Sarah Muller & Kate Morton Share BBC Children’s Strategy at Annecy

The BBC’s Kate Morton and Sarah Muller held a session at Annecy today to share the keys to making a good program for CBeebies and CBBC and what they are looking for to complement their current slates.

Morton, senior head of children’s commissioning for 0 to 6, noted that a CBeebies show is “all about warmth, curiosity and fun. We are here to help our children learn through play. It’s strong, authentic storytelling that inspires, educates and entertains.”

Additionally, “we are so proud of the fact that diversity and inclusion is absolutely at the center, both on- and off-screen. We’ve got fantastic shows like Maddie + Triggs, which has really gone above and beyond in terms of bringing in learned and known experience from a diverse perspective. It helps us tell really engaging stories that reflect the real lives of our preschool audience across the U.K. wherever they are.”

Among the latest titles on the CBeebies slate are BeddyByes, a bedtime routine show; Squirrel Club, “a wonderful new magazine show full of madness and educative content but in a truly Hey Duggee way”; Big Lizard, with “really beautiful and wonderful character-driven storytelling”; SuperTato; Zog; and Piggy Builders, a new construction show that features “a really interesting environmental approach to construction.” These are in addition to Puffin Rock, Rafi the Wishing Wizard and so much more.

As for what she is looking to add to the CBeebies slate, “we’re looking for content for 4 to 6 in particular and also 5 to 8, that bridge audience,” Morton says. “CBeebies is so strong. We want to keep hold of this audience and hand them over to CBBC. We want to stop them perhaps falling off a cliff into YouTube and looking at content that’s maybe not appropriate for them. So, we are really keen on ideas with fast-paced, character-driven comedy, perhaps wry family observational comedy and a real sense of place and culture.”

“We share the bridge territory,” Muller, senior head of children’s commissioning for 7-plus, added. “We decide in a friendly and organic way whether a show is upper bridge or lower bridge. Upper bridge tends to mean a bit more jeopardy. It’s probably got more comedy in it.”

As for the 7-plus set and what she is looking to add to the CBBC slate, Muller says, “we’re always looking for something that’s cool, funny and full of attitude. Cool is obviously quite difficult to define, but we all know when we see it.”

“As there is a lot of choice and the audience has a lot of choice, we’re looking for things that are unique and exciting and that come with a built-in discovery, so we can work with you to bring the audience to it,” she added.

The CBBC programming offer features Super Happy Magic Forest, Duck and Frog, Captain Onion’s Buoyant Academy for Wayward Youth and Gangsta Granny, as well as Pokémon Horizons, Grizzy and the Lemmings and Miraculous: Tales of Ladybug and Cat Noir.

“We’re looking for fast-paced comedy for 6 to 9 that makes your audience laugh out loud,” Muller says. “We’re looking for premises that offer a rich seam of story, so that’s comedy or jeopardy or a combination.”

She and her team are also looking to serve the 10-to-12 audience with comic book adaptations and anime. “On the acquisition and prebuy front, we’re working now with our colleagues at BBC Three, and we’ve been helping them source content for acquisitions,” she said. “For instance, our colleague who does acquisitions has just bought 1,800 episodes of One Piece. That’s not something that we could have bought for the children’s platforms because it would never be compliant because it’s just not suitable, but our audience is interested. So, we brought it in to BBC Three, and that means an older audience can enjoy it, and where appropriate, if younger fans want to access it, they can.”

Both Morton and Muller stressed the fact that they are looking for projects with international appeal but with a British twist, which is “about making certain it’s content that feels relevant and resonates to our U.K. audience,” Morton explained. “We want characters that you can sit there as a child or family in the U.K. and go, ‘Oh, I want to be them. That could be me.’”

“There has always been, in my time in this business, a tendency to make everything look really American,” Muller noted. “Just by default, the backgrounds are typical American high streets and cities and buildings [and] how the characters dress [is American]. That was because you wanted your American sale. It was something that as producers, distributors, that’s what you were looking for. But now, I think European children potentially deserve to see Italian streets, German streets, all different streets because you’re not necessarily going to sell it to America in the current climate anyway. So, let’s use this opportunity to really sell European-centric, culturally relevant stories.”

One scheme that ensures a British twist in programming for CBeebies and CBBC is Ignite, a program for U.K. content makers and creators. The first edition saw 1,000 submissions, which were turned in completely blind, “which is an extraordinary, very freeing process,” Muller said. The submissions come with no names or studios. “You have no idea whether it’s an individual student or a massive studio like Aardman or BBC Studios that submitted these ideas. So, you make your decisions based purely on [the idea] and not [the name].”

The submissions were narrowed down to 18 ideas, and after 18 months of development—fully funded by BBC Children’s—three have been successfully commissioned: Duck and Frog, Captain Onion’s Buoyant Academy for Wayward Youth and The Underglow.

A second Ignite program is in the process now. Over 1,600 ideas were submitted and 12 have been selected for further development.

Even if you’re not a U.K. creative, there is still the chance to be involved. “If you’re not a U.K. creator, the way in is to reach out to us if you’re a studio or a designer,” Muller said. “We can slot you in now in the process or later on.” They are currently working with character designers in Scandinavia, France, Germany and Italy on Ignite.

“There’s so much European co-producing, co-commissioning, partnership, co-funding [and] friendly relationships,” Muller noted. “I think that’s a very encouraging story in quite a negative landscape. There’s definitely opportunities for us all to work together.” And studios and producers can do so in numerous ways—BBC Children’s will work on commissions, prebuys or straightforward acquisitions.

Although the titles Muller and Morton want for CBeebies and CBBC should have a U.K. appeal, they are still open to working outside of the European or American markets. “There is absolutely an opportunity to bring stories in” from elsewhere, Muller encouraged.