12 V I D E O A G E June/July 2022 All the signs at the L.A. Screenings 2022 event pointed to a relaxation of the grip that the U.S. studios’ streaming platforms have over international TV distribution. “We’re open for business,” declared Lisa Kramer, president, International TV Licensing for Paramount Global Content Distribution, during her opening remarks at Paramount’s screenings. That sentiment was echoed by Pearlena Igbokwe, chairwoman of Universal Studio Group, during a press luncheon: “Production for our [NBCUni] Peacock streaming platform is available for international licensing.” At the broadcast Upfronts in New York City (which started on May 16, and immediately preceded the L.A. Screenings), the chatter mostly focused on advertising money, ratings measurement problems, and the large number of broadcast series that were canceled after just one season. As far as ad revenue goes, it was pointed out that political spending, among other sectors, is expected to rise. Curiously, Marianne Gambelli, president, Advertising Sales, FOX, said that FOX’s audience skews young so they don’t depend on pharmaceutical or cleaning products as much as tech, sports, and financial. Following that admission, a Wall Street Journal reporter asked if the young FOX audience doesn’t use soap. As for the series canceled after but a single season, ABC, FOX, and NBC each canceled three series, while CBS and The CWcanceled two series each. But it was also pointed out that streamers were not far behind, with Netflix canceling five TV series after one season. In Hollywood, even though the studios’ series that were newly available for world sales were not at pre-streaming era levels, all the majors were able to screen up to seven new series each to a good crowd of international buyers — many of whom were high-level execs —who numbered about half of those at the pre-pandemic L.A. events. All the studios’ own U.S. network fare was still available for licensing to Canadian TV channels, with the screenings done in two stages. The first was for the major TV networks, and the second was for the “independent” (i.e., smaller) TV outlets. As expected, talks about the major streaming platforms dominated conversations at the Screenings, which were saturated with statistical data that either revealed a failed business model or a successful one. After all, data can sometimes reveal surprises, and sometimes not. One other dictum was that the industry is not going back to former business models despite the fact that no one can predict how to move forward, but only hope for the best. ThenMcKinsey, a data-research company, shattered that idea by announcing that “hope is not a strategy.” Streaming was also the topic of a VideoAge luncheon held in Beverly Hills on Friday, May 21, that had four international TV executives in attendance (see photo below). The question posed was whether “streaming will be a Trojan Horse for the studios (the same way the elimination of Fin Syn was for the networks).” The consensus was that the giant social-tech media will not be gambling the studios, and that Amazon’s acquisition of MGM is not a test case. When asked about the future of Netflix, it was noted that it is considered a streaming pioneer that will end up being “the Polaroid of the sector,” in the sense that it created an industry, but has since been taken over by other, better services. One of the participants, Rallie’s John Laing, added: “Streaming exerts immense economic pressure on the [U.S.] studios due to fierce competition to attract and retain subscriptions. Rather than ordering content, gauging its performance by audience uptake and mitigating the risks of new content production costs with foreign broadcasters through license fees and output deals, they have abandoned their traditional economic model for an unfamiliar and traditionally untested economic arena betting the whole house on streaming. Additionally, the studios are now forced to compete by financing and constantly producing more brand-new content and bearing all the costswhile ransacking the value of their content libraries, which are the foundation of their economic power. The irony is streamers as such, other than the BBC, have forgotten the power of broadcasters.” Back to the Screenings, over 49 suites from 46 distribution companies (a few companies reserved multiple suites) were reserved at the newly refurbished Century Plaza (which is now under the Fairmont brand, which in turn is part of the French conglomerate Accor), in the Century City section of Los Angeles for the indie portion of the L.A. Screenings, which mostly catered to LATAM buyers, and which was set for May 18-20. The suites were located throughout the nine floors of the hotel, from the 3rd floor to the 11th. In addition, since the allotted number of suites was sold out, 14 meeting desks (i.e., tables) for some 13 other distributors (one company reserved two tables) were added to the floor just below the lobby. These exclude last minute L.A. Screenings 2022: Trying to Escape From The Streamers’ Den Market Report Indie exhibitors’ suites were located throughout nine floors of the Fairmont Century Plaza hotel Marianne Gambelli at the FOX Upfronts presentation Multicom Entertainment’s Irv Holender, VideoAge’s Dom Serafini, Incendo’s Gavin Reardon, Media Dorothy’s Dorothy Crompton The industry is not going back to former models despite the fact that no one can predict how to move forward, but only hope for the best. Then McKinsey shattered that idea by announcing that “hope is not a strategy.” (Continued on Page 14)
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy MTI4OTA5