Maria Kyriacou

June 27, 2011 World Screen

This interview originally appeared in the MIPTV 2011 issue of TV Europe.
 
As the international distribution arm of ITV, the leading commercial broadcaster in the U.K., ITV Studios Global Entertainment represents more than 35,000 hours of original and formatted programming from ITV Studios and from leading independent producers. Maria Kyriacou, managing director, talks about the importance of securing a constant flow of content that has international appeal.
 
TV EUROPE:What have been your goals since you took over ITV Studios Global Entertainment?
KYRIACOU: We want to be known as the place for the best content, which is the key to all of this. You have to have the right kind of content to sell to broadcasters, and that’s where our success is going to come from. Adam [Crozier, the chief executive of ITV] has reiterated a number of times that a key objective of ITV’s transformation is creating content that resonates internationally. We also want to be known as the best distribution network for producers and providing them with the best possible service. We are a large-scale distributor and we can use that to make sure producers’ shows get into as many homes as possible. I’d like us to be known as a total-value distributor. We can deliver not only to audiences on tele­vision but to consumers who want to connect with shows in different forms, whether it’s a book or it’s online, or if it’s a kids’ property it could be toys or apparel. We are really focused on how we can grow our consumer-products business so that we are a total-value distributor.
 
TV EUROPE: You have also been making partnerships with third-party producers.
KYRIACOU:We announced last MIPCOM our distribution deal with La Plante Productions and that’s the kind of content that ITV has long been associated with. We’ve got the latest Above Suspicion and we will be launching it at MIPTV. We also announced a distribution deal with an L.A.-based company called BASE Productions. They produce an excellent factual show called Police POV, which we launched last market. And we have a deal with Wild Pictures, which produced a critically acclaimed documentary series for ITV1 on the Holloway women’s prison.
 
We’ve got some very successful longer-running relationships with producers and at MIPTV we’re going to be launching some of their shows. Mammoth Screen has a new medical drama for ITV1 called Monroe starring James Nesbitt, which looks phenomenal. We’ve got very high hopes for it. And with Ruby Films and Television we will be launching Case Histories, which stars Jason Isaacs and is based on the very successful series of books by Kate Atkinson. 
 
TV EUROPE: And you have been forging partnerships with broadcasters.
KYRIACOU:We have a relationship with Hunan TV in China and we think we are breaking some new ground with this. Hunan TV and ITV have gotten together not only to bring some Western ideas into China, but also to recognize that the Chinese market has its own cultural identity and we really need to be developing on the ground specifically for the Chinese market. We have a co-development deal and together we intend to develop brand-new ideas and then we at ITV can distribute them across the globe.
 
TV EUROPE:You mentioned you are developing your consumer-products business. What is the strategy?
KYRIACOU: Step one was to hire a well-respected, very experienced executive named Jean-Philippe Randisi. He previously worked at MTV Networks International. He was also at Saban Consumer Products Europe and Walt Disney Records. He comes from a world where creating and exploiting brands is bread and butter. With Jean-Philippe we’ve put home entertainment, promotions and merchandising and licensing under one roof. With him in place we will start to create greater scale at an international, rather than just a U.K., level. Part of the process is to [see] what we’ve got in our library, where we’ve got a lot of very valuable IP, and have a look at re-inventing some of the shows that are in there.
 
TV EUROPE: In what areas do you see growth?
KYRIACOU: For us it’s all about creating content. We are going to spend a lot of time with ITV Studios here in the U.K. and with the international offices using our first-hand knowledge of the global TV market to ensure we are developing more internationally relevant content. We are also building relationships with third parties. So our growth is about bringing the right type of content to market and exploiting it in the right way.
 
One area we want to be more active in is co-productions. We believe there is a market for international collaboration on bigger projects and, as an example, we’ve got Titanic. This is an ambitious, high-value production. Julian Fellowes is writing it and in collaboration with Lookout Point we have secured pre-sale co-production partners in the U.S., Canada, Ireland, Spain, Portugal, Sweden, New Zealand and Australia—partners who have come on board early to co-produce and co-fund. I believe there will be more of these large-scale international collaborations. We’d like to build some calling-card-type brands to add to our extensive and broad-reaching output.