Alex Mahon

April 1, 2009 World Screen

 

April 2009
 
The Shine Group consists of four British production companies: Kudos, Dragonfly, Shine TV and Princess, which have created a slew of hits, including Spooks, Hustle and Life on Mars. Last year, Shine acquired Reveille, the producer of the U.S. version of The Office and of Ugly Betty. Alex Mahon talks about the innovative quality of Shine’s dramas.
 
WS: How has Spooks changed the face of British drama?
MAHON: Spooks has changed British drama in the sense that it’s a very high-end glossy drama, much more in the American style of production. It’s high-budget, very slickly produced and post-produced, the characters are all good-looking and attractive, and that’s not usual for U.K. drama. It’s not parochial; it’s wide-ranging and international and mold-breaking in that sense. That’s why it has sold to 70 territories. We’ve just done a big U.S. syndication deal. It’s called MI-5 in the U.S. Spooks was quite game-changing, and it gave British drama producers and the world a sense that U.K. drama doesn’t have to be unattractive and parochial. Americans say British actors have bad teeth and are fat and you can’t do close-ups—we have a constant problem with that!
Another one of our shows, Merlin, has also traveled internationally. We sold it to NBC, which will air it this summer, and that was a kind of a hurdle for a U.K. drama. It was a straight sale to the network. It will be interesting to see if with that, and with other shows, we can create the kind of family drama on U.S. network television [that has been working in the U.K.] There is a desire for it from American broadcasters, it’s certainly been a great success in the U.K., but it has to hit the sweet spot of something that is appealing enough to adults while also compelling for children. It will be interesting to see if Merlin works in the U.S. It certainly did well in international sales. It’s been a massive hit in Italy, and it has sales in France, Germany and Australia, so we’ll see how it goes.
 
WS: Is British drama catching up to American drama in terms of scope and ambition, and has Shine played a role in that?
MAHON: I would say it’s absolutely getting there. The Kudos dramas Spooks and Hustle have been absolutely game-changing because they have been so slick. Kudos has also produced the U.K. version of Law & Order. It airs on ITV and is outstanding, very true to the original format. Dick Wolf is reportedly delighted with it. It’s very tough to keep up with those U.S. standards of drama, but Kudos has managed to do it. As a production entity, Kudos has been outstanding, and Shine TV has done well with Merlin, which has the international ambition and a longer run. It was ordered in a 13-episode run, which for U.K. drama is almost unheard of. People in the U.K. are beginning to commit to longer runs because it makes the programs less expensive. They are starting from the position of, How do we make this show sell internationally so we can make more money out of it?
But fundamentally, the production models are still very different. The U.S. still works on the pilot season and still has massive deficits on shows. It will be interesting to see if the U.S. model changes to become a little more like the U.K. model, where you don’t necessarily produce a pilot, you order [the series] straight off the script, but maybe you make a shorter order or you reduce the deficit and bring in international sales earlier. I suspect the U.S. will have to, because the current funding model may not be economically sustainable in this climate. We may see the U.S. and U.K. coming closer together rather than the U.K. always trying to catch up to the U.S.
 
WS: On a few projects, NBC has bypassed the pilot and gone straight to series. Do you see that becoming a trend?
MAHON: We are definitely seeing the trend—we’ve seen it in non-scripted programming for years—where people see a format on air in another territory and produce it locally. We are starting to see that in scripted programming. It happened on The Office, which is the biggest success at Reveille. We did it with Kath & Kim. We are trying it more and more, and there are more shows we are working on to see if we can get the really big break for a show in the U.S. Can we ever get something as good as The Office? I hope so. When you’ve seen a format on air somewhere else, it should be able to go straight to series. It shouldn’t necessarily need the pilot first. I think the studios will have to try that more and more.
 
WS: What is Shine’s philosophy in attracting talent and giving them free rein to do what they do best?
MAHON: We try to attract what we call creative entrepreneurs, ideally someone who knows how to run a business and perhaps has done so for a number of years, and at heart believes in creativity, in the creation of original intellectual property and the ownership of it. All the companies we have bought so far, or that we’ve created, have been run by those kinds of people. And what Liz [Elisabeth Murdoch, the Shine Group’s chairman and CEO] and I are trying to do is nurture them and keep them happy and attempt to create an environment in which they can thrive and have the freedom to do more. We are always trying to find people who have not quite reached the finish line—who feel there is quite a lot more they want to do. And in order to do that we try to create an environment where creative people can thrive.
They don’t really thrive in big silo-type bureaucratic companies, and at the same time, they don’t seem to thrive in purely financial places, purely private-­equity-driven, where they hear, “Make another 20-percent profit or you’re on your own.” That’s not to say the money is not important! But we try not to make it the overriding factor in everything. The Shine Group is run by people who come from a creative production background, so we try to place that at the heart of what we are doing and believe in the idea that if we make the best product we can, that will see us through.
That’s how we try to approach it, but ultimately, a true content business is only as good as the people you have who are coming up with the ideas. You have to be very cognizant that the primary drivers are nurturing and maintaining those people in an environment that they are happy to work in.
 
WS: Tell us about the recent Shine and ITV Global co-production partnership.
MAHON: We always try to be nimble and experimental. Certainly in the U.S., it’s much more normal to partner with a studio. What we have tried to say is, “ITV Studios has a lot of people, a lot of facilities and very good relationships with the network. Is there something we can do to bring together their creative people with ours and create a couple of shows for specific slots that are needed by the network, where combined we have more chance of coming up with some new product?”
Lee Bartlett, who comes out of the U.S. system [he was previously at FOX] and now runs ITV Studios, is very open to creating this kind of collaboration.
 
WS: Are you happy with the Reveille acquisition?
MAHON: We are delighted with it. We really pursued Reveille. For us, they were absolutely the biggest jewel in the crown that we could ever get in America because of their huge abilities in both scripted and non-scripted programming. In bringing them on board, we immediately came to the forefront of both the U.S. and the U.K. in both genres. To have a company that has Ugly Betty, The Office, The Tudors and Kath & Kim in one year is really outstanding.
And Reveille has this amazing strength in formatted entertainment with The Biggest Loser, American Gladiators and Breakthrough with Tony Robbins, the show for NBC that we just announced.
And we also got an international-distribution arm in ShineReveille International, which has a really strong team, and they are selling not only our formats, but they have [Mark Burnett’s] Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader?
Putting together our U.K. creative teams with our U.S. team is really starting to pay off now, as we can transfer shows faster between the two territories, whether they be scripted or non-scripted.
 
WS: Do you see adding on other production companies to the Shine Group?
MAHON: We are very opportunistic, and if we find the right people, we definitely want to get them.
 
WS: What growth areas do you see in the next 12 to 18 months?
MAHON: We are very strong in the U.S. and the U.K. and we are strong already internationally through our distribution arm, but we want to do more in terms of diversifying both geographically and into other genres. So the next year will absolutely be about finding those key people or key companies to continue that.