FX's John Landgraf at TCA: It's All About the Brand (and Streaming)

But this time his approach was a bit different There was no commentary about the state of the industry overall instead Landgraf was laserfocused as are most executives who appear on TCA panels on his networks including FX on HuluquotYou39ve heard me talk ad nauseam about the importance to FX of curating a brand identity and as some of you may have noticed we have now affixed the FX logo to the title treatments of all of our shows so that wherever those shows travel our brand travels with themquot Landgraf said during his opening remarks quotOur mission is to develop commission produce market and publicize our shows in support of our talent and brand Many of our shows are produced directly through FX Productions and many come from our partner Dana Walden and her teams at 20th Television and ABC Signature Job one is to make shows that are highly original and driven by distinctive creative perspectives that become commercial and qualitative successes and if we do that we continue to make FXbrand deposits that benefit our linear channels Hulu Star and ultimately The Walt Disney Company We are well positioned moving forward to just do thatquotThis shift from Landgraf39s usual approach when speaking to the TCA was so noticeable that one journalist asked him about it during the QampampA that followedquotYou39ve often talked about the state of the industry as much as the state of FX39s slate and you39ve talked about the number of scripted shows and your feelings about that over the yearsquot the journalist began quotWhat is your feeling about the state of the small screen industry right nowquotquotYou know for many years I have been involved in the distribution process and running linear channelsquot Landgraf replied quotThere was a major restructuring at the Walt Disney Company and the running of the linear channels now exists elsewhere in the company I run a brand that markets commissions publicizes programs and produces original programming so that39s one of the reasons you39re seeing my focus change somewhatquotAnd as for the state of the industry quotWe can all see the focal point of consumption of scripted programming moving towards streamingquot he continued quotIt39s not that there isn39t major consumption going on at linear channels anymore There is But scripted programming consumption is rising very rapidly on streaming platforms and conversely it tends to be declining on linear channels So that39s why it was vitally important for FX to really play a major part in the component of the ecosystem that39s growing As you39ve seen Hulu is a really vibrant platform and it39s growing very very fastquotSo we39re in this bifurcated place where we make shows for our linear channels amp8230 but all those shows are now available in a streaming context As far as I39m concerned that positions us towards the future Because what you can see is the emergence of these streaming platforms as the sort of central place where scripted programming is housed and consumedquotLater Landgraf noted quotOne of the things I39ve remarked upon in the past is the fact that there were at one point 60 or 70 different purveyors of scripted programming and many purveyors of documentary programming What you can see now is the industry is consolidating So I think those that remain viable in the streaming era and who maintain a sort of level of quality and volume are going to have a much better opportunity to stand out and to be recognizable and distinctive to consumersquotLandgraf also framed the recent production issues brought on by the COVID19 pandemic in a way we hadn39t heard before Asked about the challenge of deciding when to schedule shows he replied quotI would say I39ve had less control of the question of when to put a show on this year than I39ve ever had in my entire career because so much of that has been decided for us by frankly when we could return to production safely and when and where and how our talent was comfortable with the safety of the working environment I guess you could say that39s been frustrating but on some level it39s been easier because the decisions have been made for mequotAlthough it is not yet over FX Networks has come out of the pandemic in a renewed position of strength quotWe are back to where we were before the pandemic and ramping up our development and production to increase our slate to approximately 30 shows a yearquot Landgraf said quotWe thought very carefully about that number taking into consideration our desire to maintain the highly personalized artistfocused process that has yielded a consistency of quality and success as well as a fidelity to FX39s 39Fearless39 brand filterquotIn 2020 we programmed just 12 shows Dating back to the recent launch of Dave season two in June and through the upcoming launch of The Premise in midSeptember we will have premiered about that same number of shows in just a fourmonth spanquot he explained quotSome of that is due to finally getting back some key returning shows a number of which were on hiatus prior to the pandemic These include American Crime Story American Horror Story Atlanta and Itamp8217s Always Sunny in Philadelphia which is like having four Hall of Fame players who are on injured reserve all returning to the starting lineup at the same timequotSimultaneously we39ve been ramping up our new series in developmentquot he continued referring to two new American Story spinoff limited series American Sports Story and American Love Story another potential cycle of American Crime Story centered on the legendary goingson at Studio 54 and a franchise based on the Alien movies created by Noah Hawley the mastermind behind the Fargo series In addition beginning in two weeks FXFXXFX on Hulu collectively will premiere the 10th installment of American Horror Story entitled Double Feature season twelve of Archer season three of What We Do in the Shadows Impeachment American Crime Story two new properties The Premise and Y The Last Man the next documentary film under The New York Times Presents banner and amp160season fifteen of It39s Always Sunny in PhiladelphiaquotIf you go back to the shows we39ve launched since March of 2019 we39ve actually had one of the most successful batting averages across that span that we39ve ever experienced in the 17 years I39ve been at the channelquot Landgraf concluded quotThe challenge now is how successfully can we scale that process and how much can we contribute to Hulu and Disney without lowering our batting average or sort of diminishing the success or quality of our shows Thirty shows was the number we arrived at as the most and best that we can do It39s my hope that that number is substantial enough across the course of a year that it39s a meaningful beacon to consumers even within the extraordinarily competitive environment in the streaming eraquotClick the social buttons to share this content with your friends and colleaguesThe opinions and points of view expressed in this content are exclusively the views of the author andor subjects and do not necessarily represent the views of MediaVillagecomMyersBizNet Inc management or associated writers

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FX's John Landgraf at TCA: It's All About the Brand (and Streaming)

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FX's John Landgraf at TCA: It's All About the Brand (and Streaming)

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