Too Much TV: Your TV Talking Points For Thursday, August 10th, 2023
Money cares mostly about money
Here's everything you need to know about the world of television for Thursday, August 10th, 2023.
PROGRAMMING NOTE
It is not your imagination, I did not send out a newsletter on Wednesday. I would love to be able to share some exciting explanation of what happened. The truth is that I broke my glasses. And as much as it pains me to admit it (I used to have 20/20 vision), seeing a computer screen clearly without them is a challenge.
I also vote that we should outlaw the effects of aging.
MONEY CARES MOSTLY ABOUT MONEY
The WGA and AMPTP are scheduled to meet again this Friday and if I have one takeaway from the public discussions so far is that there are a lot of people in Hollywood who just don't comprehend the stakes of this strike. The studios clearly underestimated the percolating anger among union members and the willingness of other unions to jump in and offer support. They also underestimated the SAG response and it's clear that's one of the reasons why they came back to the WGA first.
But the unions, the industry press, and various supporting groups also misunderstood the core of the problems. There has been lots of talk about CEO pay, the need to grow future showrunners, and the loss of the "relationships that made Hollywood a success."
The problem is, none of that matters. Remember all the moon-eyed talk about David Zaslav being "talent-friendly?" Or that Bob Iger respected how creative minds worked and would be able to bridge the gap between the business and its talent?
None of that was true then, and it's no different now. The strike is not going to be settled by moaning over old business models or the loss of that undefinable Hollywood feeling. These issues are all going to be resolved over money. What costs the least, what carve-outs the studios to sneak in the deals to open up new areas of exploitation and gimmes to the union that are more psychological than revenue-based?
I spent some time as a finance reporter and I've seen these same issues play out across many industries, You want to see visceral, extinction-level panic? Live through the tech boom as companies begin folding left and right. One consequence of experiencing such carnage is coming to terms with the fact that these pressures leave no industry untouched. Not Hollywood. And, as it turns out, not college sports.
Matt Brown's Extra Points covers college sports and he has a nice way of framing complicated subjects into ideas that even non-sports fanatics can understand.
In his newest piece, his starting off point is the recent collapse of the PAC-12 and he points out that the greed that ultimately destroyed that league will likely impact your favorite team. Because the bigger the school, the more likely they are to chase the biggest paycheck, no matter what the costs to the fans or the players.
As an example, he mentions Florida State, which desperately wants to get out of the ACC. That league signed a media deal that runs through 2036 and all the Florida State coaches and administrators can see are the stacks of money they won't be able to make right now as other conferences have signed new, extremely lucrative media rights deals.
The problem for the school is that leaving the ACC would cost them a lot of money in broken contract penalties, early withdrawal fees and other associated costs. And we're talking staggering amounts of money. At least $100 million and perhaps as much as $500 million. An amount not even the richest school can afford. So Florida State is apparently looking to private equity to come to the rescue. Specifically, JPMorgan, the same firm which tried to launch the European Soccer Super League. And as Brown notes, while JP Morgan or the Saudi Sovereign Wealth Fund or a dozen other deep-pocket places would no doubt be thrilled to get its hooks into college sports, fans likely won't like the way it plays out:
This scenario should be highly alarming to sports fans. Private equity doesn’t have a great track record with many of the other industries it’s gotten involved in, from media companies to health care to the housing market. Selling an equity stake to a third party also means that Florida State athletics will lose some measure of control over the operations of the athletic department. What happens if JPMorgan wants to raise ticket prices, or drop the women’s soccer team? What happens if Florida State can’t secure a huge bump in their TV revenue? What assets will be stripped for parts?
But even beyond that, if Florida State can raise $500 million to get out of an allegedly ironclad contract and league affiliation in the name of chasing more money…anybody else can do that too. The only thing stopping the Big Ten from kicking out Minnesota and Indiana, or Ohio State, Michigan and friends from forming a new Super League that promises even more money is administrative restraint or political backlash.
And that's where we are at this moment in the television industry. This strike is technically about various proposals from the unions. But it's really about money and the promise of more money. For all of the Hollywood industry braying about the tech industry destroying the television business model, what really is driving things are the same trends that came for big box stores and regional airlines and college sports are deep diving into the possibilities of the American media industry. Most of these companies are worth more broken apart and stripped for parts than they are as some huge entertainment conglomerates.
This is why I find stories such as the ones speculating Apple might buy Disney so ludicrous. Do you know how Apple became Apple? By not spending scores of billions of dollars for a company with some nice IP but a combination of businesses they don't need (parks, cruise ships) and ones that are, to be kind, performing with all of the nimbleness of William Shatner on Dancing With The Stars.
There is no buyer for Disney's linear TV networks other than one of these private equity firms. As I have previously written, private equity firms and hedge funds typically buy distressed companies. This means Disney will have to accept a much lower price than it wants to get rid of them. And once they are sold off, the equity company's sole driving force will be to maximize revenue until the point where the businesses collapse or can be sold in pieces to competitors in some reverse-Frankenstein disassembling procedure.
I have no idea what is going to happen in these perhaps-renewed negotiations. I do know that if the unions want to walk away with at least some of their asks, they need to frame everything through the lens of "this is how we can make you money."
Because at the end of the day, money is what matters.
ICYMI ON ALLYOURSCREENS
Here are a couple of stories from AllYourScreens which posted earlier today
* Given the controversies that have surfaced just this week, are reality TV shows going too far?
* 10 Global TV and streaming stories you should know: 08/10/2023
* Linda Martindale did a recap of Wednesday's episode of Riverdale, which is two weeks away from the series finale.
NICE TO SEE VARIETY JOINING THE 'HOW DO I WATCH X?' SEO CHUMMING MARKET
There are several ways to determine when a website needs to drive some cheap traffic numbers. One primary hint is when they start cranking out headlines designed to grab some low-hanging search engine traffic. If your favorite website starts cranking out "What Does The Super Bow Start?" articles, then they are likely set to miss their revenue targets are just getting a bit desperate.
Which made it interesting to me to see this piece pop up on Variety today, which is mostly an article that just recaps what the movie is about and links to a review of the film.
BTW, the spoiler answer to the headline's question comes in the final paragraph, which provides a clear-cut example of just how lame this article truly is:
In order to stream “Red, White & Royal Blue,” you’ll have to sign up for Prime Video for $8.99/month, or sign up for Prime Video with an Amazon Prime membership for $14.99/month.
It's a reminder that all of those Hollywood trades are taking a beating financially as the Hollywood strikes continue. Lost advertising, high revenue-generating events being postponed and just fewer interesting things to write about are going to make the next few months a challenge for the industry's biggest press outlets.
I DO NOT BELIEVE BUNDLING MEANS WHAT YOU THINK IT MEANS
When you hear someone talking about the "rebundling of television," what do you think of? I suspect most civilians think of something that looks a lot like cable TV. One payment, one interface.
But the reality is most people in the industry see bundling as something that looks a bit like Amazon Channels, albeit not forcing services into the same interface, Consumers would be able to go to one place to access and pay for their selected SVODs (and receive some discount). Which is not at all like a cable TV experience.
Vulture's Joe Adalian's Buffering newsletter looks at the idea of bundling and it's a good look at where the industry hivemind is at on the issue right now. I'm not going to dive into that piece, other than to say that David Zaslav's obsession with combining services in order to lessen churn - which was the primary driver of the attempt to combine HBO Max & Discovery+ - is more a reflection of his inability to create a service that people would want to stay subscribed to longterm than some overall problem with the streaming industry.
I did want to highlight that perhaps the biggest barrier in any so-called rebundling isn't financial. Yes, streamers would be forced to give up some revenue. But the theory is that would be offset by lessened churn and the ability to spend less on customer acquisition.
A primary reason why the major media companies are so hesitant to encourage bundling is that the most valuable component of any streaming subscription is the ability to have a direct relationship with the subscriber. It's not just mundane things such as personal data and credit card information. Having a direct connection to subscribers opens up the possibility companies can use that data to sell the subscriber other connected services.
TWEET OF THE DAY
ODDS AND SODS
* Production Weekly has a mention of a U.S. version of Squid Game, to be produced by Kim Ji-yeon, Hwang Dong-hyuk and David Fincher?
* Bravo is going to air three episodes of the Peacock series The Gentle Art of Swedish Death Cleaning on Thursdays, beginning August 17th.
* Whether you're ready for it or not, Nancy Grace is back on the true crime beat with the Investigation Discovery special ID Special Report: The Long Island Serial Killer, which premieres Sunday, August 13th.
* The 16th Annual Academy of Country Music Honors will air Monday, September 18th. That special takes the place of the Emmy Awards broadcast, which has now been moved to January.
* Johnny Hardwick, the comedian who voiced Dale on King of The Hill, has died at age 68
WHAT'S NEW TODAY AND TOMORROW:
THURSDAY, AUGUST 10TH:
Alone Australia Series Premiere (History)
Broken Ties (Sundance Now)
Cookie Monster's Bake Sale (Max)
Danger Lurking Under My Roof (LMN)
Fight To Survive Series Premiere (The CW)
Limbo Series Premiere (Viaplay)
Love In Taipei (Paramount +)
Marry My Dead Body (Netflix)
Mech Cadets Series Premiere (Netflix)
Painkiller (Netflix)
The Challenge USA Season Two Premiere (CBS)
The Ex-Wife (BritBox)
The Silence (Topic)
FRIDAY, AUGUST 11TH, 2023:
All Up In The Biz (Showtime)
Big Sky River: The Bridal Path (Hallmark Movies And Mysteries)
Down For Love (Netflix)
Heart Of Stone (Netflix)
Hellhole (Film Movement+)
Men In Kilts Season Two Premiere (Starz)
Red, White & Royal Blue (Prime Video)
Sound Of The Police (Hulu)
Swagger Season Two Finale (Apple TV+)
Thanks A Million (The Roku Channel)
The Communion Girl (Shudder)
Toast Of Tinseltown Season Four Premiere (Roku Channel)
Click Here to see the list of all of the upcoming premiere dates for the next few months.
SEE YOU WEDNESDAY!
If you have any feedback, send it along to Rick@AllYourScreens.com and follow me on Twitter @aysrick.