Exclusive Interview: FremantleMedia’s Cecile Frot-Coutaz

September 17, 2012 World Screen
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PREMIUM: Cecile Frot-Coutaz, the CEO of FremantleMedia, talks to World Screen about the essential ingredients that make shows like American Idol, Got Talent and The X Factor hits.

 

WS: What are the essential ingredients that make shows like American Idol, Got Talent or The X Factor hits?
FROT-COUTAZ: First of all, they are big events and if you really boil it down, they tell a story of the search for that one person that gets anointed at the end. It’s almost like a feature film that extends over three months. You start with a search, but you know that by the end you will have your winner. That’s a very universal story. It works everywhere. But above and beyond that, what’s made a big difference was introducing the voting component when Idols started. That was pretty ground breaking. It really made that winner the people’s winner. Voting empowers viewers, it makes them relate to the show and connect with it. These shows connect very deeply with their audiences, like no other shows do.And music is very universal, but it’s not only about the music, it’s about that rags-to-riches story. What sets these shows apart is that they are very real. The people who show up to audition, whether it’s for X Factor or Idol or Got Talent, don’t show up just to be on one episode and make a bit of money. They show up because they truly want to become a pop star or a rock star. They want to make music. They want to be famous. They want to perform. And the show also wants to find that person, so there is a complete alignment between the goals of the show and goals of the contestants, and that makes those shows incredibly real and incredibly raw.
 
WS: They say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. There are so many talent competition shows out there now. Is the genre being diluted?
FROT-COUTAZ: As you say, imitation is the best form of flattery and people love these shows. For a while you say: I can’t get enough, and it’s true up to a point, but it will be interesting to see what happens. So far, these shows haven’t cannibalized each other hugely because the market has gotten bigger and the demand is still there. We’re certainly seeing that. But naturally, each one of these shows probably isn’t quite as successful as it could be if there was only one show in the marketplace. Let’s not forget though, if we’re talking about Idols, or X Factor, or Got Talent, we’re talking about the world’s top entertainment formats. These shows are getting huge audiences and they’re still travelling. Looking at the wider landscape and the other shows around, maybe they will all survive at their current levels, maybe some of them will go away. Our job as producers is to make sure our shows still feel relevant and surprise people, and make sure we find great talent, and that we’re true to what the shows are about. That’s all we can do—concentrate on making the very, very best shows in the market.
 
WS: Are there specific ways to look for the next big hit, or does it just happen when it happens?
FROT-COUTAZ: If there were, there would be a lot more big hits! What we’re finding is that the reality genre has really matured. I don’t know if you remember ten years ago, but every week you’d read about a new reality show, and there was a lot of creativity and a lot of invention because the genre was completely new. It isn’t new anymore, so now we’re in a different place. If you talk to me or to any of our competitors, the big question is, where is the next big hit going to come from? Nobody’s got a crystal ball so all you can do is try a lot of different things: have really talented people on your team, join in partnerships, take some risks, look globally. And if you do enough things and if you try enough times, hopefully you’ll find something that works. Ultimately, there is no prescriptive way to approach development, other than establishing a culture that nurtures creativity and being fairly agnostic and flexible about how you approach it.
 
WS: Has social media increased the engagement that viewers have with big shows?
FROT-COUTAZ: Yes. That is the short answer. Social media has become a must, but as with everything, it’s much more complex than that. It’s very easy to say you have to do social media. Of course you have to do social media, the question really is how do you do social media. If you really want to use social media to further the engagement viewers have with a show, it has to be compelling and it has to actually engage viewers. It’s not enough to just generate conversations around the show, you have to understand the nature of the conversations and why they’re taking place. The crazy thing is, two years ago, Twitter barely existed, and now you can’t watch a show that doesn’t have a hash tag on it. Interestingly, it’s still a fairly small part of the population that tweets, but those people who do tweet are obviously very engaged with the shows. It’s still not a broad medium, the grandmother in Iowa is probably not going to be tweeting, but she’s still watching the show and is engaged. The thing about Twitter in particular is that it’s almost like a live research tool. When we’re doing a show like The X Factor and people are telling you in real time what they think of what you’re doing, it’s really interesting for us as producers. You have to be quite careful how you use it because it does represent only a certain part of the viewing population, but it’s fascinating to get viewers’ feedback and see the level of engagement they have. You can’t launch a big show like that today without a social-media strategy. It’s just part of doing business.
 
WS: There are other ways of connecting with viewers beyond the TV screen. Do you start thinking of consumer products while you are developing a show or do you wait until the show starts connecting with viewers?
FROT-COUTAZ: It’s a bit of both. From an economic standpoint, shows that have extensions will be more profitable than shows that don’t, because you can create all these additional revenue streams. Putting an emphasis on those kinds of shows while you develop is important. It’s also important to recognize that once a show goes on air, typically it takes more than one season to do something that is very meaningful around extensions. By the time you have gone through two or three seasons, you’ve really refined your brand, and you and the viewers know what the show really is about. It then becomes far easier to sell it to your sponsors, look more deeply at the licensing aspects and figure out what makes sense for the show. It is also far easier to monetize those aspects when the show is a hit—that’s when the revenue streams really start to come through.
 
WS: What are the major challenges and opportunities you see as you take the helm of FremantleMedia?
FROT-COUTAZ: A key focus is on getting IP into the pipeline, across a broad range of genres. Strengthening the development effort globally continues to be a top priority, along with looking at different kinds of partnerships. Another focus is on digital, and this is crucial. New technologies, new platforms and new digital audiences open up enormous opportunities for a company like FremantleMedia. On a more short-term tactical level, there are a lot of markets around the world that are entering recession, and we always have to bear that in mind as we look at the next couple of years. But if Europe is having a tough time, that’s counterbalanced by markets like Brazil or India that are real growth markets. That’s the good news about having a global company.
 
WS: Tell us about your 17 years with the company.
FROT-COUTAZ: When I started it was a very different kind of company. We were at Pearson Television, which had literally just been assembled under Greg Dyke’s leadership. The core of the company was Thames Television. We had just bought Grundy; that was our first big acquisition and it set us down a path of building an international-production business. My first big deal in my role, which was to support Greg Dyke in acquisitions and strategy, was the acquisition of All American Television, which at the time was owned by the Scotti brothers. The company produced Baywatch, it had a big syndication operation and it had all the Goodson-Todman Productions’ game-show formats. That was a substantial acquisition and a very big deal for us, in size, in scale and in monetary terms. Getting that acquisition done, and also then integrating the acquisition into the rest of the company, was a fantastic experience.I talk about that deal because having that experience and history means I understand the fabric of the company, and how the business model was put together, and why it works and how it works. Some of the questions we have today, interestingly, were the same ones we had ten, 12 or 15 years ago. We went from a collection of companies around the world to being a truly global company. There is a big difference; having an international footprint is one thing, but having a company that functions as a global company, as we do now, is very different and a huge strength. Looking back, I’m really proud to have been part of that very big construction exercise.
 
WS: And you eventually moved to the U.S.
FROT-COUTAZ: I went from that job to a more operational job in Europe and then eventually went over to the U.S., where I ran our North American operation. That was about building the company into one of the leaders in North America in reality television. When I arrived there, it really wasn’t an empire at all. It was quite transformational, and this is a business that has managed to retain its key brands. We have the very successful daytime shows that are still going strong, which maybe people don’t talk about as much as the big prime-time television shows. But for us those are very big brands and some of them have had a real resurgence lately, like Family Feud with Steve Harvey. The social-gaming activities we’ve been able to launch around Family Feud have shown us the power of these brands and how evergreen and important to the business they are. And of course there are the three big talent shows, American Idol, Got Talent and The X Factor. I also served as executive producer on these three shows and I’m very passionate about them! I spent a lot of my days and years worrying about how to make the next season better than the previous season. It has been a great rollercoaster and there is something really special about being part of shows that are big events like that and that really have an impact on the culture.
 
WS: As you step into your new role as CEO, what are you excited about?
FROT-COUTAZ: The thing that is incredibly exciting about FremantleMedia and that I am very proud of is that we are a truly global player. And there are very few companies like ours. We have worked very hard during the last ten years to make that work. When I say we are global, we are global in terms of our approach to production and we’re also starting to use our global presence to further our development efforts. That is quite hard to do because the world has become a much more global marketplace than it was ten years ago. We’re a great partner, we work very well in partnerships and we are really good executors. This company makes really good shows. We have a very large amount of number one shows around the world. If I look at the future, the challenge for me is around answering the question: where is the business going? Where are the viewers going? People’s tastes are changing. The kinds of shows that are working today are not the same kinds of shows that were working ten years ago. Drama is making a comeback. We’re looking at those trends and I want to broaden the scope of the company into some new genres. I also want to really focus on what digital means for us. There is a transition that is happening right now. As a content player that is very exciting because we have options and opportunities. The next decade will be quite transformational for our company and for our competitors as well. And that is the exciting part, figuring out what our path is going to be and how we can be a trailblazer.