John Landgraf at TCA: “We’re Ballooning Into a Condition of Over-Supply”

amp8220In the 12 years Iamp8217ve been at FX I donamp8217t think weamp8217ve ever had a better first half of a calendar year than 2016 and I know weamp8217ve definitely never had a better traditional broadcast year than the 20152016 seasonamp8221 Landgraf declared clearly thrilled with the record four TCA Awards the network received on Saturday along with many recent honors from the AFI and the Broadcast Television Journalists Association And then thereamp8217s the little matter of the 56 Emmy Award nominations FXamp160just received amp8211 a record for a basic cable networkamp8220That Emmy nomination total which is more than Netflixamp8217s is stunning to meamp8221 he admitted amp8220Our Emmy nominations were mined from only three program categories Drama Comedy and Limited Series with only 14 total shows submitted for consideration HBO and Netflix program to virtually every possible Emmy category and each of their Emmy boxes contain 39 programs nearly three times the number of FX submissions On top of that our programming budget is approximately one third of HBOamp8217s and about one sixth of Netflixamp8217s To me this is a testament to the notion that excellent programming is not ultimately about big data or algorithmic recommendation or even necessarily about the brute force of huge programming budgets or having a vast number of programsamp8221So when it comes to scripted television how much is too much Landgraf amp8211 the man credited with popularizing the phrase Peak TV amp160had much to say on the subject amp160amp8220I and we at the FX Networks have always believed that great storytelling is best fostered in a uniquely personal and humanscaled contextamp8221 he said amp8220The storyteller has to come before the story and the story has to come before the data or the money or the competitive ambitions of the organization Television shows are not like cars or operating systems They are not best made by engineers or coders in the same assembly line manner as consumer products which need to be of uniform size shape and qualityamp8220Every single television show and every great episode of every great television show should on some level be one of a kind and every creator needs and deserves personal relationships and an attention to detail that takes its direction from inside their vision as a storyteller amp160from everyone at their partner network or brand across all dimensions of program development current programming scheduling publicity marketing production etc If an engineer or a coder does their job brilliantly then every jet engine coming off a line is precisely and reliably the same and every user who visits a site has the same perfect qualitative experience If FX and our storytelling partners do our job brilliantly then every series and every episode is graded in its own unique and at best surprising wayamp8220The fact that we at FX know this that we accept it and that we admit it publicly remains one of the underlying secrets to our success in fostering the work of talented storytellersamp8221Last summer Landgraf stunned the TCA by pointing out that yeartodate in 2015 there had been 304 scripted series in all of television So far in 2016 he revealed that number has increased to 322 Interestingly among the broadcast networks there has been an increase of only one series from 117 to 118 among premium cable again an increase of only one show from 24 to 25 and collectively the basic cable networks are down from 139 last summer to 130 shows so far this yearThe increase is wholly attributable to online programming services up from 24 to 49 original series yeartoyear Addamp160announced series that have yet to premiere into the equation Landgraf said and the increase among streaming services is even more dramatic amp160especially for Netflix which this year has premiered andor announced 71 adult scripted original series not counting childrenamp8217s fare or foreign language seriesamp160amp8220For reference thatamp8217s more than the announced future output of HBO Showtime Starz and FX combinedamp8221 Landgraf saidamp8220I donamp8217t know much about their businessamp8221 he later said of Netflix amp8220I donamp8217t think anybody but them knows all that much about their business because they are I think quite secretive in many waysamp160 But obviously they canamp8217t double their original series production and then double again and then double again and then double again because the entire planetamp8217s surface would be covered by Netflixamp8217s television shows in 20 short yearsamp160 Why it is that they are making such an extraordinarily large number of shows I really couldnamp8217t tellamp8220You could give me all the money in the world and I could not make an organization that could supervise 71 shows with anywhere near the same level of personal attention and the focus that we give to the 20ish shows that we are going to makeamp8221 he continued amp8220I wouldnamp8217t know how to do it So itamp8217s just a very very different business model It obviously does create some excellent showsamp8221Counting Netflix Huluamp160and Amazon plus smaller online services like Crackle Seeso and Vimeo streaming services should collectively reach a combined output in 2016 of 130 scripted series approaching English language broadcast televisionamp8217s recent full year total of around 150 original scripted series Landgraf continuedamp160 That means amp8220the total number of adult English language scripted TV shows premiering in the US during this full year should be in the 430 to 450 series rangeamp8221 he said adding that given projected increases that number amp8220should approach or slightly exceed 500 scripted series for all of 2017amp8221Landgraf expressed confidence that there will be a decline in scriptedamp160output in 2019 amp8220I think weamp8217re ballooning into a condition of oversupply which will at some point slowly deflate perhaps from 500plus shows to 400 or a little less than thatamp8221 he saidamp8220One of the reasons that I think the condition of television making more than 500 original scripted series is probably unsustainable is that as best we can guess when you average out the perhour cost of every one of those television shows amp8230 the cost of making and marketing an hour of television in America today is more than 4 millionamp8221 Landgraf continued amp160amp8220It could be somewhere between 4 and 5 millionamp8220You have to have really robust monetization for it to be profitableamp8221 he concluded amp8220You have to have millions of people watchingamp8221The opinions and points of view expressed in this commentary are exclusively the views of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of MediaVillagecomMyersBizNet Inc management or associated bloggers

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John Landgraf at TCA: “We’re Ballooning Into a Condition of Over-Supply”

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John Landgraf at TCA: “We’re Ballooning Into a Condition of Over-Supply”

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