The TV Biz Redux...
Jul. 21st, 2009 10:35 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shadowkatAm saving Torchwood for the weekend - so I can watch all five episodes in a row, marathon style and fast-forward through commericials. BBC America has an awful lot of annoying commericials, more than anyone else - I'm willing to bet. I may cave and start watching on Wed or Thurs, time and mood permitting.
Tonight watched Moonshot instead - which was regrettably dull. If you want to watch a film about the NASA space program start with The Right Stuff and end with Apollo 13. Moonshot felt a bit like watching a documentary of the moonlanding, which let's face it was more hype than anything else. Watching it made me realize two things, 1) the 1960s were sexist and chauvinistic beyond belief. Women are treated as little more than appendages and support systems. (This came across in prior films but not quite to the same degree). 2) going to the moon wasn't that big a deal. Oh and, James Marsters is a rather adept character actor who looks completely different in every role I've seen him in. He's not attractive, sexy, or remotely charismatic as Buzz Aldrin, but he plays Aldrin well - which is a normal guy. He also emotes well on screen - Aldrin was apparently the exact opposite of Neil Armstrong, emotional to Armstrong's lack of emotion. Unfortunately for Marsters, who had the above the title credit here, the film is dull. Writing and direction due make the actor, like it or not. Which may explain why so many actors I've known are so busy trying to write screenplays, produce and direct - because they've gotten sick of bad roles and bad scripts and no control.
Speaking of the Entertainment Biz...which I know a bit about for the following reasons: 1) vast number of information interviews and reading of biographical works by insiders, including notably Julia Phillips - "You'll Never Eat Lunch in this Town Again", William Goldman's two non-fiction works on screenwriting, numerous interviews, 2) friends who have worked in the biz, 3) family members who are working in it or attempted to. 4) my own work experience in portions of the industry.
Thing to remember about tv shows - the process of getting a tv show or film picked up by a distributor is not that different than getting a first novel picked up by a publishing house or agent, except it's about five times harder and requires a lot of brown-nosing. Why? Money. It costs a lot of money to produce and distribute a film or tv show. Not that much in comparison to publish a book. More movable parts and uncontrollable variables. In some respects it is very similar to producing a show on Broadway - which is also expensive and difficult and requires a thick skin.
Tv show creators do not go look at the networks like a writer opens up writers market and says, gee I think my show fits the F/X network best - I'll air it there. That's not how the biz works people. The tv show creator usually shops his show around to various networks, which if he/she is lucky will bid on it. That is only if they do not already have a contract or production deal with a network or distributor, which depending on the contract, may be exclusive. Contract law enters into this. Buffy for example was owned by the Kuzie's. They came to Whedon and said, please write and create a TV show based on our film Buffy for us. We'll give you "Creative" control. But creative control only meant how he told the story, cast it, filmed it, edited it, and wrote/directed it. It does not involve marketing, distribution, copyright, derivative works, or whatever the Kuzei's choose to do with the stories he tells. Whedon is a work for hire writer. He does not own his product. The Kuzei's own it. Fox did set up a deal with Whedon's production company - Mutant Enemy, but Whedon worked for Fox. Depending on the contract he signed - his stories were Fox's property. Just as the Kuzei's sold partial rights to Buffy to Fox. This means that Whedon can't decide to air Buffy on Showtime or on FX or HBO. Anymore than he can decide to air Firefly on those channels. He had to get Fox's permission first. Once he got Fox's permission - he was able to shop the show around. Just as he was able to make Serenity and distribute it through another channel. Without Fox's permission, the film Serenity would have sat on a shelf. (This almost happened to The Watchmen film - which was owned by another studio (FOX) who fought with Warner Brothers (I think it was Warner Brothers) and issued an injunction to stop it until they finally settled the case. Same thing happened with Project Runway which the Weinstein's sold to Lifetime without Bravo's permission and ended up in court for ages.)
That's why "Dollhouse" is on Fox. It's not Whedon's choice. He did not decide - oh, I'll stick with network television. What happened is he had a meeting with Eliza Dusku who contacted him regarding advice on her career. Eliza had a development deal with Fox. She had a contract that gave her about four or five years, possibly longer or shorter, to develop productions to air on Fox or with Fox. (David Boreanze has a similar deal, as does Alyson Hannigan with NBC). But she couldn't find anything that grabbed her. Whedon started brain-storming with Dusku and came up with the tv show - Dollhouse. He went back to his production company and said he accidentally came up with a tv show that Eliza told him she was not only willing to co-produce but would make sure Fox aired. She'd use her clout to get it on TV and her development deal with Fox to get it there.
Whedon had two choices at this stage:
1. Develope Dollhouse with Dusku and distribute on Fox, keep as much creative control as possible
2. Try to convince another network to distribute Dollhouse - which would entail a lot of brown-nosing, a lot of selling, a lot of rejection.
Try to think of it this way - you have lunch with a friend, while talking you come up with a great idea for a novel, they agree to help pay for the cost of your research, also do some of the research themselves - they also have an agent and a publisher lined up. All you have to do is write the thing and give them a credit, maybe even include one character with their name. You can either do that, or, you can try to sell the thing on your own, without an agent, without a publisher. And hope for the best. Knowing full well that your novel is a risky one.
It's a little bit like that, except...a whole lot harder. Since TV unlike books is a collaboration and a lot of jobs are on the line, not to mention money. Dollhouse costs over a million dollars to produce. Publishing a book? About a third of that...possibly less.
Granted he could choose to put this stuff on the web - but you don't make that much money off the web. Dr. Horrible didn't make enough to pay Whedon's mortagage. It's small change.
People are under the misconception that loads of money are being made off of the web - but that's not the case - at least not yet, while you can download stuff for free, block advertisements, and steal things. The web is the wild west when it comes to intellectual property. I know because I used to work for an online video game developer in their finance department. I know exactly how much money developers of content can make and how it is parceled out for people. Unless you are charging per hit or download, it is not that much. Ad's don't tend to pay that much. TV is still where the money is. He's putting Dollhouse on Fox so he can make a living. He doesn't make that much as a comic book writer - well he makes more than he did for Dr. Horrible.
Tonight watched Moonshot instead - which was regrettably dull. If you want to watch a film about the NASA space program start with The Right Stuff and end with Apollo 13. Moonshot felt a bit like watching a documentary of the moonlanding, which let's face it was more hype than anything else. Watching it made me realize two things, 1) the 1960s were sexist and chauvinistic beyond belief. Women are treated as little more than appendages and support systems. (This came across in prior films but not quite to the same degree). 2) going to the moon wasn't that big a deal. Oh and, James Marsters is a rather adept character actor who looks completely different in every role I've seen him in. He's not attractive, sexy, or remotely charismatic as Buzz Aldrin, but he plays Aldrin well - which is a normal guy. He also emotes well on screen - Aldrin was apparently the exact opposite of Neil Armstrong, emotional to Armstrong's lack of emotion. Unfortunately for Marsters, who had the above the title credit here, the film is dull. Writing and direction due make the actor, like it or not. Which may explain why so many actors I've known are so busy trying to write screenplays, produce and direct - because they've gotten sick of bad roles and bad scripts and no control.
Speaking of the Entertainment Biz...which I know a bit about for the following reasons: 1) vast number of information interviews and reading of biographical works by insiders, including notably Julia Phillips - "You'll Never Eat Lunch in this Town Again", William Goldman's two non-fiction works on screenwriting, numerous interviews, 2) friends who have worked in the biz, 3) family members who are working in it or attempted to. 4) my own work experience in portions of the industry.
Thing to remember about tv shows - the process of getting a tv show or film picked up by a distributor is not that different than getting a first novel picked up by a publishing house or agent, except it's about five times harder and requires a lot of brown-nosing. Why? Money. It costs a lot of money to produce and distribute a film or tv show. Not that much in comparison to publish a book. More movable parts and uncontrollable variables. In some respects it is very similar to producing a show on Broadway - which is also expensive and difficult and requires a thick skin.
Tv show creators do not go look at the networks like a writer opens up writers market and says, gee I think my show fits the F/X network best - I'll air it there. That's not how the biz works people. The tv show creator usually shops his show around to various networks, which if he/she is lucky will bid on it. That is only if they do not already have a contract or production deal with a network or distributor, which depending on the contract, may be exclusive. Contract law enters into this. Buffy for example was owned by the Kuzie's. They came to Whedon and said, please write and create a TV show based on our film Buffy for us. We'll give you "Creative" control. But creative control only meant how he told the story, cast it, filmed it, edited it, and wrote/directed it. It does not involve marketing, distribution, copyright, derivative works, or whatever the Kuzei's choose to do with the stories he tells. Whedon is a work for hire writer. He does not own his product. The Kuzei's own it. Fox did set up a deal with Whedon's production company - Mutant Enemy, but Whedon worked for Fox. Depending on the contract he signed - his stories were Fox's property. Just as the Kuzei's sold partial rights to Buffy to Fox. This means that Whedon can't decide to air Buffy on Showtime or on FX or HBO. Anymore than he can decide to air Firefly on those channels. He had to get Fox's permission first. Once he got Fox's permission - he was able to shop the show around. Just as he was able to make Serenity and distribute it through another channel. Without Fox's permission, the film Serenity would have sat on a shelf. (This almost happened to The Watchmen film - which was owned by another studio (FOX) who fought with Warner Brothers (I think it was Warner Brothers) and issued an injunction to stop it until they finally settled the case. Same thing happened with Project Runway which the Weinstein's sold to Lifetime without Bravo's permission and ended up in court for ages.)
That's why "Dollhouse" is on Fox. It's not Whedon's choice. He did not decide - oh, I'll stick with network television. What happened is he had a meeting with Eliza Dusku who contacted him regarding advice on her career. Eliza had a development deal with Fox. She had a contract that gave her about four or five years, possibly longer or shorter, to develop productions to air on Fox or with Fox. (David Boreanze has a similar deal, as does Alyson Hannigan with NBC). But she couldn't find anything that grabbed her. Whedon started brain-storming with Dusku and came up with the tv show - Dollhouse. He went back to his production company and said he accidentally came up with a tv show that Eliza told him she was not only willing to co-produce but would make sure Fox aired. She'd use her clout to get it on TV and her development deal with Fox to get it there.
Whedon had two choices at this stage:
1. Develope Dollhouse with Dusku and distribute on Fox, keep as much creative control as possible
2. Try to convince another network to distribute Dollhouse - which would entail a lot of brown-nosing, a lot of selling, a lot of rejection.
Try to think of it this way - you have lunch with a friend, while talking you come up with a great idea for a novel, they agree to help pay for the cost of your research, also do some of the research themselves - they also have an agent and a publisher lined up. All you have to do is write the thing and give them a credit, maybe even include one character with their name. You can either do that, or, you can try to sell the thing on your own, without an agent, without a publisher. And hope for the best. Knowing full well that your novel is a risky one.
It's a little bit like that, except...a whole lot harder. Since TV unlike books is a collaboration and a lot of jobs are on the line, not to mention money. Dollhouse costs over a million dollars to produce. Publishing a book? About a third of that...possibly less.
Granted he could choose to put this stuff on the web - but you don't make that much money off the web. Dr. Horrible didn't make enough to pay Whedon's mortagage. It's small change.
People are under the misconception that loads of money are being made off of the web - but that's not the case - at least not yet, while you can download stuff for free, block advertisements, and steal things. The web is the wild west when it comes to intellectual property. I know because I used to work for an online video game developer in their finance department. I know exactly how much money developers of content can make and how it is parceled out for people. Unless you are charging per hit or download, it is not that much. Ad's don't tend to pay that much. TV is still where the money is. He's putting Dollhouse on Fox so he can make a living. He doesn't make that much as a comic book writer - well he makes more than he did for Dr. Horrible.