As Fremantle’s director of global entertainment, Andrew Linares, prepares for a trip to Mipcon, he talks to Variety about his market outlook and the enduring appeal of the production and distribution giant’s shows “Got Talent” and “The X Factor.”
Mr. Freemantle’s major entertainment works at Mipcom are the strategic reality show “Pandora’s Box,” the comedy format “Knockout Champs,” and the factual entertainment series “The Secret DNA of Us.”
“Pandora’s Box” was developed by the Dutch RTL creative unit, and production is already underway in the Netherlands, France and Hungary. The Dutch show is produced for RTL Netherlands by Fremantle’s Blue Circle.
“I feel like the strategic reality genre has evolved around new game mechanics,” Linares said.
Strategic reality format “Pandora’s Box” launches at Mipcom.
Courtesy of Fremantle
The show is inspired by Greek mythology, where Pandora, the first human woman on Earth, was given a sealed box by the gods. “At the heart of the game is a Pandora’s Box, and the 12 contestants are told not to open the box. If the box stays closed, they win a large prize. But there are many temptations to open the box,” he explains.
“In each episode, two of the players are cursed. They realize they’re cursed, which means the bust is lowered into the box. Whichever two players are in the box at the end of the episode, they’re dueling to stay in the competition. So they don’t want to be in the box.”
The show has a “Greek mythology look,” Linares said.
“Knockout Champs” is presented by Dutch digital label De Stroom and produced in collaboration with Blue Circle, and features a combination of content creators and comedians from the digital world. The show was originally produced for YouTube, where it established a sizable following, but is now being produced for Dutch streamer NPO Start.
Andrew Linares, Fremantle’s Director of Global Entertainment.
Courtesy of Fremantle
“It’s a comedy show with rounds where two teams try to make the other team laugh against their will. You earn points by making your opponent laugh,” says Linares.
“Knockout Champs” was created with Supergaande, a group of true friends comparable to groups like Sidemen and Beta Squad. This is a boundary-pushing comedy that speaks to a young, diverse generation by staying true to the culture and comedy that its existing fan base lives by.
“We all know that YouTube has a lot of young attention right now, but it can be difficult to get young attention on traditional TV. But what happened was that young viewers absolutely came to watch the show. They got hooked on the content they were watching on YouTube and followed it to NPO Start,” says Linares.
“The show was made in much the same style as YouTube content. Sometimes, when something makes that transition and is made for ‘real TV,’ it could potentially be made in a different style, maybe cleaned up and polished, and edgy jokes could be edited out to be too edgy.”
“There was a strong desire to keep the show exactly the same. So it has the same spirit, the same kind of language, the same edginess. What that meant was that the young viewers who were watching the show felt like they were watching something incredibly authentic.”
“It’s really fun and edgy and that’s the core of its success. We didn’t allow it to be sanitized for regular TV.”
The show’s success with young viewers proved this approach valid. “You shouldn’t give up on young people just because it’s hard to reach them. Young people probably consume more content than anyone else on the planet, but I still want our format to speak to young people. I want young people to be excited about our format,” Linares says.
Music artist, YouTuber and boxer KSI has become a judge on ‘Britain’s Got Talent’.
Courtesy of Fremantle
In the NPO start, “Knockout Champs” maintained the top spot for four weeks. During the same period, social media exploded with over 50 million views in just four weeks. It ranks as NPO Start’s third most-watched title so far this year. The show’s core audience is young men (78% of viewers are men between the ages of 16 and 34).
Fremantle happily embraces both traditional television and the digital world, Linares said. “In my opinion, the world of entertainment is becoming more and more expansive, and there is space for all of it to interact with different parts of it. It’s a bit like KSI, who was on Britain’s Got Talent, talking about that kind of merging of those worlds. I don’t think they’re separate anymore. I think it’s all mainstream and there are ways to integrate it.”
“The Secret DNA of Us” is a “warm embrace of a show,” Linares says. The song was produced by the UK’s Fremantle label Naked, and the first version was produced by Australia’s Eureka for SBS. “Each episode, we take an entire city and test their DNA, and from there we find out what the common connections are between the people in the city. We also find from that DNA some really interesting individual stories. So there’s this great sense of community, where people in the community are all You get this great feeling of discovering that they’re connected in a kind of way. They might even be related. And you get the people that we really highlight on the show and discover what’s remarkable about them.”
“Our secret DNA” is like a “warm hug,” says Andrew Linares.
Provided by: SBS
“So a warm embrace is the perfect word, because this is one of those shows that speaks to all of us who want to know who we are and where we come from. It can be a really fun show, it can be a funny show, but it can also be a very emotional show.”
For a show to be successful, it needs to feel culturally relevant, Linares says. “For something to go beyond a TV show and become a hot topic in society, it absolutely has to touch the moment and speak to the culture of the moment.”
Looking back at the three headliners at Mipcom, Linares says, “I think they all speak to very different needs in the market, and I think they all speak to different audiences. They all check very different boxes.”
Some of Fremantle’s evergreen formats have reached or are about to reach major milestones. The 20th series of “America’s Got Talent” begins in the summer, and next year Fremantle will celebrate the 70th anniversary of “The Price is Right,” the 50th anniversary of “Family Feud” and the 25th anniversary of “Idol.”
Mr. Linares is well qualified to comment on the success of such a globe-trotting format. He was the original showrunner of The X Factor and Got Talent when they first aired in the UK in 2004 and 2007, respectively. Since 2011, while living and working in the United States, he served as EP and showrunner for the American version of The X Factor, and in 2018 became EP and showrunner for Dancing with the Stars.
What is the secret to their continued success? “If you want to keep a great show on the air for years, the core DNA of that show is really important,” Linares says.
“The great thing about ‘Got Talent’ is that while the show has been running for 20 years and has continued to grow in terms of the types of talent on the show and the scale of the show, the show’s DNA remains the same: to captivate people and celebrate their extraordinary talent and the great stories that go with it.
“This is a great fairy tale of a show. What it boils down to is taking people and celebrating absolutely the best version of themselves. I think the core DNA of the show has never changed.”
The introduction of the Golden Buzzer was an innovation, but it simply strengthened the show’s emotional punch.
“I always think that a show like ‘Got Talent’ is an emotional journey, and you can see that in the audition shows. There’s this feeling of somebody coming in and wanting to make it through, wanting to be celebrated. And if they get a ‘yes,’ you get this big, amazing moment, like they did with someone like Susan Boyle back in the day. The Golden Buzzer takes that moment and makes it even bigger, makes it more spectacular.”
She added: “I always say we’re dealing with emotions, so you have to make sure the show makes you feel something. And I think talent shows in particular give people very extreme emotions, where you feel extreme joy or extreme sadness and feel excluded, depending on whether someone had a good week or a bad week. As a producer, you have to keep thinking afterwards, ‘How can I find new ways to create that emotion?'”
“At the end of the day, what makes a great format successful? It’s that the audience is hooked.”
Today, engagement also means interacting on social media. “When we talk about longevity, we know that one of the things that keeps the conversation going on the show is social video,” Linares says. “Audition is a great bite-sized story, perfect for that kind of viewing. They’re hitting extraordinary numbers.”
“When YouTube was still in its infancy, we were first exposed to Susan Boyle and Paul Potts in the first series in the UK.The relationship between them grew over the years to the point where we felt there was a huge global story around Susan Boyle.
“We are celebrating the 20th season of America’s Got Talent, which just reached 1.7 billion social video views.
“Fremantle has a long-standing tradition of creating timeless entertainment hits across a variety of platforms for decades, and part of our success is because we continually evolve with our audiences.
“From the huge success of Knockout Champs, co-produced with digital-first talent, to making YouTuber KSI a permanent judge on the next season of Britain’s Got Talent, to opening up our IP to create exciting creator-led titles like Sidemen Supermarket Sweep, we are seeing the worlds of linear and digital entertainment bridging.”
