FremantleMedia International’s Jens Richter

With a catalog of more than 20,000 hours of drama, factual and factual-entertainment programming, FremantleMedia International (FMI) sells product to some 200 territories worldwide. FMI feeds its pipeline with finished shows and formats from parent company FremantleMedia’s global network, which has operations in 31 countries. It then supplements that output with programming it co-finances, co-produces or represents from third parties.

Jens Richter, FMI’s CEO, has been growing the company’s roster of content by taking advantage of FremantleMedia’s investments in talent and production companies, increasing its involvement in jointly financed and produced projects and focusing on high-end drama. Recent titles have included Deutschland 83, The Young Pope and American Gods.

While there is great demand for drama, talent competition shows and factual programming continue to be mainstays of FMI’s offering. The finished version of American Idol sold around the world, and there is much enthusiasm for the show’s new iteration that will premiere on ABC next year. Also, lifestyle and cooking shows, and their hybrids, consistently deliver audiences for channels and services, big and small.

As Richter tells World Screen, he and his teams in ten regional offices around the world are focused not only on selling programming but also on building brands.

WS: There is a lot of drama in the market. Are you focusing on high-concept projects with A-list talent?
RICHTER: We all agree there is a lot of drama out there, so you have to aim high to be able to make an impact with your show and to do that you need several elements. It’s about the story that hasn’t been told before. It’s about the piece of IP that has a great fan base, like Neil Gaiman’s American Gods or Elena Ferrante’s Neapolitan Novels. It’s about the creative talent involved, the writers and the producers. And as the projects become more ambitious, that means greater in scale, so you want to be authentic in your productions. If you do something like The Young Pope, you rebuild the Vatican to the point that people believe you shot there. That does come at a cost, and it means that everyone needs to have real trust in the production—the production company, the entity that helps finance the project and the broadcaster or platform that prebuys projects like that. The track record of the producer is also important, as is how unique the writing talent is. The Young Pope was the first time Paolo Sorrentino did a TV series. It’s also about the on-screen talent. An actor with recognition that fits the role 150 percent, as Jude Law did, does make an impact as well. And in American Gods, Mr. Wednesday is Ian McShane—it’s just him. For the character Shadow Moon, they saw a lot of people, and they were looking for something very specific: the man of no color as described in the book. And Ricky Whittle did a fantastic job; this is going to be his breakthrough.

This comes back to the point that there is a lot of drama out there. There is quite a spread between shows that can make an impact in the market or just another show that gets lost among a lot of others. It’s the middle ground that becomes more and more challenging, because not only is there a lot of drama, there is also fragmentation in the market. There are so many platforms—[traditional] TV channels, pay TV, SVOD and AVOD—that for an individual platform to break through it needs shows that make a difference. Drama is widely seen as the high-quality piece of television that can have the impact in the market that can help to break through. If you’re really lucky, you get the double whammy of critical reviews and audience. That is beautiful. Coming back to American Gods, the reviews we got in the weeks before and surrounding the launch were unbelievably positive. That was because of a huge fan base. There was a lot of anticipation for a series based on a Neil Gaiman book. The fans of the book are almost fanatic. And the current political and social landscape, the themes of [religion] and immigration, make a book written in 2001 almost more relevant today than it was back then.

Also, it was the most successful launch for Starz in a long time. Amazon is the global partner. They tell us it’s the number one show across the world. They have been able to activate more subscribers with American Gods.

WS: Was The Young Pope well received by international buyers?
RICHTER: The Young Pope was the most unusual piece of drama I have worked on in a long, long time. First, it was a lot about Paolo Sorrentino, who creates, writes, produces and directs amazing theatrical films and is now doing television. There was high anticipation and curiosity surrounding what the series would be about. Then there was Jude Law and the whole cast, which was mega impressive. It was screened at the Venice Film Festival. Everyone was very nervous because at the Venice Film Festival you get a direct response from the audience in the theater. There was a standing ovation at the end of the screening; everybody loved what they had seen.

What was critical for us was the feedback from the U.S. The New York Times and other publications loved it. Then we went out to market and we had some very interesting conversations with clients. Some clients were seriously concerned about what the show was really about. Was it a criticism of the Catholic Church? At one platform, the acquisition team loved it, but the head of the channel is a practicing Catholic and wanted to know how the show deals with the Catholic Church. So we set up a call with the head of the channel, the acquisition team and the producers, and we openly discussed the show. There were very direct questions to Lorenzo [Mieli, an executive producer of The Young Pope]: Are you a believer? After a one-and-a-half-hour conversation, we all agreed the show is about one character who hadn’t received his calling yet, and it follows his search and journey. The show was not going after the Catholic Church in any way. The acquisition team and channel head were very grateful for the call and said, Let us discuss internally and we’ll get back to you tomorrow. The next day they came back and said, We want the show. The Young Pope went on air and did phenomenally well for them, both critical reviews and audience. When the news came out about The New Pope [Sorrentino’s upcoming limited series], they immediately said, We want to be on board again. The Young Pope is one of our best-selling drama series ever. It sold in every market around the world to a mix of premium pay TV, public broadcasters and VOD platforms.

WS: At what point do you invest in a drama project?
RICHTER: We come on very early. The way we work at Fremantle is unique. First, over the last two or three years, we went heavily into drama. We invested in drama talent. We acquired production companies like Miso Film in Scandinavia, Kwaï in France and Wildside in Italy. We brought production talent into the group. Kate Harwood is reviving Euston Films, an established drama label in the U.K. She’s doing Hard Sun for the BBC, set it up as a co-production with Hulu. We also invested in start-ups like Dancing Ledge and Corona TV, two U.K.-based production companies. We attract production talent that helps us create a wonderful pipeline.

Second, we have our global drama department, headed by Sarah Doole and Christian Vesper. They nurture our development pipeline and give a lot of advice to our producers. A beautiful case study is what we did in Australia with Picnic at Hanging Rock, which is a Foxtel commission based on the novel by Joan Lindsay. You know about the 1975 Peter Weir movie. What we have working for us is the book IP, and the movie, which is known to quite a lot of movie buffs and quite a lot of buyers. We looked at the property, and our addition was to create something that did not bring the movie to tele­vision in a six-hour version but created a new interpretation that fits into today’s world.

One of the discussion points was this is a show with a lot of female protagonists. We have this unmarried woman who comes from the U.K. with a lot of money and sets up a boarding school for women in Australia. On Valentine’s Day, 1900, they go on an excursion and all the girls but one goes missing. What happened? What’s the secret of the lady who opened the boarding school? It’s a show with women for women. The 1975 movie had a male perspective. We decided we’d like to have a female director who can bring a visual language that fits a global audience. That’s where our drama department came in, and Christian hired Larysa Kondracki, who had worked on Legion and Better Call Saul. Larysa is the director of the first three episodes and the showrunner for all six episodes. She will also oversee the post-production.

Then the casting component came in. Who could be the boarding school headmistress? The ambition was to find a cast that fits on a billboard, taking into consideration the marketing and communications elements. When Natalie Dormer of Game of Thrones came in, she fit the part wonderfully. We certainly don’t produce average drama anymore. We are now at an international level, and that means we have to spend more money.

WS: Have distribution and financing changed in this age of high-end drama?
RICHTER: We are not a studio, but very few indies have a structure like ours. We have ten regional offices, so once we have a drama we believe in we can heavily market it and we can place it. We can have The Young Pope on Fox in Latin America or SBS in Australia because we have salespeople on the ground who understand our shows really well and they sit with the broadcasters.

The way we support the marketing has also changed because of piracy. If you have a big show, it’s about day-and-date airings and global launches. You have to put a lot more energy and thought into the marketing assets. An interesting experience was American Gods. Starz needs different assets than Amazon. The moment you have a lot of SVOD platforms involved, you deliver not only different marketing assets, but you also deliver different materials for the show.

And the way you support the financing of shows is also changing because the moment you’re talking about these big, ambitious, impactful shows, you do end up spending money. And the budgets surely are not covered by the commissioning broadcasters alone, so you need financial resources to do this kind of drama.

It’s an orchestrated process, and you need a lot of people working hand in hand. You compare that to ten years ago when a show might have been financed mainly by the commissioning broadcaster. You dealt only with traditional linear broadcasters. Piracy wasn’t an issue. So people were pretty relaxed about when you would deliver a show. Everybody got the same set of materials because they weren’t specific to the platform. It’s all completely changed, and at the same time, there is a lot more opportunity in the market because there are so many platforms and broadcasters. And broadcasters that still have a mainly live audience require different shows and different storytelling—the characters may not be as complicated. There might be the story-of-the-week element. While if you work with platforms or broadcasters that have a high level of catch-up or on-demand, you can do different types of storytelling.

Because we talk to broadcasters and platforms all the time, we know what they have in development and on their slate. That is very valuable insight. You don’t want to put a lot of time and energy and money into developing and creating a show and then finding out, oops, there are three others in this space. Then you won’t have the impact anymore. Then you are number four in line behind others. So, what is the USP of your show? And you have to be fairly sure there is a USP.

WS: Factual is still quite important for you, isn’t it?
RICHTER: Yes, and in the unscripted space, there is factual, factual reality and our talent shows. In the talent show space, the week before the L.A. Screenings was the most beautiful week of the year. We had American Idol coming back and the renewal of American Gods in the same week. It couldn’t have been better! With American Idol coming back, we are excited about ABC in the U.S., and we’re also excited about having the tape for the rest of the world because the tape is very valuable for us. American Idol, America’s Got Talent, Britain’s Got Talent and The X Factor are all global shows. We sell them around the world. Ten years ago, it didn’t make much difference when these shows would go out. Now the world is connected, so if you have a fan base for America’s Got Talent online, your fan base knows what’s going on in America on the show live. Now, we bring these shows all out day and date, so if you are a pay-TV platform in Asia and you want America’s Got Talent, you will air it the same day as in the U.S. or the next day, depending on the time difference.

WS: What have been some of your recent factual reality shows?
RICHTER: We are very proud of some of our big brands, like Grand Designs. That’s a great property, and it works well in pay and free TV. It has closed-ended episodes. It’s high quality and aspirational, and we are always telling the story of a homeowner’s emotional journey. The closed-ended episodes allow for a lot of repeats and very flexible scheduling for the broadcasters. We have Grand Designs U.K., Grand Designs Australia and now one from Denmark, and the tape value of all these versions is incredibly high and they travel very well.

For more than ten years we have been working together with Jamie Oliver. Jamie Oliver is a brand, and there again the way we work has changed completely. It’s not us only selling the tape. We talk with Jamie Oliver and his production company and ask, what are your key markets? Where are you active with merchandise, with your restaurant business? How can we help create synergies between all these different businesses to help you grow the Jamie Oliver brand? Then we bring him together with the broadcaster. We have sessions with books, broadcaster, restaurant and merchandising in the same room. That’s way beyond selling tape; that’s building brands, and FremantleMedia is very different from everybody else. I don’t think there is any other company out there that is so conscious about brands. And the journey with American Idol and the big talent shows really helped because it created experience and awareness for the company about building brands and running the business around these brands. And we are more than happy to share that with third-party producers.