Carnival Atmosphere; Nickelodeon Brazil's Next New Big Teen Telenovela To Be Commissioned From Brazil

From C21Media:

Carnival atmosphere

New legislation aimed at increasing the amount of local content shown on Brazilian pay-TV in primetime and requiring platforms to carry more homegrown networks has been welcomed by the country’s producers. Ed Waller reports.

The BRIC countries – Brazil, Russia, India and China – are currently home to 40% of the world’s population and their combined economies are expected to overtake those of the G7 by 2027.

That's only 15 years away.

In the first of those countries, alphabetically speaking, things are already changing fast, as it prepares for not only the Fifa World Cup in 2014 but also the summer Olympics in 2016.

Brazil, home to 192 million people, is also witnessing big changes in its media industries. Seismic shifts – demographic, legislative and technological – are dragging the Brazilian media industries into the 21st century, presenting challenges and opportunities in equal measure to all involved.

The first of these is the massive influx of Brazilians from the lower classes into the middle classes, due to the growing economy. The effect this is having on the TV industry is obvious. “Something like 40 million people have migrated from the lower class to the middle class in the past three years, and this means more people can afford pay-TV,” says Anthony Doyle, Turner International’s Brazilian distribution chief, adding that his monthly subscriber gains sometimes top 300,000.

“Subscription TV now reaches more than 39 million Brazilians, which is 21% higher than in 2010. This is some substantial growth, especially considering the new B2C classes,” adds Paulo Barata, director of Universal Channel in Brazil.
Not only does this mean pay-TV platforms and channels are riding a lucrative wave that could erode the edifice of vertically integrated free-to-air behemoths like TV Globo, Brazil’s biggest media outfit, but it also attracts the attention of regulators.

Brazil’s pay-TV sector comprises 13 million pay-TV homes and is dominated by Net, which accounts for around 45% of the market, alongside other players such as Sky Brasil (26%), Via Embratel (9.8%), Telefónica TV Digital (5%) and OiTV (3%), with smaller platforms making up the remainder.

However the market breakdown goes, all platforms are now bound by a recently passed regulation, dubbed Law 12.485, that obliges pay-TV platforms to carry more Brazilian channels. The same law also stipulates that all cable channels must carry at least 3.5 hours of locally produced programming in primetime per week.

The quota has been gradually passed into law over the past few years and came into effect last month. Brazilian independent producers, and their trade body, ABPI-TV, have been popping corks as they’ll be benefiting from all the commissioning that cable channels will be doing, and the mood at February’s Rio Content Market was celebratory to say the least.

“This is a good moment for independent producers in Brazil,” Kiko Mistrorigo, VP of ABPI-TV and co-founder of Fishtronaut animation house TV Pinguim, told C21 at the Rio event. “The law is an attempt to regulate our broadcasters and open space for local production. The quota is small – only 30 minutes per day – but it’s symbolic. Changing the law has been a fight and those who oppose it have questioned whether local producers will be able to make enough quality content to fill it. But Brazilian independents already produce for major channels around the world, so why not for Brazilian channels? We need a healthy internal market and this law is the first step.”

However, Sky Brasil has launched a campaign slamming the law and claiming it is “unconstitutional.” The News Corp-backed firm says the legislation, overseen by national cinema agency Ancine, allows too much state control of TV and is seeking to have it repealed. “Your remote control is now in the hands of Ancine,” it declares, adding that the law “brings different rules, sometimes incoherent, sometimes illegal and unconstitutional, directly affecting our rights and freedom of expression, and damaging a sector that has invested in Brazil for years.”

In response, ABPI-TV says: “Sky has turned its back on democratic debate to defend its own interests and has started campaigns of misinformation. The campaign is wrongly questioning the constitutionality of the law.”

Speaking privately, ABPI-TV execs say there’s very little chance Sky’s campaign to overturn Law 12.485 will succeed. But Sky is not alone. Turner International’s Doyle is also critical of the new regulations his company must now work under.
“We’ve produced 100 local productions in Brazil over the past 10 years but we don’t agree with the law. In the case of Cartoon Network, we are already complying and producing enough content that meets the local quotient,” he argues, citing shows Turma da Mônica, Gui & Estopa, Brasil Animado and the upcoming Gisele e a Equipe Verde, Carrapatos e Catapultas and Tromba Trem. “If we’re already doing something, why do we need a law to dictate to us? It’s ultimately a decision programmers should make based on feedback from subscribers and advertisers, and not something imposed by government.”

He goes on to say the new law requires Turner to produce many more hours of local programming, yet the company’s programming budget hasn’t suddenly gone up accordingly. You can’t quadruple your hours and keep the total spend the same without quality falling, goes his argument.

The law, forged with the best intentions, could even reduce choice for Brazilian pay-TV subscribers, Doyle adds. “Take our channel TCM, for example. It’s a brand based on delivering Hollywood movies and series; that’s what viewers come to the channel to see. Why shove Brazilian content down their throats just because the legislators think it’s a good idea? Ultimately, Brazil should be legislating for the subscribers, not for a few independent production houses.”

Another issue is the ownership of the rights to the local content that channels are obliged to commission. “If we produce something in Brazil with 100% of our own financing, it would be logical to think we’d retain 100% of the rights. But if we do, it doesn’t count towards our local content quota, unless we give the majority of the rights to the local production house. So they have more ownership of that content even though it might have been an idea created by us and financed by us. We have a problem with that,” Doyle continues.

While Sky Brasil and Turner are the most vocal in their opposition to the law, some pay-TV channels welcome it. “It will oblige platforms to carry more Brazilian channels, and we’re 100% Brazilian,” says André Saddy, commissioning editor at Canal Brasil, part of cabsat group Globosat. “We hope it means we’ll be able to get into more basic cable packages, as we’re in premium at the moment and it’s too expensive for most Brazilians. We have about four million out of 13 million pay-TV subscribers, so we have room to grow.”

Suffice it to say that every pay channel in Brazil is now focusing on filling its quota, whether they welcome the law or not. Roberto Martha, director of production at Viacom Brasil, says he's in the market for more longer-running series, of up to 26 episodes, about fashion, celebrities and “the pop cultural universe” to fill VH1 Brasil's quota.

He's also busy commissioning series about Brazil’s burgeoning stand-up comedy circuit to feed his recently launched channel Comedy Central, some based on Viacom formats like Roast With… and some not. Nickelodeon's next big teen telenovela, furthermore, will also be commissioned from Brazil, he says, following recent teen production Julie & the Phantoms.

HBO Latin America, in turn, has commissioned Brazilian drama series Preamar (aka High Tide, 13x50′) from Rio de Janeiro-based production company Pindorama Filmes. The show, which is due to air across Latin America from this month, follows a high-flying financial trader who falls foul of the recession and ends up becoming a stallholder on the beach at Ipanema. The script was written by Patricia Kogut, William Vorhees and Pindorama chief and the show’s director Estevao Ciavatta.

Universal Channel, meanwhile, is also making a virtue of a necessity, commissioning local programmes based on the theme of ‘backstage’ to complement its diet of Hollywood movies. Two new shows are in development: What’s Off? and Corta! The first is a faux reality show about a wannabe movie director, from indie prodco Zohar, and the latter is an animated series going behind the scenes at a fictional TV show, from 2D Labs (My Big Big Friend).
Both will complement existing series What’s On, an interactive magazine about continuity glitches, spotted by the social-media-savvy audience, that’s been airing for the past seven years, produced by indie YFilmes.

Barata says having NBCUniversal and Globosat as parents allows his channel “to specialise in American series and at the same time invest locally in programmes that fill in the breaks of the channel. Because of the new Brazilian pay-TV law, the channel will expand the experience started with What’s On to establish a direct contact with independent producers,” he adds.

Forcing pay channels to air more local content might be a rather blunt tool, and there are still issues to be resolved with Law 12.485. But as Brazil’s pay-TV market expands, having more local content and attracting bigger audiences will generate more ad dollars and could evolve into a virtuous circle. It might hurt some pay channels initially but will lead to a healthier and bigger pay-TV market. Making the pie bigger can only be a good thing.

Ed Waller
09-05-2012
©C21Media

TAGS: editorschoice
SHOWS: Brasil Animado, Carrapatos e Catapultas, Corta!, Fishtronaut, Gisele e a Equipe Verde, Gui & Estopa, Julie & the Phantoms, My Big Big Friend, Preamar, Tromba Trem, Turma da Mônica, What's Off
PEOPLE: André Saddy, Anthony Doyle, Estevão Ciavatta, Kiko Mistrorigo, Patricia Kogut, Paulo Barata, Roberto Martha, William Vorhees
COMPANIES: 2D Labs, ABPI-TV, Ancine, Canal Brasil, Globosat, HBO Latin America, NBCUniversal, News Corp, Nickelodeon, OiTV, Pindorama Filmes, Sky Brasil, TCM, Telefónica, Turner International, TV Globo, TV PinGuim, Universal Channel, VH1, Via Embratel, Viacom Brasil, YFilmes
COUNTRIES: Brazil