Video Interview: Grupo Televisa’s José Bastón

NEW YORK: José Bastón, the president of television and content at Grupo Televisa, sat down with World Screen Newsflash to talk about the strengths of the company’s current activities, growth prospects and facing competition from Telmex in the Mexican market.

Last week at NATPE, Grupo Televisa and Lionsgate unveiled a new production venture geared toward creating TV shows for English-language audiences. The TV pact is an extension of an existing partnership between the U.S. independent studio and the Mexican programming powerhouse that started in 2010 with the creation of Pantelion Films, focused on features for the Hispanic market.

The move is but one example of Grupo Televisa’s commitment to serving the rapidly growing U.S. Hispanic market and its dedication to producing more English-language content. Bastón tells World Screen Newsflash in this video interview that co-productions are among the strategies being used to ramp up the company’s English-language output. Televisa recently entered into an exclusive first-look co-production deal with Sony Pictures Television that covers scripted and telenovela formats.