{"id":7809,"date":"2020-08-17T09:00:00","date_gmt":"2020-08-17T13:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dev2.worldscreen.com\/tvformats\/worldscreen.com\/"},"modified":"2020-08-17T10:58:15","modified_gmt":"2020-08-17T14:58:15","slug":"fremantles-rob-clark-2020","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvformats\/fremantles-rob-clark-2020\/","title":{"rendered":"Fremantle\u2019s Rob Clark on Navigating the Current Format Landscape"},"content":{"rendered":"

As productions have been impacted across nearly all genres (and in nearly all markets) in recent months, studio entertainment shows have certainly been among the trickiest to navigate amid new production measures. For Fremantle, the coronavirus pandemic has led to some carefully executed iterations for a number of its key productions, including megahit entertainment franchises such as Idols<\/em>, Got Talent <\/em>and The X Factor<\/em>. Sharing knowledge across its global network of producers, the company has continued to deliver broadcasters and audiences the type of feel-good, escapist entertainment that the marketplace is absolutely craving at the moment. Rob Clark, Fremantle\u2019s director of global entertainment, shares his view on navigating the current format landscape and what\u2019s to come.<\/p>\n

\"***Image***\"TV FORMATS:<\/strong> How were Fremantle\u2019s key format productions impacted by global production shutdowns, and what were some of the innovative ways that productions were able to move forward?
\nCLARK:<\/strong> Everything was affected; absolutely no show was unaffected. It either affected the creative, or physically being able to produce the show and bring people together.<\/p>\n

Initially, [the virus took hold] in Southern Europe. So, we did the finale of the Italian version of Got Talent<\/em> and it was the first of the talent shows we did without an audience. We then went on to do the German version of Idols<\/em>, Norway\u2019s Idols<\/em> and X Factor<\/em> in Denmark without an audience\u2014and all successfully! With each iteration, we learned how to do it. In many ways, we went back to more like the original way of shooting these shows, which was to have the cameras pointed right at the center of the stage. Whereas [generally], we use the emotion of the audience, either cheering or clapping or crying or smiling\u2014which you will notice there\u2019s an awful lot of in a Fremantle show. We went back to shooting what we used to shoot, which was the action on the stage. It worked very well. And then we learned how to shoot with fewer people, locked-off cameras, electronically-controlled cameras.<\/p>\n

What I\u2019m most proud of is that while we made some mistakes, we never made them again. We were able to pass around our global network all of the iterations and remedies that we had found in every single territory. It was really quite remarkable. We\u2019re still being affected now. We\u2019re shooting game shows without audiences. We produced a brochure in March of 50 studio shows that don\u2019t need audiences, knowing full-well that the next stage of this would be, OK you can get back into production, but you\u2019re not going to be able to have big audiences in the studios. We are now making Family Feud\u00a0<\/em>in France, Australia, Brazil, the U.K.\u2014all of which we haven\u2019t made for many years. We\u2019re making Password<\/em> in France. All of these \u201cCOVID-friendly\u201d shows we\u2019re back in business with on a global scale.<\/p>\n

The show that had the most to lose and the most to prove, in a way, was American Idol<\/em>. It\u2019s still the biggest entertainment show in the world. They did a phenomenal job in how they managed to make that show. At that time, you were not allowed in studios in California, and we had just reached the studio stage of the show. So, they shot it all from people\u2019s homes. They didn\u2019t have any cameras as we would know it; they shot everything on iPhone 11s. It was passed down the wire back to central edits, rebuilt and put together by editors and producers working from home. It was a phenomenal achievement, to have gotten through all of the live shows and then to have the final actually on-air on ABC. It all paid off, as the series delivered a total multiplatform average audience of 10.1 million total viewers. We did a good job.<\/p>\n

We haven\u2019t let our broadcasters down, and we haven\u2019t let our audiences down. We have managed to make the shows that we were planning to make. They may have looked slightly different, and they will continue to look slightly different, but the essence of the show is still there, and I\u2019m glad to say they all rated rather well.<\/p>\n

TV FORMATS: <\/strong>How do you see the future of Fremantle\u2019s studio shows taking shape as productions get rolling again?
\nCLARK:<\/strong> Until there\u2019s a vaccine or eradication of COVID-19, the production process is compromised. You have to find ways around it. We have a COVID-19 process, which is many pages of recommendations on what to do and what not to do. In each territory it\u2019s slightly different, depending on what local regulations are. But in the U.S. and Italy, we\u2019re in production now with a lot of shows. We\u2019re testing people on a very regular basis. If anybody tests positive, it doesn\u2019t shut down the production; it shuts down the bubble that they operate in. You have to stick to the area of the studio that you operate in. You have to stick to the people that you are allowed to be with. The whole point is to cut down on a) the number of people you\u2019re in contact with and b) the areas that you have been to. It\u2019s quite extreme, but it\u2019s for everybody\u2019s benefit. It is more costly, but it saves lives. We\u2019re very strict about it.<\/p>\n

TV FORMATS: <\/strong>What new developments will come in the dating space to make them more compliant with new production protocols?
\nCLARK:<\/strong> One of the production protocols is to get tested. If you get tested and then are in a bubble, you\u2019re fine. You just have to follow procedures and make sure that once you\u2019re tested, you are cleared and in your production or cast bubble, and that is how you stay. But you can do dating shows.<\/p>\n

What we saw at the beginning of COVID-19 was an awful lot of \u201cCOVID shows,\u201d which had people talking on Zoom or Webex or whatever, in their front room with children running past and the occasional appearance of their dog. At first, they were quite interesting, but people very quickly got bored with them. You saw ratings drop. People are wanting an escape from that sort of thing. They have been doing that every day with work, and every night with their social and family circles. What they didn\u2019t want was to turn on the television and find that the same thing was on, that they were watching their own life being fed back to them. That\u2019s not the point of television; the point is to give somebody an experience that\u2019s beyond what they normally have.<\/p>\n

We need to be very careful in developing things that are short-term. People see beyond that. Those shows filled a necessary void at the time when they were there, but they very quickly were replaced by having as many bells and whistles from the normal production regime that you could possibly muster. COVID-friendly formats are being developed, and that is what broadcasters are looking for, but they\u2019re also looking for shows that give the viewer an experience of entertainment. They want scale, they want escapism.<\/p>\n

TV FORMATS: <\/strong>As Fremantle is the undisputed \u201cHome of Game Shows,\u201d how will this genre be impacted in the year ahead?
\nCLARK:<\/strong> In the U.K. we [recently] had Epic Gameshow<\/em>, which was an amalgam of a number of our games. Each show had a different, bigger ending: a bigger ending to The Price Is Right<\/em>, a bigger ending to Play Your Cards Right<\/em>, a bigger ending to Bullseye<\/em>, all these very well-known game shows. It rated through the roof! I expected it to do well, but I was amazed at how well it had done. There\u2019s a secret there, in its casting. We had a comedian called Alan Carr, and it was the first time he\u2019d done this sort of series. He was just genius. It\u2019s always about casting. You can see that with Steve Harvey [on Family Feud<\/em>] or Alec Baldwin [on Match Game<\/em>]. If you get the right sock on the right foot, then you\u2019ve got a perfect fit. So, Epic Gameshow<\/em> was perfectly cast, and the shows had scale. It looked blingy without being rough; it\u2019s shiny and sparkly. There was nothing about the show that wasn\u2019t family-friendly. You can sit there with your 5-year-old or 15-year-old or your grandma and nothing is going to be said that\u2019s uncomfortable or embarrassing. It\u2019s perfect for co-viewing. When you\u2019re at home with the whole family, which at the moment most people are, there\u2019s going to be a moment where it\u2019s a godsend that you can all sit down together and enjoy something.<\/p>\n

We\u2019ve got a quiz show in the Netherlands, Ask Me Anything<\/em>, on RTL 4, and it\u2019s stripped in access [prime time]. It\u2019s often the number one entertainment show of the night.<\/p>\n

Rolling In It <\/i>launched on ITV last weekend and has consolidated at 3.8 million viewers and rocketed for the 16-to-34s.<\/p>\n

You should see the number of commissions that we\u2019ve got for game shows since that period. Game shows don\u2019t need audiences, and if they do you can get around it. For The Price Is Right<\/em>, we have a smaller audience, they\u2019re in family pods, and it works. We\u2019re back in production with that in Portugal. Game shows are also very uplifting. They\u2019re very easy to control as well, in terms of the cast and the people who are there, so you can test people easily and make sure that they are brought in in a way that they\u2019re not in contact with others. The production process can be very COVID-friendly. They\u2019re also just nice shows, good shows for the time; they\u2019re uplifting, they\u2019re positive, there\u2019s nothing about them that\u2019s downbeat. Audiences are drawn to the positivity of a game show. When you\u2019re not feeling very well, what you want is comfort food. I always equate [game shows with comfort food].<\/p>\n

TV FORMATS:<\/strong> How will broadcasters\u2019 budgets and willingness to take risks impact the next cycle of formats being launched to the international marketplace?
\nCLARK:<\/strong> We\u2019ve got to cut some slack for our broadcast partners because they\u2019ve had it tough! Everyone has had a really tough year, and it\u2019s not the year that they\u2019re going to experiment. For 2020, they may have had some things in the can that they could put on that were new, but if they didn\u2019t, they\u2019re not going to have anything for the rest of the year. However, what we\u2019ve seen is a real appetite and real desire for programs for 2021 that are original and fresh and often have scale; they\u2019re not looking for small shows. That\u2019s a very positive message for the industry.<\/p>\n

TV FORMATS: <\/strong>What are some of the new formats that Fremantle will be focused on rolling out for the rest of 2020 and into 2021?
\nCLARK:<\/strong> The autumn slate will be some new titles, game shows, a few dating shows, a few new launches from Israel in particular. Given the circumstances of the year, I\u2019m quite happy with the slate. For 2021, I see that [buyers] are still looking for family-friendly shows, they\u2019re looking for in-the-field reality, because that\u2019s been missing this year, so they\u2019re hoping they can get back to filming out of a studio and out of the controlled environment. And everything has got to have a degree of positivity about it and humor. That\u2019s a wise decision. Behind the health crisis is going to be a financial crisis, and that\u2019s going to affect audiences. Audiences invariably in those times want to be entertained, they want positivity, they want good TV in the sense of not being too harsh. There will, obviously, be some counter-commissioning to that, where there are a few programs that are absolutely the reverse of that. Overall, I\u2019m quite positive about next year. I think 2021 is going to be a good year for everyone.<\/p>\n

TV FORMATS: <\/strong>How are you and your team tapping into the umbrella of Fremantle\u2019s majority- and minority stake-owned labels for ideas that can travel as formats?
\nCLARK:<\/strong> Any new show from anywhere\u2014no matter if it\u2019s 25 percent-owned, 50 percent, 51 percent, wholly owned or not owned at all\u2014all of that is fed into our global entertainment department. Out of that, we choose the shows that we think have got the best potential for international exploitation. That will depend on a number of things: the rights situation, the content, the scale, the transferability of the idea in itself, the scalability of the idea\u2014can you make it in America and make it in a smaller territory with a much smaller budget. Also, is it returnable? What I am not interested in is somebody with a brilliant one-off stunt. It\u2019s like, Good one, but now you\u2019ve got to do it all over again next year.<\/p>\n

TV FORMATS: <\/strong>What advantages does Fremantle\u2019s scale bring to its format prowess?
\nCLARK:<\/strong> You could call it a criticism, but a lot of our formats are still on air from a long time ago. If you look at something like Family Feud<\/em>, it\u2019s from 1976, and it\u2019s been commissioned again nearly all over the world. The reason that shows like that, or any of the talent shows, are still on air is that the company has scale enough to invest. It also has the stability: financial stability and stability in terms of the people [working there]. It\u2019s a stable structure and it allows that network to function really effectively. Any new idea from anywhere is quickly monitored, checked, quality-controlled and if it\u2019s good, then it\u2019s passed on. That\u2019s why we were very quick with the different iterations with COVID-19 on how to produce. The network was stronger over that period than probably at any time I can remember. Everybody wanted to find out information, whereas when you\u2019re busy, you\u2019re busy. This time, we were all busy in a different way. Everyone needed to know what other people were doing: had anybody done this, had anybody done that. That stability and network allow new shows to be rolled out relatively quickly, but not too quickly. It\u2019s not about rolling out quickly, it\u2019s about rolling out and staying out; keeping the shows on air. That\u2019s where the value is. The value is not in having a format that sells in 20 territories in six months and only sells once. It\u2019s about having it in 70 territories and keeping it there for 50 years. That is brought about by having a stable network, a stable financial company, a company that has got the resources and the ability to invest and to care about its formats.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Rob Clark, Fremantle\u2019s director of global entertainment, shares his view on navigating the current format landscape and what\u2019s to come.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":350,"featured_media":7810,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pmpro_default_level":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[69],"tags":[1482,96],"class_list":["post-7809","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","","category-top-stories","tag-fremantle","tag-rob-clark","pmpro-has-access"],"yoast_head":"\nFremantle\u2019s Rob Clark on Navigating the Current Format Landscape - TVFORMATS<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvformats\/fremantles-rob-clark-2020\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Fremantle\u2019s Rob Clark on Navigating the Current Format Landscape - 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