This month’s coverage of the documentary and unscripted landscape is curated by your friends at Sunny Side of the Doc and DocumentaryBusiness.com.
Fetishizing personalities:
- “The Inventor: Out For Blood” exposes the celebrity money cult led by Silicon Valley’s Elizabeth Holmes, founder of collapsed medical disrupter Theranos // The Guardian.
- Misogyny? That’s what a tech writer sees in the fuss about a failed entrepreneur who happens to be a woman // TechCrunch
- Barack & Michelle Obama’s production company announces its slate. How do regular producers compete against access like that? // BuzzFeed
- Hulu’s “Ask Dr Ruth” captures the life of celebrity TV sex educator // The Guardian
Development & Production
- Coproduction on the Croisette: Trends and success factors from the MIPDoc Copro Summit // DocumentaryBusiness.com
- Blue Chip Wildlife coproductions will be more of a challenge in the SVOD Era // TBI
- Programming execs are jumping to the streamers:
TF1 to Amazon France // TBI
A+E to Apple // Realscreen
ITN to Amazon UK // TBI
HBO Documentaries to MTV // WorldScreen
FOX to YouTube Originals // Tubefilter
Meanwhile: Nancy Dubuc is fixing the troubled ‘old model’ at VICE // AdAge
Programming: LIVE Hits, Crime and more…
- A&E’s “Rescue Live”… Cablers can still hit winners! // Multichannel News
- Moose migration LIVE: SVT Sweden wins online + broadcast viewers with ‘Slow TV’ // Göteborgs-Posten (Swedish)
- Netflix also commissions Reality series, including from inside prisons // Realscreen
- Brazil’s “Killer Ratings” for Netflix shares worldwide appetite for True Crime // Realscreen
- The Kardashian empire expands to True Crime commissions from Oxygen network // Variety
Distribution & Platforms
- The channels model is alive Channels offer advertisers valuable scale, safety, and LIVE viewing // The New York Times
- Disney strategy: The Mouse’s SVOD price looks like a winner // Videonuze
- SVOD secrets Netflix, Apple and Disney begin to share viewing data // Business Insider
- Programming rights are caught in an unresolved battle. Streamers want worldwide rights, but broadcasters, channels and producers have their own interests to defend // TBI
- Online Second Behind Pay TV as Europe’s Preferred Watch // Gracenote and nScreenMedia
Case Study: THE SIEGE OF MECCA
- Sunny Side of the Doc 2019 will shine the spotlight on Germany, a European country that’s hugely important when it comes to non-fiction co-productions and distribution.
- “The Siege Of Mecca” is a French / German coproduction of an investigative documentary with a 600,000+ Euros budget.
- Our detailed Case Study covers the development, pitching, funding, production and distribution of an important film that reveals a violent event that echoes today.
- Don’t miss our first Case Study / Podcast package, covering the Tribeca Audience Award winner, HBO’s “UNITED SKATES”.
Digital Cultures & Narratives
- Institut Français to host Focus on Digital Mediation and Cultural Innovation with international museums at Sunny Side of the Doc – PiXii Festival 2019 // Sunny Side Blog
- CNC’s unprecedented study on VR and immersive experiences in France // CNC website (French)
- Launch of the Digital Archives Initiative (DAI), a new project developed through partnerships with institutions and artists’ estates worldwide // Artforum
Well worth reading
- Finland is winning the war on fake news. What it’s learned may be crucial to Western democracy // CNN
- Kenyan / Swiss wildlife filmmaker Karl Ammann exposes criminals who run the cruel tiger-breeding and bone harvesting business // The Washington Post
- Why we need transnational journalism to better understand the world // Medium
The Monthly News Highlights is created for our documentary communities by Sunny Side of the Doc and DocumentaryBusiness.com. Please let us know what you think and send us stories with links that our readers will appreciate at news@sunnysideofthedoc.com.
