The Restorers The series Human Resources, distributed by Tricon Films & Television, is billed as a factual comedy. It spotlights the team at TerraCycle, an innovative recycling company. Tricon is also launching Dining INNvasion, which follows executive chef Victor Barry and event planner Rebecca Wise as they revitalize dated resorts and inns with new menus and dining-room rejuvenations. There’s also The Restorers, about men and women who restore warbirds and antique aircrafts. “Dining INNvasion is a great fit within our lifestyle slate, and this type of programming has consistently done well for us,” says Lia Dolente, the director of international sales and communications at Tricon. “We have found a strong international appetite for factual series, so we are excited to be launching The Restorers at this market.”

“We always aim to expand the reach of the Tricon brand across new territories and platforms as we establish new relationships and continue to strengthen existing ones.” Dining INNvasion 506 World Screen 10/14

—Lia Dolente

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Wild! BBC Worldwide’s Africa. 508 World Screen 10/14

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From blue-chip specials to long-running series, the wildlife genre is a hot commodity. By Juliana Koranteng udiences around the world are more than willing to head to where the wild things are—at least from the comfort of their living rooms. High-profile distributors and producers are eagerly responding to demands from TV networks for gripping factual stories about ferocious beasts, lethal bugs, venomous reptiles and their relationship with and responses to humans and the environment. Be it about deceptively cuddly-looking pandas and polar bears, creepy-crawly spiders, snakes and centipedes, or weird-science creatures beneath the oceans, bold wildlife content consistently captures the imagination of viewers. Granted, wildlife shows might not be able to hog the limelight the way prime-time event miniseries can. However, from big-budget blockbuster blue-chip programs to cost-effective daytime fillers, natural-history documentaries can currently do no wrong. Allison Bean, the managing director of Off the Fence Productions, can’t get enough of the genre. “Wildlife programming is like an escape from modern life’s stresses for people. In times of economic hardship, viewing figures go up,” Bean says. “The natural world is always very beautiful. It’s a luxury product everyone can afford. That is why several networks have wildlife channels that need to be filled.” Off the Fence joins a roll call of major wildlife content creators and distributors that include BBC Worldwide, National Geographic Channel, NHK, ORF, Terra Mater Factual Studios and Terranoa. For the most part, they all agree it is worth finding the budget for large-scale bluechip productions.

WILD AMBITION “More money and time is spent on large-scale specials, so it is possible to make high-quality programs with more noteworthy content,” says Gen Sasaki, the general manager of nature and science programs, programming and production headquarters at NHK Enterprises. “After NHK’s success with Legends of the Deep, we conceived the Deep Ocean series, which will show the ocean depths on an even grander scale. We are making a worldwide call for production partners.” Top-end budgets require co-production partnerships. “NHK plans to continue engaging in international co-production on a large scale as a way to make major specials such as Deep Ocean and Life Force II,” Sasaki adds. Mark Reynolds, the genre director for factual at BBC Worldwide, says that landmark blue-chip shows are crucial to the company’s distribution business. “We continue to secure strong sales [for] this type of con-

tent,” he states. “Therefore, we need to make sure we have a robust pipeline delivering content of that standard consistently each year.” On BBC Worldwide’s slate is Africa, a series made by the BBC Natural History Unit that took four years to produce and has been sold to more than 200 territories. Life Story, narrated by the ever-reliable Sir David Attenborough, was released earlier this year. Future BBC Worldwide titles include The Hunt, a seven-part series about the relationship between predators and prey due next year. And, almost a decade after the landmark Planet Earth will be One Planet. Described as “the ultimate tour of an iconic ecosystem,” the series is set to be completed in 2016. “I would say the demand for high-quality wildlife is growing,” says Janet Han Vissering, the senior VP of development and production at Nat Geo WILD. Among the channel’s standout hits is Destination Wild, which brings breathtaking unexplored territories and creatures into viewers’ living rooms. This fall, Wild Congo, Wild Namibia, Wild Nile and Wild Australia will join Giant Pandas and Kingdom of the Apes to premiere on the Nat Geo WILD network in the U.S. and internationally. “This is family viewing at its best,” Vissering adds. “What we want are spectacular stories and great cinematography.” ORF, Austria’s public-broadcasting corporation, has been a major advocate of wildlife programming via UNIVERSUM, its prime-time slot for the genre. Andrew Solomon, ORF’s head of natural history and history, says the network is gearing up to respond to renewed interest in high-end productions. “Following the spectacular two-parter Danube: Europe’s Amazon, we are about to start production of our biggest-ever blue-chip specials,” Solomon says. These include Brahmaputra: River from Heaven, which follows the gargantuan river that passes through every climate zone from the Arctic to the tropical. Also on ORF’s slate is Hell and Paradise: Russia’s Wild Sea. The two-part production by Franz Hafner and Interspot Film is a look at the “turbulent” ocean between Japan and Russia. Solomon points out that “all these projects can be shown as miniseries or as an evening-filling special.”

FILLING A NEED Although Off the Fence is currently working on a bigbudget wildlife feature film, Bean cautions against investing in blue-chip shows just for the sake of it. “For several international networks, wildlife is nice to have. They will not throw loads of cash at it. It’s the bread and butter, not the party,” she declares. “Every now and then, something very innovative comes along, but it’s mostly a very conservative market.” Off the Fence titles doing well with channels include its Wildest franchise. In World’s Wildest Cities: Manaus and Monkey Thieves, the wildlife culture

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story ideas that can be narrated in new ways thanks to technology and scientific developments. Offering a new perspective is key, says Isabelle Graziadey, the VP and head of international sales and acquisitions at Terranoa. She cites La France Sauvage (Wild France), a 90-minute documentary on biodiversity in France produced by Frédéric Fougea and Parisbased Boréales. It clinched more than 6.5 million viewers in France last December. The French loved Wild France because it “showed the richness of wildlife in France, something that is exclusive to their own country. Wildlife on your own doorstep—as opposed to some far-flung territory—resonates strongly with viewers,” Graziadey explains. Unlike Wild Africa, a 2001 BBC series that focused on the traditional recurring theme of fauna and flora on the African continent, Wild France reveals how much is missed by not examining the wildlife in front of our very noses. Graziadey also highlights some wildlife creativity she finds impressive. Night on Earth, by France’s WINDS Films, opens a window into the entrancing nocturnal life and colors the human eye cannot see in the pitch dark of night. In +/-5 Meters, which Terranoa is showcasing at MIPCOM, she is struck by how much we learn about humans’ link with wildlife in the space between the ocean’s surface and five meters below. It is scheduled for release in the fall of 2015. “It’s not the normal beautiful ‘big sea’ story; it goes to places you can’t normally go to, to bodies of water and marine life in the coral reef, the Arctic waters and the bottom of the ocean, and we’ve already gained a lot of interest [from broadcasters],” says Graziadey. “It is the kind of wildlife program that will raise the profile of the channel that shows it.”

ANIMAL RIGHTS Wild Australia is part of Nat Geo WILD’s Destination Wild strand.

associated with natural, untouched environments has been extended into urban surroundings. New ways of approaching traditional natural-history themes and subjects, and innovative scientific methods for unraveling Mother Nature’s secrets, are contributing to programming themes designed to keep viewers’ eyes glued to the screen. “There is a huge fascination with animal emotion, intelligence and communication: everything that concerns our developing relationship with the natural world,” ORF’s Solomon observes about new production trends.

UNCHARTED TERRITORY For BBC Worldwide’s Reynolds, “There are really two ways of making great natural-history content: film new animal behavior that has never been seen before, or film what we are already familiar with in an entirely different way.” He notes that the company’s catalogue features Kangaroo Dundee, Tigers About the House and Beyond Human, which reveal aspects of animal habits and habitats in ways that “allow us to see things we wouldn’t normally be aware of.” In addition, BBC producers dip into the British broadcaster’s renowned Natural History Unit archive to source

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Over the decades, wildlife programming has been influencing consumers’ personal views. The question this raises is whether some programs fall under the category of “wildlife” or “activism.” “In recent years, ‘conservation’ has become a dirty word for some broadcasters,” Graziadey says. “Like ‘climate change,’ they fear it will alienate audiences who want to watch something lighter and less in your face. We have been very careful about going after this type of program.” She refers to The End of the Line, a powerful but unsettling film about excessive fishing in European Union waters. Made by U.K.-based Dogwoof, it led to high-profile names (including British royalty HRH Prince Charles and TV chef Gordon Ramsay) openly supporting sustainable fishing and spurning practices that hurt endangered species. Tigers About the House, a BBC series about cute hand-reared tiger cubs, became a political hot potato after airing earlier this year. It emerged that a zookeeper at Australia Zoo, where the series was filmed, was mauled by a tiger and suffered severe injuries. Critics attacked the show for not including or referring to the incident. Adding fuel to the fire was the fact that Australia Zoo was co-founded by Bob and Lyn Irwin, the parents of Steve Irwin, the wildlife-TV icon who died in 2006 after being struck by a stingray barb.

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[about the world’s largest coral-reef system] for instance, we shot the spawning of the corals in 4K,” Sasaki says. “We took advantage of the wide dynamic range of the 4K RAW format to show underwater scenes in a way that conveyed their depth and breadth. We hope to use 4K to shoot plants and miniature paintings, for instance, in botanical art, in ways that reveal the ecology and wonders of plants.” What should also not be forgotten is the innovative equipment offering new solutions to age-old technical problems. These include the use of flying drones and octocopters for aerial shots, portable camBLOCK cranes for enabling smoother camera movements and the nextgeneration MoVI camera stabilizers.

HOST DILEMMAS

Wildest Indochina is a new release in Off the Fence’s successful Wildest franchise.

Having captured the footage and written the script, to what extent should wildlife production include a presenter? There are two schools of thought: use a renowned personality or an expert to be part of the program’s branding, or opt for an anonymous voice that can be easily dubbed for international viewing. Sir David Attenborough, the British wildlife expert, is virtually synonymous with BBC natural-history programming, and his distinguished presence has also made him a household name abroad. “When the presenter is someone like Sir David Attenborough, there is already a strong international following, as he brings so much authority to the content,” notes BBC Worldwide’s Reynolds. Terra Mater’s Köhler also feels strongly about the matter. “In order to be embraced by international audiences, a presenter must be authentic—viewers need to believe him or her and that he or she actually likes and knows about the subject,” he says. “There is absolutely no point in using a host, no matter how famous, just for the sake of someone presenting the program.” In the end, however, whether blue chip or not, presenter-led or not, broadcasters will not compromise on production standards in the heated competition for the best in wildlife programming.

These sensitive issues aside, new technologies are spurring advancements in awe-inspiring wildlife shows. All stakeholders in the wildlife-production chain agree that emerging 4K cinematography is making a significant difference. A major appeal of wildlife programming is the ability to demonstrate the fascinating minute details the naked eye cannot see. Nat Geo WILD’s Vissering illustrates what is possible as she describes scenes featuring hummingbirds, officially the world’s tiniest birds, in Jewelled Messengers from Terra Mater Factual Studios. “The [Ultra HD] camera used brought everything to a standstill, an achievement as they fly at such a tremendous speed, at a rate humans can’t see,” she says. “People were even asking whether the image was real or used computer graphics. 4K is also future-proofing projects. As natural-history programs are watched over and over again, you don’t want to be disappointed with the visuals later on, especially as 4K TV penetration grows.” “4K is a great improvement in quality,” states Walter Köhler, the CEO of Terra Mater Factual Studios. “Innumerable details become visible for the audience, and that realism and authenticity draw them into the action, practically creating the feeling of being on location.” NHK, the Japanese broadcaster that has been pushing the limits of wildlife cinematography, is pioneering 8K resolution. “We have begun 4K production as a stepping-stone towards 8K,” NHK Enterprises’ Sasaki says. As the industry is still getting used to 4K, the possibilities offered by NHK’s “Super HiVision” 8K could be staggering. “For The Great Barrier Reef ORF’s The Grey and the Red: Secrets of Squirrels is being shot in 4K ultra high definition.

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We Are

Passion’s Tori & Dean: Home Sweet Hollywood.

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Family Family-based reality shows are enabling broadcasters to create brand-defining, long-running franchises. By Kristin Brzoznowski rom the unconventional to the downright outlandish, from the unknown to the infamous, families of all sorts have opened their doors and invited us into their homes. And reality TV is loving this trend. These broods bound together by blood deliver high drama, with equal doses of humility and heart. But what makes a particular family compelling reality-TV viewing? The core to these shows (or at least the successful ones) is the element of authenticity. “The characters have to be authentic and genuine; when they’re not, it shows,” says Joel Denton, the managing director of international content sales and partnerships at A+E Networks, which is home to such hits as Duck Dynasty and Wahlburgers. “Audiences have to be able to relate to the people in those shows as well. With Duck Dynasty, the family all sitting together as a family every day is a big thing; people relate to that. These shows have universal story lines, things that people can relate to in their own lives to a certain extent. “Obviously, there has to be some entertainment,” he adds. “They have to be interesting and fun.” Indeed, many of these shows are anchored by big, bold, larger-than-life personalities, upping the entertainment factor. Such is the case for Cineflix Rights’ stable that includes The Little Couple, The Cupcake Girls and Property Brothers. Chris Bonney, Cineflix Media’s CEO of rights, agrees that authenticity and humor are paramount to a successful familybased reality show. “It’s what we look for and what truly resonates with buyers,” he says. “With the huge success of some family-based reality series, we have been pitched lots of similar generic ideas with other families engaged in businesses or other pursuits, but most of the time they are just not that interesting, and you can see in the sizzle that it’s all just too contrived and manufactured. It’s easy to spot the families with a dynamic that truly works on camera.”

IT’S ALL RELATIVE The interplay between family members is certainly a key aspect. “The success of these shows has everything to do with family dynamics, and when you add in someone being famous and/or extraordinarily wealthy, it makes the family dynamics, and the reality program, all that much more interesting to watch,” says Michael Lolato, the senior VP of international distribution at GRB Entertainment. GRB has had a number of successful family-based reality titles over the years, including Princes of Malibu, Growing Up Gotti and The Houstons. One of the company’s bestselling titles has been Braxton Family Values, which follows award-winning singer Toni Braxton and her sisters. Each of these shows comes with the added bonus of star power, which Lolato believes is a definite advantage in the

marketplace. “Because of the instantly recognizable factor and the already built-in fan base, it is an easier sell to springboard from,” he says. This view is shared by Sebastian Burkhardt, the head of sales at Banijay International, which at MIPCOM is launching The Sorrentinos, a reality series featuring Mike “The Situation” Sorrentino, of Jersey Shore fame, and his family. “It’s useful to have at least one well-known family member as an initial hook,” he notes. “However, often these kinds of shows can wind up becoming more of a vehicle for other members of the family than the most famous cast member.”

FAMILLIONAIRES They can also become launchpads for creating celebrities. Even if a family wasn’t famous before, these shows thrust them into the spotlight, and some propel them onward into global stardom. Take, for example, the Duck Dynasty crew or the Harrison family of A+E Networks’ Pawn Stars. “They became stars in their own right with the shows,” notes A+E’s Denton. “Pawn Stars’ Rick and Corey Harrison weren’t stars, but now they travel all over the world and have [a huge number of] fans.” Passion Distribution has a mix of celebrity-led and noncelebrity-led reality titles, and has seen that there’s room in the marketplace for both. “Celebrities have the big advantage of being immediately recognizable across the globe,” says Elin Thomas, the global head of sales at Passion, which distributes celeb titles such as Life with La Toya. “Audiences everywhere are intrigued and fascinated by celebrities and want to know what’s happening in their lives and families, how they interact with each other and what the nature of their relationships is within the family,” she adds. “However, while celebrity does sell, so does the extraordinary, for example, Six Little McGhees.” Electus International, too, is mixed about celebrity allure. John Pollak, the company’s president, agrees that there are certain stories that are made better by having well-known figures in them, but also believes there are benefits to using families who’ve never seen the spotlight. “The reason a show like Mob Wives is so captivating is because they aren’t well known outside of their own world,” he says. “That allows viewers a look into this world that they would never be in. They are watching people really acting like themselves. They do not have to protect an image or an identity like a celebrity would; they’re really able to be themselves.” Perhaps one of the most widely known examples of the celebrity-family phenomenon is the Kardashians. Through E!’s Keeping Up with the Kardashians and its spin-offs, this family has embraced their reality-TV fame and capitalized on it like no other. In a case like this, some will argue, the

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more famous they’ve become, the better the show has become. As their star rises, the cameras have been able to follow them to over-the-top events, once-in-a-lifetime vacations and other glamorous affairs.

THE DARK SIDE OF FAME

The success of Mob Wives, part of the Electus International catalogue, has led to several spin-off series.

There are times, though, when a family’s newfound fame can complicate things, clouding the original authenticity that made the show so appealing in the first place. “You don’t want their celebrity to ever get in the way of a great story,” cautions Electus’s Pollak. “If they’re more about protecting who they are and their image and their brand, they might be a little bit hesitant now that they are celebrities to really let their guard down and let the cameras into their world like they had when they weren’t as well known.” There’s also a case to be made that having a celebrity family may limit the reach of a show. Paul Heaney, the managing director of TCB Media Rights, home to titles such as Jacked! and Age Gap Love, backs this position. He says, “A celebrity family will only have a certain breadth of appeal. They are limited to a few markets where these people are known. “It doesn’t necessarily repeat-view either,” he argues. “Once you’ve watched it once, would you watch it a second time? Whereas with other shows that have elements of jeopardy and more of a story, you are willing to watch a second and third time, which is why broadcasters like them. They’re durable. They’re robust. I think shows [without celebrities] will have an enduring appeal and also a longer shelf life.” Heaney also believes that noncelebrity titles have broader appeal. “With the celebrity family-based reality shows, you are really going for a younger demo, which is fine,” he says.

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“But when I go to add a show to the catalogue, I’m always looking for the broadest possible demographic. You need to know that if it’s not going to be really broad, it has to have bang-on appeal in a specific sub-demographic.” Heaney says that a positive aspect of family-based reality shows, whether they’re celebrity-led or not, is their volume. “The good thing about these is that you can make lots and lots of them. It’s a real plus point for all channels now. It used to just be a plus point for cable and satellite; now it’s a plus point for everyone.” A+E Networks’ shows air in prime time in the U.S. and on its branded channels internationally. “When we’re selling them to free-to-air or cable channels internationally, they often start in daytime slots,” notes Denton. “As they become more popular, they can gradually move up the schedule. A traditional [sequence] would be that they start in daytime, the audience begins to like the show, they move up into that shoulder-peak area, the audience continues to grow, and then they’ll find their way to prime time.” Electus International landed a prime-time slot for Mob Wives with Discovery throughout EMEA. “It was a great platform for us and really gave us great exposure,” Pollak says. “With Dog and Beth: On the Hunt, because of [Dog and Beth’s] history, we’ve seen it playing on male-skewing channels. But, because they are celebrities, it is also playing on more mainstream channels in certain territories where they already have a loyal following and an audience.” Electus has also fared well with Mob Wives spin-offs. “They’ve done great domestically and internationally,” Pollak says. “On Dog and Beth, there are constantly ongoing conversations, internally and with the network, about what could be done and what other opportunities there are

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The cast of A+E Networks’ Duck Dynasty have become stars in their own right.

because they’re such great characters and they have such a loyal following. “That’s a huge advantage for us and for a network, to be able to say, We have this hit show, and now we have these characters that are loved—let’s spin off and do more shows with them because we know that we have an audience for it,” he continues. “It’s a lot less risk for them than starting with a new family or a new idea, because the market hasn’t been created yet. For shows like this that are hits domestically, the market has already been created and it’s much easier for them to spin off and do other series.”

For Passion, the success of Tori & Dean: Home Sweet Hollywood led to the companion show Tori & Dean: sTORIbook Weddings becoming part of the catalogue. “If the original series performs well, it would be an advantage for broadcasters to have spin-offs,” says Thomas. “Once audiences are hooked on characters, they want to see more of them in different settings and circumstances. Also, such families can become faces of a channel and open up opportunities for new programming outside of the original series.” Given the high episode volume and the potential spinoffs, it’s easy for a network to brand itself using the stars of these shows, famous or not. And, oftentimes, these families don’t mind flexing their own marketing muscle to help push this along even further. “The marketing behind it is huge for us,” notes Electus’s Pollak. “All of the people who we’re working with on these shows are very in tune with how the international market works, and they want to help and they want to participate. They are more than willing to fly anywhere to do local oncamera interviews, to do phone interviews, online interviews. They tweet constantly when foreign broadcasters are airing [their shows] so they can continue to build the audience. [Social media is] a selling point for us, and I think it’s appreciated by the broadcasters because it complements the [advertising and promotion] work that they’re already doing.” Audiences love family-based reality shows for their authenticity, distributors love them for their salability, and broadcasters love them for their repeatability and marketability—these series are proving to be an all-around win for the international TV market.

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Anthony

Bourdain When CNN announced that Anthony Bourdain would be joining the network to helm a new travel and food weekend show, there were many questions about how the snarky chef/author/TV personality would fit alongside breaking news and political talking heads. Anthony Bourdain Parts Unknown has since emerged as a huge hit for CNN, in the U.S. and abroad, and has racked up Emmy and Peabody Awards over its three seasons. Sold internationally by Endemol Worldwide Distribution, Anthony Bourdain Parts Unknown has continued to innovate in the travel genre by offering new perspectives on typical tourist destinations like Tokyo or Los Angeles, and by venturing to places few other shows would, including Libya, Iran and the Congo. TV REAL: What was appealing to you about moving from Travel Channel to CNN? BOURDAIN: Well, the world opened up. CNN is an international news-gathering organization with resources everywhere, experience everywhere, correspondents who’ve worked everywhere. So nothing is off the table. We’ve shot in the Congo, Libya, Iran—those are all destinations that would have been impossible to visit [on another network]. Also, I have to say, CNN has given me a degree of freedom and latitude to go anywhere I like, to do what I want when I get there and to tell the story in any style I’d like to. They’ve been really supportive of that from the beginning. They’re making it possible for me and the people I work with, my creative partners, to do the best work of our lives. TV REAL: What was it like for you the first time you intoned, “This is CNN”? BOURDAIN: [Laughs] It felt so funny. It was thrilling! TV REAL: Could you have ever imagined, early on in your TV career, that you’d be hosting a show on the world’s largest 24-hour news channel? BOURDAIN: I think CNN saw it before I did. I was really surprised when they first called. We made a point of bringing in some of our most off-the-wall shows from the past and said, “You’d better look at these. Are you sure you know what you’re doing here?” As it’s worked out, the kind of material that we cover, while it’s not news, in many cases is a complement to the news. We just shot in Iran and I think it’s going to be really shocking to people to see how ordinary Iranians live and who they are and what they’re like. The Iran we see in the news, and the events we read about as they relate to Iran,

are just so at odds with what you see when you have an hour to hang out with ordinary Iranians eating at their table and just doing spectacularly ordinary things. We tend not to pay attention to places like Congo or Libya, or know much about them, until something really awful happens. It’s useful within a news context to have some image or idea of who we’re talking about when that hard news story happens. So I don’t think my show is as off-brand [for CNN] as some people suggested when the deal was first announced. TV REAL: You’re also going to places much closer to home for American viewers. BOURDAIN: One of the challenges of the show, and one of the things that is most gratifying, is to go to places that presumably we know about, that are close to home, and look at them from a perspective that people haven’t seen before. Los Angeles has been filmed many, many times. We decided to go there and basically pretend that there is no one in Los Angeles but Koreans, and look at it entirely from within Koreatown. When I visit a lot of places in America, I pretend that they are in a foreign country; I pretend I don’t know anything about them. I go in with as fresh a perspective as I can, rather than making assumptions. TV REAL: How do you find your guides and experts? BOURDAIN: There’s a class of people called “fixers” around the world who generally work with production companies. A fixer is somebody who knows who to get permits from and how to make basic things happen and how to interpret the often fast-changing situation on the ground, to let you know if it’s time to run or time to stay. We also reach out to chefs and bloggers. There’s a pretty lengthy process of back

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era and his terrified-looking hosts sitting there next to him like deer caught in the headlights. We work really hard to get everybody loose and comfortable, so we’re more like annoying relatives with little cameras than an invading army.

Anthony Bourdain Parts Unknown is now in its fourth season on CNN.

and forth, Skyping and talking and trying to get a sense of, Do they understand what it is we’re looking for? Do they have a sense of humor? Do they understand that we’re not doing a travelogue or a hard news story? We’re not looking for the best, top ten things someone needs to know. We’re not even necessarily looking for any kind of fair overview. This is an essay-driven show. You depend on your fixer a lot, and if you don’t have a good one, especially in a place like the Congo, it can literally be a life-or-death situation. TV REAL: It must still be stressful though, being in politically unstable places. BOURDAIN: I’m a father of a 7-year-old girl. I’m very close to the crew and I know their families. I’m not interested in being a daredevil or making stupid choices just because it will be exciting TV. I try to be smart about these things. I’m not out there doing stunt television. If people are shooting at me, I’m not going to put my head up over the wall just to look like Geraldo [Rivera, an American reporter]. I try to be smart, and grateful. I’m lucky to see stuff that very few people get to see. TV REAL: Given CNN’s reach and the increasing popularity of the show, I imagine more people recognize you in far-flung locations now. Does that present production challenges as you’re filming? BOURDAIN: Yes, particularly with social media now. A successful day is when I go to a noodle stand and they have absolutely no idea who I am and wouldn’t care in any case. That would be the ideal situation. After that, it’s a question of whether people will keep quiet about it until we’re long gone. You don’t want people standing in the background. You don’t want the dynamic of the place to get weird. Cameras already change the dynamic in the room. We work very hard to mitigate that by spending a lot of time hanging out with our subjects until they’re super comfortable with us before we pick up the cameras and actually start filming. If there are things happening in the background, we want those to be the ordinary things—we want everything to look as close to or exactly the way it did the day before we showed up. There’s a huge difference between our show at its best and other travel shows where people rush in there to get the shot, and it’s often very awkward—you have the [presenter] talking to the cam-

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TV REAL: Do you ever look back at your earlier TV work to see how your on-screen presence has changed? BOURDAIN: I’m proud of the fact that I was so spectacularly ill-suited to ever being on television, and so uncomfortable from the beginning. If I go back to the first episodes of A Cook’s Tour in 2001, I had no idea that I’d have to talk to the camera! I was resentful of it. One of the producers said to me, “There might be a career in this business for you, Tony, if you’d stop treating the camera like a sigmoidoscope [a camera used in medical procedures on the colon].” [Laughs] There’s a degree of not caring, not knowing, learning as I go, that I’m proud of. I think it’s one’s obligation to try and fail as often as possible when making television, because the alternative is to make the same show every week, and that would be a living hell. In a perfect world, I wouldn’t even be on my show, seeing as I wince every time I see myself up there. TV REAL: I’m curious about the Lyon episode, in which you met the legendary chef Paul Bocuse. That seemed like it was a particularly moving, emotional experience for you. Was it tough to be filmed in that situation? BOURDAIN: I feel like we were recording history. There are some shows that are really personal to me. I grew up as a chef looking at Paul Bocuse and his book [La Cuisine du Marché] as unapproachable. If I was absolutely certain of anything as a young chef, it was that I would never be experiencing those dishes, much less with Paul Bocuse. I felt a lot of gratitude toward Daniel [Boulud, who trained under Bocuse] and to Chef Bocuse, and a real sense of obligation to get that episode right. I could imagine what young cooks will feel like 10 years, 20 years from now, looking at the scene of Paul Bocuse [introducing] the greatest hits of his career, or seeing the salmon in sorrel made at Maison Troisgros. That is pretty epic stuff. I was very aware of that. I felt I had to get it right. Also, there was a narrative going on in my head; as I’m sitting there at the table, I’m thinking, “Oh my God, I cannot believe this is happening. I’m sitting here at Bocuse, next to Bocuse, eating truffle soup Élysée. Am I one lucky son of a bitch or what?” TV REAL: I also really loved the episode about the dark, fetishfilled underbelly of Tokyo. There was some risqué content in that episode. What was the response to it? BOURDAIN: That show is one of the reasons I’m really grateful to the network and to Jeff Zucker. That was a difficult piece of material. It’s one thing to make a change like they did in taking on my show. But to air a show like that, that took some courage. They didn’t blink. OK, I’m sure they blinked a few times, but they backed our play and they aired it. They had every reason to believe that the reaction was going to be pretty terrible, but in fact, people loved the show! It rated really well. We didn’t know how it was going to go.

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After more than a decade of building up the FOX International Channels (FIC) brands across the Asia Pacific and the Middle East, Ward Platt was tapped last year to take the reins at National Geographic Channels International (NGCI). As CEO of the unit, Platt is charting NGCI’s continued expansion through investments in local content, rollouts of the new Nat Geo People and Nat Geo Play brands, and more global events. Platt, who is also COO of FIC, tells TV Real about keeping NGCI in pole position in the factual landscape. TV REAL: What was the overall strategy you wanted to put in place when you took on the role at NGCI? PLATT: A great foundation already exists at the channel, so my initial focus has been on refining the product portfolio, fully distributing the portfolio and market prioritization. The core National Geographic Channel and Nat Geo WILD were pretty much everywhere in the world, but Nat Geo Adventure and Nat Geo Play (our nonlinear product) were only in some markets. Our first step was to rebrand Nat Geo Adventure as Nat Geo People and reposition the channel to be more appealing to a younger, largely female audience. Our second step was to embark on a path to gain broad distribution for Nat Geo People and Nat Geo Play. We’ve also taken the time to identify our priority markets and focus more resources on them. There are 10 to 12

NGCI’S WARD PLATT markets around the world that are big markets for us today, or if they’re not big, we’re pretty sure they will become very big for us over the next five years. We are putting a little extra energy into those markets, whether it’s investing production dollars or building local ad-sales teams. We want to make sure that we can [expand] our business substantially in those markets that are likely to drive our growth over the next five years. Of course, at the heart of it all is the content. Hamish Mykura, our executive VP and head of international content based in London, and his team have been focusing on long-running series. The “Entertain Your Brain” types of shows—Brain Games, Science of Stupid, None of the Above—have performed very well for us; the ensemble character series, like Wicked Tuna, Yukon Gold and Ultimate Airport Dubai, have also been gaining a lot of traction. Then we have some traditional series that continue to bring consistent viewing to the channel: Locked Up Abroad, Air Crash Investigation, Cesar to the Rescue. TV REAL: How did you identify those core markets? PLATT: There are big markets like Brazil, which has 18 million pay-TV homes out of some 60 million homes, so there’s still a lot of growth for pay TV. A market like the U.K. doesn’t really fall into our top ten. I’ve added it to our priority mix as a special mention, but it doesn’t really meet our metrics for what the priority markets are, just because there’s not a lot of room for growth in pay TV and it doesn’t give a particularly high return on our investment.

Indonesia is a market with great potential. There are markets like Poland that have been very good for us. Portugal has been a good market. Turkey is growing very quickly. So it’s a combination of markets you would expect to find, but also markets that aren’t necessarily that big today but where we see a huge amount of growth potential, because pay TV is growing, our brands are popular there, or our overall FOX International Channels presence is big and we have the opportunity to leverage that. TV REAL: How has the response been to Nat Geo People? PLATT: It’s still in its early days. We swapped Nat Geo Adventure—which has been around for ten years, was pretty niche, didn’t have as much traction as we would like and was mostly an acquisition channel—for Nat Geo People at the beginning of this year. We’re now in nearly 29 million households, 50 different countries, in Asia, Australia, the Middle East, North Africa and Europe. In markets like Singapore it’s done phenomenally well, consistently out-performing TLC. In Australia it’s roughly on par with TLC. In Italy and Germany, it’s gone up since we rebranded. We’d like to find ways to expand into the rest of Europe and Latin America with that brand. TV REAL: How are you positioning Nat Geo Play? PLATT: It can be a catch-up service where people can see the episode they missed through an authenticated device. We’re also launching a deeper library service that is more

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Yukon Gold is among the character-based factual series faring well on NGC around the world.

like a subscription video-on-demand product, which we see as a great way to leverage the 5,000-plus hours of recent relevant content we have in our library. TV REAL: How are you managing the windows on your titles? PLATT: It really depends on the market. We don’t have too many markets where our channels are exclusive—we try to be non-exclusive. In markets where there’s high pay-TV penetration and there’s one dominant pay-TV player and we have a good relationship with them, we’re probably not going to be out there rushing to sell our content close to our own broadcast window. In markets like Spain or Japan, where you have 20 percent pay-TV penetration, we’re aggressively windowing our product. Sometimes we’re selling shows nine months after our broadcast to a free-to-air or third-party OTT service. Our own SVOD product normally would have [content] that is at least one year old, often more than two years old. Take a show like Cosmos—it had 90 million viewers outside the U.S. We’re in 400 million homes and there’s four people in each of those homes. There’s a huge number of people who would like to watch Cosmos and never did. So there’s no harm in giving them other chances to consume a product they want to watch. Even for a show like Killing Kennedy, in the U.K. we created a second window only seven days after our initial broadcast. That was on terrestrial. We had to make sure Sky was OK with that. You have to be flexible. There are financial concerns and promotional concerns. If you have a successful show like Brain Games or None of the Above and you’re launching a new season, then perhaps exposing viewers to those previous seasons more broadly in the month leading up to your own new launch isn’t such a bad idea, to increase awareness of those franchises. In the U.S., [channels] are a bit more cautious about that. In a lot of the international markets, if mobile video operators and OTT players and IPTV operators have access to 100 percent of the people in the market and pay TV has access to 20 percent, why wouldn’t we be prepared to sell the nonlinear version of our service to some of those other players? We don’t want

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to burn bridges with our existing [partners], but we are spending a lot of money investing in good content and we want to make sure we give people adequate opportunities to consume that content. TV REAL: Tell us about your localization initiatives, particularly with Science of Stupid. PLATT: It’s been a huge success. We had a U.K. host and it worked in markets that just used the U.K. host, but we also [added] a local host [in eight markets] quite costeffectively, shooting against a green screen. In five out of those eight markets it performed 200, 300 percent above average. The question is, How do you cost-effectively localize global programming? Dubbing is the easiest way, but once you have hosts it becomes challenging. This was an experiment in doing that. We’re going to do more episodes of Science of Stupid. TV REAL: What are your key strategic priorities for NGCI in the next year? PLATT: We’ll continue to develop our Nat Geo Play strategy, whether it’s authenticated catch-up for subscribers of our existing channels or a deeper access service, sold through traditional or non-traditional platforms. We’ll continue to build out the four products everywhere— the three linear channels plus the on-demand product. Killing Jesus is launching next spring. We believe that that will be a great tentpole special, similar to Cosmos in its power to bring a broader audience to the channel. There are a few other specials we’re working on, some brand-defining things. We need to have some things that remind people consistently that we’re part of National Geographic. We can be on-brand and educational and informative and entertaining all in one. In this world of changing ways in which people consume video, having good content is more important than ever. We’re very good on the FOX [channels] side at doing global launches. On the Nat Geo side, we’re trying much harder to make sure that our broadcast dates are more closely aligned to the U.S. [premieres] so we can create a lot of global buzz.

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