International content executives discussed the current challenges and global trends surrounding the screen industry on day two of the Banff World Media Festival.

“The business of making traditional content is getting harder and bigger, and it also requires way more partnerships and creative ways to get your shows financed,” said John Morayniss, Blink49 Studios co-founder and CEO, during the session Media Leaders: What’s Now and What’s Next, moderated by The Hollywood Reporter‘s Mikey O’Connell.

Part of what Blink49 is doing now, he explained, is focusing on how they can add to their value proposition for creators. He cited the company’s May investment in L.A.-based digital-first comedy prodco Stapleview as an example, as the challenge for Blink49 is to take Stapleview’s audience beyond its primary home of YouTube, TikTok and Instagram.

Morayniss also addressed Bell Media’s strategic investment in the company, which was announced the same day as the panel. “We need to do more of that in Canada,” he said. “[Producers and broadcasters are] not adversaries, we’re all here to work together, and I want that conversation to continue.”

The spectre of artificial intelligence (AI) loomed large over the panel as well. Kevin Johnson, CEO of AI-focused WPP Media Canada and WPP president, said AI is already improving the speed of media campaigns, as an example.

Johnson warned there will be less entry level jobs thanks to the technology, with an inverse increase in senior level positions, although he stressed it’s too early to “say our kids are not going to have a job anymore.” However, Christian Vesper, FremantleMedia CEO, global drama and film, noted that the loss of jobs will more adversely affect young workers below the middle class.

Part of the panel narrowed in on global trends in content, with Prentiss Fraser, Fox Entertainment Global president, noting a dearth of action-adventure series. “I would urge everybody in this room to start developing shows in that space that can be financed on a territory-by-territory basis, [so it] isn’t only kept for the global SVOD opportunity.”

The success of Netflix’s British crime drama Adolescence was another key talking point. According to Morayniss, the lesson is, “you either have to focus on [a] niche, or you’ve got to focus on something that really hits a note.” Vesper referred to the show’s commission as a “miracle” based on “what Netflix says they want.”

The execs highlighted other series that stood out to them, with Fraser choosing CBC’s Murdoch Mysteries (Shaftesbury), saying “I wish I had it for the last 20 years.” Morayniss singled out HBO’s The Rehearsal, from Vancouver-born Nathan Fielder, going as far as to say he would like to bring the comedian back to Canada for a series.

YouTube strategies

Paul McGrath, CBC senior director of digital publishing, delved into the success of the pubcaster’s YouTube strategy over the last year.

He explained that CBC examined their entire content library and, after determining what they had YouTube publishing rights for, posted 550 hours worth over a 12-month span. He was also interested in looking at whether the YouTube clips would cannibalize traditional viewership, but instead he found that consumption increased on CBC for specific series after posting certain episodes.

“It’s very hard to get attribution that way [of an audience increase via YouTube], but I think at minimum, the dynamic that we did not see was a cannibalization,” said McGrath during the panel, titled Partner Presentation – The YouTube Playbook Driving Success for Media Companies.

Moderator Stephanie Wilson Chapin, YouTube Canada’s partner lead for TV, sports and news, said the company’s 2022 research found that 49% of respondents who watch film and TV content on the platform discover new series as a result. As well, 31% decided to subscribe to a paid service.

For example, Joe Harbinson, senior distribution and partnerships lead – social and digital at the U.K.’s Channel Four, said Huge Homes with Hugh Dennis, a real estate-focused reality series that first aired in 2022,  garnered more than one million views on YouTube, despite being georestricted to the U.K.

According to McGrath, 20% of CBC’s content is more than 20 minutes long in the pubcaster’s YouTube catalogue. That one-fifth accounts for 50% of total consumption on the platform.

“That allows you to build a full audience funnel on a single platform, similar to what Amazon has with some of their SVOD and AVOD services from third parties,” said McGrath. “I think that’s a very powerful phenomenon to think about strategically over the next several years.”

Global opportunities with K-Content

June Park, the chief business officer at Mr. Romance, said Korea built a “strong system” utilizing webcomics and novels during the panel Inside K-Content: Building Stories, Platforms and IP for a Global Stage, moderated by C21 Media’s Jordan Pinto.

Mr. Romance is behind an upcoming remake of Global’s Mary Kills People (Cameron Pictures), with Park citing the series’ viability for a global audience.

From Park’s point of view, international coproductions were largely about sharing budgets in the past, but today they are “about making new kinds of stories together.” She cited a sports drama the company is working on with a “major French studio” as an example. The series, which she did not name, will film in Busan, but was written by both Korean and international writers, with a similar cast to match.

Sehee Jang, head of marketing at CJ ENM, which produced Bong Joon Ho’s Parasite, mentioned the company’s focus on localization as a way to expand its global reach.

Anjali Sud on connecting to Gen Z

During her Summit Series keynote chat with The Ankler‘s Elaine Low, Tubi CEO Anjali Sud emphasized the popularity of free premium entertainment for all generations: people want great storytelling, but they don’t want to pay for it.

“Younger audiences … are just not going to want to pull out a credit card,” she said. Throughout, she stressed Tubi’s strategy of listening to these younger generations regarding what they want in their storytelling. This also applies to fandoms, such as the “Earpers” of Wynonna Earp (SEVEN24 Films, Cineflix Studios). She said Tubi created a “fan-fueled studio” last year, where anyone can pitch a project. About five projects are being rolled out on their slate as a result, according to Sud.

A prime example is the success of Sidelined: The QB and Me, from Vancouver-based Thunderbird Entertainment’s Great Pacific Media and Toronto’s Wattpad Webtoon Studios, which Sud said became the No. 1 title in the platform’s history. The film, which has a sequel on the way, is based on Tay Marley’s Wattpad novel The QB Bad Boy and Me.

“[The film had] 15 million viewers. Almost all of the marketing was from fans on social media, viral memes that got nearly two billion views online,” said Sud. “We are not the arbiters of quality, our audience is.”

Her youth-focused strategy extended to TikTok, which she said reflects culture in real time. “What we’re very interested in is, how do you bring that into long-form without a two-year, three-year delay?”

Sud said the streamer is going to continue to invest in the territories it’s currently in, with a significant segment of Tubi’s content produced in Canada. “What has surprised me is, of course, there’s local interests and local tastes, but the model has resonated the exact same way: Free, premium entertainment, [a] large library, originals [and] a frictionless, easy experience.”

Pictured (L-R): Bing Chen, Prentiss Fraser, Kevin Johnson, John Morayniss, Christian Vesper and Mikey O’Connell; Photo by Kristian Bogner