Ben Hall has been appointed as MD of Shine’s internal “centralised incubation and information hub for the development and fast-tracking of group formats” called Shine Network. He joins the London office from Digital Rights Group where he was Chief Creative Officer. He was previously Head of Creative at BBC Worldwide. Source: C21
These days it's not enough to come up with a factual TV show that gets commissioned by one TV channel - in order to make money you'll need to be able to sell it around the world too. And that means knowing what will sell in the global market. As a rule of thumb, in order for documentaries to be successful around the world they need to stay away from parochial, local subjects and concentrate on themes that people can identify with wherever they are in the world: March of the Penguins (survival against the odds); Touching the Void (friendship/human spirit); Blue Planet (the wonder of nature); The Apprentice (the American dream/ rivalry). Formats also need to deal with universal themes, but they can be tweaked to suit the local market. You'll no doubt be familiar with the likes of Who Want's to Be a Millionaire? (sold to 100+ territories), Idol (40+ territories), Dancing with the Stars (30+ territories) and Wife Swap (20+ territories). But, according to major distributors, there are a lot of best selling shows that might not be so familiar. Here is a list of some of the top sellers: (Photo by: JasonRogersFooDogGiraffeBee)
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