World Screen MIPTV 2014

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THE MAGAZINE OF INTERNATIONAL MEDIA โ ข APRIL 2014

www.worldscreen.com

THE POWER OF PAY DISCOVERY'S David Zaslav DISNEY'S Anne Sweeney HBO'S Richard Plepler ESPN'S John Skipper A+E'S Nancy Dubuc AMC'S Josh Sapan STARZ'S Chris Albrecht TURNER'S Gerhard Zeiler FIC'S Hernan Lopez VIACOM'S Robert Bakish SKY'S Sophie Turner Laing ZEE'S Subhash Chandra GLOBOSAT'S Alberto Pecegueiro LIONSGATE'S

Jon Feltheimer TELEVISA'S

Emilio Azcรกrraga PROSIEBENSAT.1'S

Thomas Ebeling ITV'S

Peter Fincham NEIL deGRASSE TYSON HENRY WINKLER TOM COLICCHIO HEIDI KLUM

MIPTV Edition

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contents APRIL 2014/MIPTV EDITION

Publisher Ricardo Seguin Guise Editor Anna Carugati Executive Editor Mansha Daswani Managing Editor Kristin Brzoznowski Contributing Editor Elizabeth Guider Special Projects Editor Bob Jenkins Editor, Spanish-Language Publications Elizabeth Bowen-Tombari Associate Editor, Spanish-Language Publications Jessica Rodríguez

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Kerry Washington

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The star of Scandal talks about what it’s like to play Olivia Pope, a crisis-management expert, on the hit ABC series.

—Anna Carugati

Sofía Vergara

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A chat with the Modern Family star, who is also an executive producer and a spokesperson for a number of brands.

—Anna Carugati

David Tennant

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After his acclaimed turn on the monster hit Broadchurch, the Scottish actor has headed Stateside for Gracepoint.

—Mansha Daswani

Michael Emerson

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The actor talks about his enigmatic roles in Person of Interest and Lost.

—Anna Carugati

Special Report

Associate Editor Joanna Padovano

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POWER OF PAY

This special report on the issues at stake in the thriving global pay-TV business includes interviews with Discovery’s David Zaslav, Disney’s Anne Sweeney, HBO’s Richard Plepler, ESPN’s John Skipper, A+E’s Nancy Dubuc, AMC Networks’ Josh Sapan, Starz’s Chris Albrecht, Turner’s Gerhard Zeiler, FIC’s Hernan Lopez, VIMN’s Robert Bakish, Sky’s Sophie Turner Laing, ZEE’s Subhash Chandra and Globosat’s Alberto Pecegueiro.

—Elizabeth Guider & Anna Carugati WORLD SCREEN is published nine times per year: January, March, April, May, June/July, September, October, November and December.

Annual subscription price: Inside the U.S.: $70.00 Outside the U.S.: $120.00 Send checks, company information and address corrections to: WSN INC. 1123 Broadway, Suite 1207, New York, NY 10010, U.S.A. For a free subscription to our newsletters, please visit www.worldscreen.com.

One-on-One

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LIONSGATE’S JON FELTHEIMER

The CEO of the independent studio talks about the strengths of the company’s film and TV businesses.

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DISNEY’S ANNE SWEENEY

The co-chair of Disney Media Networks and president of the Disney/ABC Television Group weighs in on serving audiences across multiple platforms.

—Anna Carugati

In Conversation

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TELEVISA’S EMILIO AZCÁRRAGA JEAN

The president, CEO and chairman of the Mexican company reveals how it has become the Latin major.

—Anna Carugati

Executive Briefing

Online Director Simon Weaver Art Director Phyllis Q. Busell

—Anna Carugati

On the Record

Assitant Editor Joel Marino

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VIACOM’S ROBERT BAKISH

The president and CEO of Viacom International Media Networks discusses the enduring appeal of brands like MTV and Nickelodeon around the world.

Production & Design Director Victor L. Cuevas Production Associate Meredith Miller Sales & Marketing Director Cesar Suero Sales & Marketing Coordinator Faustyna Hariasz Business Affairs Manager Terry Acunzo Senior Editor Kate Norris Contributing Writers Steve Clarke Andy Fry Juliana Koranteng Jane Marlow Joanna Stephens Jay Stuart David Wood Copy Editors Maddy Kloss Amy Canonico

—Anna Carugati

DEPARTMENTS WORLD VIEW

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GLOBAL PERSPECTIVE

32

VIEWPOINT

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UPFRONTS

40

ADVERTISERS’ INDEX

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WORLD’S END

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Front Cover: ©Brendan Meadows/FOX

THE LEADING ONLINE DAILY NEWS SERVICE FOR THE INTERNATIONAL MEDIA INDUSTRY. For a free subscription, visit www.worldscreen.com/pages/newsletter

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Ricardo Seguin Guise President Anna Carugati Executive VP & Group Editorial Director Mansha Daswani Associate Publisher & VP of Strategic Development WORLD SCREEN is a registered trademark of WSN INC. 1123 Broadway, Suite 1207 New York, NY 10010, U.S.A. Phone: (212) 924-7620 Fax: (212) 924-6940 Website: www.worldscreen.com ©2014 WSN INC. Printed by Fry Communications No part of this publication can be used, reprinted, copied or stored in any medium without the publisher’s authorization.

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contents milestones APRIL 2014/MIPTV EDITION THESE TARGETED MAGAZINES APPEAR BOTH INSIDE WORLD SCREEN AND AS SEPARATE PUBLICATIONS:

Feature IN THEIR PRIME

Features 148

Interviews ITV’S PETER FINCHAM PROSIEBENSAT.1’S THOMAS EBELING PROSIEBENSAT.1’S RÜDIGER BÖSS SKY’S SOPHIE TURNER LAING

158 162 168 174

Feature THIRSTY FOR MORE

332 336

Feature IDEA HUB

Interviews HANK ZIPZER ’S HENRY WINKLER PEPPA PIG ’S NEVILLE ASTLEY & PHIL DAVIES CBEEBIES’ KAY BENBOW SABAN BRANDS’ ELIE DEKEL DISNEY TV ANIMATION’S ERIC COLEMAN ACTF ’S JENNY BUCKLAND

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CRIME SCENE FAST TRACK

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Interviews PROJECT RUNWAY ’S HEIDI KLUM BANIJAY’S MARCO BASSETTI KESHET’S AVI NIR TOP CHEF ’S TOM COLICCHIO

302 304 308 312

Feature 366 374

Interviews COSMOS ’S NEIL DEGRASSE TYSON DISCOVERY’S DAVID ZASLAV

TWICE AS NICE

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BY POPULAR DEMAND

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Interviews ZEE’S SUBHASH CHANDRA ASTRO’S ROHANA ROZHAN FIC’S JOON LEE HUNAN’S BERYL YAN

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LISTINGS OF MORE THAN 120 DISTRIBUTORS ATTENDING MIPTV

471

Feature 428

Interview TWOFOUR54’S NOURA AL KAABI

Feature 220 230

Features 340

Interviews STARZ’S CHRIS ALBRECHT AMC NETWORKS’ JOSH SAPAN

GERMAN BUZZ TV FOR TOTS

GLOBAL DRAMA

450

Interviews 434

LIONSGATE’S KEVIN BEGGS TALPA’S JOHN DE MOL FREMANTLEMEDIA’S CECILE FROT-COUTAZ

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world milestones view

BY ANNA CARUGATI

No Longer Mad as Hell When the movie Network was released in 1976, it created a sensation with its depiction of the fictitious U.S. network UBS, its management’s crazed quest for ratings and its use and misuse of anchorman Howard Beale’s rage, famously encapsulated in the line, “I’m as mad as hell, and I’m not going to take this anymore!”

If you haven’t seen the movie, I strongly encourage you to. First, it features superb writing and acting. It was directed by Sidney Lumet and won four Academy Awards: best actor for Peter Finch as Howard Beale; best actress for Faye Dunaway as UBS’s programming executive; best supporting actress for Beatrice Straight, the scorned wife of news executive Max Schumacher, played by William Holden; and best screenplay for Paddy Chayefsky. Second, Chayefsky’s brilliant satire of network tunnel vision and large corporations’ unbridled greed predicted some of what we’ve seen actually occur in the business and media worlds today. However, and this is the most important reason to watch the movie, the television industry has veered far from the demise Chayefsky envisioned.The programming that is emerging from networks today is vastly better than that shown in the movie.

Briefly, Network is about Howard Beale, an anchorman who is disgusted with the vapid nature of television programming, the executives who keep commissioning garbage because it generates ratings and VIEWERS ARE profits, and the clueless audience that thinks television is more real real life. At the beginning of NO LONGER PASSIVE than the movie, Beale incites viewers to get mad as hell and yell in the COUCH POTATOES. streets. He tells them, from his anchor desk, that television is trash that is ruining their lives.

Obviously, network brass is displeased and they want to fire Beale. But Beale strikes a chord with the audience and his ratings go through the roof. So, the executives give him a longer, expanded show and let him preach his gospel of anger to the masses. Meanwhile, the head of programming cuts a deal with a radical terrorist group and orders a docudrama series called The Mao Tse-Tung Hour, in which the group commits crimes and acts of terrorism— all in pursuit of ratings. As a result, UBS goes from the fourth-ranked network to number one. UBS is then acquired by a large corporation, which in turn is bought

by Arabs. Beale discloses this transaction on his show, much to the chagrin of the head of the corporation, who gives one of the movie’s best speeches: “There are no nations.

There are no peoples. There are no Russians. There are 30 World Screen 4/14

no Arabs. There are no third worlds. There is no West.

There is only one holistic system of systems, one vast and immane, interwoven, interacting, multivariate, multinational dominion of dollars…. It is the international system of currency which determines the totality of life on this planet. That is the natural order of things today.” This, and the movie’s shocking ending, which I won’t give away, provides plenty of food for thought.

Chayefsky, who began his career in television, wrote some of the best shows in the early days of the medium.

His teleplays were performed live and he preferred stark, simple sets so that the audience would focus on the dialogue, of which he was a master. He died in 1981 and his Oscar for Network was his third. Had he lived longer, I believe he would be oh-so-pleasantly surprised to see what the television industry in the U.S. has become today.

No longer dominated by three broadcast networks, the competition from cable, satellite and online players has set the bar for quality so, so high.The multichannel landscape has been replicated in market after market around the world.Viewers are no longer passive couch potatoes.They can pick and choose their favorite movies and shows from a vast array of sources. While not everything on television today is great, I’m convinced Chayefsky would be delighted with the choices available.

Our main feature in this issue of World Screen looks at some of the world’s leading channel groups and programming, marketing and business models that are keeping pay television a vibrant business. We launch a new targeted publication as well, TV Drama. With so much quality scripted programming being produced around the world, we felt it appropriate to give more attention to this genre.

Scripted fare is also providing growth to the format industry. While the crimes planned for Network’s The Mao TseTung Hour were a bit extreme, to say the least, true crime remains an extremely popular section of factual programming.We look at what is fueling the creativity in the Israeli TV market, the increased competition in the kids’ television market in Germany, leading prime-time trends across Europe, and OTT platforms in Asia.

Our main interviews are with Lionsgate’s Jon Feltheimer, Disney/ABC’s Anne Sweeney, Televisa’s Emilio Azcárraga and Viacom’s Robert Bakish. I’m sure they have seen Network; you should, too.

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global perspective

BY BRUCE L. PAISNER

This Year in Jerusalem On June 11, directors and members of the International Academy will sit down in Jerusalem for dinner with Shimon Peres, the president of Israel.That will be followed in subsequent days by dinners and meetings with other key government officials, and a much anticipated visit to the Peres Center for Peace for conversations with Palestinian and Israeli leaders.

It’s all part of Academy Day in Jerusalem, the latest installment in a special program of the Academy that has introduced Academy members to political, media and business leaders around the world.

Let’s face it. Media executives, though among the smartest business people in every country, are not always the best rounded. The pressures of the job—and the challenges of new technology—leave little time for anything else, let alone outside their own country. But because technology is making the world’s media so interrelated, a broader knowledge of what is going on in other countries is essential. The Academy Day concept was invented to meet that need. Approximately every two years, Academy members and a few guests journey to a country in the news, and meet with the people who are making the news. In Brazil in 2008, the keynote speaker was President Lula. In Beijing in 2006, THERE IS OFTEN the hosts were CCTV and Phoenix, and the group met the organizers of the NO SUBSTITUTE with Beijing Olympics while all the contentious issues were FOR MEETING brewing. In Hong Kong two years ago, the Academy met with the incumbent and forIN PERSON. mer chief executives, and had an in-depth visit to Shenzhen, China’s leading industrial city. Academy Day in Jerusalem will continue those traditions. The host company is Dori Media, under its chief executive, Nadav Palti. Events will range from a dinner with Israel’s leading scientists to an outdoor performance by the Israeli Opera of La Traviata at the Masada fortress.

In fact, Academy Day was not so much invented as re-created, from one of the great marketing concepts of all time—the Time magazine news tour. Every few years in the 1960s and ’70s, Time invited the CEOs of its major advertisers to join the magazine’s editors and correspondents in one of the world’s hot spots. Several days of meetings, briefings and high-level encounters ensued. The CEOs came back much better informed about a critical 32 World Screen 4/14

area of the world, and, not incidentally, Time sold a lot more advertising to their companies.

Academy Days, of course, do not have a profit motive— just the education of Academy members through indepth, high-level engagement in an important region of the world. And the opportunity for leaders in that region to communicate their points of view to leading media executives and producers. Does it work? On the one hand, people who have attended one Academy Day tend to keep coming back. Someone who has been to all of them—and to a major Academy board meeting in Berlin in 2010— would have a high level and substantive knowledge of several of the world’s key issues, leaders and culture. What also happens is that people, once exposed to a region, tend to follow its affairs—to produce programs and keep up with developments. So it will be with Academy Day in Jerusalem. The importance of the city and the region are undisputed. But few people get to be briefed by the key players, and few media executives get to explore issues and opportunities in small groups and intimate surroundings.

Looking further ahead, to late June 2015, Academy members will journey to Brazil, for an Academy Day in Rio de Janeiro.This one is strategically placed between the World Cup and the Summer Olympics, and will offer participants an inside view of the events and issues of the Rio Summer Games, a year before they start. Academy members will also meet with key political and business leaders in a strategic and growing country. Globo, one of the world’s most distinguished media organizations, will serve as host for Academy Day in Rio. Ironically, as the world gets ever more interconnected by technology and social media, the imperative for face-toface encounters tends to fade in the minds of busy people. But, as any successful statesman will attest, there is often no substitute for meeting in person—and a danger in relying on words and video, if one is really to understand what is going on, and find ways to benefit from it.Academy Day is the International Academy’s way of making sure that its members stay connected to the world’s key decisionmakers in media, politics, business and the arts.

Bruce L. Paisner is the president and CEO of the International Academy of Television Arts & Sciences.

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milestones viewpoint

BY JEAN PREWITT

Copyright Under the Microscope As our industry debates the future of the evolving digital marketplace, policymakers are debating whether copyright laws—rewritten less than a decade ago—should again change in recognition of that evolution.

For those who work to finance, produce and distribute film and television programming, and for those who enjoy that programming, it is critical that the copyright policy process support the growth of the legitimate commercial marketplace, rather than attempt to lead it.

Why is a reexamination of copyright policy taking place now? Content industries are faced with a twofold dilemma: to recoup investment, expensive “products” must be protected from widespread theft online; at the same time, consumers’ expanding demands for online availability must be met. On the other hand, online services and new technology vendors want to see subscriber growth without complications, but also need to attract legitimate content and show that their online marketplace is safe and reliable. And policymakers want satisfied voters and strong economic growth within both the creative and technology sectors. The debate is increasingly polarCOPYRIGHT INDUSTRIES ized between those who depend on copyright and those who see copyright as an ARE GROWING AT A obstacle to technological innovation and freedom of As a result, the RECORD PACE. expression. world has recently seen a wave of so-called “copyright modernization” exercises, with multiple countries engaged in the process of reviewing their copyright laws.

Countries have approached their copyright reviews from different perspectives, largely based on policymakers’ perception of the public’s “sore spots.” For example, a central premise of the European Commission’s Licenses for Europe exercise in 2013 and its new public consultation on copyright is a desire to increase cross-border access and portability of audiovisual content online. The Commission has suggested measures that would require providers to license cross-border online distribution without regard to traditional licensed territories based on national boundaries. In the U.S., concerns that existing copyright laws, including the fair use defense to infringement, are insufficient to accommodate new forms of creativity and use by consumers has been a theme in the comprehensive evaluations of the U.S. Copyright Law. There is no intention within policy circles to damage film and television production. Indeed, there is regular discussion of “encouraging creativity and innovation.”

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But the process of financing and producing audiovisual content is not well understood.There is a persistent myth that consumer demand exists for all content, everywhere and at all times and that this mythical demand is sufficient to drive investment into our sector. Copyright law should not be built on this erroneous theory.

In fact, of course, the independent sector of the film and television industry relies on license fees resulting from copyright ownership to pre-finance and produce new content. After assessing the value of a project and local consumer appeal, local distributors enter into license agreements with the independent producer that provide minimum license fees (minimum guarantees) to be paid in order to secure exclusive distribution rights to a project before its production. These deals, grounded upon copyright protection, support bank and equity investment. These national distributors take on the responsibility of marketing the project within their own territory.

Especially for independents, it is at the national level that public awareness of a work is created and where financing for this and future projects is generated. The emergence of online platforms does not change the practical reality: where there is identifiable consumer demand for a project, producers and distributors will assume the risk of satisfying that demand.

Looking ahead, copyright industries are growing at a record pace. In the United States alone, the core copyright industries added over $1 trillion in value to the U.S. economy in a single year, accounting for almost 6.5 percent of the total U.S. GDP, and accounted for $142 billion in foreign sales and exports.

As governments review their copyright laws, decisionmakers should not amend existing legislation merely to fix short-term gaps that the marketplace will bridge over time. Governments should recognize the unique business and financing models of independent film producers that rely on copyright protection and their ability, as rights holders, to exploit content in a framework that respects the demands of the local marketplace.With this in mind, the current policy efforts should be used as a stock-taking on current developments, rather than an occasion for inappropriate action to change the dynamics of our industry in a harmful way.

Jean Prewitt is the president and CEO of the Independent Film & Television Alliance.

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upfronts

A+E Networks • Flowers in the Attic • World Wars • Wahlburgers The emphasis for A+E Networks at MIPTV is on its movie catalogue. “We’re the leading producer and distributor of TV movies with a slate that includes 30 new movies each year,” says Marielle Zuccarelli, the company’s managing director of international content distribution.“We’re excited to present our new lineup, which includes Flowers in the Attic and it’s highly anticipated sequel, Petals on the Wind, which both star Ellen Burstyn and Heather Graham.” A+E Networks is also launching its new international co-production World Wars, a TV event that looks at the 20 years separating World War I and II. As for real-life programming, A+E Networks is presenting Wahlburgers. “It’s wildly hilarious and universally relatable, and we anticipate that it will do very well in the international marketplace,” says Zuccarelli.

“Buyers are looking for bold, entertaining content with larger-than-life characters that can captivate their audiences.”

—Marielle Zuccarelli Flowers in the Attic

all3media international • ANZAC Girls • Hinterland • Love Child

The drama ANZAC Girls honors the centenary of World War I by presenting the stories of a group of previously unsung heroines of the war.The Australian series, produced by Screentime for ABC TV, is being offered to buyers as part of the all3media international catalogue.The company’s portfolio also includes the Welsh detective drama Hinterland, as well as Love Child, which is set in the ’60s.

“There is a significant increase in demand for period drama from our clients in Central and Eastern Europe and continued interest in gripping detective series able to thrill large audiences,” says Nadia Mykhaylyuk, a sales executive at all3media international.

“Our new lineup of high-quality productions reflects this trend.

Our drama series have achieved loyal audiences and excellent ratings for a wide variety of broadcasters across CEE.”

“Our latest productions continue our mission to bring the very best drama series to audiences around the world.”

—Nadia Mykhaylyuk ANZAC Girls

AMC/Sundance Channel Global • Sundance Channel • WE tv Sundance Channel and WE tv Asia have continued to expand their footprints. Sundance Channel recently launched for the first time in the Middle East and North Africa.“There have also been recent agreements to increase distribution of our linear andVOD services throughout Asia, Europe and Latin America,” says Bruce Tuchman, the president of AMC/Sundance Channel Global.At MIPTV, the company will be meeting with platform operators to discuss the expansion of its services in other parts of the world.“Our audiences globally can look forward to a terrific lineup of spring and summer programming. This includes the exclusive premiere of the Sundance Channel original drama The Red Road in Latin America, the Middle East and North Africa, and key European territories, including France, Iberia, Benelux, Poland and CEE,” says Tuchman.

“We’ll continue to focus on expanding Sundance Channel across the globe, along with increasing distribution of our other popular service, WE tv Asia.”

The Red Road on Sundance Channel 40 World Screen 4/14

—Bruce Tuchman

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Artist View Entertainment • Nowhere Safe • Fatal Instinct • Siren The feature Nowhere Safe touches on the timely topic of cyber-bullying in schools. Artist View Entertainment is presenting the title at MIPTV, where it will also showcase Fatal Instinct, a police mystery with a twist at the end, and Siren, a female-driven thriller with fantasy elements. “The stories are all fast paced and are very entertaining,” says Scott Jones, the president of Artist View. “And each of the films has unique marketing elements that will appeal to both pay-TV and free-TV buyers.” Jones adds that the company is continuing to focus on supplying a wide variety of feature films, while at the same time expanding into the world of lifestyle programming, covering categories such as fitness, fashion, food and travel.

“All three titles have strong casts and high production values.”

—Scott Jones Fatal Instinct

ATV • The Noble of Today • Fugitive • Peace Street

The Turkish drama Fugitive has already garnered significant attention from buyers, according to Ziyad Varol, the head of sales at ATV, who hopes to keep this momentum going for the show at MIPTV. “Fugitive has a strong cast and thrilling action scenes, and the fact that the main actor, Gürkan Uygun, was already known by the audience from ATV’s Valley of the Wolves had a great impact on this success story.” Varol says that the dramas The Noble of Today and Peace Street are appealing for buyers because they are able to attract female audiences. “ATV’s drama series are very high quality and this is an inevitable consequence of the fierce competition of the local Turkish market,” he adds. “Beautiful settings, strong casting and great story lines attract the audience.”

“Turkish dramas provide a new vision and totally different cultural perspectives.”

The Noble of Today

AVA Entertainment • Romantic Moment of Cappadocia • World Romantic Cities • Miracle Land DMZ Promoting its 4K productions is a main priority for AVA Entertainment at this year’s market in Cannes. One of the company’s highlights is Romantic Moment of Cappadocia, a documentary focused on the nature and culture of a visually stunning historical region located in Central Anatolia, Turkey. AVA is also showcasing World Romantic Cities, a seven-episode travel program in 4K that spotlights the breathtaking scenery and attractions in various romantic cities around the world. Then there is Miracle Land DMZ, an hour-long environmental doc about the area surrounding both sides of the border barrier that divides the Northern and Southern portions of the Korean peninsula. The production took two years to complete due to the fact that daily access to the buffer zone is limited.

Romantic Moment of Cappadocia 42 World Screen 4/14

—Ziyad Varol

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Azteca • Acapulco… Forever Yours • Forbidden Love • The Agency Azteca’s new production Acapulco… Forever Yours, under the direction of Elisa Salinas and producer Rita Fusaro, is an original story where wickedness, greed, selfishness and a series of injustices propel the heroine to fight for the love of her life. Comarex is presenting the title to MIPTV buyers, and will also be chatting with them about Forbidden Love.

“The producers of this thrilling new telenovela are Rafael Urióstegui and Ximena Cantuarias, who produced hits such as Under a Red Sky and Running from Destiny,” says Marcel Vinay, Jr., the CEO of Comarex. Also a highlight is The Agency, which is the story of a woman trying to make a name for herself at a male-dominated advertising agency that she takes over from her father.

Acapulco... Forever Yours

“Acapulco…

Forever Yours is a story of a humble young woman with great beauty and a big heart who dreams of love.”

—Marcel Vinay, Jr.

BBC Worldwide • The Honourable Woman • Da Vinci’s Demons • Human Universe

The contemporary spy thriller The Honourable Woman features an all-star cast led by Maggie Gyllenhaal, Stephen Rea and Lindsay Duncan. “Written and directed by BAFTA winner Hugo Blick, we expect this eight-part drama to touch a nerve with audiences everywhere,” says Paul Dempsey, the president of global markets at BBC Worldwide.“We’re also pleased to be able to bring global audiences the next installment of the hit series Da Vinci’s Demons,” which now has a second season.“Human Universe is our standout science title, presented by the hugely popular professor Brian Cox,” Dempsey adds. “Quality always does well, and there is a real appetite for character-driven storytelling internationally.

Escapism continues to really strike a chord with audiences, and who doesn’t want the answers to life’s big questions?”

“As viewers and buyers become more demanding and discerning, we are well placed to capitalize on the demand for quality.”

—Paul Dempsey The Honourable Woman

Beyond Distribution • Airshow • Manufactured • Hillbilly Preppers: Atlanta With Airshow, audiences gain entry into an arena of danger and excitement that represents a normal day’s work for a certain group of individuals. “The series really is full of thrills and spills,” says Yvonne Body, the head of acquisitions at Beyond Distribution.The company is also presenting Manufactured and Hillbilly Preppers: Atlanta. “Manufactured gives the full visual lowdown on how iconic products are designed and made, while Hillbilly Preppers: Atlanta is one of those ‘only in America’ insights that also features a great cast of characters,” Body says.

“On the sales side, obviously we are aiming to make great sales for our new and existing programming. For acquisitions, it’s about finding the shows that are going to be hits next year and the year after.”

“These are three quite different shows, but each guarantees access to a world that the audience probably hasn’t seen before.”

Hillbilly Preppers: Atlanta 44 World Screen 4/14

—Yvonne Body

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Blue Ant International • Nomads of the Serengeti • Live Here Buy This • Rebel Without a Kitchen Shot in 4K, Nomads of the Serengeti invites viewers along with veteran safari guide Jean du Plessis on a trip through the African wilds. Blue Ant International, which is making its MIPTV debut, is offering the title to buyers at the market. It will also be looking to shore up slots for Live Here Buy This, in which couples search for a home in paradise, and Rebel Without a Kitchen, featuring Matt Basile and his roving food truck. “We bring a fresh and collaborative approach to connecting content creators with decision-makers in the international marketplace,” says Solange Attwood, the senior VP of international at Blue Ant Media.

“Our diverse catalogue of more than 700 hours of top-tier programming includes scripted comedy, factual, natural history, reality, lifestyle, formats, documentary series and one-offs.”

“This being our inaugural market, Blue Ant is placing importance on premium and evergreen programming.”

—Solange Attwood Nomads of the Serengeti

Canal Futura • Going Back • Armed • The Adventures of Teca

Canal Futura is aiming to expand its reach by building new contacts with stations in Latin America. “The European market also interests us, especially Portuguese-language countries, with which we have a very strong connection,” says Lúcia Araújo, the director of Canal Futura.At this year’s MIPTV, Canal Futura is presenting two new hour-long documentaries that deal with issues of human rights: Going Back and Armed. For children, the company is offering the animated series The Adventures of Teca.The program features themes of friendship, family, personal health and playfulness, and addresses them in a way that is fun for young viewers.

“Our programming is dedicated to promoting ethnic and racial equality, community spirit, entrepreneurship and cultural pluralism, combining education and entertainment,” says Araújo.

“Our programs seek to contribute to the day-to-day life of ordinary people, offering entertainment and information that’s relevant and useful.”

—Lúcia Araújo Armed

Caracol Television • The Sweetest Love • The Mother in Law • The Dark Widow The Sweetest Love

The romantic telenovela The Sweetest Love is about four wealthy sisters who wind up falling for the men they least expect. Caracol Television is promoting the title, alongside the comedy The Mother in Law, a co-production with Sony Pictures Television.“The story line is simple but catchy at the same time since there are interesting and unexpected turns,” says Berta Orozco, Caracol’s sales executive for Western Europe, the Middle East and Africa.“As a comedy, I think that it would be very suitable for Western European territories more interested in adapting telenovelas than just merely finished products.” The Dark Widow is based on the true story of one of Colombia’s most powerful female drug-traffickers.“I think that with The Dark Widow we will surpass our clients’ expectations for series with action and drug-trafficking themes,” says Orozco.

“Our stories are unique and without borders, and our goal is to share this with the world.”

—Berta Orozco 46 World Screen 4/14

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CBS Studios International • Penny Dreadful • The Affair • Extant Premiering on Showtime in the U.S. in May, Penny Dreadful is a new premium series on offer from CBS Studios International (CBSSI).“In Penny Dreadful, some of literature’s most famously terrifying characters—including Dr. Frankenstein and his creature, Dorian Gray and iconic figures from the novel Dracula—become embroiled in Victorian London,” explains Barry Chamberlain, the president of sales at CBSSI. “The series weaves together these classic horror origin stories as the characters grapple with their monstrous alienation.” Coming to Showtime later in the year is The Affair, which explores the emotional and psychological effects of an extramarital affair.The futuristic thriller Extant, which premieres this summer on CBS in the U.S., comes from the same team behind last year’s breakout event series Under the Dome.

“These shows have terrific production auspices across the board and are highly desirable from a marketing perspective—all elements that a broadcaster or premium platform is looking for to reach their audience.”

Penny Dreadful

—Barry Chamberlain

Cineflix Rights • Rambam Gets His Man • Stonehenge Empire • Hollywood One on One

Steve Rambam is one of the world’s foremost experts in cases of disappearance and the go-to private investigator for cases that nobody else can solve. He and his team have allowed cameras into their world as they relive some of their greatest cases in Rambam Gets His Man, which Cineflix Rights is distributing.

The company is also offering the two-part Stonehenge Empire, which showcases the sophistication, ambition and power of the people who built the prehistoric monument. Cineflix Rights will also be talking to buyers about Hollywood One on One, which features celebrity interviews and previews of films. “Hollywood One on One sells itself really: great access, exclusive insights and fantastic previews of the world’s biggest stars and most exciting films,” says Chris Bonney, the CEO of rights at Cineflix Media.

“Stonehenge Empire is about as high a blue-chip quality production as you can get.”

Stonehenge Empire

—Chris Bonney

Cisneros Media Distribution • Criminal MasterMind • Emerald Heart • Sweet Thing Having rebranded from Venevision International, Cisneros Media Distribution is looking forward to showcasing its new image to clients.While the company has diversified its catalogue with a variety of products, telenovelas continue to take top billing for MIPTV.“We have no doubt that the telenovelas Sweet Thing and Emerald Heart, with their classic story lines, will follow the same successful and proven outcomes as our other dramatic series that have fared well in international markets,” says Cesar Diaz, the company’s VP.“Our new shorter dramas, or tele-series, like Criminal MasterMind, will most definitely help programmers gather market shares and ratings in non-traditional telenovela slots. We are determined to provide our clientele with a wide selection of products to satisfy all their programming needs.”

“We are especially excited about this year’s edition of MIPTV because we are making our debut at the international market with our new company name.”

Criminal MasterMind 48 World Screen 4/14

—Cesar Diaz

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CJ E&M Corporation • Emergency Couple • Let’s Eat • In Need of Romance 3 A trio of romantic series lead the slate that CJ E&M Corporation is showcasing at this year’s MIPTV. First up is Emergency Couple, which tells the story of two divorcees who find themselves interning at the same medical facility.

“It seems like a nightmare, but they end up working together and understanding each other,” says Alex Oe, the company’s sales director. There is also Let’s Eat, about a man and a woman united by food, and In Need of Romance 3, which focuses on a group of career-driven women who are looking for love. “In Asia, Japan and China are always ripe [for sales], but Vietnam is growing fastest for us for finished versions,” says Oe. “We also see high demand from Europe and America for our scripts.”

“As finished programs, Korean drama is still very much [in demand] in Asian territories.”

Emergency Couple

—Alex Oe

Content Television • 19-2 • The Au Pairs • Journey to Le Mans

Headlining Content Television’s drama slate is the 10x1-hour series 19-2, an English-language adaptation of the award- and ratingswinning French-Canadian series. Set in Montreal, the drama follows the lives of two newly partnered patrol officers amidst the highly charged environment of the city’s 19th precinct. “19-2 is a richly nuanced drama that premiered in Canada to very strong ratings, bringing an intelligent, immersive series to prime-time schedules,” says Saralo MacGregor, the executive VP of worldwide distribution at Content Television & Digital. Also from Content, The Au Pairs is a factual-entertainment series about four young women who travel abroad for the first time to live and work as au pairs in London. Sir Patrick Stewart narrates the feature doc Journey to Le Mans, about the world’s oldest endurance race.

“Our new launches at MIPTV include a broad range of high-quality programming from some of the world’s most renowned production talent.”

—Saralo MacGregor

19-2

Discovery Networks International • Discovery Channel • TLC • Animal Planet Celebrating its 25th anniversary this year, Discovery Networks International (DNI) operates one of the most extensive international television businesses in the media industry. Its portfolio of networks reaches more than 1.6 billion cumulative subscribers in 220-plus territories. Led by the flagship Discovery Channel, DNI has 46 international TV brands, including Animal Planet, TLC, Investigation Discovery andVelocity.Through recent acquisitions, the DNI portfolio has grown to include Switchover Media’s five brands in Italy, Fatafeat in the Middle East and SBS Discovery’s 20 television brands in the Nordic region. Many of the offerings are also available in high definition, with HD services available in 189 global markets. Jean-Briac (JB) Perrette, the incoming president of DNI, has oversight for this diverse mix of brands.

“We have incredibly strong brands in a world of Millennials looking for authentic stories and relating to authenticity as a key theme in their entertainment.”

Wheeler Dealers on Discovery Channel UK 50 World Screen 4/14

—JB Perrette

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Distribution360 • Tessa & Scott • Leave it to Bryan • House of Bryan The ice-dancing duo Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir is in the spotlight in the docuseries Tessa & Scott, distributed by Distribution360. “Tessa & Scott will appeal to anyone interested in a behind-the-scenes look at the world of international figure skating as the series highlights the ice dancers’ highs and lows as they go through grueling competitions in preparation for the Olympics,” says Kirsten Hurd, the director of international sales and acquisitions at Distribution360.There are also new seasons of the hit shows Leave it to Bryan and House of Bryan, produced

by Si Entertainment. “The Si Entertainment series are wellestablished shows with an excellent following in many markets,” says Hurd.“These types of high-quality factual series are exactly what buyers are looking for: great characters and stories.”

“Distribution360’s focus is to increase our network of lifestyle and factual buyers and source new third-party programs.”

—Kirsten Hurd Tessa & Scott

Electus International • Food Fighters • Bet On Your Baby • Years of Living Dangerously

James Cameron directed and executive produced the doc series Years of Living Dangerously, which Electus International distributes.

It follows A-listers such as Harrison Ford, Don Cheadle, Matt Damon and Arnold Schwarzenegger as they travel to various regions to see how humans contribute to climate change and how these changes are affecting people around the world. “Climate change and how we as humans are affecting the planet is the most important global story of our generation, and Years tackles [the issue] in an entertaining and informative way,” says John Pollak, the president of Electus International. Food Fighters, a cooking game show, and Bet On Your Baby, a family-friendly game show, are also on the slate. “As always, we are focused on bringing the world’s best content to our partners around the world,” says Pollak.

“These titles are completely unique and original ideas that will definitely stand out to buyers and viewers alike.”

Years of Living Dangerously

—John Pollak

Endemol Worldwide Distribution • The Fall • The Crimson Field • Jennifer Falls With the 100-year anniversary of the start of World War I, interest is high in programs that touch on this topic. At MIPTV, Endemol Worldwide Distribution (EWD) is offering buyers The Crimson Field, which tells the story of war from the perspectives of the nurses, doctors and volunteers on the front line.The company will also be discussing the second season of The Fall with buyers. “The quality of the production and the cast, including Gillian Anderson and Jamie Dornan, speaks for itself,” says Cathy Payne, the CEO of EWD. “Quality crime drama will always be appealing to international buyers.” After having success with the TV Land sitcoms Hot in Cleveland and The Exes, EWD is looking forward to presenting the new network original Jennifer Falls, which stars Jaime Pressly (My Name is Earl).

“The Crimson Field has an outstanding cast and production values.”

—Cathy Payne The Crimson Field 52 World Screen 4/14

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By Mansha Daswani In 1989, well ahead of most of its competitors, Discovery Communications firmly secured a foothold in the still nascent pay-TV business in Europe, launching the first international feeds of the Discovery Channel in the U.K. and Scandinavia. In the last 25 years, Discovery Networks International (DNI) has expanded across the globe, with its portfolio of networks now reaching more than 1.6 billion cumulative subscribers in 220-plus territories. A 20-year Discovery veteran, Mark Hollinger, the president and CEO of DNI, has been a key player in much of this rapid expansion. Ahead of stepping down this June, Hollinger looks back on helping to build Discovery into the world’s number one nonfiction media company.

MARK HOLLINGER WS: What have been some of DNI’s major milestones?

HOLLINGER: There are two things that were very impor-

WS: Tell me about the strategy in Western Europe.

HOLLINGER: What we saw in Western Europe were

tant that happened right around the time that I joined.

One was that we bought TLC in the U.S., so we went from being a one-channel business to a two-channel business, and we grew from there. Having such a substantial U.S. portfolio and content engine has been critical to the growth of DNI.The other was that we took control of the business in Europe. When we launched in ’89 we were only a 30-percent owner. A TCI-owned company, one of our shareholders at the time, owned 70 percent and operated the business for us. But in 1991 we were able to buy back their stake and own 100 percent of the business.

Taking control of our fate internationally early on was critical.The next step would have been in 1994, when we made the decision to make a big push into Latin America and Asia. Being out as early as we were has been one of the key foundations for the business. The fact that we have now expanded into other genres in terms of general entertainment and sports, and into other business models in terms of free-to-air in certain parts, has been the next big milestone for the international business.

enormously powerful economies, big ad-sales markets and pay TV being challenged in terms of growth by the launch of digital terrestrial platforms. [In select markets] we now have a free-to-air business, which has been a very nice balance to the pay-TV business in those markets. In Italy, for example, we have a nicely balanced portfolio with six pay-TV channels and six free-to-air channels, and we have the third biggest audience share in the market. In the Nordics, the great thing about the SBS asset is, we look at them not as broadcast networks but really as big dual-revenue paytelevision networks. The fact that [SBS Nordic] was a solid, dual-revenue stream business in very good markets with good leadership [meant that the acquisition] was a good way to get to some real scale and to understand the world of general entertainment and sports.

Eurosport is also a dual-revenue stream business in these markets where broadband penetration is growing. For the long term, what’s the impact of various SVOD, OTT services on broadband going to be? What can you do to make sure that you have must-have content in your pay-TV portfolio? Certainly one category of must-have live content in every market around the world is sports. Eurosport was this great asset with terrific distribution, and from a demographic perspective a great complement to the male-oriented channels we have in the portfolio. They have found a great position for themselves with a broad array of middle-tier sports.

WS: Of all the developments in pay TV, what was most transformational for Discovery’s business?

HOLLINGER: The organic growth of pay TV has been [the single most important] thing for us. The advent of digital technology...means we can launch more channels into an environment, more HD channels and VOD content.We have the biggest portfolio of HD channels of any program provider in the world.

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By Mansha Daswani As the incoming president of DNI, Jean-Briac (JB) Perrette is taking on oversight of a diverse mix of 46 brands, pay and free, outside of the U.S., heading up a team of regional leaders in Western Europe; Central and Eastern Europe, Middle East and Africa; the Nordics; Latin America and the U.S. Hispanic market; and Asia Pacific. Perrette is not new to Discovery, having served as chief digital officer since 2011 following more than a decade at NBCUniversal. He talks to World Screen about landing his dream job and the strength of DNI as it marks its 25th anniversary.

WS: What do you think your successful background in running Discovery’s digital businesses brings to your new role?

PERRETTE: The world has known digital for the last 10 to 15 years as something that was somehow apart, separate from our traditional businesses. But as we all know, increasingly every day, our consumers, who ulti-

JB PERRETTE mately are the focal point of our business, don’t view the world as traditional versus non-traditional or digital versus traditional. They just view it as their media experiences, on whatever screen, on whatever platform, in whatever way. If you look at the next three, five, ten years of where this business is going to go, it is about delivering experiences that are completely agnostic to whether something is “traditional” or “television” versus digital. The digital background is incredibly helpful to blending those worlds into great multimedia experiences for our audiences.

WS: What are the key strengths of Discovery’s global portfolio today?

PERRETTE: It starts with the people. Every business is about talent and people. The team that is in place [under] Mark Hollinger’s leadership has delivered incredible results the last several years. Secondly, we are constantly aspiring to be better and better storytellers.

Great content creation and great ideas and great formats…are truly globally incubated now. Ideas come from the U.K. or Israel or India and truly go global. We have people in all of these markets, so from a creative and content-development standpoint, our model as a global content company, not just a U.S. content company, is a huge asset. The third thing is our unparalleled

platform, again thanks to David [Zaslav] and the leadership team over the last seven years. The seeds were planted years ago by John Hendricks and the board, who very early on agreed that they wanted to invest in owning actual assets as opposed to just licensing content into the international markets. That has given us an unparalleled footprint from a distribution standpoint.

This is like beachfront property—it’s very hard to get now. We have it; we started building internationally 25 years ago. We have incredibly strong brands in a world of Millennials looking for authentic stories and relating to authenticity as a key theme in their entertainment.

That’s what we’re about. The last thing I’d say is the leadership team with David and the board have proven over the last 25 years [that they will] invest in what’s next in media. They were early to invest in cable in the U.S., they were early to invest in the international business and they were early to invest in HD. They have been innovators and have been willing to take those pioneering steps to develop what’s next. If you look at the next five or ten years, or the next 25, you can imagine that there will be an equal number of ways that we will want to try to reinvent the company and invest in the next things coming in the media space. Having that support and that background is incredibly helpful as you look forward.

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25 YEARS OF GROWTH “Discovery is a truly global company reaching 2.5 billion subscribers with 197 networks in 224 countries and territories, and we are focused on growing in all of those markets.”

—David Zaslav, President & CEO, Discovery Communications

1989

Discovery Channel launches in the U.K. and Scandinavia.

1994

Discovery Channel launches in Asia, Latin America, the Middle East and Africa.

1995

Discovery Channel launches in Canada, India and Australia.

1996

Discovery Kids launches in Latin America.

1997

Animal Planet launches internationally, and People + Arts launches in Latin America.

1998

Discovery Science launches internationally.

2000

Animal Planet reaches 100 million households globally.

2001

Discovery Channel becomes the world’s most widely distributed television brand.

2004

DNI announces the launch of the Discovery lifestyle portfolio of brands: Discovery Travel & Living, Discovery Home & Health, Discovery Real Time and Discovery Real Time Extra.

2005

Discovery HD, Discovery’s international HD network, launches in Asia and Canada.

2006

Discovery HD launches in the U.K. and Europe. DMAX, Discovery’s first free-to-air channel, launches in Germany. Discovery Historia launches in Poland.

2007

Discovery Turbo, dedicated to all things motored, and Discovery Knowledge, focused on history, launch in the U.K.

2008

DMAX launches in the U.K. Discovery World launches in Europe, the Middle East and Africa. Discovery launches its first international HD simulcast service for Discovery Channel in Japan.

2009

Investigation Discovery launches in Europe, the Middle East and the U.K. Discovery HD launches in Romania, its 24th international market. Animal Planet HD launches internationally in Scandinavia.

Quest launches on the Freeview DTT platform in the U.K.

2010

Discovery HD launches in India. TLC expands outside of the U.S. with a launch in Norway in March. TLC launches across Asia Pacific and other parts of Europe. The free-to-air channel Real Time launches in Italy.

2011

Discovery Communications acquires U.K.-based betty in landmark indie-production deal. In less than a year and a half, TLC reaches more than 100 million households outside the U.S., and continues its international expansion with launches in parts of Europe, Africa and Latin America. DMAX, Discovery’s second free-to-air channel offer in Italy, launches. DNI launches first 3D services with trial run in Japan and Brazil as well as a partnership with Sky in the U.K.

2012

DNI acquires Switchover Media. Discovery’s portfolio now has the third-largest market share in Italy, operating six channels in free TV and six channels in the pay-TV space. DNI acquires Dubai-based media company Takhayal Entertainment and its affiliated companies, including its flagship TV network, Fatafeat, the number one food network in the Middle East. Investigation Discovery launches across Latin America. Discovery Kids launches in Asia Pacific. Discovery MAX, a new free-to-air channel offering, launches in Spain. DNI acquires a 20 percent equity stake in Eurosport International channels.

2013

DNI acquires SBS Nordic operations from ProSiebenSat.1 Group, including 12 television networks, as well as leading radio stations and several digital brands in Norway, Sweden, Denmark and Finland. TLC launches in the U.K. OWN: The Oprah Winfrey Network has its first international launch as a programming block on TLC in the U.K. DNI’s female flagship portfolio now reaches 329 million households in 167 markets. Discovery Education International launches and acquires Espresso UK, the company’s first European-based education investment.

2014

DNI signs agreement to increase Discovery’s stake in Eurosport International from 20 percent to a controlling 51 percent. Central and Eastern Europe, Middle East and Africa announces launch of ID Xtra, a complementary channel to Investigation Discovery. For the first time in Discovery Communications’ history, DNI surpasses the U.S. in terms of delivering revenue for the company.

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Entertainment One Television International • Turn • Matador • Close Up Kings Entertainment One (eOne) recently scored an exclusive multiyear distribution agreement for all original scripted series from the U.S.based AMC and SundanceTV. At MIPTV, eOne Television International will be bringing to market the first three series from this output arrangement: Halt and Catch Fire, Turn and The Red Road.

From its output agreement with El Rey Network, the company is offering the drama Matador for presales. “Halt and Catch Fire, Turn, The Red Road and Matador are top-quality productions with fantastic [talent attached],” says Prentiss Fraser, the seniorVP of worldwide sales and acquisitions. “These are the types of series buyers are looking for: shows that excite the audience and capture their attention.” Along with the scripted highlights, eOne will be presenting an unscripted lineup that includes Close Up Kings.

“We really strive to bring the best of the best to the market, all the while making sure we have a diverse offering for our clients.”

—Prentiss Fraser Turn

FILM.UA Distribution • The Sniffer • Inseparable • Eskimo Girl

The drama series The Sniffer, represented by FILM.UA Distribution, was the highest-rated TV series in Russia in 2013.The highoctane detective drama features a self-contained plot, in which stories are resolved within the same episode. A second season of The Sniffer is set for the fall. “The creators managed to come up with a fascinating investigative plot and vivid characters and further reinforced the narrative with the clever use of CGI,” says Evgeniy Drachov, sales manager at FILM.UA Distribution.“This time we’re going to present The Sniffer not only as a ready-made series, but also as a format.The story in The Sniffer is both special and simple.

We believe that it will find success with local producers.” The company is also showcasing Inseparable, a disaster movie with loads of special effects, and Eskimo Girl, an animated children’s series.

“The main target for us today is to show that FILM.UA is ready to present highend products that can compete with the best TV shows produced in North America or Europe.”

The Sniffer

—Evgeniy Drachov

Foxtel • Coast Australia • Wentworth • Paddock to Plate Earlier this year, Foxtel debuted its new online movie service, Presto, which offers film lovers a monthly pass to stream Foxtel Movies, both live and on demand. Brian Walsh, Foxtel’s executive director of television, also mentions the launches of a new recorder, the iQ3, to come mid-year, and a new consumer products proposition, a bundle of telephony, broadband and TV services, before the end of the year.As for upcoming programming highlights, Coast Australia and Paddock to Plate are both set for second seasons.

There’s also Wentworth, which is the most-successful local production in Foxtel history. “Hailed by critics and audiences alike, it is an uncompromising and confronting drama series, which has now been sold in many territories, including the U.K., and has been remade as both a Dutch and German production,” says Walsh.

“We’re highlighting the recent launch of our new SVOD service, Presto.”

—Brian Walsh Coast Australia 4/14 World Screen 61

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FremantleMedia International • The Sixties • Lindsay • Dicte The CNN original series The Sixties spotlights important events that took place during the 1960s. “The series looks at the years between 1959 and 1970 through archival newsreel footage, personal movies and interviews with people who were there at the time, underpinned by expert historical commentary,” says Bob McCourt, the acting CEO of FremantleMedia International. “If the content wasn’t enough, The Sixties also has an amazing production pedigree as it’s exec produced by Emmy Award-winning producers Tom Hanks, Gary Goetzman and Mark Herzog.”

Other highlights include Lindsay, an observational docuseries about Lindsay Lohan, and Dicte, a Scandinavian drama based on the books penned by Elsebeth Egholm.“Dicte is a crime series that manages to be both warm and humorous,” says McCourt.

“The great thing about FremantleMedia International is that it’s a truly global business, with a diverse portfolio of content across all the major genres.”

The Sixties

—Bob McCourt

Global Screen • Iron Fist • The Undertaker • Pinocchio

Global Screen is looking for presales on the big-budget event movie Iron Fist at MIPTV. The two-hour TV movie tells the story of Germany’s most famous knight, robber baron and ladies’ man, Götz von Berlichingen. There are two seasons available for The Undertaker, a Swiss crime series about a former cop turned undertaker. “The world market is demanding entertaining series, so we are happy to present this hilarious gem,” says Marlene Fritz, the company’s head of TV sales. Also at MIPTV, Global Screen will be speaking with buyers about Pinocchio, a miniseries that is partly animated. It is a modern retelling of the world-famous stories by Carlo Collodi. “It stands out with its cute animated protagonist, and the story is well known and beloved all over the world,” says Fritz.

“Iron Fist is a spectacular, entertaining, big-budget event movie, comparable to our The Charlemagne Code.”

—Marlene Fritz Iron Fist

GMA Worldwide • Carmela • Rhodora X • Innamorata The contemporary drama Carmela centers on a woman of unmatched beauty, while Innamorata features a young lady with a genetic disorder that gives her boils and sores. In Rhodora X, a woman is suffering from multiple personality disorder caused by a horrific past experience.“All three titles have strong or progressive female heroines who are dealing with their own personal struggles, be it physical appearance, social status or extreme adversity,” says Roxanne Barcelona, the VP of GMA Worldwide.“They confront their unique situations using the few resources they have. These women not only endure but also break through barriers like stereotyping, sexism, workplace inequality and violence against women.

The male audience, on the other hand, relates to these subjects as well because they are exposed to it in real life one way or another.”

“These shows stand out because they emanate a very relevant attitude regarding social issues today, particularly those concerning women.”

—Roxanne Barcelona Carmela 62 World Screen 4/14

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GRB Entertainment • The Haves and the Have Nots • The Wildlife Docs • King of Thrones While factual has long been GRB Entertainment’s specialty, the company is heading to MIPTV with scripted series from OWN: Oprah Winfrey Network. This includes Tyler Perry’s The Haves and the Have Nots. “This has been a number one rated show on OWN for a reason,” says Mike Lolato, the senior VP of international distribution for GRB. “Not only is it from the creative genius Tyler Perry, but it also taps into a much-loved theme of privileged versus working class.” There are some factual highlights still in the mix, including The Wildlife Docs. “This is an exciting inside look into the world of zoo veterinarians and the untold stories of the animal ER,” says Lolato. King of Thrones is a lifestyle series on bathroom renovations that transform boring old sinks, toilets and bathtubs into over-the-top, outrageous oases.

“We have already proven that we are experts in factual and lifestyle programming, but we are really excited this market to introduce the new scripted series we are distributing.”

—Mike Lolato The Haves and the Have Nots

Incendo • The Good Sister • The Surrogacy Trap • Time of Death

Sonya Walger stars in The Good Sister, a 90-minute movie from the Incendo catalogue.The story follows a woman who is struggling to deal with her philandering husband until her twin sister shows up and things take a deadly turn. Incendo has a number of other female-led movies in its portfolio, including The Surrogacy Trap, starring Mia Kirshner and Rachel Blanchard, and Time of Death, featuring Kathleen Robertson.“We are known for our high production values and well-crafted stories,” says Gavin Reardon, the head of international sales and co-productions at Incendo. “Our films are a cut above most television films and as a result are always in demand.” Reardon says that Incendo is always keen to meet and work with companies around the world for co-production and distribution opportunities.

“The Incendo name is synonymous with quality.”

—Gavin Reardon The Good Sister

ITV-Inter Medya • Black Rose • The Butterfly’s Dream • Stolen Life The drama Black Rose is a ratings hit and one of the bestperforming series in Turkey. “We believe that it will be a ratings smasher in international markets as well,” says Can Okan, the CEO of ITV-Inter Medya. Okan credits the series’ success to its “very strong story and high production values.” ITV-Inter Medya is also showcasing for buyers the five-hour miniseries The Butterfly’s Dream, which has been re-edited from a feature film. The cast includes Kivanç Tatlitug and Mert Firat, both of whom are well known in the international market, according to Okan. The Butterfly’s Dream is set in the 1940s. Stolen Life is the most recent title in the ITV-Inter Medya catalogue. Okan emphasizes that the cast and their acting abilities are what set this series apart.

“Our LatAm sales team is working hard to close a couple of deals in the region.”

—Can Okan The Butterfly’s Dream 64 World Screen 4/14

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ITV Studios Global Entertainment • The Great Fire • Game of Chefs • Autopsy: The Last Hours of…

Set in 1666 with events unfolding over four consecutive days, The Great Fire features one of the world’s biggest disasters. It tells the story of a city and its people in crisis. “The Great Fire is a spectacular, high-budget, event miniseries,” says Tobias de Graaff, the director of global television distribution at ITV Studios Global Entertainment (ITVS GE). “It’s a big TV event that will draw a broad audience.” Also new from ITVS GE is Game of Chefs, a prime-time cooking competition. “It will appeal to broadcasters that have already had success with cooking reality shows and are looking for the next big show, as well as broadcasters that want to share in the success of this genre,” says de Graaff. Autopsy: The Last Hours of…, meanwhile, investigates the tragic deaths of various celebrities.

“The Great Fire features one of the world’s greatest disasters and the extraordinary impact it has on the lives of the people in its path.”

The Great Fire

—Tobias de Graaff

Keshet International • Rising Star • She’s with Me • Easy Money

The interactive talent format Rising Star has sold into more than 20 territories since launching at MIPCOM 2013. The U.S. version of the show will premiere on ABC this summer, and Keshet International is now offering the version as a finished tape. In the way of scripted, the company is offering She’s with Me. “It has themes which can translate to any culture: the fairytale story, culture clashes, celebrity, love and humor—the perfect ingredients for international broadcasters looking to create a successful prime-time scripted series,” says Keren Shahar, the head of distribution and acquisitions at Keshet International.

The comedy Easy Money tells the story of what happens when Eli, a broke and apathetic claims adjuster, wins $70 million.

Shahar calls the series “painfully funny.”

“It’s fair to say that some of [our shows] are impossible to ignore.”

—Keren Shahar Easy Money

KOCCA • Korea Pavilion The Korea Creative Content Agency (KOCCA) is dedicated to promoting Korea’s content industry. Part of its remit is to introduce Korean formats to the global market and support their exploitation. KOCCA also helps Korean firms to network with format-related experts from around the world. “We support Korean producers and distributors to introduce and promote their formats and products in more effective ways,” says ImKyoung Sung, the team manager of KOCCA’s broadcasting industry team. The agency manages a Korea pavilion at industry trade events to support independent production and distribution companies, giving them an opportunity to expand their business in international markets. At MIPTV, KOCCA will be representing around 30 companies.

“KOCCA makes efforts to establish a broader network in the creative industry by participating in markets like MIPTV.” —ImKyoung Sung 66 World Screen 4/14

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Lightning Entertainment • Goodbye World • Gods Behaving Badly • Healing Movies take top billing for Lightning Entertainment at the market.

Offerings include the post-apocalypse thriller GoodbyeWorld, which features Adrian Grenier and Gaby Hoffman.The company also has the comedy Gods Behaving Badly, starring Christopher Walken, Sharon Stone, Oliver Platt and Alicia Silverstone. It is an adaptation of Marie Phillips’ best-selling satire novel of the same name, about a young mortal couple who encounter a group of Greek gods living in New York.The Australian film Healing, with Hugo Weaving and Xavier Samuel, is another lead title for Lightning. Ken DuBow, the company’s executive VP and general manager, calls it a “heartwarming and well-reviewed drama.” DuBow says that in addition to scoring sales for these and other titles, Lightning is looking to find new co-production opportunities for both films and series.

“Quality films always stand out and buyers are always looking for quality.”

—Ken DuBow Healing

Marc Dorcel • Xillimite.com

For the last 35 years, Marc Dorcel has been working to make its adult content accessible to the widest audience possible. Its latest endeavor is Xillimite.com, an unlimited streaming service for adult movies. The new offering was launched to counter the many illegal platforms out there in the marketplace featuring this type of content. “Marc Dorcel is the first industry player to offer an innovative and legal solution that allows every adult over 18 to access thousands of movies from more than 40 studios on every screen (PC, tablet, smartphone) where and when they wish,” says Gregory Dorcel, the CEO of Marc Dorcel.

The SVOD platform has more than 1,000 adult movies to offer “at an attractive rate,” says Dorcel. Among the titles available is The Ingenuous, which features Aleska Diamond.

“Marc Dorcel wishes to promote 35 years of innovation and original content.”

The Ingenuous on Xillimite.com

—Gregory Dorcel

MarVista Entertainment • Thinspiration (Starving in Suburbia) • Kristin’s Christmas Past • If I Had Wings MarVista Entertainment has been busy building up its catalogue of TV movies. “Over the past two years, we have significantly expanded the volume of movies we debut at the markets, and have become respected as providers of quality movies with well-known casts that earn strong ratings in primetime slots,” says Vanessa Shapiro, the company’s executive VP of worldwide sales. In Thinspiration (Starving in Suburbia), a 17year-old dancer is pulled into the dark world of anorexia.

Kristin’s Christmas Past is about a woman who finds herself transported in time to come face to face with herself at the age of 17. If I Had Wings is about an unlikely friendship between a blind teen who dreams of running cross-country track and his classmate who spends most of his time running from the law.

“There continues to be a healthy appetite for TV movies from broadcasters all over the world.”

Kristin’s Christmas Past 68 World Screen 4/14

—Vanessa Shapiro

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Miramax • From Dusk Till Dawn: The Series • Miramax library • Revolution Studios & Samuel Goldwyn libraries The action-horror flick From Dusk Till Dawn, from director Robert Rodriguez and screenwriter Quentin Tarantino, has been adapted as a TV series for Rodriguez’s own U.S. cable channel, El Rey Network. Miramax is bringing the show out to the global market. “This is the first of our television projects and we are so fortunate to have come out of the gate with this series,” says Joe Patrick, the executive VP of worldwide television at Miramax. “Robert’s vision and passion for the project have yielded a pretty spectacular show that’s unlike anything else on TV right now. From Dusk Till Dawn: The Series is based on the cult-classic film, and brings with it many of the characters and story lines that made the film a hit with audiences.”

“We are excited to bring From Dusk Till Dawn: The Series to market following its U.S. premiere on El Rey Network.”

—Joe Patrick From Dusk Till Dawn: The Series

Mission Pictures • The Redemption of Henry Myers • Love Finds You in Sugarcreek, Ohio • Love Finds You in Charm, Ohio

The theme of romance can be found within Mission Pictures’ top three highlights for MIPTV.“The Redemption of Henry Myers, Love Finds You in Sugarcreek, Ohio and Love Finds You in Charm, Ohio are great stories featuring great production values and unique, strong female characters,” says Chevonne O’Shaughnessy, the company’s president. “Mission Pictures will focus on selling our female-based TV product that is targeted at entertaining the whole family. [It is] product that parents, children and siblings can all watch and enjoy together. We also wish to impress on our clients that Mission Pictures can supply 12 new titles per year that meet these criteria. Through our production arm, we will produce three to four titles annually. The rest we will acquire from the high-caliber artists our buyers have become accustomed to.”

“Mission Pictures distributes and produces TV movies that are perfect for afternoon time slots, and will appeal to the female and family demographics.”

—Chevonne O’Shaughnessy The Redemption of Henry Myers

Multicom Entertainment Group • John Paul II, A Man, A Saint • Classic TV series • Feature films, series & miniseries The drama John Paul II, A Man, A Saint is the true story of the friendship between the late Pope John Paul II and his private ski instructor. Aleksey Guskov (The Concert) and Giorgio Pasotti (The Last Kiss) star in the feature, which is a top highlight for Multicom Entertainment Group. Multicom is also presenting a lineup of classic TV series that features Peter Gunn and The Invisible Man, among others, as well as feature films, series and miniseries that star Hollywood A-listers such as Reese Witherspoon (Freeway) and Jared Leto (Basil ). “Along with traditional television and home-video deals, we are looking to package our content into various ‘channels’ for distribution through cable, satellite and Internet carriage,” says Irv Holender, the company’s chairman.

“Our catalogue boasts over 2,500 hours of high-quality content that mostly aired on major broadcast networks worldwide.”

—Irv Holender John Paul II, A Man, A Saint 70 World Screen 4/14

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National Geographic Channels • Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey • Brain Games • Killing Kennedy When Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey debuted, it did so with an unprecedented day-and-date launch on more than 200 channels around the world. National Geographic Channels will be talking to buyers at MIPTV about bringing it to their own platforms.

“Cosmos is the perfect example that epic storytelling still exists in science programming,” says Germaine Deagan Sweet, the company’s senior VP of global content sales. “It resets the standard for science programming, much in the same way that the original Cosmos series did 30 years ago.” Another strong push for Nat Geo at the market is Brain Games. “After the success of last year’s Brain Games, we are pleased to see the series return with another ten hours,” says Deagan Sweet. In addition to factual content, the company is highlighting the feature-length special Killing Kennedy.

“With an ever-expanding catalogue with multiple genre opportunities, our focus is on the equally expanding market for digital rights.”

—Germaine Deagan Sweet Brain Games

Nippon Television Network • Mansion Madness • Pharaoh • Perfect Balance!

For buyers looking for new formats, Nippon Television Network is introducing Mansion Madness. In it, contestants are locked up in a mansion filled with spooky rooms and must be prepared to answer quiz questions at any time. The format, which features reality, comedy and mystery elements, is “perfect for those who are looking for something more than just an audition/ competition show,” according to Mikiko Nishiyama, the director of international business development at Nippon TV. The company is also presenting the game show Pharaoh, which challenges contestants’ knowledge and physical strength. Perfect Balance!, meanwhile, is a family entertainment format. “This is a show that has a flexible budget and can be localized as a weekly or daily show, for any time of the day,” says Nishiyama.

“Japanese programs possess uniqueness and originality.”

—Mikiko Nishiyama Perfect Balance!

Novovision • Pop Foot • Pop Video HD • Pop & Pop Marking Novovision’s first compilation show about soccer is Pop Foot, a MIPTV highlight featuring a slew of clips focused on the popular sport. “Novovision is bringing a touch of humor for World Cup 2014 with Pop Foot,” says FrancoisXavier Poirier, the company’s founder and CEO. Other titles being showcased by Novovision this year include Pop Video HD, containing thousands of high-definition home-video clips, and Pop & Pop, a video-gag program presented by a baby, a dog and a duck in the style of a news bulletin. “[Pop & Pop] will be made up of the best home videos featuring children and animals,” says Poirier. “It is scripted and voiced by comedians, initially in French and English versions. Other languages are planned for various international markets.”

“Our nondialogue, non-violent, non-sexual and nonreligious shows are aimed at a global family audience.”

—Francois-Xavier Poirier Pop & Pop 72 World Screen 4/14

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ORF-Enterprise • Wild Venice • Secrets of Bumblebees • Triumph of the Tomato The documentary Wild Venice was filmed in 4K Ultra HD, which is four times the resolution of full high definition. The production features the multifaceted wildlife of Venice. ORFEnterprise is highlighting the documentary alongside Secrets of Bumblebees and Triumph of the Tomato. “The fascinating highquality nature and wildlife documentary Secrets of Bumblebees that captivates with its macro and high-speed cinematography allows us to witness the behavior, the biology and the unique abilities of bumblebees,” says Marion Camus-Oberdorfer, the head of ORF-Enterprise—Content Sales International. “The instructive documentary Triumph of the Tomato visualizes the cultural history of tomatoes, revealing many unknown facts of cultivation farming.”

“These new documentaries of the renowned Universum brand will again convince with overwhelming visual impressions and solid cinematographic know-how.”

—Marion Camus-Oberdorfer Secrets of Bumblebees

Peace Point Rights • Food Truck Face Off • Colin and Justin’s Cabin Pressure • Frontier Vets

The food-truck phenomenon has been generating buzz in markets around the world. The new Peace Point Rights series Food Truck Face Off taps into that trend. “Food Truck Face Off will appeal to a broad array of buyers as it combines elements of competition, reality, elimination, food and business all in one action-packed hour,” says Les Tomlin, the president and executive producer at Peace Point Entertainment.“Both the format and finished series will be offered at MIPTV for the first time so we expect to do brisk business with this show at MIP.” There’s also Colin and Justin’s Cabin Pressure, which features the outrageous decorating duo of Colin McAllister and Justin Ryan, and Frontier Vets, which follows eight final-year vet students working in an animal clinic in a remote community.

“We continue to build upon the success of our previous markets with strategic acquisitions in factual, reality and scripted as well as continuing to sell our catalogue of top-quality content to our worldwide channel partners.”

—Les Tomlin Food Truck Face Off

PFC - O Canal do Futebol • Troca de Passes • SporTV Repórter • Bem, Amigos!

PFC - O Canal do Futebol, a Globosat channel, airs more than 600 soccer games a year, including an array of big-name Brazilian matches such as the Brazilian Championship, the Brazil Cup and the State Championships. It also broadcasts games from other events, including the Futsal League and showbol and beach soccer competitions. Journalistic programs are an important part of the network, with new shows SporTV Repórter and Bem,Amigos! joining Redação SporTV, É Gol!! and Troca de Passes. In 2014, the channel hopes to launch a new website and expand beyond the 18 countries where it’s currently available while reaching out to new subscribers in its existing territories. “We are always open to new countries,” says Marcos Botelho, PFC’s business manager.“We also want to increase our subscribers in places where we are available.”

“We want to show more live games and some new programs focused on the biggest Brazilian teams.”

Soccer action on PFC 74 World Screen 4/14

—Marcos Botelho

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Power • New Worlds • Birdman Chronicles • The Kalahari Meerkats New Worlds, co-produced with Company Pictures and Channel 4, is a lead offering for Power. Susan Waddell, the CEO of Power, says, “It features stunning locations, gritty action and outstanding performances from an ensemble cast,” which includes Jamie Dornan (Fifty Shades of Grey, The Fall ), Freya Mavor (Skins, TheWhite Queen), Alice Englert (Beautiful Creatures) and Joe Dempsie (Game of Thrones). New Worlds is set in England and America in the 1680s, and tells a story of love, courage, sacrifice and the struggle for liberty.

Power’s factual offering includes Birdman Chronicles, which showcases the adrenaline-fueled realm of wing-suiting, one of the world’s deadliest sports. Power also has some new wildlife titles for buyers heading to the market, including The Kalahari Meerkats, which gets up close and personal with the Gosa gang of meerkats.

“Leading Power’s slate is the powerful new drama New Worlds.”

—Susan Waddell New Worlds

Red Arrow International • Roald Dahl’s Esio Trot • 100 Code • Remedy

Oscar winners Dame Judi Dench and Dustin Hoffman lend their voices to the family feature Roald Dahl’s EsioTrot, a top title for Red Arrow International.The company is also presenting 100 Code, a crime series that pairs up a U.S. detective (Dominic Monaghan, Lost) with an investigator from Sweden (Michael Nyqvist, the Millennium trilogy) to investigate a series of horrific murders.“The gripping series combines a fish-out-of-water story with edgy Scandi crime at its best,” says Irina Ignatiew, the managing director of global scripted distribution at Red Arrow International. Set in the heart of Toronto, the medical drama Remedy looks at life at a hospital through the eyes of charismatic Griffin Conner (Dillon Casey, Nikita).“Medical dramas are sought after internationally, and we are thrilled to present the series at MIPTV,” says Ignatiew.

“All of these shows boast terrific talent, thrilling stories and high production values.”

—Irina Ignatiew Remedy

Red Bull Media House • Red Bull Air Race World Championship • Neymar • Red Bull X-Fighters Red Bull Media House offers a wide variety of live andVOD programming in the areas of sports and lifestyle, nature and science, and tradition and inspiration. A live event that’s particularly special this year is the Red Bull Air Race World Championship. The world’s fastest motorsport series brings together the planet’s best race pilots in a competition that combines speed, precision and skill.

Besides Red Bull Air Race, there’s Red Bull X-Fighters, a tour of freestyle motocross competitions; Red Bull Cliff Diving, where divers plummet from almost three times the Olympic height; and Red Bull Crashed Ice, the Ice Cross Downhill World Championship tour with an international lineup of skaters battling it out through obstacles, jumps and chicanes.Then there’s Neymar, a documentary about the young Brazilian soccer superstar.

Red Bull Air Race World Championship 76 World Screen 4/14

Red Bull X-Fighters

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Rive Gauche Television • APB with Troy Dunn • The Super • DJ Diaries Troy Dunn, an expert in locating and reuniting long-lost persons, leads the action in the investigative series APB with Troy Dunn. Dave Paladino, a building superintendent, is center stage in the factual-entertainment program The Super. Both are top titles for Rive Gauche Television. “We feel two of our shows, APB with Troy Dunn and The Super, are built around very strong characters, which viewers are drawn to,” says Jon Kramer, the company’s CEO. “You will find audiences rooting for them to prevail.” Rive Gauche is also highlighting the half-hour series DJ Diaries. Kramer says, “DJ Diaries is unique as it gives audiences a pulse-pounding look at the world’s hottest DJs. We go backstage and beyond into the world of electronic dance music’s hottest stars.”

“Rive Gauche always focuses on expanding our business in the emerging markets of Eastern Europe, Asia and Latin America.”

—Jon Kramer APB with Troy Dunn

Scripps Networks International • Food Network • Travel Channel • Fine Living Network

Scripps Networks International is hoping to continue its distribution growth in Asia and EMEA this year. “We will continue expanding our distribution footprint for Food Network, Travel Channel and Fine Living Network across EMEA and Asia on pay TV,” says Jim Samples, the company’s president. “In select markets we’ll also launch on DTT; we recently announced the launch of Fine Living Network on DTT on Channel 49 in Italy.”

Another priority is investment in and consolidation of Scripps’ operations in Asia, where it operates Food Network, Asian Food Channel and Travel Channel. “We’re seeing good momentum for all three networks,” notes Samples. In Latin America, Samples says there are “ambitious plans to replicate the success we are now experiencing with our channels in Europe and Asia.”

“Across all markets, distributors are responding well to our channels, based on Scripps Networks’ leadership in lifestyle networks in the U.S. and our successful international track record over the last few years.”

Andy Bates Brazilian Street Feasts on Food Network UK

—Jim Samples

Sierra/Engine Television • Black Box • Crossbones • Siberia Shortly after MIPTV wraps up, the series Black Box will be making its debut on ABC in the U.S. Kelly Reilly (Flight, Sherlock Holmes) stars as Dr. Catherine Black, and the series is directed by Simon Curtis (My Week with Marilyn). The pirate-themed Crossbones is scheduled to launch on NBC this summer. Sierra/Engine Television is preselling the title internationally.The company is also looking for further deals on Siberia. “Siberia is a scripted series with a groundbreaking mash up of the genres of mystery and suspense that sparked watercooler conversations in a myriad media outlets from fans and industry professionals alike after its premiere on NBC,” says Chris Philip, the CEO of Sierra/Engine Television. “As a series that was fully financed before any network was attached, Siberia became a trendsetter in the television packaging and finance space.”

“Crossbones is a thrilling drama set in a time period full of adventure.”

—Chris Philip Crossbones 78 World Screen 4/14

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Sky Vision • Working the Engels • L.A. Frock Stars • Micro Monsters with David Attenborough The family comedy Working the Engels, produced by HalfireCORE Entertainment in partnership with Shaw Media and NBC, is a top highlight for Sky Vision. Leona Connell, the company’s head of global sales, calls the title “laugh-out-loud” funny. Sky Vision’s catalogue also includes L.A. Frock Stars, produced by NHNZ for Smithsonian Channel, which goes behind the scenes of a Hollywood vintage clothing store. Micro Monsters with David Attenborough, produced by Colossus Productions for Sky 1 HD, also tops the list for MIPTV. “This revolutionary new series reveals the marvelous adaptability of the most successful group of animals on the planet,” Connell says of the 4x1-hour production. She adds, “From factual entertainment to scripted comedy to award-winning factual programming, these titles showcase the best in their field.”

“All of these titles offer prime-time scheduling opportunities for broadcasters, with global appeal across a range of genres.”

—Leona Connell Working the Engels

Starz Worldwide Distribution • Power • Black Sails • Far From Home

The official MIPTV World Premiere TV Screening is the Starz original series Power. The series was created by Courtney Kemp Agboh (The Good Wife), executive produced by Curtis “50 Cent” Jackson and stars Omari Hardwick. Starz Worldwide Distribution is gearing up for a busy market thanks to the buzz from the title.

The company is also coming off the successful U.S. launch of the epic series Black Sails, from executive producer Michael Bay. “There are not many series with the degree of production value and global appeal in the marketplace as the Starz series, and broadcasters definitely have responded very strongly to our content,” says Gene George, the executive VP of Starz Worldwide Distribution. Continuing its focus on made-for-TV movies, the company is also bringing out Far From Home, starring Barry Watson.

“Our content is eventdriven, cinematic and unlike most series on television.”

Far From Home

—Gene George

Sullivan Entertainment • Ronaldinho Gaucho’s Team Created by the renowned Brazilian cartoonist Mauricio de Sousa, Ronaldinho Gaucho’s Team is an animated series based on a fictional childhood of two-time FIFA World Player of theYear Ronaldinho.

Sullivan Entertainment’s main focus for MIPTV is on presenting the kids’ series to global buyers. “Ronaldinho played for various clubs across Europe and for Brazil, and is widely regarded as one of the best footballers of his generation,” says Kevin Sullivan, the company’s CEO.“This imaginative series follows a young Ronaldinho and his friends on extraordinary adventures as their magical soccer ball leads them to new fantastical discoveries.The series promotes a healthy way of learning and enjoying sports, sharing with the viewers the importance and influence soccer and sports can have on a healthy family upbringing.”

“Ronaldinho Gaucho’s Team allows us to expand our educational children’s programming, especially with the upcoming 2014 FIFA World Cup in the summer.”

Ronaldinho Gaucho’s Team 80 World Screen 4/14

—Kevin Sullivan

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Tandem Communications • Sex, Lies and Handwriting • Crossing Lines • Pirate’s Passage Tandem Communications believes that its MIPTV highlights transcend cultures and have a global reach. One such title is Sex, Lies and Handwriting, a one-hour procedural drama co-produced with Lionsgate.“The series is not only procedural crime, but also has a lighter, wittier side,” says Rola Bauer, the company’s president and partner. Also featured for MIPTV is the second season of Crossing Lines, which just finished shooting in the south of France.

The company hopes Pirate’s Passage, an animated film written and produced by Donald Sutherland, will resonate with viewers of all ages. “Pirate’s Passage is one of those unique family films that can easily appeal to broadcasters all around the world, not only because of its strong story with global attraction, but also because of Donald Sutherland’s complete involvement in the project,” says Bauer.

“Procedural series of high quality are always in demand around the world, especially when they give a fresh angle to the crime genre.”

Crossing Lines

—Rola Bauer

The Jim Henson Company • Farscape • The Dark Crystal • Labyrinth

Produced by The Jim Henson Company, Farscape fuses live action, state-of-the-art puppetry, prosthetics and CGI animation. “Farscape challenges the senses with mindboggling alien life forms, a record number of dazzling special effects, edgeof-your-seat thrills, irreverent humor and unforgettable characters—all brought to vibrant life by the creative minds at Jim Henson’s Creature Shop,” says Richard Goldsmith, the executive VP of global distribution at The Jim Henson Company.

The Dark Crystal, directed by Jim Henson and Frank Oz, also features innovative animatronics and unique soft puppets created by Jim Henson’s Creature Shop. The Shop also brought to life characters for Labyrinth, directed by Jim Henson and executive produced by George Lucas.

“These properties have an incredible level of brand equity with consumers around the globe.”

—Richard Goldsmith Farscape

Twentieth Century Fox Television Distribution • Tyrant • The Strain • 24: Live Another Day From Homeland producers Howard Gordon and Gideon Raff comes Tyrant, a new drama for FX in the U.S.Twentieth Century Fox Television Distribution is representing the show, which is about an unassuming American family drawn into the workings of a turbulent Middle Eastern nation.Also an FX series, The Strain is a vampire drama created by Guillermo del Toro and Chuck Hogan, based on their novel trilogy of the same name. Another highlight of the catalogue is 24: Live Another Day, a limited-run event series set four years after the events of season eight of 24.

“All three shows are vastly different, but they are big, sprawling epic dramas, which are highly original and very cinematic,” says Marion Edwards, the president of international television at Twentieth Century Fox Television Distribution.

“We are showcasing three highly anticipated, exciting dramas.”

Tyrant 82 World Screen 4/14

—Marion Edwards

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Veria Living Worldwide • Good Food America • Under the Sun • Fit, Famous & Fabulous The lineup of Veria Living Worldwide is led by the Emmynominated Good Food America, which is now in its third season.The half-hour series follows chef Danny Boome on a culinary adventure in search of the best healthy restaurants across America.Veria Living also has new episodes of Under the Sun, in which host Nathan Leroy travels to new locations to explore organic foods at the heart of the healthy-living revolution. In Veria Living’s Fit, Famous & Fabulous, Adrienne Janic goes one on one with today’s hottest, healthiest and fittest stars of stage, screen and sports. “The lineup Veria Living is bringing to MIPTV is based on our keen understanding of what today’s market demands,” says Raymond Donahue, the company’s head of worldwide sales.“Our shows provide buyers with a deep cross section of programming.”

“Whether your needs involve reality, early fringe or even prime time, we have the shows to help networks effectively program their schedules to attract eyeballs and sponsorship revenues.”

Good Food America

—Raymond Donahue

Warner Bros.International TV Production • The Link • Extreme Family School • Two vs. the Nation

The quiz show The Link sees three teams using strategy, teamwork and quick thinking to identify the link between the answers to a range of questions.“We know that buyers are always on the lookout for a new twist to the standard game show format,” says Andrew Zein, the senior VP of creative, format development and sales at Warner Bros. International Television Production. Zein says the show has “a simple yet addictively entertaining idea, which we are confident will travel really well internationally.” Zein also has high hopes for the factual-entertainment format Extreme Family School, which “offers a unique new twist on the tried-and-tested parenting/coaching format.”Also a highlight is the entertainment show Two vs. the Nation, which pits two celebrities against the country in a variety of physical and mental challenges.

“We are confident that we have something for all our buyers during the market.”

—Andrew Zein Extreme Family School

ZDF Enterprises • Knight Rusty • Thicker Than Water • Nature’s Greatest Secrets: The Coral Triangle From its children’s catalogue, ZDF Enterprises (ZDFE) is highlighting the animated series Knight Rusty, which features a lovable scrap-metal knight as its clumsy hero.“Clanking, ex-cash-register Knight Rusty is simply irresistible,” says Alexander Coridass, the company’s president and CEO. In the drama arena, the company is pushing its Scandinavian co-production Thicker Than Water, which Coridass says has a “quirky premise.” ZDFE also continues to expand in the factual domain with the new Nature Now! programs. “The crown jewel of this market’s new factual programs is the three-part high-gloss, landmark documentary series Nature’s Greatest Secrets: The Coral Triangle, a genuine adventure captured through blue-chip cinematography,” says Coridass. Among ZDFE’s entertainment highlights are Wanna Bet? and Dalli Dalli.

“Intriguing stories, high production values, innovative approaches, great appeal for channels, viewers and users— these remain major focal points both in our sales and acquisitions strategies.”

—Alexander Coridass Thicker Than Water 84 World Screen 4/14

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KERRY WASHINGTON

BY ANNA CARUGATI

86 World Screen 4/14

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Chock-full of OMG moments

WS: How did you hear about the show, and what first

connected to unbelievable—

WASHINGTON: I got a call from my agents. They had

bordering on implausible—but oh-so-juicy situations, Scandal has developed a hugely loyal following. It is one of the mostchatted-about shows on social media, and fans love to watch it live while tweeting their amazement, disbelief and shock to other “Gladiators” in the virtual community. In the show, the Gladiators are the employees of Olivia Pope, a crisis-management expert played by Kerry Washington.

Pope, one of the most powerful people in Washington, D.C., is always fixing one emergency or another, when she isn’t fixing presidential elections or sharing the bed of the President of the United States.

Scandal, like Grey’s Anatomy and Private Practice, was created by Shonda Rhimes.

appealed to you about the role of Olivia Pope? read the script and they really loved it. They said, “There is this script we want you to read. It’s almost as if Shonda wrote it for you.” Of course she hadn’t. At the time, Shonda and I didn’t know each other at all. But I read it and I too just felt, Oh my God, this role is amazing. It’s me in some ways and in the ways it’s not me, these are things I want to explore as an actor. I just really, really, really wanted to be a part of it, as did lots of other actresses!

WS: What research did you have to do into the world of Washington, D.C. and into your character?

WASHINGTON: I spend a lot of time with Judy Smith, who is the inspiration for the character Olivia Pope.

She’s a real-life crisis-management expert who works out of Washington but is also in New York and L.A. I spent a lot of time with her, shadowed her and tried to absorb as much as I could about her world.

WS: I understand she also serves as producer on the show. What kind of input does she have?

WASHINGTON: She does a lot of consulting with the scripts. A lot of times the writers will come up with the most scandalous situations they can think of and then they call Judy and ask, What would you do? It’s not that she pitches ideas based on her previous clients, because she’s not allowed to do that, obviously. And even with me often she will explain a story or a situation but she’ll never attach a name. But she is very helpful in getting us to understand the process of crisis management.

WS: What do you like about Olivia?

WASHINGTON: I think the thing I like most about

playing her is her complexity. In some ways she is so together and strong and in control and empowered, and in other ways she is just a mess and so vulnerable. Basically in her professional life she is the most important person in any room and wields her power with intelligence and grace and real authority. But when it comes to the President, she is a different woman because of how much she loves him.

WS: I’ve got to ask, what is in the drinking water in the writers’ room?

WASHINGTON: [Laughs] I know! I always say, I don’t know what drugs you guys are on, but stay on them! I think the writers are just very bold, and they’re not holding back.They are having a good time and we get to therefore have a great time because of it.

WS: Are you privy to any information regarding plots

or characters ahead of time?

WASHINGTON: You do not get any sort of outline or

anything in Shondaland! We hear things at the table readings for the first time all the time. It’s one of the reasons we really enjoy being on social media with our audience, because the same way that people are screaming and throwing things at their televisions and crying and cheering, we have all those same reactions when we hear it at the table read with each other.

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there hasn’t been a woman of color leading a network drama in 40 years. Obviously, if you look at the state of Hollywood right now, that’s not because of a lack of talent, it’s because of a lack of opportunities. So I really thank ABC and ABC Studios and the Disney/ABC family for the opportunity of giving this show a chance, and Anne Sweeney and Paul Lee [president of the ABC Entertainment Group] and Bob Iger [chairman and CEO of The Walt Disney Company] for taking a “risk” on this show.

Thanks to a devout fanbase and plenty of social media buzz, Scandal has become one of ABC’s most successful drama series, building its viewership every season.

WS: I know Shonda is really big on Twitter. Are all of you too, and is this something you enjoy doing?

WASHINGTON: Yes, in some ways we owe the show to our fans’ enthusiasm—they loved this show into a second season and a lot of it had to do with grassroots social media following.

WS: I interviewed Anne Sweeney, co-chair of Disney

Media Networks and president of the Disney/ABC Television Group. She is a big fan of the show and sent me the famous Olivia Pope wineglasses, which I have in front of me as we speak!

WASHINGTON: I had two people come up to me at a luncheon today to say that they had Olivia Pope glasses on their bridal registry! But they are sold out at Crate & Barrel all over the U.S.You can’t get them right now!

WS: Tell me a little bit about the atmosphere on the

set. In particular, there are some pretty intense and gruesome scenes. How do the actors deal with that?

WASHINGTON: You know what’s interesting? I was just thinking about this yesterday. We have this really talented ensemble of actors and everybody’s toolbox is very different—how they approach the work and how they live in the work. One of the great joys for me, because I get to work with most of the characters, is that I get to be privy to everybody’s differing processes and watch how different people work, how they approach the work, how they get to where they need to be. It’s really fun. I feel like I’m always learning from how each actor approaches the material. It’s fascinating.

The one thing I’ll say is that it’s like being part of an amazing theater troupe. We are always pushing each other and supporting each other to do better and be more and more courageous in the work.

WS: What’s it like working with Shonda?

WASHINGTON: I just want to say because you brought

up Anne, I love working for Anne. She’s such a dynamic, powerful, intelligent woman. And there has been so much talk about the historic nature of Scandal and how 88 World Screen 4/14

WS: And it’s a risk that paid off, isn’t it?

WASHINGTON: And a lot of that has to do with the creative currency that Shonda has built up at the network. Having successes like Grey’s Anatomy and Private Practice really created a landscape where she could take these swings and call the shots. It’s really exciting. She is still hands-on with our show, and I’m just so grateful for her talent and her imagination.

WS: Why do you think the show is so successful?

WASHINGTON: First of all, I feel really blessed

because we are in a golden age of television right now where some of the best work that is happening in Hollywood is happening in television. To be a part of that is really exciting. A lot of that has to do with the fact that there are more writers in television than there are in filmmaking. One of the reasons why our show resonates is that it does have a little bit to do with this antihero moment going on in a lot of our media.

There are no good guys and there are no bad guys.

Everything is about flawed human beings just doing the best they can. And I think people relate to that.

That’s how we all are—we’re all flawed. We all want to be the heroes of our own lives but are struggling to do that.

WS: You have worked both in television and in fea-

ture films. Do you prefer one or the other, or do you enjoy them both?

WASHINGTON: I find that television has all the things I love most about film and all the things I love most about theater combined. In theater you get to work on the same character over and over again over a long period of time and you get closer and closer to who that person is and you get to revisit their behavior and their identity. You also become a family with the people you work with over a long period of time and keep going back to the same situations. I love that TV is like theater in that way. But I love that film is really about the intimacy of the camera and the intimacy of the emotional connection between actors on a smaller scale and that you have new words every day and not the same piece of theater every night. So television really is the best of both worlds.

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SOFÍA

VERGARA

By Anna Carugati

Sofía Vergara is known to millions of TV fans as Gloria on the hit comedy Modern Family. Vergara shares many traits with the hilarious character she plays—she speaks with a heavy accent, and has a fierce sense of family loyalty and a self-deprecating sense of humor—but behind the beauty and the body is a woman with sharp business acumen. Vergara is a 50 percent partner in Latin World Enter tainment (Latin WE), which she set up in the late ’90s with her business partner, Luis Balaguer. Vergara, who according to Forbes Magazine is the highest-paid television actor in the U.S., is the spokesperson for a number of renowned brands, including Diet Pepsi, CoverGirl and State Farm Insurance, and has a clothing line at Kmart. She also executive produced Killer Women, which ran on ABC earlier this year, and is working on two other shows. She talks to World Screen about these new shows, the craft of acting and how laughter has guided her through life, in good times and bad.

WS: Tell us about Killer Women, which is based on the Argentinian show Mujeres Asesinas.

VERGARA: Like most Hispanics, I am a huge, huge fan of Mujeres Asesinas, of both the original Argentinian format from Pol-ka Producciones, and also of the Mexican show produced by Televisa. They were addictingly amazing! The thing is that real-life female assassins are extremely complex, crazy, passionate, and why not say it—interesting. A woman can snap because after years of abuse her husband implied she’s fat, or because he didn’t raise the toilet seat and peed all over, or simply because he loves something too much—like his money! [Laughs] These are not silly

Sofía Vergara for CoverGirl.

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spotlight

and simple states of mind.

Women mainly kill not for what they hate, but for what they love, for what they are obsessed with in their minds and hearts. And what makes them plot, endure, stab a mother-inlaw 47 times or bury an ex in the backyard under a guava tree or a rose bush is incredibly interesting. [Laughs] We all have seen in the news how crazy these women’s crimes can be and how addicting it can be to understand them. The female crimes we see on cop shows don’t go into that psychological part as we did in Killer Women.

Since 2009, Vergara has delighted audiences as Gloria DelgadoPritchett on the ABC comedy Modern Family, a role that has won her a SAG Award, among other accolades.

WS: You have two more shows in the works. There is Raising Mom for ABC—is this based on your own experiences as a parent? And you have Speak American for FOX. Tell us about these two shows.

VERGARA: I can’t say Raising Mom is autobiographical, but it did inspire my team to come up with an idea based on my relationship with my son Manolo. The truth is, it’s the story of lots of young, single, working moms with smart Millennial kids who grow up together and help raise each other in a cute and funny way.

Mothers like me and our kids love each other and go through a lot of crazy situations, and relationships like that have not been explored yet on TV. Anyone who is raising a Millennial kid is going to identify with this and enjoy it like crazy. Millennial kids don’t hurry or rush like us, they don’t get our stress, they have a whole different vision of what success, friendship, tolerance, respect, happiness and rules mean—and of what huge tattoos are! There’s a lot of comedy there. Things get crazier when these kids officially become adults and their moms are not even 20 years older than them, are not ready to face the empty-nest syndrome and are mistaken for their own child’s hot sister or girlfriend all the time. There are extremely funny situations between millions of “young” moms and their “adult” kids today, with so much heart and comedy, and thank God this idea caught the interest of ABC to give us an opportunity. Our writer is the super-talented Christine Zander, who has a Millennial son, and our director Gail Mancuso just won an Emmy for directing Modern Family.

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The idea of Speak American was brought to us and our partners at Electus by producer Andrew Lenchewski and writer Benjamin Brand in July, and my team flipped for the idea. Who better than us to produce a sitcom about an accent-reduction center to help immigrants fulfill their American dream? Huh? [Laughs] Most of our production team at Latin WE needs those services!

Including me! [Laughs] The original idea had a female lead teacher, an American girl with a European background, and we made her a Latina!

Andrew and Ben, our writers, worked on the project with our team to come up with the unconventional methods [the teacher would use] in her school and the amazingly funny students that would attend. They added some crazy love tension here and there, and FOX said “Claro que YES” with an accent—and we are thrilled!

Crossing our fingers that together we’re going to do something great!

WS: What appealed to you about the character of Gloria in Modern Family? What do you like about her?

VERGARA: At the beginning Gloria scared, terrified me. The idea of playing a sexy, young, bigmouthed stepmother who was loud, dramatic and married to a rich older man, [prompted] two questions: Are Latinos going to hate me and be offended?

Are Americans going to dislike me, and her, for being too much of a gold-digger symbol? That’s the truth, I was nervous.

The challenge was to give her so much heart, empathy, and strength in her values of love for her husband and family to make her likable, and thank God it worked.

And I absolutely love her. She has given me all I have now—my career, my life in Hollywood. What I admire most in Gloria is that she has so much love for her family, for the truth. She is so

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In addition to a clothing line and a slew of product endorsements, Vergara has a furniture brand, the Sofía Vergara Collection.

unapologetic and honest with her flaws that you have to at least forgive her even if you don’t like her.

in and I like to be well paid for sharing that with the world.

WS: When did you first realize you could make people

WS: You have a very strong sense of humor. What

laugh and that you had a talent for comedy?

VERGARA: My family in Barranquilla [in Colombia] and my friends from elementary school say I was the class clown, the one with the funny faces and best imitations at family gatherings. I do believe that comedic timing is something that you get better at with practice and to a certain point, sure, it can be learned, but you have to be born with at least a little seed of humor, and some sharpness, cynicism, self-deprecation or wit to be able to make a living out of it. I feel lucky to be able to make a career of this, because I love to have fun, to make people laugh and to give them a break from a real life that can be very hard at times for all of us. Trust me, it’s not easy to make guys laugh or to make women take you seriously in comedy when you look like me, with big everything: big boobs, big accent, big teeth, big attitude, huge heels, plus a transvestite voice no one seems to understand, not even me at times.

role has a sense of humor played in your life, both in times of great success and also when you were battling cancer?

VERGARA: I try to compartmentalize so the absurdity, craziness, unfairness and bad surprises in life don’t become an excuse for me to get down, and I consciously try to get a good laugh or make a joke in the middle of every crisis to alleviate things and not go down the wrong way of unnecessary drama…of course, all this after I calm down. It’s difficult to live by those standards or maintain an upbeat pose when bad things happen. But you really have to do it because the other option of drama is really horrible. I hope I never lose that resource of laughing things out.

For example, something silly like a dress ripping apart, exposing your butt, during a live, national award ceremony can be for many, understandably, an embarrassing PR disaster where people are fired, tears flow, the fear of ridicule sets over, etc. For me, it just became a chance to get some laughs and share a funny picture with fans. In the case of my cancer, that is no laughing matter, of course, especially before 30, and with me being a single mom and being the sole breadwinner I did have a dark moment. But then I said, OK, enough, you’re a mom, grow more balls, your son and family cannot see you like this. You are young, strong; just fight it. And I just laughed away the fear with “wig” jokes, feeling like “the hot girl in the plastic bubble” when isolated for radiation therapies.

And with a couple of jokes it all started to look brighter. If I laughed then, I can laugh forever.

WS: How do you choose products

to endorse in commercials?

VERGARA: I have to like them, really like them, and they have to pay me, really pay me…well!

[Laughs] Really, I have to be honest in both senses, I endorse things I like, use and b e l i eve

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An eight-part series produced by Kudos for ITV about the murder of a young boy in a small coastal town, Broadchurch came out of left field to become the U.K.’s most-talked-about drama of 2013. The finale delivered a 33-percent share for Britain’s leading commercial broadcaster, and Shine International has gone on to license the series across the globe. The show’s ratings and critical acclaim were enough to make FOX in the U.S. sit up and take notice, with the American broadcaster issuing a straightto-series order for its own version from Shine America, called Gracepoint. In an unprecedented move, FOX cast David Tennant, who captivated audiences as Detective Inspector Alec Hardy in Broadchurch, as Gracepoint’s lead. The Scottish actor is among Britain’s most versatile and accomplished television stars, with a long list of credits that includes playing the Tenth Doctor on the global hit Doctor Who, a French military attaché in the World War II drama Spies of Warsaw and a successful criminal defense lawyer in The Escape Artist. He is also widely regarded as one of the U.K.’s leading theater stars, most recently playing the lead role in Royal Shakespeare Company’s Richard II. Tennant took a break from filming Gracepoint on Vancouver Island to talk exclusively to World Screen about playing the same role twice, coming to grips with the American accent and the state of TV drama today.

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WS: When you were first approached about Broadchurch, what appealed to you about the project?

TENNANT: I had previously worked with Chris Chibnall [the creator of Broadchurch] on both Doctor Who and on his TV movie United, about the Manchester United Munich air disaster. So I knew Chris well, I knew his work well and I knew that it would be a script worth reading. James Strong is a director I’ve worked with many times, again on Doctor Who and on United. So the fact that it was them approaching me meant that I was all the more inclined to be part of it. And then I read [the script] and thought, this is fantastic—a brilliantly drawn portrait of a terrible event with these extraordinary characters, all of whom you need to know more about.The whole world of it was so evocative. At the end of episode one you are desperate to know what happens next. All those things collided to make me think, this is something to be part of.

WS: Did you know at the outset how it was going to end?

TENNANT: We found out [about plot developments] as

the scripts came out to us. I had no idea, for instance, who the killer was until I got the script for episode eight. I had my own suspicions and my own theories, but I was as in the dark as Alec Hardy was. I was genuinely investigating each character as I came across them. And I had no sense of who was lying to me and who wasn’t. That was quite useful as an acting exercise.

WS: The way every episode left you anxious for the next, it feels like the show was made for the kind of binge viewing so many of us are doing these days—but most people seem to have watched it week to week as it went out on ITV and other broadcasters around the world.

TENNANT: It’s interesting that you say it appeals to binge viewing. I suppose it does, but what took everyone by surprise when it was broadcast in the U.K. was that it seemed to rekindle a kind of desire for that collective national experience. There was very much a sense that people were waiting week to week to sit down and watch it together. We wouldn’t have been able to engender that sense of expectation if people were watching it all in one go. I don’t mean that [watching it week to week is] a more puritanical or better experience! You’re right, there’s an assumption that people don’t want to watch things [as appointment viewing] now, but they most certainly did with Broadchurch. The collective experience was part of what people enjoyed about it.

WS: As it was playing out on ITV, it did feel like everyone in the U.K. was talking about it, speculating about who the killer might be!

TENNANT: It seemed to catch a moment. It took all of us by surprise. Whenever you make something, you hope it’s going to be well received and enthused over, that people will hopefully think it’s as good as you do.

But that kind of thing, when it takes on a life of its own, when it becomes a national talking point, I don’t think any one of us was quite prepared for that. It’s wonderful to be in the center of something like that, but quite overwhelming! [Laughs] During the run up to that final episode, people were going crazy about what was coming. It was fantastic to be part of a national conversation.

WS: I imagine you were used to that though, after all those years on the much-loved Doctor Who. TENNANT: Yes, but you’re very aware that something like Doctor Who has a cultural heritage with it and it has a generations-long appeal. It was particularly wonderful to be part of Doctor Who, but [its success was] not unprecedented. Broadchurch came out of nowhere and within eight weeks became this thing that everyone seemed to be talking about. I’m sure there were lots of people who weren’t watching it, but certainly from my own perspective it felt like it was everywhere.

WS: Detective Inspector Alec Hardy faces a lot of per-

sonal demons. Can you tell me about some of the things you did to prepare for the role?

TENNANT: There’s the practical things, like finding out about stuff you don’t know about, [such as] whatever his medical complaints might be—I don’t want to give too much away for people who haven’t seen it! You spend some time with a murder squad and you find out what that world is like. Ultimately you then turn to the script and that defines everything about what you do.Whatever preparation you do, eventually you have to sync to the script, especially when it’s a good bit of writing.

WS: There are more and more dramas being remade from one country to the next, but it’s exceedingly rare that an actor will take on the same role in two different versions of a show. What was your initial reaction to the idea of doing it all over again, this time for an American audience?

TENNANT: The thing is, I’ve had a few close calls with various American television projects that, for various reasons, hadn’t quite come to fruition. There was something very appealing about the fact that this was something I knew was good. It was going to be executive produced by people I knew and trusted. It was going straight to series, which of course is quite rare. It felt like there were too many positives to look a gift horse in the mouth. It was an unusual situation, trying to recreate something I had done in a whole new set of circumstances, but that felt like it might be an interesting challenge. There were so many positives to the project that it would have been churlish to say no.

WS: How’s your American accent coming along?

TENNANT: Not for me to say of course, you’d have to

speak to others who’ve heard it, but I quite like it! I quite like working in different accents sometimes. It helps allow you access to somebody else. There’s a great liberation working in your own accent too, but as I’ve [worked in] a variety of different accents, it’s interesting to see what sounding different does to the rest of you and how that makes you think slightly differently and even move slightly differently. It can help transform who you are. I quite enjoy the challenge of that and the change that that affords you.

WS: In Gracepoint, Anna Gunn portrays Detective Ellie

Miller, your partner in investigating the crime at the center of the show. Does your working relationship with her alter how you play Emmett Carver, the American version of Alec Hardy?

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ing of the scene.The decisions and choices you make are influenced by the decisions and choices of the actors around you. It’s certainly been great to work with her so far and it feels like we’re establishing quite a believable and competent relationship between the characters. There’s a sparkiness between Carver and Anna’s Ellie which is quite exciting. [Anna’s] very easy to get along with, which is how I like things to be!

WS: I understand that Gracepoint will dif-

fer from Broadchurch in that it’s a longer episode order, and the ending is different.

TENNANT: I find myself in the same situation I was in with Broadchurch— the decision was made by people well above my pay grade that the story wasn’t going to follow exactly the same path. That’s all I’ve been told. So as with Broadchurch before, I’m in the dark again, which I’m quite pleased about. I know as much as you do—I’m told there’s going to be a different ending. It could be fundamentally different or a subtle nuance, I have absolutely no idea. I will be enraptured to find out, as hopefully millions of viewers will be.

WS: You mentioned you’ve been

involved in American pilots before.

With those projects and your experience so far on the set of Gracepoint, have you seen any major differences in how American shows are made compared with series in the U.K.?

TENNANT: It’s not wildly different.

There are differences to the ways the days are structured. There are differences to the hours that are worked and the practicalities of it—the turnaround times and all these kinds of things. But basically it’s the same job. The differences are cosmetic rather than fundamental. Ultimately you’re trying to do the same thing and you’re doing it in the same way that films have been made for over 100 years, more or less.

WS: There are a lot of British actors work-

A lifelong Doctor Who fan, Tennant was the star of the BBC series from 2005 to 2010 and recently reprised the role for the 50th anniversary special, The Day of the Doctor.

ing in Hollywood these days, and shows from the U.K. are certainly gaining more fans on this side of the Atlantic. Do you think there are things Hollywood can learn from what’s coming out of British television today?

TENNANT: It has been a good few years [for British drama in America]. We’ve always received so much American TV, maybe it’s just the balance is slightly redressing 98 World Screen 4/14

itself as the world becomes inevitably smaller. We sit in Britain watching Homeland and Dexter and Girls—I suppose the cream of the stuff that comes out of the States. It would be fair to say that the things that get exported are probably the best of the British product, which is right and proper.

On both continents we would agree that there’s a lot of stuff that doesn’t get exported and therefore perhaps your international reputation is greater than your domestic reputation when it comes to looking at the products that are around. I think there’s been some fantastic television out of America in recent years and some fantastic television out of Britain too. Television actually is having a rather golden age at the moment, and that’s partly to do with what you were referencing earlier about the changing ways in which we watch it and the changing expectations we have of it. When we were making Broadchurch, I loved that people were talking about how rare it was to have one story over eight weeks. Even since we shot it, which was less than two years ago, that feels like quite a quaint thing to say now.

There is that sense that we’re looking for longer-form stories and deeper character development. Those sorts of things that we tend to associate with quality drama are more the norm now.That’s been good for television drama all over the world. Britain is producing some great stuff, so is the U.S., and there’s all the Nordic stuff that we’re enjoying as well. It’s one of the advantages of the new technologies and the ever-shrinking television marketplace that we have access to the best, wherever it comes from.

WS: You’ve had an incredibly busy television schedule

the last few years, but you still make time for your stage work. Why is working in the theater important to you?

TENNANT: It’s what I’ve always done. It’s what I started doing. For the first few years of working as an actor, that was very much the lion’s share of what I did. I would do the occasional episode of a TV show, but I filled my years working in the theater. Even as that balance slightly shifted in more recent years, it feels like [the theater is] my proper job and it’s something I’m always looking to return to. I imagine I always will. One of the great things about being an actor is the variety of projects you get to work on and also the media you get to work in. I really enjoy the fact that I get to flip between the two. I feel very spoiled to be in that position, so I’m not going to surrender it willingly!

WS: As a devout Whovian I have to ask about the recent

50th anniversary special of Doctor Who. What was it like reuniting with Billie Piper, who played your companion, and working alongside the Eleventh Doctor, Matt Smith?

TENNANT: It’s always a joy to reunite with Billie, whether it’s socially or professionally. She’s a great pal. Matt I didn’t know quite so well, but we got on famously. It could have been an awful experience really—by rights it was his show, so with me coming in and trying to jump all over it, he would have had every right to feel a little disgruntled about it. But he couldn’t have been more generous and excited about the prospect himself. It was enormous fun to do. Doctor Who is always fun. That’s one of the reasons why it is so popular, and it’s as much fun to make as it is to watch. It was lovely to revisit that world and to be part of something that was such a big deal. There are very few TV shows that make it to 50 years. To be part of the celebration of that was wonderful.

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MICHAEL EMERSON

BY ANNA CARUGATI

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Michael Emerson developed a loyal following with his Emmy Award—winning performance as the mysterious, nefarious and highly intelligent Benjamin Linus on the critically acclaimed series Lost. He is now playing an equally brilliant, somewhat mysterious and eccentric billionaire on Person of Interest: Harold Finch, the mastermind behind the Machine, a computer that uses pattern recognition to help identify victims or perpetrators of future crimes.

Mr. Finch has teamed up with John Reese, a former CIA agent, played by Jim Caviezel, to stop these crimes before they occur. Person of Interest airs on CBS and has been sold very successfully around the world by Warner Bros. International Television Distribution.

WS: What first appealed to you about Person of Interest

and how did you hear about it?

EMERSON: It was among a pile of scripts that were being batted around at Bad Robot [ J.J. Abrams’s company, which produced Lost and is also behind Person of Interest] in the fall of 2010. I was working on a different project that I hoped was going to take off, but it didn’t work out. I still had a relationship with Bad Robot and I said, Surely you’ve got something else around here that’s cool. They showed me this and said, This might interest you, it’s kind of a noir setting, New York City-based, crime fighting, vigilante; it could be fun. I read it and I really liked it. I liked the mood of it and the atmosphere and the setting and it seemed like a good part, so I just went with it. Then you make a pilot and you think that’s that, it may or may not get picked up. And it certainly may or may not ever have success. This one has done well.

WS: It certainly has. Was it a consideration for you, in

looking at this project, that your next role after Ben Linus be a different kind of character?

EMERSON: Well, I was thinking about that and it was nice that this character was an altogether good guy, even though he was brainy and articulate; I thought that was a nice change.

WS: Is it more difficult to portray somebody who is

basically a decent person or can that be just as satisfying a character to play?

EMERSON: It’s a little harder to make good guys interesting—especially since the general feeling right now is the chase for antiheroes or worse. Villainy or darkness have a few more layers or might be a little more complex. Whether you are playing a good guy or a bad guy, it’s fun if the character is complicated.

WS: Finch has a limp and some previous injuries. Did

you add that in, and is that a way of bringing complexity to the character?

EMERSON: There was mention in the pilot script about him having been injured, and it was up to me to figure out the specifics of that. That was always part of it. It justified him needing a helper; it was why he could not go it alone.

It sets everything up. But we explained where those injuries came from at the end of season two.

WS: A prototype of the Machine really did exist, right?

EMERSON: Yes, several different ones in reality, pro-

grams that were funded by the American government at one time or another.

WS: Is the Machine starting to have its own intelligence

or is it just a computer tracking patterns?

EMERSON: It’s on the cusp of those two things, and that

is where there is tension.The Machine has been clearly programmed in a sufficiently sophisticated way that it can look out for itself. It can analyze threats to itself or to its team members. It’s smart enough to move around the country.

It’s an interesting problem: is Mr. Finch still in control of it?

It doesn’t really seem that way in season three.The Machine still does what it was programmed to do, but Mr. Finch programmed it more cleverly than he thought.

WS: But the Machine is still on the side of Mr. Finch and Reese?

EMERSON: Yes, but the Machine has new friends, like the character Root, that it talks to more freely and more regularly. The purview of its activities has expanded. It may be looking at both relevant and irrelevant numbers in a way. The Machine is trying to wrestle with a dilemma, and that is, it’s now in situations where its makers and allies are in trouble and are in situations where good and bad are not clear.

WS: Tell me about the relationship between Mr. Finch and Reese and how it has been evolving.

EMERSON: It’s one of the central relationships of the series. We were fortunate to have good screen chemistry together, and that’s not a thing that you can plan for or make happen. It just worked out. Jim and I are completely different actors and have completely different off-screen personalities, and yet we work well together. It makes for an interesting and smooth odd-couple arrangement. And that relationship has grown. What was very defensive and paranoid and prickly to begin with has settled somewhat and they have become more collegial with one another. And because they are easier with one another, the show can be a little funnier than it may have been when it started.

WS: You spent your early years not just acting, but, hav-

ing been an illustrator, you were into set design and 4/14 World Screen 101

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EMERSON: Yes, I was especially pleased with the way they resolved or, I should say, did not resolve Benjamin Linus. I thought it was a wonderful flourish out of Beckett to have him sitting on a bench outside the door of whatever you want to call it, heaven or the afterlife, waiting, not yet having sorted things out well enough to pass on through. That seemed to me perfect for my character, but above and beyond that, I thought that the ending to the series was handled as well as it could have been because Lost was a different kind of narrative than other shows. It wasn’t linear, it seemed like it was exploding in all directions, and how do you bring that to a conclusion? The only solution that I could think of and the one that the writers chose was to bring it back to the center. I am so happy that they chose a kind of spiritual ending rather than a device about time or dimension or perception. It was real life and real faith and real grace. I was very pleased, but I know I am probably in the minority. And I may be in the minority among the cast, I couldn’t say, but I was very pleased.

WS: Do you feel in any way that your creative freedom

Created by Jonathan Nolan, Person of Interest, which regularly secures more than 12 million viewers in its slot on CBS, has been renewed for a fourth season.

construction. Tell us about those years—you really did a lot on the stage.

EMERSON: Yes, I did my apprenticeship, I’ll call it, in the theater. I did it in Jacksonville, Florida, because that is where I was living when I got the bright idea that I was going to be an actor after all! So I did as many plays as I could, but no one in that community would ever get paid to play a role. There was a little money rattling around if you could design and build scenery or if you could direct or do the posters, all of those kinds of things. Since I had that background (I had been a magazine illustrator before I was an actor) I was able to piece together about half of a sensible living by doing all the odds and ends of theater work. It was good experience, and like in any other career, it’s good if you understand everybody’s job a little better.

WS: You did a whole lot of Shakespeare and classic theater; did you enjoy that?

EMERSON: In the south, that was my main diet theatrically. I went to graduate school at a very advanced age at the Alabama Shakespeare Festival, and all we did there were many, many Shakespeare plays and other classical works.

That is my background and is still what I gravitate towards.

WS: You had a part on The Practice, where you played a

serial killer, right?

EMERSON: That was a good part.

WS: So bad guys are often more interesting to play?

EMERSON: Yes, or the troubled.

WS: I can’t not ask you about Lost. There is so much to

say, but I will only ask this: Was the ending of the series satisfying to you, and do you think that was a good resolution for your character?

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has been limited because you have been working within the broadcast model?

EMERSON: Well, it is a model, and the broadcast model is different from the cable model. It governs how the narrative is structured or how it is presented.There is a structure that is demanded by a broadcast network, it’s just the landscape in which you work.You may work brilliantly in that landscape or you may not, but it is the hand you are dealt.

Cable gets to be a little looser, a little freer, but that’s a way to get hung up as well.Yes, they can be more graphic; they can be profane. They don’t feel as much obligation to explain themselves to the audience.There is an assumption of its sophisticated viewership and all of that is probably good, except it doesn’t always work out successfully.

WS: I agree, as a viewer sometimes I feel the violence

or the language or the sex is used because they don’t know where to go with the plot.

EMERSON: Maybe this is just a sign of me getting older, but I’m feeling a little over-sexed on cable! I like it as much as the next red-blooded person, but there is an awful lot! I’m a little leery of the underlining of sex without feeling. I think we get a fair enough diet of that and I could do with a little less.

WS: Much has been said about the procedural. I think

Person of Interest has made it more interesting.

EMERSON: It’s the format you have to accept if you are

going to work on CBS.There is no point in arguing against it, you just need to make a strength of it. And we do that fairly well. Our episodes will stand alone pretty nicely, and that makes the show more accessible to a larger audience.

WS: What is it about the show that can appeal to people in different countries?

EMERSON: I think it’s just the particularity of the New York setting, those backgrounds and environments that we work in. I think people around the world are interested in New York and they are also interested in these issues of cybernetics and surveillance. And I’ll say it, the acting is fairly strong on our show; they are characters that you want to know more about.

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POWER of

PAY Elizabeth Guider examines the issues at stake in the thriving global pay-TV business.

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T

hese are heady times for the global TV biz.

HBO’s Game of Thrones.

Recessionary woes are (finally) abating, advertising has picked up, new gizmos and apps are proliferating at warp speed, and M&A activity is gathering steam. In February, Comcast stunned the U.S. media business by snapping up Time Warner Cable for $45 billion, setting off a rethink among its rivals and partners as to how the media landscape will be altered and what other deals might be warranted in response.

Shortly before that bold move, several other U.S. companies, most notably Discovery Communications, AMC Networks and Liberty Global, stepped up their amassing of or disposing of assets on the foreign front. Low-level chatter suggests that other interesting international targets may be ripe for either a buyout or a bulkingup—think Scripps Networks Interactive or Central European Media Enterprises—in order to stay in the running in this increasingly frenetic fray. “How big is big?” is a newly open question among media mavens, regulatory agencies and consumers in the U.S. and beyond.

American players are, and will be, in the thick of transactions abroad as their movies and TV shows—from Gravity and Frozen to NCIS and The Mentalist to The Amazing Race and Ice Road Truckers— continue to be in worldwide

demand and as the growth potential of some of their Stateside businesses continues to shrink.

“The U.S. is arguably a mature market, but there’s still plenty of opportunity and a lot of growth in emerging and established foreign markets,” says Sean Cohan, executive VP of international at A+E Networks.“Through the recession, even with geo-political problems here and there and even with viewer habits changing, there are more subscribers to cable services today than yesterday and more advertisers lining up to chase them.” Cohan stresses that activities abroad are “a material contributor” to and “a growth engine” for his company.

While the bread-and-butter business of licensing individual series and movies to stations outside the U.S. shows no signs of drying up (though it inches up only a few notches each year revenue-wise), the international channels business is by various measures still in expansion mode. (Carriage, for example, is still limited for many in France, Scandinavia, China and parts of Central Europe, to mention only one metric.)

House of Cards on Netflix aside, it’s the shows on cable, whatever the tier—like The Walking Dead on AMC, Homeland on Showtime, Game of Thrones on HBO, The Americans on FX—that are consid-

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ered the coolest around, and not just by audiences in the States.

Dangling these and other niche sensations as a come-on, the Hollywood players who control the copyrights have adroitly built entire channels around them, slotting in locally accessed fare in select territories and rounding out their schedules with back catalogue.

The stats embedded in periodic press releases or the Hollywood studios’ annual reports are headscratchers: service X boasts a footprint covering a whopping 190 territories, service Y touts a reach of 400 million households— reporters on the beat stopped responding to such figures long ago as “not information-feeding.”

More eye-opening, or at least less opaque, have been occasional news flashes:Viacom’s Colors joint venture rising to the top with its Hindilanguage lineup against established players in India; FOX International Channels’ The Walking Dead drumming up record chatter on social media about (and boffo ratings for) its day-and-date global drop.

TRAILBLAZERS

Indisputably, Hollywood’s international channel powerhouses have made substantial inroads around the world since the first intrepid pioneers—CNN, MTV and Discovery among them—had the chutzpah back in the mid-1980s to clamor for the satellite technology that could facilitate the launch of wholesale channels to audiences around the world. They were betting that a round-the-clock diet of American content (much of it reruns in those early days) would enthrall audiences abroad and that their distracted bosses back on the studio lots would—despite start-up costs and five or more years’ time needed to break-even—support such gambles.

Impressive that.

And nowadays? Most analysts hesitate to generalize about the health of the entire sector because key providers of content boast various degrees of carriage overseas, bank on different mixes of subscription and advertising, and conduct their foreign affairs in ways peculiar to each. There’s also the looming specter of so-called cordcutting, which many pundits theo-

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FOX International Channels has become a major player in the international drama co-production space as it seeks to feed the programming needs of its global footprint, signing on to projects like the BBC Worldwide-distributed Da Vinci’s Demons.

rize will some day—some day—turn the entire content business over to the likes of Amazon, Google, Netflix and their own upstart rivals.

EVALUATING THE ASSETS

Those who would opine on the subject of fungible financials variously suggest that somewhere between “25 percent and 50 percent” of any given Hollywood studio’s revenues from the international TV business come from the channels’ side—one of them noting that, if it weren’t such a lucrative area, “why would Discovery have forked over $1.7 billion for those SBS channels in Scandinavia and why would AMC Networks have plopped down a similar sum [$1 billion] for Chellomedia’s outlets?”

And that’s not the only complication in assessing the sector.

“Every country, every region, is at a different evolutionary stage in its media development,” Andy Kaplan, the president of worldwide networks at Sony Pictures Television, points out.“No one size fits all in describing the state of the industry—and the U.S. is not necessarily a predictor of what’s next in any given territory.”

Furthermore, some territories were impacted more severely than others in the last five years by the worldwide recession, making generalities about churn or ad-buying dips even more spurious.

In short, none of the key entertainment programmers—from Sony and FOX to Time Warner and NBCUniversal—break out or provide numbers specifically related to the cash they rake in from their foreign channel operations. But no one doubts that the most established players mint considerable moolah from those efforts.

Among analysts unconnected to the Hollywood heavyweights, estimates hover in the $7.5 billion to $10 billion range for the annual revenues accruing to the sector, which help explain why almost all top studio execs routinely tout “the growth of international” in their formal comments to shareholders.

As a recent media report from the research firm PwC argued, the value of entertainment content keeps rising and those companies blessed with sizable libraries and an ongoing production machine are in an enviable position. It’s what

decisions they make from that perch that determine their relative success in the global sweepstakes.

EARLY BIRDS

Kaplan believes his company was among those that enjoyed a “firstmover advantage” by being early to the channel chessboard, especially in India, where Sony Entertainment Television (SET) has become a front-and-center contender, and in a key western European territory like Spain, where AXN has become a powerful brand.

Others, like Bruce Tuchman, president of AMC/Sundance Channel Global, or A+E’s Cohan, whose companies jumped into the foreign fray at later junctures, believe they are helped by not being burdened with “legacy issues” and by coming into the arena with mindsets already shaped by the new ways consumers are accessing media and by new technologies they are increasingly demanding.

“I think we’re seeing a benefit in being relative newcomers,” Tuchman says. “From the get-go we can

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emphasize a model that’s designed to respond to new consumer demands.”

His biggest challenge this year, though, will be to rationalize and integrate the various channels (lifestyle, cooking, horror and sports among them) acquired in the Chello deal into a coherent package alongside his AMC portfolio. Regarding the purchase, Tuchman says the move will help his company “diversify its revenue stream and give us an expanded platform on which to operate.”

Despite their differences, most Hollywood executives responsible for channel operations overseas are bullish about the state of their business and relatively sanguine about their ability to stave off cord-cutting or other yet-to-be adopted consumer practices that might undermine their success— through to, well, “the mid-term,” whenever that might arrive.

Not that these executives are dismissive of the need to be on top of every new wrinkle in the windowing of their content, both to respond to new audience viewing habits and to avoid cannibalizing

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Tandem’s Crossing Lines, heading into its second season, is a co-production with TF1 and Sony Pictures Television’s AXN network, which airs the show in 80-plus markets.

more established distribution pathways or snuffing out fledgling ones.

WATCHING WINDOWS

Belinda Menendez, who as president of NBCUniversal International TV Distribution and Universal Networks International oversees both old- and new-style distribution at her conglomerate, describes the juggling act as “both a challenge and an opportunity for us to continue evolving our ‘TV Everywhere’ strategy through expanding EST [electronic sell through] and VOD. We are focused on meeting the growing expectations of our viewers, who want to be able to access content from a variety of sources, beyond linear.”

Beyond their management of ever-more-thinly sliced or overlapping windows, these executives are,

in different ways and to different degrees, adamant that the secret to a competitive edge lies with getting the balance right between the American fare (much of it owned in-house) that underpins their services and the original or locally acquired shows in any given region that spice them up.

In other words, to beam or not to beam abroad is not the question.

Rather, the challenge is figuring out what size matters, how large and varied a bouquet one needs to be part of, and how wholesale distribution via those pipelines can complement the more traditional (and still highly lucrative) piecemeal licensing of shows to key national broadcasters.

One thing is certain. None of these top players believes being a standalone is a good long-term strategy unless that single channel

has inordinately strong brand awareness and measurable appeal, à la a Disney Channel or an HBO. PORTFOLIO PREFERRED

“It’s like going to a party alone,” says A+E’s Cohan. “With just one channel, you have poor economies of scale and less leverage with both customers and advertisers. However, with too many offerings there’s a risk of a diffused effort and a blurring of brands.”

Cohan’s company, which began its march abroad back in the mid1990s, fields its three key U.S. ser vices—HISTORY, A&E and (more recently) Lifetime—in various combinations, most everywhere, and sometimes in conjunction with three other owned services, LMN, FYI (launching in place of Bio this summer) and Crime & Investigation Network.

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“Not surprisingly, there’s an almost universal demand for HISTORY, so we’re sold out in virtually every market with that brand.

We’re increasingly bullish and aggressive with our other services, too,” Cohan says.To his mind, China and the so-called “-stans” are the hardest markets for U.S. channels to crack. Most importantly, Cohan adds, is that the company, jointly controlled by Disney and Hearst, is focused on producing and owning its own programming, a goal shared by virtually all his colleagues at other studios.

“The thing that we bring to the table that is very helpful—I think it’s our single most important competitive advantage—is that we’re producing nearly 2,000 hours of original programming each year in the food, travel and home categories,” Jim Samples, the president of international at Scripps Networks Interactive, recently told World Screen about the success of Food Network,Travel Channel and Fine Living in the international marketplace. “There’s no other program group in the world that is so focused on those three categories. We own almost all of that content and all of the rights associated with it in high definition.

We’re able to bring that to the distributors and be very innovative in the way we’re providing them with HD content and giving them ancillary rights for digital, for video on demand, and so on. We don’t have to have those internal negotiations to seek out those rights—we can act quickly.”

Similarly, Tuchman emphasizes that the intention of the AMC services is to acquire and hold on to more program rights. He points to Rectify as an example of a drama series that premiered on his channels in a first window. “That’s important in strengthening a brand—as is our recent deal to acquire key first-run windows on a half-dozen indie film titles straight out of the Sundance fest.”

Somewhat differently, Simon Sutton, president of HBO Interna-

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Universal Networks International premiered the Syfy original series Defiance on a number of its channels globally within a day of the U.S. premiere.

tional and content distribution, puts the emphasis on nurturing “the aura of HBO domestic.”

Though the channel might be exhibited differently in Poland or in Mexico, for example, what is emphasized is that HBO is “a place of mind—cutting-edge, aspirational,” Sutton argues.

IT’S NOT TV

In some key territories, HBO has opted for long-term output arrangements for its movies and series with established satcasters who offer their own upscale service—Sky in the U.K. among them—rather than running a standalone channel operation of its own.

In most places where the Time Warner-owned paybox is beamed, especially in Latin America where it’s often flanked by channels from sister division Turner Broadcasting, Sutton continues, the brand has “a lot of oomph behind it.” He points out that HBO International doesn’t compete for ad revenues but has seen its overseas subscriber base grow significantly, now topping out at around 90 million. (Of its recently reported 2013 revenues of $4.9 billion, one analyst hazarded that upwards of $1 billion could be attributed to the paybox’s international business.)

When asked what’s next for each of their companies, several executives emphasized the further refinement of their program mixes, which vary considerably from region to region and by how much time and money has been spent on fostering local production efforts. Obviously, substantial investment is required to roll the dice on localized content in foreign climes, but there are notable success stories to point to.

Longtime player Sony, for example, boasts an almost entirely localized operation in India—and, per Kaplan, that territory now accounts for a considerable part of the division’s revenues. Kaplan also notes an unexpected surprise bonanza with Korean programming that Sony is beaming across Southeast Asia on its ONE channel. “Some of our guys in the region identified an underserved segment of the audience, so we zigged while others zagged. And it worked.”

By contrast, HBO International relies mainly on its movie vault and home-grown hits like Game of Thrones, but will increasingly be focused on working with “likeminded producers abroad.” Case in point: a three-part miniseries directed

by Agnieszka Holland set in Czechoslovakia called Burning Bush, which

centers on that region’s Communist past and was not the kind of material, Sutton says, that local broadcasters were routinely taking on.

The trick, says NBCUniversal’s Menendez, is “to focus on launching distinctively positioned global brands that satisfy both subscribers and affiliate partners—including layering in locally relevant programming, managed by local teams.”

Take the transmedia property Defiance, which enjoyed a day-anddate premiere in April 2013 on multiple Syfy channels following the U.S. launch. “Not only was it distinctive content for the brand, but we offered it to multiple markets at once,” Menendez explains.

And, in the U.K., a second-screen viewing app, Syfy Sync, coincided with the worldwide launch. Created for both iPad and Android tablets, the app served up what Menendez calls “exclusive content synchronized with the channel’s linear content, offering an immersive, interactive experience.”

BRAND PLANS

Meanwhile, FOX International Channels has taken to heart the lessons it learned from its experience with The Walking Dead, says Sharon Tal Yguado, executive VP of scripted programming. “That phenomenon

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made us plan for more such launches and for more shows that are cinematic, loud, strong on character, serialized—and have stickiness.” While her division did a pre-buy on the zombie series as well as on Da Vinci’s Demons and The Bridge, increasingly, she says, the idea will be to do these kinds of shows in-house, beginning with another series from The Walking Dead’s Robert Kirkman called Outcast.

Tal Yguado is also in favor of limited series—like 24: Live Another Day, Wayward Pines and Cosmos— which she is betting will lend themselves well to her channels overseas.

“What’s better than an extended movie?” she asks rhetorically. “It elevates the quality, and that’s what everyone is after.”

As for local production efforts which have hit big numbers, she points to a much-buzzed-about series in Latin America called Cumbia Ninja, which combines romance, music, Kung Fu and gangsters.

Per their forecasts of things to come, Tal Yguado and others suggest we’ll see more such cross-border, transmedia efforts as the chief cable contenders accelerate their role in what is becoming an increasingly high-energy game of content creation.

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DAVID ZASLAV Discovery Communications distributors. If similar opportunities came up in other markets, which offered those same types of benefits, we would certainly take a look.

WS: Part of the speculation in the press is

Discovery Communications’ mission is to satisfy viewers’ curiosity, and it does so with pay-TV and free-TV channels around the world, ranging from Discovery Channel, TLC and Animal Planet to the SBS Discovery Media portfolio in the Nordic region. As President and CEO David Zaslav explains, the company’s continued investment in content is fueling growth in the U.S. and internationally.

WS: There was speculation in the press that Discovery might acquire Scripps Networks.

Would Discovery be interested in buying a channel group?

ZASLAV: First, Discovery is primarily an organic growth company, and we see tremendous growth opportunities in our existing business. We don’t need to buy to continue to grow.We are opportunistic, but highly selective when evaluating acquisition opportunities.

Potential acquisitions that give us additional opportunities to grow or position us for longterm success are attractive. Last year, we made the largest acquisition in company history with the purchase of SBS Nordic, in addition to other deals, such as Switchover Media, a channel group in Italy. Both of those transactions were accretive from day one and gave us a larger presence in important markets, which helps us drive more value with advertisers and

that channel programmers need extra leverage when negotiating subscriber fees with cable operators.

ZASLAV: Successful channels—with highquality content that engages and entertains viewers—provide the best leverage. At Discovery, we have a very strong story when we sit down with distributors. Over the past few years, we have invested over $1 billion a year in content. We’ve launched more new brands than any other media company, including Investigation Discovery, OWN, Destination America, Velocity and the most recent, American Heroes Channel. And viewers are responding. The market share for Discovery’s networks has increased from 7 percent in 2007 to more than 10 percent in 2013. Internationally, our total ratings increased by 25 percent. Our channels are consistently ranked as “must-haves” by cable viewers.

WS: Is Discovery interested in making other

acquisitions in the U.S. or overseas?

ZASLAV: Discovery has a very strong organic

growth story—we don’t need to make acquisitions to continue growing. At the same time, we are always open to opportunities that will help us grow in new ways, give us a stronger strategic position in a given market, and com-

subscriptions are flat, which means the only way to grow is to take market share from competitors. In addition, the landscape is changing; younger viewers are utilizing new platforms.

The industry needs to continue evolving and responding to viewer patterns, without sacrificing the strong economic model that allows for significant investments in content.

Outside of the U.S., in a number of markets, cable penetration is still low and there is tremendous room for growth from adding new subscribers. The key in these markets is having a presence, and that is where Discovery is uniquely positioned, with more channels in more markets than any other media company.

WS: Why is TV Everywhere a good model?

ZASLAV: It is a great time to be in the con-

tent business, especially for a company like Discovery, because we own most of the rights to everything we produce. As viewers seek to consume content on new platforms and devices, it creates more demand from distributors for those rights and more opportunities to gain additional value for that content.

TV Everywhere is an attractive solution for both content providers and distributors because it preserves the traditional cable model and bundle. For programmers, it is measurable, so we can earn advertising revenue for viewers who are watching on mobile devices and tablets. For distributors, it is authenticated, so viewers need a cable subscription to view content.

The world’s first dedicated factual pay-TV brand, Discovery today has a global business that also includes entertainment and sports networks. plement our existing business.Those opportunities could be domestic or international, but we think the most opportunities are likely outside of the U.S., as the U.S. is a mature market.

WS: What are the major issues facing the U.S.

cable industry? Are they different from the ones facing the international pay-TV industry?

ZASLAV: In the U.S., and other mature markets, the primary issues are lack of subscriber growth and changing viewing habits. U.S. cable 112 World Screen 4/14

WS: Is Discovery’s strategy for providing

content to streaming platforms changing?

ZASLAV: Discovery is platform agnostic. We

[produce] content for our global networks.

This includes long form for our pay-TV networks, as well as long- and short-form content for our online streaming networks. We make content available on various platforms as it makes sense economically for that market.

For more from David Zaslav, see page 386.

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ANNE SWEENEY Disney Media Networks U.S. alone you will see us almost instantly on iTunes, Hulu and ABC.com. And usually within the first 12 months you’ll see us on DVD, Netflix, Amazon, and television syndication is still in the mix as well. We believe that we are responding to the emerging trends in the marketplace with very innovative product. Sometimes that means we are taking a risk on an unproven technology or strategy, but our team is ready to do that.

Anne Sweeney has spent most of her career in the pay-TV arena, first at Nickelodeon, then at FX Networks. Today, as co-chair of Disney Media Networks and president of Disney/ABC Television Group, she oversees ABC Family along with the Disney Channel bouquet of services. She has seen firsthand how great programming enhanced by technology makes an irresistible consumer proposition.

WS: How do you balance the need to satisfy viewer demands against the need to protect and monetize your content?

SWEENEY: We [need to] create new business models that are built around consumer needs rather than the needs of a particular channel or platform or advertiser. We make content and we distribute it on many different platforms in many countries around the world.We can really fulfill the promise of giving people what they want, wherever they are, whenever they want it and on whatever device they are using. At the same time, we are always looking to create value for our advertising and our distribution partners. We have created a number of business models to help us monetize content: everything for us still begins with the traditional network window, but within 24 hours we are on a multitude of windows on a worldwide basis. In the

WS: ABC recently announced it is restricting next-day access to new episodes of shows.

Why was this an important move?

SWEENEY: Last year in May at the ABC Upfront, we announced our WATCH ABC app. We had an open preview in the eight markets where we own stations, so people could experience this live streaming. They could watch their [local ABC] station on their iPads or phone and also enjoy some of the programming in the video-on-demand section of the app. We wanted to make sure people understood the product, but the plan all along was to put this into the MVPD [multichannel video programming distributor] ecosystem. So the wall went down on January 6 and you have to be a subscriber to an MVPD that has done a deal with us for this WATCH app.

Otherwise, you can still get the programming on video on demand, but it is a week later than people who are subscribers to an MVPD.

MVPDs and also all of our broadcast affiliates so we can supply this linear feed of ABC and the immediate video on demand to all of our consumers.

WS: What is the role of a linear network these days?

SWEENEY: Research still shows us that fans will watch TV on the best screen available to them. Obviously, if you are home, your choice is probably going to be your television screen, but if you are traveling and you have access to your iPad or your phone, that is what your choice will be. So the television screen still does a lot of business for us. That was really, in part, the inspiration for the WATCH app—to continue to provide people with the programming that they have come to love, and also honor our commitment to MVPDs and advertisers.

Linear networks are still the largest platform and they serve as brand builders for all of the content that we create. In a world where there is so much choice, brands really are the key to viewer navigation, and the brands that are most important, certainly in our company, ABC and Disney, are the ones that will have the most clout.

WS: Are you satisfied with the quality of the

audience measurement across all screens or do you feel there is more that needs to be done?

SWEENEY: There is definitely more that needs to be done. That said, we are very

Disney Channels Worldwide is home to more than 100 kids’ and family-friendly services and feeds reaching 166 countries.

WS: What has been consumer reaction to

the app?

SWEENEY: We’ve had very positive

response to the live-streaming capabilities.

People are very happy with the video-ondemand options. The frustration really comes from people who either weren’t able to authenticate or had trouble authenticating. It’s a little lumpy right now; we are working very hard and fast to get all of our deals done with all of our 114 World Screen 4/14

happy with the progress that is being made.

Companies like Nielsen and comScore have been working very hard to expand the cross-platform measurement capability. We are able to have a better understanding of our viewership on these new platforms and hopefully it will make us smarter about the things that we offer on these platforms going forward.

For more from Anne Sweeney, see page 267.

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RICHARD PLEPLER HBO PLEPLER: What’s always appealing to talent

in whatever form is great writing and great storytelling.We are fortunate to have an enormous array of extraordinary talent that wants to work with us, both in front of and behind the camera.The combination of the power of HBO’s brand and that enormous talent is the recipe for all the great work you see on the screen—and we’re just getting started.

Home Box Office has set the gold standard for premium pay-TV services with its mix of feature films, sports, documentaries and groundbreaking award-winning original productions. This formula has been successfully exported to Latin America, Central Europe and Asia. CEO Richard Plepler oversees linear channels that target different segments of the audience, as well as the online offering HBO GO that gives subscribers access to favorite shows anytime and anywhere.

WS: HBO was one of the many bright

spots in Time Warner’s recent financials.

What was the key driver behind your revenue increase?

PLEPLER: We had a really good 2013, highlighted by the largest subscriber growth domestically in 17 years. HBO International services also saw significant increase that resulted in a worldwide subscriber count of over 127 million. Of course, what drives all this is one of the strongest programming slates in HBO history and technological innovation that allows the consumer easy access to our acclaimed content.

WS: What have you learned from how your subscribers are using HBO GO and your on-demand service? What are the prospects for offering HBO GO as a standalone option?

PLEPLER: The value of the subscription is significantly enhanced for our subscribers when they take advantage of HBO On Demand and HBO GO. HBO GO alone has 1,900 hours of programming. The ability to watch all of our shows when they want, where they want and how they want is a huge benefit for the consumer. For now the current model with our partners offers the best return for our business.

WS: HBO has expanded its partnership with

Sky in the U.K. to include co-productions.Are you looking to other partnerships globally to fill your original programming needs?

PLEPLER: It is not a reflection of any particular need per se. We have been in business with Sky for many years and the co-production arrangement was a natural evolution of that relationship. HBO has participated in many co-productions over the years and we will continue to do so when it makes sense.

WS: What other growth opportunities do

WS: What are some of the ways you’re

you see for HBO outside of the U.S.?

working with your platform partners to drive subscriptions?

PLEPLER: There is a line I like to quote from Godfather II, “We always make money for our partners.” Our partners recognize that we can play a key role in the evolution of their business. Newly introduced pack-

PLEPLER: All of our international businesses

have great upside potential. Many of the countries where we have HBO-branded networks are still building out multichannel homes and we will benefit from that expansion. The rollout of HBO GO will also continue and that only strengthens the subscription.

HBO yet again dominated the prime-time Emmy nominations this year thanks to critical darlings like Boardwalk Empire, Girls and Veep. ages such as Comcast’s Internet Plus highlight the inclusion of HBO and HBO GO because our brand elevates the offering.This is all very exciting for our business in that it not only puts us at the forefront of a marketing campaign but also gets HBO into the home at a much lower price point.

WS: In this competitive environment, how

are you able to continue attracting featurefilm talent to HBO originals? Are the shorterrun series more appealing?

PLEPLER: Theatricals play a huge role in the HBO subscription, which is why we took the steps to lock up four studios into the next decade (Warner Bros., Fox, Universal, Summit). Approximately 80 percent of the viewing on HBO is of theatrical films.

Titles such as The Hobbit, The Wolverine and Fast & Furious will be watched tens of millions of times. Our customers love these movies and place great value in having them on HBO in our exclusive window.

WS: Given the volume of original series,

what role do acquired movies still play in the HBO programming mix?

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In addition, our output-deal model, “Home of HBO,” in which the HBO brand is licensed along with the programming, has been very successful and prompted interest in additional countries.

Lastly, the HBO services are doing more and more local production. HBO Latin America has led these efforts with a great number of productions, and the miniseries Burning Bush out of HBO Europe received overwhelming acclaim.

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JOHN SKIPPER ESPN

From its TV networks in the U.S. and in 60 countries around the world, to radio and digital assets, websites, magazines and organized events like the X Games, ESPN is dedicated to providing fans with coverage of live sports, scores and information anytime and anywhere.

As John Skipper, the company’s president and a co-chair of Disney Media Networks, explains, nurturing its relationship with sports fans has been the key to ESPN’s success.

WS: Tell us about ESPN’s best-available-

screen philosophy and about serving fans wherever they are.

SKIPPER: The best-available-screen philosophy grew organically out of our mission to serve sports fans anytime, anywhere, and through research and changing consumer behavior, we realized serving them across multiple devices was what fans wanted.

I joined ESPN to launch ESPN The Magazine, and shortly thereafter took on the digital business. At the time, there was ESPN.com and some very early mobile offerings like score alerts sent to pagers.

Even then, we were seeing that the way the consumer and sports fan was headed had digital and mobile as a central part of [his or her] daily life. So we started to explore that and work to really understand it.

When I moved on to manage our sales and content groups, we continued to focus on multiple screens. We decided, quite consciously, that we were not in the TV business anymore. We were in the sports-content business. That means content including video across any device or screen or medium that a sports fan uses.

over the years. We actually like competition. It makes us better.

WS: Would you give some examples of

WS: Do you see live sports events being sold

what type of content ESPN provides on different screens? Is television still the mostwatched screen? Which others are growing in popularity?

SKIPPER: The fact is we don’t really create content only for one screen or medium anymore. When we cover sports, we do it across all media. However, without question, TV is still the most watched.

It is especially true for the live sports experience. I have said many times for many years: if you have the choice of watching the game on a 70-inch high-def television, you’re probably going to.

That said, digital media—mobile, online, game consoles and other emerging media—is hugely important, and by and large it has been additive. If I watch SportsCenter tonight, it doesn’t mean I am not going to want to check the scores or news on my phone tomorrow at lunch, or follow a cricket match while I’m at work.

It is that passion for what we call the game around the game that we have seen and

to digital platforms like YouTube or Yahoo?

How would this alter the relationship between leagues and rights holders and linear channels?

SKIPPER: As you know, we are big believers in digital platforms—mobile, online, broadband, consoles, you name it. However, I don’t quite see the scenario you mention in the near future. That is in large part because we—and many others—do a great job of delivering value to the leagues, aggregating and entertaining mass audiences around their sports. That is not nearly as easy as many people think, to deliver the value that companies like FOX Sports, NBC Sports, CBS Sports, Sky, BT Sport and many others deliver to leagues, fans, advertisers and the rest of the sports ecosystem.

Don’t get me wrong, we do not dismiss the potential. Ultimately, our job is to be sure that we’re delivering great content and value to fans across our media and delivering value to our leagues and affiliates on the business side.

WS: Which rights or sports events are must-keep for ESPN? SKIPPER: I’m going to respectfully, and openly, dodge this question. To borrow the metaphor, I can’t pick between my children.

WS: Would you give an example of a cam-

paign an advertiser has created with ESPN?

The world’s most dominant sports broadcaster, ESPN is reaching its fans via channels around the world, websites, magazines, events and more. served for years—across any of the media we work on.

WS: ESPN is facing competition in the U.S. from FOX Sports 1 and from NBC Sports. What is ESPN’s strategy in facing this competition?

SKIPPER: A lot has been made of this, but really this is nothing new. We have had competition since the beginning of our existence, even though it has intensified 118 World Screen 4/14

SKIPPER: Since we recently wrapped up

the college football season, that is top of mind. I think one of our marquee executions is the integration we achieve every year with College GameDay Built by the Home Depot. It’s a mutually beneficial relationship and a seamless experience for the fan. Outside of the U.S., we did a program with the Discover America initiative for U.S. tourism that included original content we created to run across our digital and TV channels in the

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U.K., Europe, Australia and South America.

We were able to create something that spoke to our audience, showcased the central role sports play across U.S. culture and reached fans in a variety of markets.

WS: How has ESPN been working with advertisers on platforms other than television?

SKIPPER: Multiplatform is core to who we are and what we do, and we do it better than anyone else. In fact, Ed Erhardt, our head of sales, is credited with creating the first unified sales organization to sell across all media back in 1999. We know our fans better than anyone and we can advise our clients on the best media mix for their message. We’ve increasingly been working with movie studios in the digital space, creating beautiful home-page takeovers that lead the industry.

We’ve done some really innovative things with StubHub, where fans can literally purchase tickets for their favorite teams and access stadium views as they engage with our content. In Australia, we’ve had a great six-year relationship with Hungry Jack’s around ESPN Footytips across mobile and computers, where fans can win a free burger voucher delivered directly to their smartphone to redeem in store. And globally we’ve done some really innovative marketing with Nokia—everything from jointly creating the ESPN Hub app for Nokia smartphones to a clever digital ad unit that allowed a user to emulate the user experience on a Nokia Lumia device.

WS: What was the rationale for the sale of

ESPN International’s 50-percent stake in ESPN STAR Sports?

SKIPPER: We had a great 16 years with the ESPN STAR Sports joint venture, but ultimately both ESPN and News Corp. decided that we wanted to independently pursue opportunities in Asia. We wanted more flexibility to manage our own brand and businesses in the region and we have that now.

Right now, we are focused on doing that through a variety of businesses, including digital properties ESPNcricinfo and ESPN FC. We’ll continue to build these properties and look for other future opportunities in the region. In the Pacific Rim, ESPN has a great

ESPN’s X Games.

position as a strong multiscreen market [leader] in Australia and New Zealand, where we will continue the focus on growing television and digital properties. We’re now the leading digital sports publisher in Australia, and we’re excited about the potential for that and our TV channels to be complementary to each other and continue to grow.

joint ventures in some cases (like in Canada with TSN and RDS).

Ultimately, the core strategy is the same: serve fans and develop sustainable, growable businesses. How that is done market by market will differ, and we have excellent local leadership around the world.

WS: One of the major challenges linear

WS: What is ESPN’s strategy for interna-

tional growth? What markets are you focusing on?

SKIPPER: I’ve had a number of questions about this in the past couple of years, and I understand them. Let me say this: we are absolutely invested in our brand being present, growing and meaningful for fans around the world. The specific shape and look of ESPN in each market will not be the same, though. Nor should it be. Each market is different, so we will need to have different businesses—and each will change and evolve in its own way. In some markets we will have digitally led businesses (like we have at present in India with ESPNcricinfo), in others we’ll have fully integrated TV-led multiscreen markets (like we have in the U.S., Latin America and Australia). In some we may have digital media and syndication businesses (like we currently have in the U.K. and Southeast Asia), and we may even have 120 World Screen 4/14

broadcast and cable networks are facing is that viewers are increasingly watching ondemand rather than live television. Sports events are the one type of programming that are always watched live—so what challenges are linear sports channels facing in today’s fragmented digital media world?

SKIPPER: I love the position we are in.Yes, there are challenges. Competition has never been greater than it is today. It’s nice to have a 34-year head start, but now more and more other companies around the world have seen what we saw many years ago: sports is valuable, compelling and important to many people.

Our challenge is to continue to be sure that when a sports fan—die-hard or casual, American, Indian, Australian, Mexican or Brazilian—comes to ESPN on any screen or device, they have a great experience. If we do that better than anybody, we’ll matter to fans, and that will be good business.

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NANCY DUBUC A+E Networks that same spirit and resolve to every project regardless of scale.

WS: For several years now, A+E Networks

Bringing human stories to life has always been A+E Networks’ mission. For years its channels, which include HISTORY, A&E and Lifetime, featured out-of-the-ordinary individuals in unscripted shows like Pawn Stars, Dance Moms and the megahit Duck Dynasty. The company, headed by President and CEO Nancy Dubuc, then made the decision to branch out into scripted fare. The record-breaking ratings of Hatfields & McCoys and The Bible indicate that viewers love stories grounded in real life.

has owned most of the programming it airs.

How can you apply that strategy to scripted programming, which is more expensive than unscripted programming?

DUBUC: Just last year we launched A+E Studios, our new venture that will produce our original scripted content. A+E Studios is led by Bob DeBitetto, one of the savviest executives in the business, with a ten-year track record of success at our company. We will operate the studio with a variety of production models, including co-productions and fully funding projects ourselves. Our first coproduction project is Houdini, a co-production with Lionsgate starring Adrien Brody.

We’ve just announced the pickup of our first wholly owned drama series for Lifetime, Un-Real. Global sales for the series will be handled by A+E Networks International. Drama is an important component of Lifetime’s strategy, and we continue to have success with the format on HISTORY. Given that strategy, it is critical that we can supply these programs to our partners.

WS: The Bible had a very interesting mar-

keting campaign, including screening at some of the major churches in the country.

How has marketing evolved as the television landscape has become so crowded?

that made sense. Choosing to do so in a setting that was special and sacred to them created an experience and helped foster a deeper connection. It also said that we felt strongly enough about this project to share it with those who care the most about it.

To successfully market great programming today, you need to reach consumers at every touchpoint in their lives. We start with creating a powerful exposure to our content on air.

We look at creating experiences in the social landscape because so much of consumers’ lives is being played out there. And of course, we also look at getting our content into other forms of media in more of a PR capacity.

The Bible is a good example of how creating a deeper experience, beyond the TV, is key to successfully breaking through. We are constantly looking for opportunities to engage fans in a dialogue or an experience based on our content, because we feel that is the most effective marketing we can do.

WS: How did Duck Dynasty come about?

What nerve has it struck among viewers?

DUBUC: Our process has always been to seek out great characters and great stories. Those are essential for success, so we’re always looking for colorful people with unique perspectives on life.The Robertsons delivered that in spades. When we first started developing the show, we knew there was something there but did not fixate on the level of success it would achieve. Instead, we focused on the

WS: What did you learn from Hatfields &

McCoys and The Bible?

DUBUC: Hatfields & McCoys and The Bible

taught us a lot about thinking big. Taking risks and swinging for the fences are things we always talk about here, but these two projects in particular really challenged us to do that in ways we hadn’t before. Whether it was working with top industry talent or forging new production partnerships, we learned how important unwavering commitment is to seeing our vision through.

This committed approach helped drive some of the projects we’re very excited about: Houdini on HISTORY, Bates Motel and Those Who Kill on A&E, and the return of Lifetime’s Devious Maids. As we go forward in developing scripted programming, we bring

A+E Networks covers a broad range of demographics with its flagship brands HISTORY, A&E and Lifetime, all of which are distributed internationally.

DUBUC: Along with our production part-

ners, we agreed on two key objectives for The Bible. First, treat the material—probably the biggest, richest, most significant narrative ever—with the utmost respect and historical sensitivity. Second, and more to a marketing end, get people intimately close to this timeless story and the characters that help define their lives. Naturally, sharing the content with interested audiences among the religious community was something 122 World Screen 4/14

elements of the show that were relatable, interesting and that tapped into their unique perspectives and relationships.To us, the show was always about family at its core—a family full of highly interesting characters—and that’s the part that viewers connected with most. Even though their lives and livelihoods are far different than those of people watching the show, the construct of family and the dynamics between its members endears them to our global audience.

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Lifetime’s Dance Moms.

WS: With many channels already up and

running, what is A+E Networks’ international channel expansion strategy?

DUBUC: Today, we have 62 branded channel feeds in over 160 markets and 39 languages.

We have at least one top factual channel in virtually all markets. Our first strategic priority is to have a bouquet of three to six strong, differentiated channel brands in every market.

We began the international rollout of Lifetime and H2 last year with launches across the Americas, Europe and Asia, and have additional launches planned for this year. We had our first European launch of A&E last November and expect more launches this year. Finally, we see opportunities for our newest brand, FYI, in the coming year.

We are also strategically increasing ownership in our channel businesses outside the U.S. In the past year, we acquired full ownership in operations in Southeast Asia and Italy. We will continue to explore full ownership where it makes sense.

WS: What does the Lifetime brand mean for viewers today?

DUBUC: We’re proud that Lifetime is a leading brand for women. Our goal has been and will always be to make the brand a more active and integral part of our viewers’ lives…and we set out to achieve this on several fronts. With programming, we continue to evolve our scripted, unscripted and movie slate to tap into the passions and interests of a constantly evolving female audience. We are finding ways

to expand the moments our audience spends with us by creating more co-viewing opportunities. With technology, we continue to grow our digital presence and our social following to foster more of a holistic experience around our content.

And we continue to build on the brand’s great history of outreach by developing platforms and resources around women’s rights, domestic violence and breast cancer (just to name a few) for our audience to tap in to.

WS: Tell us about the re-brand of Bio to FYI.What void do you see in the market for lifestyle channels?

DUBUC: FYI is designed to stoke personal inspiration, imagination and innovation. It is clear that a void exists in the market for lifestyle channels, but what occupies that space currently is very prescriptive. What will separate FYI is a non-prescriptive approach to lifestyle content, one that embraces an adventurous personalized spirit. Today all of us, especially Gen.Y-ers, live multifaceted lives. I call them the “proudly hyphenated.” We are building FYI to be the only network brand that truly reflects the multifaceted lifestyle of our viewers. From personal taste, space, social life, look and more, it will cover a range of experiences that mirror how people actually live their lives today, unconstrained by one passion or interest.

WS: Tell us about H2 and LMN. How do

they complete and complement A+E Networks’ portfolio?

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DUBUC: Although these emerging brands may not get as much attention, they play a very important role in our portfolio and for our audience. They are designed to complement the content of our three primary networks by offering the ability to go deeper and engage more in the things that make their parent brands appealing. In the case of LMN, a diverse mix of original movies and series makes it the destination for women seeking more powerful stories and real emotional experiences 24/7. H2 has come into its own as the place where information is entertainment. Where HISTORY connects viewers with history in new, informative and entertaining ways, H2 offers viewers the chance to drill down further via a deeply immersive perspective on history-based content from around the globe.

WS: What is the role of linear channels in

today’s changing TV landscape?

DUBUC: We work hard to constantly stay

aware and be prepared for what’s next in technology and the ways our audience consumes content. But we are a content company. Period. That’s the part we control. So for us, remaining relevant requires taking the insights we glean from our tech-savvy audience and tailoring our content accordingly. We want every experience with our brands, our shows and our characters to entertain and delight—and that means something slightly different on each platform. So part of our creative process is to think through delivering a great experience on each one.

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JOSH SAPAN AMC Networks

Josh Sapan, the president and CEO of AMC Networks, has built a very successful business by offering viewers of AMC, SundanceTV, IFC and WE tv shows that are unexpected and unlike anything they have seen before. He also strongly believes in protecting the pay-TV ecosystem by premiering series on cable or satellite platforms, whether on linear channels or VOD services.

WS: What have you been learning about how people are enjoying programming?

SAPAN: There has been an increase in viewership and utilization of off-linear services, whether it’s cable on demand, satellite on demand, or Internet subscription video services, inasmuch as they have the shows, which from us is generally a year after they air. What is curious is that we have seen our linear ratings escalate rather dramatically, while the utilization or consumption of ondemand has increased at the same time.

Perhaps the most notable example of that is Breaking Bad, which in season one was doing a little over 1 million viewers and by the time season five aired, the last episode did more than 10 million viewers. That is an interesting phenomenon because there is generally an intuitive assumption that there is a certain number of viewers, and if they see it in one place, they won’t see it in the

other place. That historically has been a bit of a media paradigm: if you window material and you put it here first, then people won’t watch it there, second, as much. And hence the word “syndication,” which has its own implications. And what we are seeing is somewhat of the inverse, which is that the sampling of shows on the various ondemand platforms—cable, satellite, transactional (by which people often mean iTunes, rented or subscription)—is exposing more people to shows like Breaking Bad, The Walking Dead and Mad Men on AMC, Top of the Lake and Rectify on SundanceTV, Spoils of Babylon and Portlandia on IFC, Braxton Family Values on WE tv, and they are then coming back in greater numbers to the show on linear. Whereas one may have conjectured that linear was under terrible pressure, [it turns out that] for the shows that are really popular on demand, it has boosted their importance and appeal on linear, if they have the right genetics. I would describe those genetics as being, most importantly, timeliness and urgency.

WS: It doesn’t hurt to have shows like Breaking Bad, The Walking Dead and Mad Men! SAPAN: Of course, but I would expand the point because those are very well known.

But a show called Rectify on SundanceTV, for which we did six episodes, is less well known and airs on a somewhat smaller channel. But we felt so strongly about the

was correct: that it helps to show it before you show it.

WS: Is social media helping fuel interest in

shows?

SAPAN: Someone mentioned a line in pass-

ing the other day. They said, “Referral is the new watercooler.” I liked it because it resonated, and of course what it means is that if one rewinds a number of years, the watercooler meant where humans collect to talk.

Today, humans collect virtually and talk virtually, and the referral that occurs in social media in any manner is a very powerful tool.

WS: What was the rationale behind the acquisition of Chellomedia, and what is the strategy for future international growth?

SAPAN: We have been operating international channels under the name Sundance Channel Global around the world, and WE tv in Asia and AMC in Canada for the past several years with reasonable success and a lot of growth. We believe that it is wise for AMC Networks to be a global company, not just a domestic company. So when Chello became available—I think it was probably the largest group of channels outside the U.S. not owned by a content company—we thought it made great sense for us to be the acquirer.

There are multiple benefits [to owning these channels] and they begin with our ambition to run them very well and to

In just a few short years, AMC has become home to some of TV’s most acclaimed dramas, including Mad Men and Breaking Bad. beneficial effect of on-demand on linear viewing that for its first season, which premiered last year, we put multiple episodes on cable VOD before the premiere [of the show on the linear channel]. So in a certain sense, we “showed it before we showed it.”

And you are not supposed to show something before you show it, right? But that’s the whole idea. And in that somewhat smaller universe we were redeemed. It affirmed and confirmed that our intuition 124 World Screen 4/14

improve on the good work that Chello management has done. In particular, to improve the content and the deployment of HD and VOD and, where appropriate, to transport the content we produce in the U.S. [We also want] to look for opportunities to co-produce outside the U.S. and, where it makes sense, deploy and program that content globally.

For more from Josh Sapan, see page 336.

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CHRIS ALBRECHT Starz DVDs, which was a business that never existed before, syndication for shows like The Sopranos and Sex and the City and big international sales—we started to have more of a complete story to tell when we were trying to get people to work with us.

The work that the early pioneers, if you will, at HBO did attracted people who were drawn by the desire to do something that they were very passionate about.

WS: There are a lot more networks, pre-

Finding gifted writers and encouraging them to take risks has always been Chris Albrecht’s approach to producing original series. At HBO it resulted in such groundbreaking shows as The Sopranos and Sex and the City. Now, as CEO of Starz, Albrecht is once again using creative talent and business models to build up original programming.

WS: At HBO, you spearheaded the shift

toward high-quality dramas and comedies.

If we think back to those days, was it difficult to draw talent to the pay-television environment?

ALBRECHT: Yes, it was. The financial pot of gold at the end of the rainbow was the result of successful series airing on a broadcast channel and then being sold in syndication. The idea that theatrical talent would cross over to television was almost unheard of. It was very difficult to draw talent, but we were able to convey that we had something unique to offer from a creative point of view—a platform, a way to tell a story differently, these big serialized dramas, a different kind of comedy—and that attracted a certain amount of people.

Once we were able to add real financial reward for producers and partners—a show becoming a big hit and selling a lot of

mium and basic, producing originals. Is there enough talent for the kinds of shows you want?

ALBRECHT: Yes, there is a sufficient pool of talent. To make sure that we have those talented, passionate people, instead of trying to compete for people who have already done a successful show—and the list of people who have done one successful television series is now getting rather long—[the key] is to go after people who have done two successful shows, because that list is still pretty short!

Also, because there are fine shows out there, there are a lot of people that are being trained in great systems [writers working alongside talented showrunners] and they haven’t done their own great show yet. So working with people who are really passionate about their first big idea is a way to access top-quality talent without getting into the arms race, if you will,

willingness to produce overseas, our willingness to co-produce with partners, where we’re not just investing financially but are actually involved with another end-user in the creative evolution of the show, is something that we are willing to do. A lot of other channels are not willing to do that because, understandably, they want to make sure that they are in the driver’s seat so that they get the product they need to fulfill whatever goals they have. We are actively doing business with people as co-production partners where in some cases we only have consultation and not creative approval and rely on the relationship we have with the creative teams of the production company and of the other network, and that allows us to expand the talent pool that we can access.

WS: Starz’s subscriber base has been increasing. Is it fair to say that originals have played a role in this?

ALBRECHT: Certainly [subscriptions] have been growing. There is no correlation—and this goes back to my entire career in the pay premium space—that anyone can ever draw between a successful show and the number of subscribers that you have. I think it’s fair to say that as more originals appear on a channel that catch the eye of viewers and the third parties—press, social media—then what starts to happen is that we have more opportu-

Starz has become known for its innovative approach to high-quality drama, including its openness to international co-productions. about issues such as how many episodes you’re going to give somebody, how much money the episodes are going to [cost], if you are going straight to series on something or if you are asking them to write a script first. There are so many things that we started at HBO that people copied, or that we’ve started here at Starz that people are copying now, that it’s important to constantly rethink how you are going to access the talent pool that you need. Our 126 World Screen 4/14

nities to market our services with our distribution partners. That is really where you see the opportunity to acquire new subscribers. It’s kind of an indirect direct result of the programs that you have on the air. But there are no equations that allow you to make a one-to-one [connection between the success of] any one particular show and subscriber uptick.

For more from Chris Albrecht, see page 332.

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GERHARD ZEILER Turner Broadcasting System International

CNN and Cartoon Network are two of the most recognized brands in the world. They are part of a portfolio of 130 channels available in more than 200 countries. Gerhard Zeiler, the president of Turner Broadcasting System International, oversees operations outside of North America and is charged with expanding the business by launching new channels and fostering greater cooperation with Turner’s sister companies, Warner Bros. and HBO.

WS: Turner Broadcasting System Inter national has recently undergone significant restructuring. What was the goal of this?

ZEILER: Starting such a substantial restructure was not an easy decision, and it is especially difficult for those who are affected personally. But it was absolutely necessary in order to put Turner International in the best possible position for further growth. It wasn’t only about saving costs. Even more, it is about changing our mindset. We had to challenge our old operating models and our traditional thinking as we built a structure to meet the needs of our current business rather than an organically evolved old structure. In the two regions where we did the restructure, in Europe, Middle East and Africa on one hand and in the Asia-Pacific region on the other hand, we still had a very centralized structure,

whereas in pay TV now there is the need to go local. There is the English word “devolution”: when the king gave more power to Scotland and to Wales, that was the process of devolution. And that is what I would like to compare our restructure to—we gave more power, more responsibility and more accountability to the local management, whether it was the U.K., Germany, Spain and Italy, or Indonesia, Philippines, Thailand, India and Japan. That is a change in mindset, almost a cultural change in the organization.

The second change was the change in management. Giorgio Stock is our new president of the EMEA organization. We have a strong stable of brands in Europe. We also have a strong slate of comedies in our kids’ business, and we are seeing universal popularity for our homegrown hits. After a short period of time, we have already seen an increase in our ratings and in our audience shares for Cartoon Network and Boomerang in most of the European countries, and amazing 30- and 40percent increases in our ratings and audience shares in the U.K., France and Germany; those were Giorgio’s first successes with his teams.

In the Asia-Pacific region, Ricky Ow is our new president. He knows an incredible amount about each of the countries in the region. His experience in launching local channels and establishing local and regional brands is known to everyone in the region.

And that is exactly our goal: launch a lot of new channels. Two other cornerstones of our

entertainment channels. Based on this experience, it is one of our main goals to expand beyond the kids’ and news genres in Europe and in Asia.

WS: Latin America is quite strong, isn’t it?

ZEILER: It’s a fantastic business in Latin

America. Together with HBO and FOX we are the leaders in the pay-TV business.

There are two reasons for it: First, we started at the right time and we never stopped investing. Last year, for example, we acquired a stake in Esporte Interativo, a Brazilian sports channel. Secondly, we accepted years of investments until they paid off. During the difficult years of financial crises, we stayed in the markets, watching some of our competitors pull out.

If you look at the performance of our channels, you will see that they are experiencing great success. Cartoon Network is the number one kids’ channel in a lot of the markets;TNT just surpassed the 50-million-subscriber mark and is, together with FOX, the top-ranked entertainment channel in the region; Space, Warner Channel and TCM [are among] the top movies and series channels; truTV and Infinito are two well-known brands in the factual genre; and CNN en Español is a must-have for all platforms in the Spanish-language markets. Last but not least, we started in the previous year to roll out TBS veryfunny, a young comedy channel. But this is not the end of the good news.

Turner Broadcasting’s international operation delivers 130 channels, including Cartoon Network and CNN, to more than 200 markets. strategy are to increase the cooperation with our “brothers,” Warner Bros. and HBO, and focus on new digital ventures.

WS: Are you looking to diversify into other

Latin America is still a region with incredible growth potential. Look at Brazil: today it has a pay-TV penetration of roughly 30 percent. I have not found anyone who doesn’t predict that this will go beyond the 50-percent mark.

genres beyond kids’ and news?

ZEILER: Definitely. Kids’ and news are actually

WS: Jeffrey Bewkes, the chairman and CEO

the minority of what Turner offers, and you can see our strength in Latin America.We have a strong slate in entertainment, movie channels, series channels and also factual-

of Time Warner, once told me he considered CNN a jewel in the Time Warner crown.

CNN International remains very well received around the world, doesn’t it?

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ZEILER: I couldn’t say it any better than

Jeff did. It really is a jewel in the Time Warner crown because it’s such a huge brand, not only in the U.S. but worldwide.

CNN International (CNNI) is the number one international TV news channel according to all major media surveys across Europe, the Middle East and Africa, the AsiaPacific region and Latin America. If there is breaking news, everyone around the world tunes in to CNN first.We also have quite a lot of brand-licensing deals between CNN and local broadcasters. They want the CNN knowledge and the CNN feeds. We are very proud that CNNI is part of our offer.

WS: Are you looking to make any acquisi-

tions? What type of assets would fit into the Turner portfolio?

ZEILER: The mandate I have from my shareholders is to grow the international business significantly. In order to achieve that, we will focus on organic growth projects, but we will also scan the market for acquisitions, which fit strategically, especially in markets where we either already have scale or in markets with high growth expectations.

Infinito’s Extreme Makeover: Home Edition Latin America.

WS: There is a lot of talk of cord-cutting in the U.S.; do you see that being an issue internationally?

ZEILER: We don’t see a lot of cord-cutting internationally.Yes, you could see some subscriber losses in Southern Europe last year, but that was mostly due to macroeconomic factors. Internationally we see quite the opposite trend, especially since in Latin America and Asia the growth of pay TV is still significant.

WS: In the U.S. many people are asking that

WS: Does Turner leverage its global reach

cable companies sell channels à la carte.

when dealing with some categories of advertisers? What other advantages does Turner have when going after advertising revenues?

ZEILER: The overwhelming part of the ad sales is still done on a local basis, as not only most of the channels, but also most of the advertisers, are organized locally. Having said that, we also see that more and more advertisers are showing interest in leveraging big media companies. One of the brands that uses this with great success is CNNI, where we sell the inventory mostly globally.

ZEILER: À la carte so far is not an interna-

WS: Profits at Turner International have been good. What has been driving growth?

ZEILER: The profit growth was quite significant in the last year and was due to two factors: one was the incredible revenue growth we still have in Latin America, both in subscribers and advertising revenues.

Secondly, we also saw the first positive results of the efficiency drive, which we started in Europe and Asia Pacific.

tional trend, although we see, for example in Scandinavia, some of the platforms experimenting with giving subscribers a choice, which channels should be part of their individual basic package in addition to a fixed set of channels. It is too early to say whether this will be a trend beyond Scandinavia in the coming years or not.

WS: Since there is a lot of on-demand and

online streaming, many people are saying the strength of linear channels will lie in event programming and appointment viewing. Do you share this view?

ZEILER: Linear channels are here to stay and they are the bulk of how people watch TV. But VOD will continue to grow as this is an additional way of viewing. Five or ten years ago, people bought DVDs. Now they can watch on demand.You are right in forecasting that linear channels will rely more on event programming in the future, but 4/14 World Screen 129

they also will have to focus on the traditional genres in order to remain strong.

WS: Is Turner allowing viewers to enjoy content on whatever screen they want?

ZEILER: With our kids’ channels, a huge percentage of our programming is owned by us, so it’s possible to serve the catch-up rights to the platforms or have our own catch-up services. And yes, in our deals with the platforms we always try to give them the rights they need without destroying our own linear networks.

WS: For years you were at the helm of the RTL Group, one of the largest broadcast groups in the world. What were your main concerns and priorities as you managed broadcast stations, and how were those different from the ones you have today managing pay-TV channels?

ZEILER: They are very similar. You need strong brands whether you are in a freeto-air or a pay-TV business, whether you own channels that attract the whole population or you have thematic channels that only reach specific target groups. You also need content that people want to watch and, last but not least, you need efficiency in your operations. It’s quite simple: the more the people who run the stations are passionate about the brands and product, allow creativity to happen, and have the courage to try new things, the better the results will be. Whether it’s free to air or pay TV, there is not such a big difference.

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HERNAN LOPEZ FOX International Channels spread out geographically is not as easy to manage as, say, if it were 1,000 people more concentrated in a few hubs. But the effort and the cost, I believe, are worth the benefit. I also believe we were the first ones to launch an entertainment series worldwide in near day-and-date with The Walking Dead four years ago. And The Walking Dead itself is an example of going against the tide, as many other networks had passed on the show before we picked up international rights.

With popular brands like FOX, National Geographic, STAR World and FX in its stable, FOX International Channels (FIC) has rolled out more than 300 channels around the globe arguably faster than any other media company.

Led by President and CEO Hernan Lopez, the group has focused on building brands that create strong connections with viewers, either with appointment viewing like The Walking Dead or the factual series Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey, or by aggressively increasing its sports programming.

WS: FIC is one of the fastest-growing international channel groups. It seems that FIC has “zigged” where many other groups have “zagged.” What has been FIC’s approach to the channel business? Has it been different from other channel groups, and what factors have fueled FIC’s success?

LOPEZ: I actually believe we have more in common with our peers than we have differences, but it is true that there are some places where we’ve taken a different approach. Organizationally, I think we were the first ones to spread out power and knowledge throughout the world, in a network that now has 64 offices, more than anyone else. That comes at a cost—an organization of 4,000 empowered people

WS: National Geographic launched after several other factual channels had already become established in several markets.

Undoubtedly, the world-renowned National Geographic brand helped with the channel’s launch, but how has Nat Geo differentiated itself from other factual channels?

LOPEZ: Obviously, all of the factual channels rely on character-driven series for viewership and continuity. National Geographic has them too, but adds two things that set it apart: shows that “Entertain Your Brain,” including Brain Games, None of the Above and the upcoming Science of Stupid. These are three series where viewers can really learn science things while being entertained. We also have mega-events, like the 13-part series Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey, a new-millennium take on the classic Carl Sagan series that showed the universe to audiences around

where we believe we can get a return. For global series, we partner with other content producers at an early stage, as we did with AMC on The Walking Dead, or we’re about to do with Cinemax on Outcast, the new series from Walking Dead creator Robert Kirkman, and we explore different models, allowing all parties to mitigate risk and share the upside, but we bring something unique to the table: a guarantee that we are able to launch a show worldwide, giving it a great promotional platform.

WS: FIC has put a lot of focus on sports.

What is the strategy for your sports channels?

LOPEZ: Sports is the most ambitious part of the transformation we’ve done at FIC in the last three years. We want FOX Sports to become a true destination for sports fans around the world. But unlike the Nat Geo or FOX businesses, which are truly global, FOX Sports has to be built country by country, and we will only do it in the places where we have a true shot at being one of the top players in the marketplace.There are huge synergies in running our entertainment channels together with our sports channels, from cross-promotion to affiliate sales to operations.

WS: In general, what are pay-TV platforms

looking for? Is it still possible to launch a general-entertainment channel? Or are

Including factual, entertainment, sports and more, FIC encompasses 300-plus channels, among them the flagship National Geographic and FOX brands. the world. In the same week as the Cosmos premiere, we had another mega-event, Live From Space.

WS: Original productions have been impor-

tant for many of the FIC channels. Producing, however, can be expensive. What are some of the innovative financing models FIC has used to make some of its popular shows?

LOPEZ: Producing is expensive—yes, it is.

We concentrate our bets on the places 130 World Screen 4/14

platforms looking for targeted channels, such as women’s, crime, movies, retro?

LOPEZ: We offer platforms both options.

For instance, we launched the FOX channel in the Netherlands [in August 2013], broadly available in digital basic, and it is already one of the top performers in pay TV. We are in conversations with multiple platforms about launching Nat Geo People, the lifestyle extension of the National Geographic brand.

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FIC’s The Walking Dead.

Platforms have different needs, depending on the tier. They see some channels as acquisition tools, some as retention tools and some as up-sell drivers. The advantage of doing business with FIC is that we have a large portfolio of global brands and content that serves all three purposes.

instance, the first episode of a series freely available to everybody in order to drive interest in the series. Our platform clients are supportive of that. We also participate in the VOD services of nearly all of our platforms, under FOX-branded sections where we monetize advertising.

WS: As on-demand viewing becomes more and more popular, how are you satisfying your customers? How are you making your programming available offchannel?

LOPEZ: We offer our authenticated players, primarily under the FOX Play brand, all around the world. Our viewers want to see on their tablets the content they already pay for, and the best solution to do that without cannibalizing the payTV ecosystem is through the use of authenticated players. Obviously we, like everybody else, occasionally will offer, for

WS: Today, is the key to establish brands

that can live on multiple platforms, rather than think of channels, online or mobile, as separate entities?

LOPEZ: It is the former. Internally, we are using the words “branded destinations” where we used to say “channels.”

One of the reasons why we have pursued the tentpole-brand strategy is precisely because in the places where we have FOX, FOX Sports and FOX Life, all FOX brands are stronger—and that is as true in TV as it is in mobile or online (which, by the way, we see as the same).

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WS: Some people in the industry are

concerned that linear channels may lose their relevance as people increasingly watch online or on VOD. Do you share this concern?

LOPEZ: Obviously, we are aware of that concern. There is an important share of content that will continue to be watched live, including sports content, but more broadly, all forms of events. Our job is to “event-ize” television series, for lack of a better word, and turn them into watercooler conversation starters so that people feel that they have to watch them at the same time.That’s one of the reasons why we have reduced the time lag in airing The Walking Dead from up to seven days from the premiere in the U.S. to, on average, 24 hours globally.

WS: What opportunities for growth do you see in the next 12 to 24 months?

LOPEZ: Execution, execution, execution.

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ROBERT BAKISH Viacom International Media Networks

When MTV launched in the ’80s, it revolutionized television and the music industry with its music videos. People were no longer listening to Top 40 songs; they were watching them.

MTV has evolved through the years, but continues to influence pop culture. It is part of Viacom International Media Networks (VIMN), whose president and CEO is Robert Bakish.

WS: MTV was one of the first brands that rolled out internationally. How has it been adapted to serve today’s young viewers?

BAKISH: MTV was born with the idea that we wouldn’t grow old with our audience. It’s a “grow-through” brand, not a “grow-with” brand. As part of that, ongoing reinvention is imperative. The only constant is change. To ensure that we are evolving with our audiences and that we are accurately and credibly serving them, we do a ton of research. That’s long been a hallmark of Viacom International Media Networks and it continues to be one today. We spoke to more than 60,000 Millennials outside the U.S. last year. And, as a result, we continue to provide programming that reflects their lives and aspirations.

That research informs something that we talk about a lot, which is our “glocal” framework—part global, part local. If you look at the MTVs all around the world, you will see that.

We share programming, long-form entertainment hits and reality shows like Jersey Shore, which has spawned a whole set of local versions. We have Geordie Shore, the highest-rated show in the history of MTV UK; Gandía Shore in Spain, which holds the record for the highest-rated digital terrestrial show in the 12-to-24 demo; and Warsaw Shore in Poland.

We are doing similar things with Catfish.

Another part of reflecting the lives and aspirations of today’s audiences is that they don’t just watch linear TV, they consume entertainment on a multiplatform basis.

They have their mobiles surgically attached to their hands! They still use the wired web and computers, so we provide entertainment product in that way.

In the music space, our signature event on MTV is the EMA [Europe Music Awards].

In 2013, we did it in Amsterdam. We got about 55 million TV viewers globally, and we also had 10 million clips viewed online.

We had 60 million social media interactions around it, with people tweeting, and we had many of the top-trending Twitter topics.

Delivering product in this multiplatform way is what today’s audience wants because it allows them access to additional information and it reinforces linear TV viewing as well.

Even after all this change, serving different consumers, and operating in a different delivery landscape, MTV is still the world’s leading youth entertainment brand. We are available to view in more than 500 million

you step back and look at it, pay TV is an incredible value proposition for the consumer. Look at what you get for your monthly subscription fee: you get access to probably the broadest range of content that has ever been in place, not only on a set of linear feeds, but also on demand.You might get a DVR. You might increasingly get access to TV Everywhere, which means you could watch programming not only on your television set but also on your tablet or your computer.We think that is very important and that’s why in virtually all of our new pay-TV deals we are extending rights to TV Everywhere for our cable operators and distribution partners.

Another sign that the pay-TV business is healthy is the M&A [mergers and acquisitions] market. There is a lot of activity with people paying very high multiples for payTV distributors. They have solid business propositions and it’s not only linear TV, it’s also broadband, telephony and sometimes even mobile. In general, we continue to see subscriber growth and an excellent value proposition for the consumer, and we remain 100-percent committed to the payTV business.

When people talk about cord-cutting, they are typically talking about mature markets, but there are a lot of markets where pay-TV growth is very vibrant. Look at Russia, for example, where penetration continues to be small, but growing very quickly.That is a place

VIMN is home to some of the world’s biggest pay-TV brands, led by the flagship MTV, reaching more than 500 million homes outside the U.S. homes outside the U.S. We are seeing very healthy ratings in many markets and even though it’s some 30 years later, we are still in a very good place.

WS: Is pay TV a healthy business and a

good proposition for consumers?

BAKISH: The pay-TV business is fundamen-

tally sound. Certainly we’re coming out of a difficult 2013, and not the best of economies, particularly in Southern Europe. But when 132 World Screen 4/14

where not too long ago we just had imported feeds. Now, we run a local version of Nickelodeon, which is the number one kids’ pay-TV channel in the market.We run a local version of Comedy Central.We took back our MTV license and launched it as an ownedand-operated channel on pay TV in October 2013.There continues to be very good opportunity in the pay-TV business.

For more from Robert Bakish, see page 347.

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SOPHIE TURNER LAING BSkyB stages. Our independent producers are pretty impressed by how coordinated we are. And because we have a lot of trackers and customer responses, we can use the insight that we gather from our customers when we’re looking to commission the second season. Which characters resonated really well? What would they like to see more of ? What did they not like? It’s fascinating to see the very visceral responses that you get from your customers, who are very, very media savvy, and our harshest critics if we get it wrong.

BSkyB is one of the world’s most successful pay-TV companies and has built its business on a few key principles: always put customers first, deliver the best content and innovate continually.

As managing director of content for Sky’s portfolio of channels, Sophie Turner Laing is responsible for much of the programming that keeps viewers coming back for more.

WS: Much of Sky’s success is due to the

relationship it has with its subscribers. How does that relationship inform your programming decisions?

TURNER LAING: It’s important to remember we’re a retailer and not a broadcaster, so needless to say, we need to have an incredibly close relationship with our customer marketing group. They are involved from the very early stages, particularly in the big bets that we’re placing in content. We rely on Stuart [Murphy, director of entertainment channels] and his team to find and polish those crown jewels, but ultimately there’s no point in us spending all this money on original content if we’re not going to tell our customers that it’s there. The customer marketing group works with us on all the communications, from press to marketing to digital to whatever, right from the very early

WS: What have you learned from how your subscribers are accessing Sky content outside of the linear feeds?

TURNER LAING: It’s important to realize that we have more than 5 million broadband customers, which is incredibly rapid growth in a relatively short period of time.

And we’re the U.K.’s biggest connected TV service. Literally one of the key USPs [unique selling points] for our customers is giving them the flexibility to watch the content where they want to watch it. If you look at the increase in on-demand, it’s very rapid, but I always want to temper this slightly. It is brilliant, and in fact Sky content in Sky homes on-demand does better than any other content, which means we’re finding the right stuff. But it’s also important to realize that in the U.K., on-demand viewing is about 6 percent. There’s still a hell of

WS: Sky has a partnership with HBO,

which you have recently expanded.

TURNER LAING: We have extended it to

2020, a very long-term deal for all of us, which is brilliant! It’s been a totally terrific partnership, literally from day one, as two pay operators with very aligned goals, very similar tastes, very focused on delivering the best. Obviously, HBO has been going for slightly longer than us in really high-end drama—we’ve had a lot of learning from them. The important bit for me with the HBO deal is the co-production element that we added to it. So, as well as extending the deal, where we remain the home of HBO till 2020, there is also a very large commitment to co-producing a number of what I would say are epic-scale miniseries.

HBO has this fabulous reputation. If you think Game of Thrones, Band of Brothers, that’s what we’re going to work incredibly hard on, with Mike Lombardo, the president of HBO programming, in how we take content to yet another level.

WS: It’s been about a year and a half since Sky

Vision launched into a very crowded market.

How has the company been received?

TURNER LAING: It’s just over a year old and going great guns. We have really driven the library hard. They’re working very closely with all our new commissions. We have our biggest investment in drama— I’m not going to tell you how much we’re

With its branded channels, Sky is delivering to its 10-million-plus customers original content they won’t find on any other platform in the U.K. a lot of eyeballs going to linear TV. The U.K. has a daily average viewing of four hours plus. Linear TV is still a big, big percentage, and we need to deliver that. From our big sports matches to breaking news, we are still relevant on the main screen.

Obviously, the transition to more ondemand and more choice is just happening; there is no turning that tap off in a million years. How we make it easier, faster, more responsive to our customers, is a key focus.

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investing, but let me assure you it’s a telephone number—on Fortitude, which Fifty Fathoms is producing for us. It’s being shot in the U.K. and Iceland. And then we have Critical also being shot, which I believe is on the biggest stage for a drama because it allows for continuous shots, à la The West Wing. It is being written by Jed Mercurio and is just incredible. Think 24 meets ER. For more from Sophie Turner Laing, see page 174.

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SUBHASH CHANDRA ZEE Entertainment Enterprises

In 1992, in a landscape completely dominated by one state broadcaster, Subhash Chandra revolutionized the Indian TV business with the launch of ZEE TV. Today, against an intensely competitive market, the flagship ZEE still regularly tops the ranking of India’s Hindi-language general-entertainment channels. It is just one of a broader portfolio operated by ZEE Entertainment Enter prises, led by Chandra as chairman, targeting the country’s estimated 150 million payTV customers.

WS: What are the prospects for the Indian

pay-TV business as it nears its 25th anniversary? Are you finding new opportunities in light of the country’s digitization mandate, which is set to be complete by 2015?

CHANDRA: The prospects are certainly positive. With the advent of digitization the overall pay-TV business will definitely receive the maximum benefit. Since the market will bring in the required levels of transparency and subscriber information, it will give this business a [boost].

WS: Given how many channels are operat-

ing in the Indian pay-TV landscape, how do you stand out and grab the attention of audiences and platforms?

CHANDRA: Our approach in terms of content strategy has always been unique and innovative. We have never followed trends, nor have we ever fallen for the [ratings] race. Our core objective has always been to stay relevant and engage our viewers. Our home-grown content formats like Dance India Dance have shown remarkable performance, and have been extremely liked and appreciated by our viewers across the globe. We stand out by offering customized content solutions to our viewers based on their geographic location and language preference. In the international markets, our approach has been mainly to connect with not just the Indian diaspora, but with the global audiences. So we offer content for the global audiences, either by dubbing or subtitling the existing content, or for certain key markets like the Middle East, we even produce customized content. We consider ourselves a content company, hence our focus will always remain towards offering engaging content to our viewers worldwide, irrespective of the screen on which they consume the same.

WS: Against the competitive environment, how has the television ad market held up for ZEE? CHANDRA: The advertising business has been quite positive for ZEE. In fact, we have outperformed the industry in terms

WS: How is your international-channel

business performing? What are your goals for this segment of your business?

CHANDRA: There is a strategic rollout plan chalked for the international markets. We are expanding our reach to more and more audiences across the globe with new channel launches based on the preferences of the global audiences. Our recent step in this direction has been the entry into the Indonesian market with the launch of two new channels (ZEE Bioskop and Veria Living). We are certainly on track with respect to the set goal of reaching a billion viewers by the year 2020. Currently we are reaching out to more than 700 million viewers across the globe. I am extremely positive and confident that with our strategic rollout plan for the international markets, we shall definitely reach 1 billion viewers by the year 2020.

WS: Channels and platforms in the U.S.

and Europe are increasingly focused on monetizing viewing that takes place off the linear channel. How is ZEE tapping into consumers’ needs for anytime, anywhere viewing?

CHANDRA: Our focus, being a content company, is definitely to capture every screen the viewer prefers. The over-the-top television platform launched by us, Ditto TV, caters to this requirement of the view-

India’s first satellite broadcaster, ZEE has a portfolio that today reaches 700 million subscribers in almost 170 territories across the globe. of the growth rate. The advertising revenue growth for the industry has been about 10 percent. However, for us the growth (excluding the spikes experienced during certain quarters due to the sports properties) has been around 20 percent.

The future seems positive for the overall advertising revenue market, with an expected CAGR [compound annual growth rate] of around 12 to 13 percent in the next one year.

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ers. With this robust platform, we intend to offer linear as well as nonlinear content to all the connected devices of the viewers, giving them access to their entertainment and information needs on the go. With its innovative approach, ZEE has always been a pioneer in introducing new content delivery solutions to the market, Ditto TV being one of the many.

For more from Subhash Chandra, see page 414.

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ALBERTO PECEGUEIRO Globosat about Brazil? They say, If we want to increase our business in Russia, Russia is not for beginners. We cannot get into China. No one has figured out how to make money in India. Europe will take a long time to recover. The U.S. is a mature market. So, compared to the other emerging markets, Brazil still seems, from an international perspective, like a market that is easy to reach and behaves according to known parameters. How much ROI [return on investment] an international company can have by enhancing its equity in Brazil is anyone’s guess. At this point it’s much harder to predict how Brazil will behave. We believe 2014 will largely be a repetition of 2013.

When Globosat launched, in 1991, it introduced Brazilian viewers to an array of choice that had never been seen before on television. In Globosat’s early years, only affluent consumers could afford pay-TV offerings, but thanks to packages tailored to lower-income demos, a strong national economy and a growing middle class, CEO Alberto Pecegueiro has seen his business boom in the last decade.

WS: All major international media companies are very bullish about pay-TV growth in the Brazilian market. What is your view of the rate of growth, considering the economy has slowed down some recently?

PECEGUEIRO: It’s a matter of perspective. If you are coming from 25-, 24-, 23percent growth a year, as we were between 2008 and 2012, going down to 13 percent, which was the rate of growth in 2012, it looks a little frustrating. The overall subscriber base increased by 12 percent last year, which is nothing to be ashamed of, and we expect the same rate for this year. When we talk to international media companies, I ask them, We are not the last Coca-Cola in the desert anymore, why are you still so excited

WS: Is Globosat still offering pricing and packages for lower-income consumers?

PECEGUEIRO: That has worked, but we shouldn’t forget that that is not a decision that Globosat can make on its own— building those packages has to be done in conjunction with the DTH and cable operators. The growth of the market will depend on our joint capacity to provide solutions and the growth we have seen is a consequence of that. But there’s a limit to how much we can lower prices, especially considering that the cost of content continues to increase. That comes from intense competition in the international acquisitions market; there is a dogfight for

ing their cost increases to the cable operators, and of course the prime example is ESPN. In Brazil, because we have been riding the growth of the market, the operators have been able to deliver increasing revenues to the programming companies, and therefore it is unheard of passing escalating prices to the cable operators. That makes all of us a little more comfortable on both sides of the industry. So at this point, lowering the price of packages will be more difficult to do.

WS: In Brazil are linear channels still the

main screen for viewers? How much viewing is taking place on demand or online?

PECEGUEIRO: We are still in a comfortable position with regards to linear channels because bandwidth, the use of credit cards and piracy still represent a challenge for pure over-the-top [OTT] players. At the same time, the whole industry has been enhancing cable video-on-demand offerings as an alternative to the pure OTT players. The numbers are showing explosive growth in consumption through video-on-demand and OTT platforms because most of the programming companies have their own OTT services, although all of them are authenticated services—the content is only accessible to current subscribers. Our numbers are

An early mover in Brazil’s nascent pay-TV sector, Globosat is delivering a cross-genre portfolio of 30-plus channels. good product in most categories. On the sports-rights side, the fact that the live sports events are so valuable to linear channels has increased the demand and the competition for sports rights. On all fronts we have escalating content prices, and that is something to be put into perspective when we discuss how low can we go with the retail price of the industry.

In the U.S., which is a mature market, programming companies have been pass138 World Screen 4/14

really amazing, and none of this has been achieved at the expense of the ratings of the linear channels. Granted, this may change in the future, but the more content we make available on nonlinear platforms, and if that content is very popular, the more it benefits the linear channels.

WS: Are you continuing to invest in

original productions?

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Gloob’s D.P.A. - Detetives do Prédio Azul.

PECEGUEIRO: Original pro-

ductions have been one of our competitive edges in the last 15 years. The news is that in 2014 we will start a very ambitious program of co-producing with the broadcaster TV Globo. While we are not diminishing the volume of our independent production commissioning, we will have additional content developed with TV Globo. That is a winwin formula because we are going to benefit from TV Globo’s know-how in scriptwriting, acting, directing and production. In return, we are going to open a new window for the development of new talent.

We already have a 13-episode series in pre-production called Animal, and we have other product in development for 2015. By 2016 we want to have a pipeline of production that will deliver content for our channels.

Multishow’s Nalu Pelo Mundo.

WS: The FIFA World Cup is in

Brazil this year and the Summer Olympics will be in 2016. In covering these events, are you sharing resources with TV Globo?

PECEGUEIRO: Our level of investment in the coverage of the World Cup is huge. We are very engaged with TV Globo in order to make the best use of all the resources for everyone. TV Globo provides broad coverage in terms of ratings and reach and impact and we give the football fans in Brazil in-depth coverage that is unmatched.We currently have three sports channels, the flagship SporTV and SporTV2 and SporTV3. During the World Cup, SporTV will broadcast live 24 hours a day. It will be the first time that we have a sports channel providing a 24/7 coverage for such a long period. And we are going to dedicate a good number of channels to covering the Olympics.

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one-on-one

ionsgate has built a successful business by identifying underserved audience niches and reaching them in movie theaters, on television and on digital platforms.

For horror fans there is the Saw franchise. Urban viewers have enjoyed a steady diet of Tyler Perry movies and TV series, and Pantelion Films, Lionsgate’s joint venture with the Mexican media giant Televisa, has been serving Latino movie aficionados, recently scoring a box-office hit with Instructions Not Included. Another key focus has been the young-adult market; the megahit Hunger Games and Twilight franchises have been joined this year by Divergent. For the second year in a row, Lionsgate broke the $1-billion mark at the domestic box office, and took in another $1 billion internationally.

The company has provided discerning viewers sophisticated cable series like Mad Men, Weeds and Nurse Jackie, as well as Orange Is the New Black on Netflix.

Lionsgate Television has 21 cable series on 16 different channels, five shows in national syndication, Nashville

on the broadcast network ABC, and new shows for Amazon and Hulu. In addition, the television division has diversified its business with its innovative 10/90 model, with such shows as Anger Management and Saint George, and has increased its production of nonfiction series.

Creativity is not only pervasive in the development and production of films and TV series, it is also a hallmark of many of Lionsgate’s financing-and-distribution deals.

Following a standard set by CEO Jon Feltheimer, the company has pursued a very disciplined approach to production, yet never at the expense of quality, and always attracting top talent to the studio.

Lionsgate, which had record revenues in 2013 of $2.7 billion, has equity positions in nine branded channels around the world, including FEARnet; EPIX; TVGN, a fifty-fifty partnership with CBS Corporation; and six channels with Celestial Tiger Entertainment in Asia. Feltheimer talks to World Screen about the company’s many businesses and its focus on securing the best talent, opportunities and business models.

Jon Feltheimer Lionsgate

WS: What is driving the success of the film division?

FELTHEIMER: What’s interesting is that the billion

dollars in the domestic marketplace doesn’t include the revenue from our films that we do through our partner Roadside Attractions, nor does it include the films we do through our Televisa partnership, Pantelion. That would add another $44 million for Roadside, which would include films like All Is Lost and Mud, and it would have added another $44 million on top of that from Pantelion Films just for Instructions Not Included, the Eugenio Derbez film. Those are pretty good examples of things that most of the other studios aren’t doing that we like to repeat over and over. The other area that we’ve emphasized is international growth. The whole international market is growing, but we’ve concentrated a lot of our attention on territories like China. Our film Escape Plan, for example, made more money at the Chinese box office last year than it made in the U.S. Because of our presence on the ground with Celestial Tiger, our channel platform out of Hong Kong, we’ve really been able to focus on that market. We had six releases in China this past year, which is a significant percentage of the 34 films that were released by the Hollywood studios and, as a result, we greatly increased our market share in China. So, we’re seeing a lot of growth from emerging markets like China and India, and we believe that’s starting to add significantly to our international growth story.

WS: 2013 was Lionsgate’s best year in China. How impor-

tant is China?

FELTHEIMER: China is obviously a very important mar-

ket given its stature as the second-largest economy in the world, with a huge consumer base and a growing appetite for Hollywood films and television programming. The 4/14 World Screen 189

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Chinese box office generated $3.6 billion last year and is projected to grow to more than $6 billion within the next three years, and we’re seeing similar growth in the television market.We established our Celestial Tiger partnership in part to give us proximity to this market and facilitate our licensing of content to Chinese buyers. In the past few years, we’ve licensed hundreds of Lionsgate films and over 1,000 hours of television programming to digital and traditional platforms in China.

As demand from consumers increases across multiple platforms, buyers in China are paying significantly more for our content. For example, our Chinese distribution partner paid a significant sum to license a single upcoming Lionsgate

film, Gods of Egypt—more than all the revenue we generated from that territory a few years ago—and the digital platform Youku paid a premium license fee for the first two seasons of Orange Is the New Black so it could stream the series in China the day after it debuted in the U.S. WS: What other international markets are important?

FELTHEIMER: That’s a little like picking a favorite child. Nearly all of our territories are important to our film and television business, often for different reasons. In addition to China, Russia and Latin America have been big growth markets for our business. Some of our films are now generating tens of millions of dollars at the Russian box office in a

territory that generated almost no revenue for us five years ago. The box office for Catching Fire in Latin America was more than 50-percent higher than for the first Hunger Games film and, with distribution from our IDC joint venture, it generated nearly double the profit.

Sometimes you have to create your own growth in a market. We purchased Redbus Film Distribution in the U.K. in 2005, and with a great local management steadily built our business there, culminating in a stateof-the-art output deal with Netflix two years ago. Our U.K. operations have become a diversified profit center that distributes a combination of Lionsgate mainstream commercial releases, third-party acquisitions and their own internally produced films.

Lionsgate UK achieved a record year in 2013 and just completed the best quarter in its history.

Our success in the U.K. is attributable not only to the business we built but to the changing business paradigm to which we were responding. The arrival of Netflix and Amazon’s LOVEFiLM ended BSkyB’s virtual monopoly in the U.K. and created intense competition in a market where little or no competition previously existed.

Even BSkyB has responded by competing more aggressively for the second windows of our product after their first window on Netflix.

We believe that this paradigm shift will become evident in other territories as new SVOD services and EST platforms continue to emerge. Netflix operates in Latin America, Canada, the U.K., Ireland, Scandinavia and the Netherlands, and we believe they will launch in two other major European territories in the near future. Amazon’s LOVEFiLM has a strong presence in the U.K. [where it is branded as Prime Instant Video] and Germany, and Apple has [iTunes] stores in 110 countries around the world.

WS: How is Lionsgate balancing

Netflix is the home of Lionsgate’s Orange Is the New Black, which was a bingeviewing hit for the platform in its first season and is returning for a second.

its mix of films—franchise and non-franchise—in any given year?

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FELTHEIMER: We take a global view when we create our film slate, and we rely on a portfolio approach.

Our slate includes franchises like The Hunger Games and The Expendables, potential franchises and branded properties like Divergent, Mortdecai, starring Johnny Depp, The Last Witch Hunter, starring Vin Diesel, the sequel to our sleeper hit Now You See Me, and Gods of Egypt, an epic reenvisioning of mythical ancient Egypt that combines spectacular visual effects and a distinctly Lionsgate business model, as well as star-driven genre films with breakout potential. Within each of these categories, we’re very cognizant of capitalizing on the tremendous growth of the international marketplace in everything from our casting to our production locations to our marketing and distribution.

For example, we were committed to building on the success of the first Hunger Games film and making Catching Fire a truly global phenomenon, and we gave it a huge kickoff for our international distributors at Cannes last year and held premieres in London, Paris, Berlin, Madrid and Rome before its American premiere in Los Angeles. Due in part to these efforts, Catching Fire grossed 60-percent more at the international box office than the first Hunger Games film, and we’re already exploring ways to build on that momentum with the two Mockingjay films. Now You See Me was a sleeper hit that grossed $118 million at the North American box office, but it did double that business internationally, so we will be shooting the sequel in the U.S., Europe and Asia to maximize its worldwide appeal.

Escape Plan, starring Sly Stallone and Arnold Schwarzenegger, was a modest performer domestically but it did so well internationally, especially in China, that we’re exploring a sequel that would be shot and possibly co-produced in Asia.

We also see opportunities to take what we’ve learned from our successes in certain markets and replicate them in other territories

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around the world. Eugenio Derbez’s Instructions Not Included is an example of a film that incorporates universal elements of family, humor and poignancy that are replicable and transportable, so we’re exploring an urban version for the U.S. market and remake opportunities in France, Brazil, China and India.

WS: Through Pantelion Films, what have you learned about Hispanic viewers?

FELTHEIMER: One in six Americans is Hispanic, and they not only represent a market of more than 50 million consumers, but they are the fastest-growing segment of the U.S. population.

Our goal with both Pantelion Films and our South Shore venture with Televisa on the TV side has been to build a brand and an audience with a consistent pipeline of English and Spanish-language content.

When Instructions Not Included was a breakout hit, the only people not surprised were Lionsgate and our partners at Televisa. The film’s tremendous success validated the premise on which Pantelion was built—that the Latino consumer in the U.S. is both underserved and underrepresented in mainstream commercial films and TV series. What many Latinos want, whether in English or Spanish, are themes, stars, locations and values to which they can relate.

Learning from the success of Instructions, a key element of our strategy going forward will be to source content from talent deals with top stars with cross-cultural appeal— George Lopez, Eugenio Derbez and Zoe Saldana.

We’re working on several projects with Lopez who, in addition to his 10/90 series Saint George, has just wrapped production of La Vida Robot for release this fall. We have several projects in the works with Eugenio Derbez, and when this interview appears, we will have just released Pantelion’s biopic of Cesar Chavez, directed by Diego Luna.

Our South Shore TV venture with Televisa is also off to a fast start. ABC

Catching Fire, with Jennifer Lawrence, the second film in the book-based Hunger Games trilogy, was a significant driver of Lionsgate’s revenues this year. It will be followed up by the first part of Mockingjay this year.

Family has already ordered a full 20 episodes of Chasing Life, based on the Televisa drama Terminales. We have a number of other interesting projects in development, including a new 10/90 comedy series, Ask a Mexican, with George Lopez attached to produce, as well as a Stan Lee–George Lopez drama for Syfy built around a new superhero character that Lee, Lopez and showrunner Nancy Miller are developing.

WS: Lionsgate Television is known for a very disciplined approach to production and being quite costconscious, and yet quality on screen is never sacrificed.

FELTHEIMER: When you’re a newer company and you don’t have a lot of the overhead and legacy deals that an older company has, you can start with a fresh piece of paper and build your own model so you make sure that you’re producing the right shows for the right networks.

You don’t have a whole infrastructure of soundstages, for example, where you say, “This is where these shows have to be shot,” so you can go to states that offer great tax credits and, frankly, might even be better from a creative perspective. You can take chances. You can build new models that have different kinds of ancillary revenue sources, and you

can take chances with shows that might seem daring but actually are very appealing to actors.The combination of all of those factors makes Lionsgate Television a very attractive place for people to do business.

Quite frankly, a lot of the shows that we’ve done are shows that other people either said no to or were scared to do. Mad Men is a great example. Weeds is another example of bold, innovative programming. They weren’t easy to finance, because you had to put a wide array of different revenue sources together to support their production value and make them profitable. By having less overhead, maybe it’s possible that we’ve been able to do those shows a little cheaper than somebody else. But the main thing is not just keeping the costs down, it’s also creating a business model and enough ancillary revenue to enable you to do a show that you’re proud of. At the end of the day, the best shows are the ones that become the most valuable. They last forever, and that’s the way we’ve been able to supply new buyers as well as to keep attracting talent.

If you look at our 10/90 models, which we’re still the only company doing, look at the kind of talent that we’re attracting. Great showrunners and great stars like Kelsey Grammer, Martin Lawrence, George Lopez,

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Charlie Sheen, and they all enjoy doing production a different way.

When we get an order for 90 episodes, the showrunners and the stars not only know that they’re going to be producing for a long time, they [also] know that we’ve set up a way for them to produce. We can shoot without an audience so we can block and shoot and, when we don’t get it right, we can just keep rehearsing over and over until we do, and we’re not sacrificing any quality in the process.

We’ve simply figured a different way of doing things that takes advantage of the bigger scale and volume of the shows we’re producing. If you ask any of the showrunners, I think they would tell you this is a better way to work, and our talent would tell you the same thing. We’re not really trying to save money, we’re trying to create a different model each time, and that’s working pretty well for us.

WS: How much are revenues from digital platforms increasing compared to revenues from broadcast and cable entities?

FELTHEIMER: If you look at the growth of our TV business, we’ve gone from revenue of $8 million about 12 years ago to $400 millionplus this year, and a lot of it has been

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With Televisa, Lionsgate operates Pantelion Films, which targets Hispanic moviegoers with features like the summer hit Instructions Not Included.

driven by the growth of digital platforms. You can look at digital platforms three different ways in terms of how they affect our business.

One is producing original shows for these new platforms. Two is the syndication of the shows that we’ve got on other networks in the digital platform arena. And the third is how digital is driving the growth of our library. Each of these three ways is pretty significant for Lionsgate.

This year we’re producing original shows for Hulu, Netflix and Amazon. We’re making a pilot for Amazon, Deadbeat for Hulu and Orange Is the New Black, a big hit show, for Netflix. We figured out a way to work with all those platforms and love the fact that they’re really a new source of what we call pay-TV programming. When you look at some of the really high-quality serialized shows like Mad Men and Weeds, one would’ve thought that there wasn’t much back-end value, but all of a sudden along came these digital platforms and they have shown how significant that value can be on their platforms. Netflix has become a very important syndication partner in the first window for both Mad Men and Weeds, and Hulu and Amazon are all players now in the back end that previously included only the basic cable networks or station syndications.

Turning to the impact these digital platforms are having on our library, if you look five years ago, about 62 percent of our library rev-

enue was coming from packaged media. Today it accounts for only about 28 percent, and the margins have grown from about 33 percent to 38 percent. A lot of this growth is due to the emergence of digital platforms and fresh demand for content from new players who value the library for different reasons and in different ways. So in all three of these areas, digital platforms are helping to grow our entire business, both in features and in television.

WS: Do you think online stream-

ing and on-demand viewing of movies and shows will outpace viewing on linear channels?

FELTHEIMER: Secular changes within our industry used to take place every five or ten years. Now our business is changing every year or two, and whenever our industry transitions from one business model to another, people are quick to proclaim that the old model is dead.

With the advent of cable networks, people said that broadcast was dead. In fact, it turned out to be an opportunity to reinvent itself as the home of event programming, from the World Series and the Olympics to spectacles like The Sound of Music Live!, and nobody does it better. With the emergence of SVOD and EST, pessimists were ready to proclaim that the DVD was dead, even when it remains a vibrant $12-billion business with plenty of opportunities for those willing to find them.

We believe that the same is true of the competition between online and on-demand platforms and linear channels. The television ecosphere is expanding to encompass broadcast, premium and basic cable and streaming services, offering an unprecedented level and diversity of content, and we view this not as an “eitheror” but a win-win for content companies and consumers alike.

Consumers not only have more abundant choices but an opportunity to view high-quality, premium content in more places than ever before. A hit can come from anywhere. The Sound of Music Live! on NBC, Duck Dynasty on A&E, Mad Men on AMC and Orange Is the New Black on Netflix are all a testament to this golden age of diversity. And that is great news for content suppliers like Lionsgate, because every media platform in this new ecosystem is chasing a hit.

The key to success in the current environment is great content and great curation. Networks like Showtime, Netflix, Hulu, FX and AMC all have common goals—establishing or refining brand identities that cut through the clutter and are synonymous with quality programming, whether consumers watch their shows on television or an iPad, at an appointed time or on the go. Our opportunity is to supply the content that helps them establish these identities.

WS: As you look forward 12 to 24 months, where do you see the greatest opportunities?

FELTHEIMER: The international market for our films and TV programming continues to grow.

Although the box office is relatively steady at around $11 billion, the international box office is $24 billion and continues to grow at 6 percent a year, with the greatest growth coming from China, Russia and Latin America.

We’re well positioned to capitalize on this growth with a hybrid global distribution infrastructure that includes output deals in most

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major territories, self-distribution in the U.K. and our IDC joint venture in Latin America.

The emergence of digital platforms like Netflix around the world as well as the launch of local SVOD platforms from China to Brazil is helping to drive growth in our international television business as well— our international TV revenues have increased more than 50 percent each of the past two years. While it’s not surprising that a star-driven TV show like Anger Management can generate international sales of nearly $1 million per episode, the similar level of success we’re achieving in licensing Orange Is the New Black internationally underscores the extent to which new digital platforms are driving demand.

The digital revolution is creating not only meaningful incremental revenue streams but significant opportunities for margin growth throughout our businesses. Our digital and on-demand revenues increased 46 percent to $276 million last year, and that doesn’t even include the new series we license to digital platforms. We expect this growth to continue as we license more content to digital platforms around the world, create original programming for Netflix, Hulu, Amazon and other digital buyers, and forge partnerships with new digital players such as Comcast, which are expanding the dimensions of the EST space.

As I mentioned earlier, we’ve already seen this influx of digital and on-demand revenue contribute to growth in library margins, and we believe that the ongoing consumer shift to digital consumption will help drive profitability as well as growth in our business.

A third major opportunity for growth is obviously the creation of new franchises while we continue to expand our existing brands.

There has never been a better time to be in the content business, and our big franchises have tremendous value still to be unlocked if we’re innovative and opportunistic.

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on the record

s co-chair of Disney Media Networks and president of the Disney/ABC Television Group, Anne Sweeney oversees a wide array of media businesses that range from the ABC Television Network, ABC News, the development and production of shows at the ABC Entertainment Group, and domestic and international distribution, to the cable assets ABC Family, Disney Channels Worldwide and an equity interest in A+E Networks, which includes the brands HISTORY and A&E. The ABC Entertainment Group includes ABC Entertainment, ABC Studios and its new boutique

studio Signature, and produces such shows as Scandal, Grey’s Anatomy, Criminal Minds, Castle and Revenge.

Disney Media Distribution sells these shows and others in some 240 territories around the world.

Disney Media Networks’ goal is to serve viewers of all ages, starting with the youngest, with multiplatform brands like Disney Channel, Disney Junior, Disney XD and more.

Moving up the target age group, ABC Family has become a prime destination for Millennials with shows like The Secret Life of the American Teenager and Pretty Little Liars. The broadcast network ABC has many female-skewing shows in prime time, including the hit Scandal, which has become a sensation in social media. In fact, Scandal and Pretty Little Liars are two of the most-tweeted-about shows on television. Always on the hunt for new viewers, ABC News has partnered with the Spanishlanguage network Univision to launch Fusion, a news-andentertainment service in English that targets Hispanics in the U.S. Besides managing linear channels, Sweeney has been at the forefront of finding ways to use technology to follow and find viewers wherever they may be.

She was part of the groundbreaking iTunes deal in 2005, which made episodes of Disney/ABC product available for purchase. The following year, ABC.com began allowing fans to stream full episodes of shows with commercials. Last year, the company launched the WATCH ABC app, which lets viewers stream their local ABC stations live or view shows on demand on their mobile devices.

After 18 years at Disney, Sweeney, who is repeatedly listed as one of the most powerful women in Hollywood in trade and consumer press, announced she would be stepping down from her role in 2015 to pursue a career as a television director.

As she embarks on this new challenge, she will undoubtedly tap into her wealth of knowledge about audiences—young, old and in between—and how to serve them better.

Anne Sweeney

The Walt Disney Company

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WS: How are ABC Studios and

Signature approaching the diverse U.S.TV landscape that includes both broadcast and cable?

SWEENEY: We launched Signature in January of last year, and it is quickly becoming a very prolific producer of scripted TV for cable networks and emerging digital platforms. This unit actually looks for straight-to-series orders that are currently targeted to an ABC summer launch. It also gives us what I think is a really unique opportunity for our ABC Studios producers and writers to develop projects at a wide variety of price points, off cycle and year round. So they are not held to the traditional process where scripts come in in November, pilot pickups are in January and February, pilots are produced from that point on, are screened in April and scheduled in May. [Signature] is a 12-month business, and I give Paul Lee [the president of ABC Entertainment Group] and his team a lot of credit. They took a very immediate and very aggressive approach to setting up development in the world of cable.

They’ve got about 30 projects right now in different stages of development, drama and comedy, and they actually have a property called Benched, which is a half-hour singlecamera comedy produced by Mark Gordon, and it was recently picked up by USA Network.

WS: ABC is the one broadcast net-

ABC Family has carved out a niche for itself as the destination for Millennial audiences with hits like Pretty Little Liars (top), which is one of the most popular shows in social media, and The Fosters.

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work that doesn’t have much sports programming in its schedule. This could be considered a challenge by some, but what opportunities, particularly in drawing female viewers, does this type of schedule offer?

SWEENEY: It’s important to note that The Walt Disney Company owns what I believe is the greatest sports brand out there, which is ESPN. All sports that are on ABC are branded as ESPN on ABC, whether it’s our college football in the fall or our NBA Finals in June.

We don’t air NFL games any longer.

If you view the broadcast business through the traditional prism that

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certainly might seem a challenge, but we really don’t see it that way.We are a content-creation engine for The Walt Disney Company, and we believe that our true strength and value to The Walt Disney Company really lies in our ability to create compelling content that we then monetize around the world.We have an ability with ABC to over-index with affluent audiences. We have a larger delivery of women, and as we know, women watch more television than men, which is a huge strength with advertisers. And another benefit to not having sports is the cost.

The tier one sports are increasing in cost, and we are not subject to absorbing those skyrocketing fees, and at the same time, we don’t have to impact the 5,000 hours of valuable prime-time entertainment and daytime and news that we produce each year.

WS: Scandal, on ABC, and Pretty Little Liars, on ABC Family, are two of the most-chatted-about shows on Twitter. What have you learned about viewers and “must-tweet TV”?

SWEENEY: Social media is continuing the conversation after the episode airs, and what I love about Scandal and Pretty Little Liars being the most-tweeted shows on television is really the fact that their showrunners, Shonda Rhimes on Scandal and Marlene King on Pretty Little Liars, are the impetus for all of this. It’s very interesting to see them work with social media because they want to talk to their fans. They want to engage viewers in conversations about the shows. This is not about marketing; this is about the larger relationship that we have with our fans. They are good to their fans because they create a number of OMG moments for them that make the conversation even richer.

WS: Is there any marketing ben-

efit to the buzz and the watercooler effect that social media create around shows?

SWEENEY: I think there is definitely some impact. The use of

Castle remains a strong performer on ABC in its sixth season. It has been syndicated to TNT for its basic-cable window in the U.S. and has sold widely across the globe.

social media platforms has become an integral part of the overall marketing strategy, not just for Scandal and Pretty Little Liars, but for all of our shows. And from a paid advertising perspective we are now able to run these micro-targeted campaigns that reach potential viewers where they are likely to engage and share with others. So our paid campaigns work to build strong fan communities that provide us with a tremendous promotional platform that we are able to use on an ongoing basis. As I said earlier, the whole social media space is not a monologue—it’s a dialogue and it’s about sharing interesting content that fans will share with friends and with other fans. That’s what creates viral buzz and incremental earned media impressions.

Twitter has created an entirely new way for us to get our fans excited and engaged in real time with their favorite shows. And we are always encouraging fans to re-tweet popular hashtags related to what is happening on air. And I think it’s because all of this happens in real time that it helps us understand how critical it is for us to maximize social media platforms and to build buzz and also tune-in.

WS: Compared to the days when three networks dominated the U.S. landscape, it must be so

much more complicated to market shows nowadays.

SWEENEY: It’s more complicated on one hand and it’s more exciting on the other because you’re actually getting a return on the message that you put out, and the return is, I like this, or,Well, what about this?

We’re engaging in the conversation with viewers.

WS: And it sure doesn’t hurt to

have shows like Scandal!

SWEENEY: Oh my goodness! A

day doesn’t go by that I am not grateful to Scandal and to Shonda and that talented cast!

then we broke comedy ground with Baby Daddy and Melissa & Joey—that was when we started to see ABC Family really hit its stride with its audience. Pretty Little Liars is ABC Family’s number one series of all time, which is amazing. Last summer it wasn’t just the number one series on all TV, broadcast and cable with the Millennial audience 12 to 34, but in the first seven days that it was available on video on demand it added another 2 million views per episode. Again, it just shows you the power of great storytelling. And it is a social media smash hit.

WS: These Millennials, of course,

WS: If we look at ABC Family,

how does it keep connected to its audience, and what is driving the success of that channel?

SWEENEY: I do believe the success of ABC Family and our other channels is that they have done quality storytelling, and in the case of ABC Family it is quality storytelling for the Millennial audience. If you look back at our early days and Kyle XY, Greek and Wildfire, these were shows that were beginning to scratch the surface of this audience, and they helped us understand who is coming to watch and learn who our audience was. With The Secret Life of the American Teenager and then other dramas like Switched at Birth, Pretty Little Liars [and] The Fosters—and

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watch on different devices, but do they go back to the linear channel?

SWEENEY: They do, and that is what’s so amazing to me. There are Pretty Little Liars parties. There are Scandal parties. I am just amazed by the stories I hear about people who have gone out to buy the wineglasses that Olivia Pope uses and they celebrate episodes with friends, drinking red wine, eating popcorn and drinking out of those glasses while they watch the show!

WS: Tell us about Fusion, the joint

venture with Univision, and Disney/ ABC’s desire to target Englishspeaking Latinos.

SWEENEY: Fusion is so exciting!

We launched on October 28, and

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when I walked into Newsport, which is where all of the action takes place with all of the stages, all of our correspondents, all of the newsgathering, I was struck by the fact that I was looking at the future.

It was so powerful, it was so profound and it was so exciting that I almost didn’t want to leave. This is a very exciting demographic. This is the most mobile demographic. The English-speaking Hispanic audience is projected to have incredible spending power. I believe by 2016 this audience will have $1.5 trillion in spending power, up from $1 trillion today, which is larger than the economies of all but 13 countries in the world. It is mind-blowing.

WS: Tell us about some of the growth at the Disney bouquet of channels outside of the U.S. SWEENEY: We have tremendous pride in the growth of Disney Channel. It really has become the touchstone for our brand in homes around the world. It has introduced Disney to new markets; it is a terrific global brand ambassador, and today we have 108 Disney channels in 34 languages reaching more than 428 million homes in 166 different markets. When you add the extended reach of our partners around the world, meaning where we appear on broadcast, the Disney and the Marvel-branded kids’ TV content is now available in almost 1 billion homes.

WS: Is there still growth opportunity for Disney Channel?

SWEENEY: There still is. We launched our first free-to-air Disney Channel in Russia almost two years ago. It was the number one free-toair channel for kids 4 to 12 for all of 2013. This is due in large part to our country manager, Marina ZhigalovaOzkan. She launched a spectacular business for us that is resonating with children and families in Russia, and introducing not just a new generation but generations to the Disney brand.

In January, we launched a new freeTV version of Disney Channel in

Sofia the First has become a significant preschool franchise for Disney, with a devout following on Disney Junior and a lucrative licensing and merchandising rollout.

Germany, which is Europe’s largest TV market. It topped Nickelodeon in the ratings its first weekend on the air, pretty amazing! And it came in number three among kids’ networks in Germany behind SUPER RTL (which as you know is the joint venture of Disney and the RTL Group) and the public broadcaster KiKA, but still ahead of Nickelodeon.

WS: Is the choice to go free to air opportunistic?

SWEENEY: Yes, it is purely opportunistic.We look at the options available to us and the decision is made based on what is best for the Disney brand. Then our team goes forward to see what is the best deal that can be made for the company.

WS: What are you learning about

how kids are watching shows, and what is Disney doing to keep them happy no matter what screen they have in front of them?

SWEENEY: We have a lot of good learning going on out there, for example, with the Disney Junior business. We launched ten channels for preschoolers outside the U.S.— they were originally called Playhouse

Disney, and have all since been converted to Disney Junior channels.We had a lot of good learning about a 24-hour channel for preschoolers, their parents and their caregivers, that we brought to the U.S. when we launched Disney Junior here [in March 2012] and it’s been a very good channel for us.

We’ve learned a lot through technology. Our WATCH Disney Channel app in the U.S. provided us with some very good learning around video on demand.We know that with little ones, 2- to 6-yearolds, there is a lot of repeat viewing.

What we didn’t know is that there is a lot of repeat viewing with the older demos as well.

WS: Do they still watch linear channels as well?

SWEENEY: Yes, they still go to the linear channel when they have one.

It was interesting, I was in China in September with Gary Marsh [the president and chief creative officer of Disney Channels Worldwide] and our country manager, Stanley Cheung, organized for us a visit to a school. We got to spend an hour with a classroom of second graders

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and an hour with a classroom of third graders. I’m always very interested to hear about the stories that the kids like, the songs that they sing, the music they gravitate towards. Do they play instruments, what do they do after school, things about their lives. One of the questions we asked them was, “How many people have a television?” and everybody in both the second and third grade very politely raised their hand. Then we asked the question,“How many people have an iPad?” and every kid jumped out their seat: “I have one, I have two.” We thought, Wow! In China, we have the Dragon Club that carries our Disney-branded programming. Then we asked the question, “What do you do with your iPad?” And you know what they said that amazed me? “Watch TV!” I was not expecting that—not at all. Overthe-top services like Youku are very popular among kids. It was a key piece of learning, but also a good illustration of our corporate culture.

We are a very curious company and we are always interested in how people are engaging with our stories and always trying to figure out the best way to engage them.

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in conversation

milio Azcárraga Jean is the president, CEO and chairman of the board of Grupo Televisa and oversees a media conglomerate that is the largest producer of Spanish-language content in the world. This programming feeds marketleading broadcast stations in Mexico; a bouquet of pay-TV channels under the Televisa Networks banner; a healthy international-sales business to countries around the world; and distribution on digital platforms.

Televisa is involved in several other businesses as well, including radio broadcasting, cable television, publishing, telecommunications, professional sports and live events.

The group also owns a stake in Univision Communications, the leading Spanish-language broadcaster in the U.S., and is a partner with Lionsgate in Pantelion Films, a producer and distributor of feature films for Hispanic audiences. In fact, partnerships are important to Azcárraga, as he believes Televisa has content and production know-how that can be easily adapted to numerous markets around the world.

Under Azcárraga’s leadership, Televisa has more than doubled its operating margin and consolidated its leadership position in the Mexican broadcast market. Televisa’s accomplishments in and outside Mexico have been recognized by a number of international organizations. Azcárraga was honored as MIPCOM’s Personality of the Year in 2012 and earlier this year at NATPE, he was one of four recipients of the Brandon Tartikoff Legacy Awards, which are given each year to a select group of television professionals “who exhibit extraordinary passion, leadership, independence and vision in the process of creating television programming and in evoking the spirit of Tartikoff’s generosity,” as the award states.

Following the award ceremony, Azcárraga was interviewed by Anna Carugati, World Screen’s group editorial director, in front of a live audience.

Emilio Azcárraga Jean Grupo Televisa

WS: When you took the reins of Televisa, what was the scope of the company, and how much bigger is it today?

AZCÁRRAGA: A lot has changed since 1997. Our company has been in content production since we started in radio, in the 1930s. But if you look at the development that has taken place from 1997 to 2014 just in technology and devices and the different distribution platforms that exist and the different businesses that we have, we have grown a lot in all of these new venues.

Since 1930, Televisa has been in the production and distribution of content.

We have been able to have an incredible group of people who have been talented enough to take advantage of all these new platforms and produce content not only for what we did before, which is television over the air, but also pay television and international, as well as taking advantage of all these new distribution platforms and trying to get to the audiences whenever they want and wherever they are.

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WS: Storytelling is the engine that

drives all your businesses. How many hours does Televisa produce every year?

AZCÁRRAGA: We produce 90,000plus hours. I remember when we used to say we produced 60,000 and thought it was a lot of hours, and now we produce 30 to 40 percent more.

We have been growing organically.

We have looked at taking advantage of these platforms. We understand that producing for linear channels is different from producing for paytelevision channels, which is different from movies, and different from producing for the Internet. When we start to build a program, we always think about all these distribution platforms. We don’t develop only for one window, but we try to develop for any window, while taking advantage of music and live shows and pay television and Internet. I believe that Televisa’s important achievement has been not just producing a program but producing a concept that can travel through different windows.

WS: Televisa’s sale of programming

to broadcasters around the world is also a huge business, and that also continues to grow because of all these new platforms?

AZCÁRRAGA: Yes. What we have seen is that Televisa has become the Latin major not just because we can produce a lot of hours, but the trick is to produce a lot of hours with good quality and great ratings.Televisa has achieved that, not only because we produce in the native language in Latin America but also because we have started selling to 60-plus countries and in a lot of languages.

WS: You made that sound easy—

In addition to selling telenovelas worldwide, Televisa Internacional has been building up a strong format business, offering titles like the comedic dance show Dancegerous.

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so a lot of content of high quality and high ratings! Is there an easy formula for that?

AZCÁRRAGA: There’s an easy [formula] whenever you have the goodquality people who work with me in Televisa, because at the end of the day, the key to the success I have had as CEO of Televisa is really having a

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At NATPE to receive a Brandon Tartikoff Legacy Award, Azcárraga was interviewed in front of a packed hall by World Screen’s Anna Carugati.

great group of people working together to achieve these goals.

We produce some really bad programs just like anybody else, and what is very interesting is that the ones that turn out the worst are the ones you thought would be the best and vice versa. But the incredible talent and the number of hours worked by these executives, producers, writers and actors at Televisa make it—not easy, because it’s a lot of work—but [make it possible] because we have this model that works very well and has been working forever.

WS: I wouldn’t want the headline

tomorrow to be “Emilio Azcárraga: We Produce Really Bad Programs!” So please talk about some of the good shows.

AZCÁRRAGA: [Laughs] Every person who has come to NATPE for a long time has at some point produced very bad programs, and that is why packages exist, and we understand how the market works!

When a program is not performing as well as we want, we have the capacity to react very fast. The production system and the creative ideas of the producers [allow us to] react quickly and substitute a program, or substitute a producer, or substitute something to make the show work.

You see this not only in the number of hours we produce for prime time in Mexico but also in the United States. All of Univision’s prime-time schedule is produced by Televisa.

And we don’t measure Univision against the Spanish-speaking chan-

nels in the U.S., we measure it against the general market broadcast networks [ABC, CBS, NBC, FOX].

We are number four and were number two during the summer. That speaks to the very good quality programming that we produce, which not only works in native-language markets like Mexico and Latin America.There are around 50 million Latinos in the U.S. and 250 million more people who don’t speak fluent Spanish. So if you are the number two- or three- or four-ranked network—with that disadvantage it means that our programs are very well produced. We have an example of our level of quality not only in the things that we export but also the things that we import. The Voice in Mexico is produced by Televisa, and in a country that has a population of 120 million, it has more people watching it than The Voice in the U.S., with 300 million people.

WS: You are also a partner with

Lionsgate in Pantelion Films, which had a huge theatrical success this year, Instructions Not Included.

How is Pantelion doing?

AZCÁRRAGA: After earning more than $40 million at the box office, Pantelion is doing great! The business plan that we had for five years evidently has changed! This movie was an example of the fact that there are people in America who want to watch good-quality movies no matter what the language is. This movie is 80 percent Spanish and only 20 percent in English, so Americans

have to watch it with subtitles. In Latin America we are used to watching movies with subtitles; in the U.S. it’s difficult for people to do this.The movie tells a great story. It’s not a violent movie. It’s not a sexual movie. It’s really a movie for the entire family, and I believe that what Televisa has demonstrated over time about producing family-oriented programming [is also evident] in Instructions Not Included. Pantelion has produced other movies that have done fairly well, [but] not as well as this one.We have learned this market is eager to go to the movies and see quality programming. We have been developing new ideas not only with movies but also for television.We started the first season of Devious Maids and we are producing the second one. And we have another series, Chasing Life, which was adapted from the Televisa series Terminales. I definitely see new opportunities for Televisa through Pantelion to produce for the English-speaking market.

WS: How do you feel about the

future of linear channels?

AZCÁRRAGA: It’s still a good busi-

ness now, and I believe it will be in the future. But I believe that those programs made for the linear channels need to be made available afterwards on any device.What technology gives us is that you don’t need to be home watching television, you can take your television in the car or on a trip.What we need to work on is producing exclusive content for this audience, but also making pro-

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grams available to all the people on any device at any time they want to see them.There is the opportunity to capture a greater audience if you make your content available and easier to get access to than what we do on the linear channel. So I see linear channels like radio and the movies— everybody thought radio would die, and then movies would die, and then television would die. But I believe everything can work and everything has its own ecosystem. And the whole ecosystem changes because of the new opportunities that we have.

WS: The growth of online and mobile viewing in America is very high. How do you see it in Mexico and the rest of Latin America?

AZCÁRRAGA: There is still a lot to go in broadband penetration in Mexico, but it grew by 27 percent in 2013. There is still a long way to go, but at 27-percent growth every year I believe we are going to achieve very high penetration in a short period of time. Pay-television penetration was at 14 percent 12 years ago and now it’s close to 50 percent.

As penetration in broadband, cable and mobile increases, the ecosystem is going to change. Now that competition is going to open up in telecommunications in Mexico, it will be an opportunity to lower the cost of Internet [access]. When we started providing Internet through cable operators we achieved not only the growth of Internet penetration but we also benefited subscribers by lowering the price, so

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In addition to its significant free-TV business in Mexico, Televisa operates a portfolio of thematic pay-TV channels under the Televisa Networks division, including the music video channel Ritmoson Latino.

they get a better connection at a lower price.This has been important not only for improving connectivity, but better and less expensive Internet connections are important for the development of the country.

WS: As you look to expand your business internationally, what are you looking at, acquisitions or joint ventures?

AZCÁRRAGA: It’s more joint ventures. Obviously, our focus has been the United States, with Univision and now Pantelion. The U.S. is the biggest and the most secure market in the world. We have done a lot of joint ventures around the world that have worked pretty well. We are starting to look at and make a move in Brazil.We are very open to look at any market. We believe that our content and our ideas can be successful in any market. [Our main] focus is on who is going to be the right partner. We don’t believe in doing one-year partnerships.We try to develop long-lasting relationships. So choosing the right partner makes it more difficult, but

whenever we have one we have worked together very well. And obviously Latin America is a buoyant place to invest. You see the economies in most Latin American countries are [performing well], and I believe that Latin America will be a highlight in the next decade.

WS: Are you looking opportunis-

tically at Europe?

AZCÁRRAGA: I am not an expert on the European economy, but yes, a lot of mistakes were made and they had to make corrections on the path that they were taking. Europe is definitely going to come back.We have our venture in Spain with laSexta and Antena 3 and we have done coproductions. Being from Mexico and having been able to navigate many crises, and having the credibility of investors who have navigated with us through rough waters—not necessarily because the company made mistakes, but because of the economic situation in Mexico back then—I believe that any country like Spain that gets into trouble deserves a chance. They were a great economy

and we did great business and they will come back.You cannot say, “I’m going to forget about Spain and come back in five years.” I believe there is a lot to do, and when there is crisis there is very big opportunity.

WS: Televisa also has a school,

Centro de Educación Artística, which trains a lot of talent.

AZCÁRRAGA: Ninety percent of the actors in Televisa programs went to school at Televisa. It’s a three-year program and these young kids study from seven o’clock in the morning to ten o’clock at night.They can see that it is a very difficult career to be an actor, but also for writers and producers.That’s why I believe that [the production] system that we have can react very quickly; we have been able to not only control the end product but also to control [the process] from the very start, from the school and the teaching, from the capabilities of the people who are working in technology, from our partners Sony or Panasonic who come up with new equipment and take it to Televisa to see if it’s going to work.

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WS: Tell us about Fundación Tele-

visa’s mission.

AZCÁRRAGA: In 1997, we had to

close the foundation because of all the restructuring that was going on at Televisa.We opened it in 2000 as a social foundation but we didn’t have a lot of money to put into it because we were in the middle of the transition and the economic situation at Televisa wasn’t as good as it is today.

So we started leveraging the content and the media that we had available.

We started working with other foundations that were doing things right.

There were a lot of people in Mexico doing incredible things and what they really needed was just for somebody to shed light on them. And now, all of the telenovelas we do have a cause attached to them. Any goal scored in any soccer game in Mexico also has a cause—that goes from transplants to computers. The foundation is very important and at the core, we work for the audience. The audience chooses us before anybody else, so we definitely believe we need to give something back more than just entertainment.

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executive in conversation briefing

ome of the most well-known TV brands in the world are part of Viacom International Media Networks (VIMN). Leading the pack is MTV, which in the ’80s and ’90s promoted dozens of artists and launched the careers of numerous directors thanks to the success of music videos. With its emphasis on music, a universal language, MTV also attracted viewers from around the world—the young and the young at heart—in a way no other channel ever had before.

It has kept its finger on the pulse of its audience through a mix of shows: reality programming (long before it became a global phenomenon) with series like The Real World and, more recently, Jersey Shore—which has generated a string of local adaptations; live awards, starting with MTV Video Music Awards; and pro-social initiatives such as partnering with a variety of sponsors in the Staying Alive Foundation, which promotes the prevention of HIV.

For younger viewers, Nickelodeon has offered some of the biggest live-action hits for tweens—Drake & Josh, iCarly and Sam & Cat, just to name a few. SpongeBob SquarePants, the wisecracker who lives under sea, is a household name. And from The Ren & Stimpy Show, The Fairly OddParents and Sanjay and Craig to the reinvention of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Nick has given hours of laughter to kids. The channel’s signature live event is the Kids’ Choice Awards. And littlest viewers are offered preschool programming through Nick Jr. Among the other channels in the VIMN portfolio are Comedy Central, BET and the Paramount Channel. All together the Viacom brands are seen in some 700 million households, in 170 territories, through more than 200 TV channels. This portfolio is accompanied by more than 550 digital and mobile properties. As Robert Bakish, VIMN’s president and CEO, knows well, the young demos targeted by all of these linear and digital services are viewing content on every possible screen and device available.

Bakish is spearheading the growth of VIMN brands around the world and he sees plenty of opportunities, across a number of businesses: successful formats, linear channels, apps and digital assets, consumer properties and more. The key is VIMN’s “glocal” approach—part global, part local.

Robert Bakish Viacom

WS: VIMN airs award shows on a num-

ber of channels. Do live events boost viewing on linear channels?

BAKISH: Live events are a very important part of our business and are valuable as a social currency to our young viewers, who might be Nickelodeon viewers, MTV viewers, Comedy Central or BET viewers. For kids we have a franchise called KCA, the Kids’ Choice Awards.

We’ve done it in different ways. In the current version it’s an event held in the U.S., but consistent with this “glocal” model, we add key local components to it. In 2013, we had 15 localized voting sites. We sent crews from most of our Nickelodeon channels around the world to Los Angeles, where we shot local awards, and international fans could vote in some 22 local categories. There were local winners that we then integrated into the U.S. show. That gave a little localization for our international channels that aired the show. KCA is great for our consumers, it’s great for advertisers and it’s an example of the power of that kind of programming.

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Following the success of Jersey Shore on MTV in the U.S., VIMN’s international program-sales group has been formatting the show in several markets, including Spain, where Gandía Shore broke records on MTV Spain.

On MTV, beside the EMAs [Europe Music Awards], we also do events year round. We tend to air them under our World Stage banner—there are things like Isle of MTV Malta, World Stage Malaysia, World Stage México, and so on. We say that in this digitally connected world there is no substitute for live [events]; we see that passion on fans’ faces as they are having this communal experience with other fans listening to great music. Events are a very important part of what we do and will continue to be in the future.

WS: How have you been rolling out Comedy Central and BET internationally?

BAKISH: About two years ago, we looked at Comedy Central. It was a U.S. and European brand, and we decided it needed to be a global brand. We went on an aggressive expansion program where we lit up Africa, all of Latin America, more of CEE and we launched in Asia. In the last 18 to 24 months its distribution has doubled in size— we have some 28 Comedy Central

channels and it has become the only global comedy network.

In operating it we pursue the same “glocal” philosophy as our other brands. We take global hits, which in Comedy Central’s case tend to be off-network product, shows like Two and a Half Men and Anger Management, and we supplement it with our own product. On the local level Comedy Central is a significant player in stand-up comedy. We have also been developing made-forComedy Central international product. We had a show, Threesome, last year that worked very well. We have Popoz (which is a translation of Cops), a Dutch show that is working for us, and we have a series of shows at the pilot stage that we are looking to launch later in the year.

Comedy Central has plenty of [potential] ahead of it and we will continue to build it out. It also helps us in the advertising space because it gives us exposure to the adult market—as opposed to the youth and kids’ market—which is a place where we have very low share and therefore plenty of opportunity.

BET is also an expansion network. Last year, to complete our U.K. distribution, we did a key deal with Virgin, and now, with either the Virgin or Sky EPGs you get BET. On the back of that we have seen extremely healthy ratings growth. We are also in Africa in a variety in countries. We are about to launch in France, where we’ve had a block on MTV and that will be expanding on a different frequency to a 24-hour service.

After Comedy Central the next big brand is going to be Paramount Channel. We launched in Spain first, then in France at the end of September. We had major launches in February in Russia and Hungary. It is an ad-supported film channel and relies heavily on the Paramount library, but in the case of Spain, we have a whole bunch of local titles there. That channel continues to grow audience share month after month and has proven to be very successful.

WS: Nickelodeon is a very strong

brand, but it is present in some

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very crowded markets—the U.K. comes to mind. What gives it its competitive edge?

BAKISH: Nick is a great contemporary kids’ entertainment brand. Its success is due in large part to its significant and growing pipeline of both live-action and animated content, both of which travel well. SpongeBob SquarePants has been a hit everywhere in the world, including in China on CCTV. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, which the Nick crew has reinvented for today’s kids, is doing very well and there is also a feature film coming.

Our live-action show Sam & Cat is a hit all over the world.

The success of Nickelodeon starts with our shared global pipeline, which emanates from the U.S., and like other services, we supplement that. We’ve done formats like House of Anubis, which was a show originally created in the Netherlands, where it did very well. We then did a German version that did very well.

Then, in partnership with Nickelodeon U.S., we did an English-language version for the world, which was shot in the U.K.

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but had some U.S. talent in front of and behind the camera and it did well around the world. We supplement Nickelodeon with shared international programming as well as relevant local product like Olive the Ostrich in the U.K. or Camp Orange in Australia.Then we have events like KCA that is the signature event.

Globally, Nickelodeon is one of the most recognized and widely distributed multimedia brands for kids and families. We reach 350 million homes in about 110 countries with around 75 channels. And it’s not only the core Nick channel; we also have Nick Jr., and Nicktoons in the U.K., and that allows us to superserve segments of the kids’ audience.

WS: Are you also serving children on screens other than the TV? BAKISH: We’re in the middle of rolling out a really cool Nick app.

It’s not the first app we’ve done; we’ve done a bunch of franchisespecific apps, like a SpongeBob game and they all do very well in the iTunes and Android stores. But the Nick app—that umbrella brand app—has some very cool-looking features, like this big button in the middle of the screen that says “Do Not Touch,” and of course all kids touch! It’s fun to play with. In the U.S. it’s being rolled out as an authenticated device for cable subscribers. Internationally, we are looking at different models; in some cases we will do that, in some cases we might roll it out more on a standalone basis. We have rolled the Nick app out in the U.K. to great success, with more countries coming.

We’ve also done a cool new product called My Nick Jr., which is a multiplatform Nick Jr. channel that allows parents to become the programmers. You sign on as a parent and put in some parameters for your kids—age, what kind of shows and games you want them to focus on, how long you want them to use the device, etc.—and then the child plays on a customized version. If your child is watching on a TV and you say, “Oh

I’ve got to run out to the grocery store to get some milk,” no problem; you can press pause on the TV, pick up the tablet, hop in the car, press play, and the show picks up where it left off. We want to make sure we’re bringing innovative versions of Nick to today’s kids to get the most out of this great programming lineup.

We also do a lot on the consumer-products side. The current big hit is Turtles; that business

is growing like weeds! We have a feature film coming from Paramount.

Nickelodeon has remained relevant.

It’s a great brand, with great creative, a lot of hard work and a lot of great ideas.

WS: Most of the economies in Latin America are doing well. Is it a good market for you?

BAKISH: Absolutely. Sometimes people think of Latin America 20

years ago when the economies and the currencies were tougher, but it’s been a great growth market; certainly for pay TV it’s a great growth market. We have multiple brands active there: MTV, Nick, and we launched Comedy Central both in Spanish and Portuguese. If you look at the development of the middle class, first they are buying pay television and then they are getting larger packages. That

In addition to commissioning local kids’ product, the Nickelodeon channels internationally tap into the brand’s American library, securing access to hits like Sam & Cat. 4/14 World Screen 349

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more in Brazil, more in Russia, and we are in the middle of bringing in another brand in some of the Eastern European markets.

There is certainly a broad palette of opportunities out there, and some of these higher-growth markets are important.We’ve had a lot of growth in Africa too, and are thrilled with our African business. Georgia Arnold, the head of social responsibility, was recently in Nigeria with Alex Okosi, who runs our business in Africa, because we created a franchise called Shuga that relates to our work fighting HIV and AIDS and the MTV Staying Alive Foundation.

WS: Staying Alive is one of your

major pro-social campaigns.

Viacom expanded its business in India by aligning with Network18 for a joint venture that operates a bouquet of networks, including the general-entertainment service Colors, home to the Indian version of 24.

market has a long way ahead of it and we will be launching more brands, perhaps as soon as later this calendar year. The ad market continues to grow; the fundamentals of that continent are sound.

It’s also a great place to do creative. We have a substantial facility in Buenos Aires where we do a lot of short-form content, and increasingly long-form production. We’ve done MTV novelas and Nick novelas and they have been great ratings generators. In fact, we recently took one of the Nickelodeon novelas called Grachi, we created an English-language version of it with our Miami team that debuted in the U.S. recently [Every Witch Way] and is performing extremely well. Latin America is not only a great market to serve; it’s also a great market to create in. There is lot of excitement ahead, perhaps most exciting is that we took back our MTV license [in Brazil] and launched an owned-and-operated service in October. It’s off to a very strong start, with almost full distribution right out of the gate.

WS: And you also have a lot going

on in India.

BAKISH: We have a fifty-fifty joint

venture called Viacom18; our partner is Network18. Seven years

ago, when I started, we had a 100-percent-owned operation in India. We had been there for a while, but we decided we wanted to be a more substantial player given the importance of the market. We decided to make a major commitment there and thought it was relevant to bring in the right kind of local partner, so we created Viacom18. We went on to launch Colors, which is a true generalentertainment network. That went on to re-write history in this space.

We went from zero to number one in a very short period of time, something nobody thought could be done. And today there are four general-entertainment networks at the top of the ratings and we’re always in that group.

Colors is an out-and-out hit. It has gone on to be exported all over the world. We have Aapka Colors in the U.S. We have Colors in the U.K. and the Middle East, and we have program sales all around the world. Colors has become a powerhouse Indian entertainment brand with all original programming created for the Indian consumer. The core is Bollywood novelas, serialized strips telling Indian stories that often involve a lot of music.

We also continue to operate MTV and [have launched Pepsi MTV Indies], which has a different feel particularly on the music side.

We operate a number of kids’ ser vices—Nick, Sonic—and we brought Comedy Central in as an English-language service. And we’re not done yet.You will see us make some moves in India in the not-too-distant future. It’s great business and we’re thrilled with our partnership and with having a leading position in that market.

WS: What other regions are you

targeting for growth?

BAKISH: We’re in most places

where there is a semblance of an economy. It’s easier to talk about where we’re not! We’re not in North Korea. In general we have a pretty wide reach; however, the opportunity comes in increasing our participation in a market and that comes through either taking an MTV or Nick and adding localization, or more likely comes from adding a Comedy Central or a Paramount Channel.

On the back of our success in India, we said we needed to deepen our participation in some of the less mature markets. We thought of doing more in Latin America,

350 World Screen 4/14

BAKISH: 2013 marked the 15th

anniversary of Staying Alive. We work with the U.N. and we believe we’ve helped make a difference.

Obviously, it’s a large and complex issue and continues to be an area of importance to our audiences, and is therefore important to our brand.

The MTV Staying Alive Foundation has handed out almost $5 million in grants in the last decade to fund local youth-led drives for HIV prevention all around the world, and has helped raise several more millions of dollars for the same cause.

We have also been active in helping to fight human trafficking with our MTV EXIT foundation, mostly in Asia. All of this sits under an umbrella brand called MTV Voices, which is an ongoing project of ours to encourage youth all around the world to think about causes. We support it digitally and on air.

Finally, at Viacom, social responsibility is part of our corporate DNA. We have [an annual] Viacommunity Day, when all our offices around the world participate in and support a range of causes. We believe you do well by doing good and we need to reflect the fact that we have tremendous reach from our media assets and we should employ them to attempt to make a difference in the lives of our viewers and their families.

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advertisers’ in conversation index

4K Media 247 9 Story Entertainment 205 A+E Networks 183, 351, 357 ABC Commercial 395 ABS-CBN Corporation 411 AFL Productions 385, 471 all3media international 317 AMC/Sundance Channel 63, 65 American Cinema International 91 APT Worldwide 384 Armoza Formats 274, 275, 285, 287, 437 ARTE 371 Artear 142 Artist View Entertainment 20, 21 Astro 127, 413 ATV 22, 23 Audiovisual from Spain 135 Australian Children’s Television Foundation 233, 235, 237, 377 Ava Entertainment 51 Azteca 69 Banijay International 309 BBC Worldwide 2, 3, 8, 9, 10, 11, 338, 339 Beyond Distribution 75 Blue Box Entertainment 315 Brand Licensing Europe 419 Breakthrough Entertainment 213, 352, 353 Brightcove 392, 393 CAKE 217 Canada Media Fund 424 Canal Futura 133 Canamedia 381 Canitec 464 Caracol TV Internacional 95 CBS Studios International 163, 175 Cineflix Rights 83 Cisneros Media Distribution 155, 341 CJ E&M Corporation 99, 313, 401 Construir TV 455 Cyber Group Studios 194, 195, 258, 266 DHX Media 211 DISCOP Africa 506 Discovery Networks International 52 Disney Channel Asia 407 Dori Media Group 289, 433 DreamWorks Animation 196, 197 Eccho Rights 324, 325 Electus International 49, 305 Endemol Group 81 Entertainment One Television 1 Film.UA Distribution 137 FINAS 403 Fox International Channels Asia 399 Fox International Channels Latin America 451 Foxtel 177 FremantleMedia 271, 280, 318 FremantleMedia International 141, 143, 323, 326, 391, 394, 423, 425 Gaumont International Television 161 Global Agency 272, 273, 276, 277, 278, 279 Global Screen 79 Globosat 111 GMA Worldwide 103 GRB Entertainment 115, 117, 119, 121 Hasbro Studios 203 HBO 12, 13, 181 HBO Asia 405 HBO Latin America 443 Hoho Rights 241, 243 Imagina International Sales 445 Imira Entertainment 231 IMPS 215 Incendo 73 International Academy of TV Arts & Sciences 139, 262 ITV Studios Global Entertainment 6, 7, 25, 200, 299

ITV-Inter Medya 18, 19 Jim Henson Global Distribution 35, 207 Kanal D 14, 15 Keshet International 16, 17 Kocca 125 Licensing Expo 257 Lightning Entertainment 28, 29 m4e AG 221 Marc Dorcel 93 MarVista Entertainment 4, 5 Mediatoon Distribution 234, 236 Miramax 27 Mondo TV S.p.A 193, 260 Multicom Entertainment Group 511 National Geographic Channels 41, 390 NATPE 459, 505 Nerd Corps Entertainment 209 New Dominion Pictures 373 New Films International 36, 37, 38, 39 NHK Enterprises 359 Nippon Television Network 113 Novovision-MEG 427 Off the Fence 369 ORF-Enterprise 107 Passion Distribution 365 Planeta Junior 229 Rainbow 198, 199 RCN Television 254, 255 Record TV Network 439 Red Arrow International 71, 301 Red Bull Media House 31 Rewind Networks 409 Rive Gauche Television 167 Russia Television and Radio/Sovtelexport 149, 333 Saban Brands 253 Scripps Networks International 43, 397 Secuoya Content Distribution 311 Sesame Workshop 245 Shine International 171, 173, 281, 283, 329, 331, 361, 363 Sierra/Engine Television 89 Smithsonian Channel 109 Sony Pictures Television 295, 297 Splash Entertainment 225 Starz Worldwide Distribution 47, 166 Studio 100 Media 223 Sullivan Entertainment 33 TANDEM Communications 169, 187 TCB Media Rights 354, 355, 356 Technicolor Animation 227 Telefe International 435, 449 Telefilm Vietnam 417 Telefilms 457 Televisa Internacional 151, 307, 346, 422, 438, 470 Televisa Networks 157 Terranoa 367 The Funny Shorts Company 251 TM International 45, 185, 379 Tricon Films & Television 375 Turkish Radio & Television Corporation 335 Turner Broadcasting 219 TV Chile 440 TV Film International 453 TV5MONDE 153 TVE 188 Twentieth Century Fox TV Distribution 165, 179 Twofour Rights 145 Universal Cinergia Dubbing 469 Veria Living Worldwide 77, 249 Warner Bros. International Television 147, 265, 512 WWE 85, 447 ZDF Enterprises 67, 345 Zodiak Media 291, 293 Zodiak Rights 327

4/14 World Screen 507

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Print and Digital Magazines World Screen TV Latina TV Europe TV AsiaPac TV MEA TV Brasil TV Kids TV Ni単os TV Real TV Formats TV Drama TV Novelas TV Listings Print and Digital Guides World Screen Distributors Guide TV Kids Distributors Guide TV Formats Distributors Guide TV Latina Channels Guide TV Latina Distributors Guide Websites WorldScreen.com TVLatina.tv TVKids.ws TVReal.ws TVFormats.ws TVDrama.ws TVNovelas.ws TVEurope.ws TVLatina.ws TVUSA.ws TVAsiaPac.ws TVMEA.ws TVCanada.ws TeveBrasil.com Daily Online Newsletters World Screen Newsflash TV Kids Daily Diario TV Latina Weekly Online Newsletters World Screen Weekly TV Kids Weekly TV Formats Weekly TV Real Weekly TV Drama Weekly TV Latina Semanal TV Ni単os Semanal TV Novelas Y Series Semanal TV Canales Semanal Apps World Screen Reports World Screen App TV Latina App Video Portals WorldScreenings.com TVLatinaScreenings.tv

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on the world’s end record IN THE STARS

Almost every national constitution forbids the establishment of an official state religion. But this secular bent doesn’t stop people from looking to the heavens for answers to life’s most troublesome questions: Will I succeed? Will I find love? Will I make a steamy music video with Shakira?

John Travolta

Shakira

George Lopez

Ellen DeGeneres

John Travolta

George Lopez

Global distinction: Movie star with moves.

Sign: Aquarius (b. February 18, 1954) Significant date: March 2, 2014 Noteworthy activity: During this year’s Academy

Global distinction: Mexican-American comedian.

Sign: Taurus (b. April 23, 1961) Significant date: February 27, 2014 Noteworthy activity: After performing at the Caesars

Awards, the disco-dancing actor attempts to introduce Idina Menzel, who is there to perform the song “Let It Go” from the animated hit Frozen. Travolta completely butchers her name, calling her Adele Dazim instead. He later responds to his verbal blunder by tweeting: “I’ve been beating myself up all day. Then I thought...What would Idina Menzel say? She’d say, ‘Let it go, let it go!’”

Horoscope: “Slow down and think before you speak.... If you ignore vital facts, you will seem foolish and feel embarrassed.” (gotohoroscope.com)

Windsor Hotel and Casino in Canada, the 52-year-old funny man gets arrested for public intoxication. Police officers are called to the scene after it was discovered that Lopez had passed out on the casino floor. No charges are filed against the Saint George star, who jokes about the experience at his next show and confesses to having consumed an excessive amount of shots.

Horoscope: “It’s a good day to spend on yourself, as long as you don’t overdo it.... Fly under the radar and you should be fine.” (shine.yahoo.com/horoscope)

these little pearls of random fore-

Shakira

Barack Obama

sight occasionally prove prophetic.

Global distinction: Colombian hip-shaker.

Sign: Aquarius (b. February 2, 1977) Significant date: March 7, 2014 Noteworthy activity: The sultry Latina recently released

Global distinction: U.S. President.

Sign: Leo (b. August 4, 1961) Significant date: March 6, 2014 Noteworthy activity: Obama makes a spelling blunder

a raunchy music video in which she and pop superstar Rihanna are all over each other. In Billboard magazine’s cover story on Shakira, The Voice coach reveals that her boyfriend, soccer stud Gerard Piqué, does not allow her to make music videos with men, and that’s how she wound up caressing Rihanna’s thighs on camera.

Horoscope: “Some may feel threatened by your new direction, but that’s only because they’re overprotective. Take this opportunity to assert your independence.” (uk.astrology.yahoo.com)

while praising the “Queen of Soul” Aretha Franklin before a White House concert featuring several musical legends. “When Aretha first told us what R-S-P-E-C-T meant to her,” Obama says, before the audience in the East Room erupts into laughter.

Horoscope: “Make sure you have your facts straight before you open your mouth. Some people may take delight in your misstep.” (mydailymoment.com)

Every day, papers and magazines worldwide print horoscopes—projections for people born in a specific month, based on the positions of the stars and planets. While many people rely on these daily, weekly or monthly messages for guidance in their lives, some readers skip over them entirely.

The editors of WS recognize that

But rather than poring over charts of the zodiac to predict world events, our staff prefers to use past horoscopes in an attempt to legitimize the science.

As you can see here, had some of these media figures remembered to consult their horoscopes on significant dates, they could have avoided a few surprises.

Jennette McCurdy Global distinction: Nickelodeon sensation.

Sign: Cancer (b. June 26, 1992) Significant date: March 3, 2014 Noteworthy activity: Half-naked selfies of the 21-

year-old Sam & Cat star make their way to the Internet. Although the culprit has not been officially identified, fingers point to NBA player Andre Drummond, McCurdy’s ex-boyfriend.

Horoscope: “Be careful who you trust today. You could accidentally fall into a trap, and even one that is set without any bad intentions can be dangerous to you and your reputation.” (readthestars.com) 510 World Screen 4/14

Ellen DeGeneres Global distinction: Comedienne & talk show host.

Sign: Aquarius (b. January 26, 1958) Significant date: March 2, 2014 Noteworthy activity: The Oscars host steps into the

audience during the live taping of the Academy Awards and rallies a who’s who of Hollywood stars to snap a pic with her. Jennifer Lawrence, Julia Roberts and Brad Pitt are among those featured in the photo, which racked up more than a million re-tweets in less than an hour to set a new Twitter record.

Horoscope: “The sun is in your sign, so this is traditionally the time of year when you get a lot of attention. Jump on the party bandwagon as soon as you can.” (midlifetransits.com)

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