Paula Hutchinson

Director of Sales & Acquisitions, re:think Entertainment

What are your top titles for MIPTV?
Shreducation (26 x 30′) – Season 2 13 new episodes
The Biscuit Brothers (45 x 30′)
The South African Story with Bishop Desmond Tutu (9 x 30HD + 1 x 60’HD)
Cubers (1 x 60′)

There’s something there for the whole family. It’s entertaining programming with high production values that kids and parents can enjoy watching together, even our preschool series.
Shreducation Season 2 is ready to go, bringing us up to a total of 26 episodes. Nickelodeon Australia and Nickelodeon New Zealand, who acquired season one, have both licensed it to premiere next month. It’s a live-action series about a group of young snowboarders who travel the world, training to turn pro. For two young Shredders in season two, the dream of making it to the 2010 Winter Olympics became a reality (Palmer Taylor and Jeff Batchelor). Meanwhile, they’re dealing with the usual teenage pressures – pimples, parents, school and girls/boys. Shreducation is tons of fun, but the underlying message is beautifully clear for kids – have a dream and go for it! International feedback on shreducation.tv, Facebook and Twitter has been overwhelmingly positive, and this year in particular, snowboarding has been gaining popularity with kids everywhere. Season two is available for the U.S., U.K., the Nordic territories and Asia (except Australia and New Zealand) in all media.
Brand new to MIPTV is The Biscuit Brothers: a wealth of quality edutainment content for kids 3-6 that we’re very excited to present internationally for the first time. Produced in the U.S., each of the 45 episodes is a fast paced and funny mix of live action, puppetry and animation that teaches children about music on Old MacDonald’s Magical, Musical Farm (also known as E.I.E.I.O: The Environmental Institute for Every Instrument in the Orchestra.) Every half-hour episode follows the adventures of Buford and Dusty, "The Biscuit Brothers" and their friends as they explore musical concepts and apply them to everyday life. It’s won two LONE STAR EMMY Awards for excellence in Children’s programming and a National Parenting Publication Award (NAPPA Gold). Worldwide rights are available in all media.
We recently acquired the North American rights to The South African Story with Bishop Desmond Tutu (9 x 30HD + 1 x 60’HD), which is being launched at MIPTV as well. This is a new HD travel & history series that captures the essence of South Africa’s past, present and future—from social reform and the amazing people and places that have shaped the country, to the FIFA World Cup and beyond. It’s visually stunning in full HD and as South Africa takes the world stage (or field!) this summer, will be ideal companion programming.

What are your expectations for MIPTV?
For me specifically, finding the right broadcast homes for our new youth and lifestyle programming, and acquiring new series in the same genres. Susan Boshcoff, our director of production and development is there to meet with our current and future international production partners. Generally, MIPCOM was brisk, so we’re expecting MIPTV to follow suit. There’s still a demand for good quality factual programming, that hasn’t changed. If broadcasters continue to program themselves out of this recession, we’ll all be OK. That, and a little sun would be nice.
We have two science series in development that we’re bringing to discuss international pre-sales. They both focus on past and future energy alternatives, a topic that’s extremely relevant to what’s happening in the world today.