MGEITF 2003: HBO Boss Calls Form More Risky UK Television
British broadcasters need to take more risks if they are to produce international television hits to rival The Sopranos and Sex And The City, according to Chris Albrecht, chief executive of subscription-funded US cable channel HBO.
Delivering The Worldview Address at this year’s Media Guardian Edinburgh International Television Festival, Albrecht, who oversees all of HBO’s original programming, claimed the quality British television could suffer if broadcasters bow down to commercial pressures.
He said: “The British television landscape had a long period of very high quality, almost protected programming. Now its is going through the same growing pains and changes that come with more of a free market, free competition environment. If you don’t open yourself up to new ideas you’re destined to just repeat the old formulas.”
HBO, which is owned by AOL Time Warner, is now available in over 50 countries worldwide and Albrecht claims its success is down to making risky commissions, such as funeral-home saga Six Feet Under and second world war drama, Band of Brothers, starring Tom Hanks.
In contrast, the BBC has played it relatively safe over the last few years with the likes of Casualty and Holby City, which attract large audiences, but have been criticised as examples of formulaic and unimaginative television.
Albrecht said: “There is nothing wrong per se with hospital shows, but I think it’s important to try and associate yourself with the best and most talented people and instead of telling them what they should do, let them tell you what they want to do. That is something for a long time we had intuited was what British Television was doing and if it’s not doing that, that could be why some things are formulaic.”
He confirmed that HBO is in discussions with the BBC about developing joint productions, which could inject fresh creative the British television market. He said: “We have the beginnings of some things which might be very interesting for both of us.”
The former New York night club owner explained that HBO decided to reinvent itself in the mid-nineties after realising it lacked energy and creativity. He said: “We decided to do whatever struck us as original and fresh, irrespective of the genre, as long as it had the flavour of something that you couldn’t see anywhere else […] To take risks that no one else in the business was prepared to take.”
Albrecht emphasised that HBO differed from other television networks in that it sells to subscribers rather than advertisers and is not restricted to chasing large ratings for specific audience demographics. However, he cited HBO’s mantra as a lesson to the rest of industry, saying: “Hold the creative quality as the central driver of your decision, not whether you think it will be popular.”
Recent Television Stories from NewsLine Granada Dismisses Elstein’s Merger Savings Calculations ITV Axes SM:TV Live After Five Years On Air BBC Should Sell Its Most Popular Programmes
Subscribers can access ten years of NewsLine articles by clicking the Search button to the left