Commissioners
They hold money and air time: you need both for successful TV. “The person holding the purse strings and access to schedules is the one you want to look for.”
- InIncreasingly they come from marketing, scheduling or audience research backgrounds
- Tthey are obsessive: they will watch the overnights and base decisions on how well a programme does in a particular slot; whether it improved on that slot from the year before etc and this method applies to whether on BBC, ITV, Channels 4 & 5 and digital channels too.
- MMove to the producer to solve their problems and to secure their repuatation as a trustworthy channel etc
- CCommissioners, now, are deeply involved in every step of the project to ensure that it will gratify the needs of their specific slot, channel and audience.
- TTHEY WILL TAKE THE CREDIT IF THE SHOW IS A SUCCESS
- IF IF IT IS A FLOP THEN IT IS ALL YOUR FAULT!
It was also apparent that it is increasingly tough to get a show off the ground because commissioners rarely fund the project themselves now. Apparently they’ll put up a certain amount but it’s progressively more expected for US to bring the money, particularly with drama and more and more with documentaries…. The way you get money to float a show sounds kinda dodgy to me, for example ad-funded programming because it’s hard to maintain the editorial worth whist meeting the needs of the advertisers too. On the hand I thought format exploitation sounded really smart: you take the shape of the programme and then replace the onscreen talent with your own country’s famous people. It makes programmes really marketable and if you can propose format exploitation in the pitch, then it’s so much more likely to get bought/funded. That’s why Days That Shook The World did well because it had a voiceover and no talking heads in it, so then other countries just had to dub it in their own language.
Producers:
-BrBring the talent and ideas to the table
- TTurn an idea into compelling T
We did an exercise on tendering and this, whilst being fun and being the source of my title (courtesy of Murray!), it showed me just what commissioners may choose and why. We were given the options of three programmes.
BBC History had said they wanted a new popular history magazine format for early evening BBC2. We had to imagine we were the commissioners and make a decision as to which project to go with. Key points we had to think about were: the time slot, to think economically (which one would have the best returns) and editorially. Out of four groups no-one picked the one which actually got commissioned! I had thought another programme (Six Degrees) had looked the most promising on returns, popularity and had potential format exploitation. But this programme was picked because of the success of the American version that is now in its 7th series. So commissioners
a) get scared with big budgets (Six Degrees had a MUCH larger budget than any other programme being tendered.)
b) pick programmes that have a safe format and don’t look risky…
Things that crossed my mind:
- Will ‘talent’ take over TV? In other words will the only way we will be able to sell programmes is with an ‘expert’ or a ‘celebrity/well-known kinda guy’?
- Does EVERYTHING have to be sold on the price over quality?! Going back to The Days That Shook The World – it was sold on its cheapness and it was a combo of drama, archive and contemporary footage sold at documentary prices! (But no, there is still loads of quality programmes out there – just like Nel: From Camden To Kabul, which blew me away – I’ll talk about that later!)
- When will there be a correct balance with the editorial content between the broadcaster and the producer since, apparently, all the broadcasters in the UK have held on strongly to the editorial control for programmes….
Key points of advice!
KNOW YOUR PITCH
By this target the channel by knowing exactly what the channel’s output is, do they want an ‘expert’ (Ch4, BBC2 and BBC4) or a ‘celeb’ (BB1, ITV1)?
Have a very good idea on how your pitch will play out.
Do your research: BBC commissioning website and Channel 4’s are good resources.
I really enjoyed Colin's talk because I learned a few more tips and saw the reality of how shows are tendered and put forward and how they are chosen on a tight basis, all very nitty gritty but I think with a good balance TV could be graced with some amazing shows.....I hope we have him again next year.
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