Both MipTV and the wider TV business are at an inflection point. Times are tight for audiovisual producers, as the total pay-TV revenue pool continues to diminish, while streaming growth decelerates and consumers hit their subscription thresholds, altogether making for a pinched economic climate.
Now, against these headwinds – and against competition from other showcases and fonts of info made available and up-to-date all year long – MipTV must redefine itself. Running April 8-10 in Cannes, this year’s MipTV will see a market in flux.
After 2023’s more streamlined experiment, this upcoming edition will once again return the MipDoc and MipFormats sessions to a premarket perch on April 6-7, hosting a keynote from Trilogy Film founder Dawn Porter alongside presentations on the state of the unscripted nation and reports on commissioning trends.
And after six decades on the Croisette, this year’s edition will the last one held in Cannes, as organizers chart a move to London in 2025. This change in scenery will also carry a change in format and a shift in focus, with next year’s London set confab to accent networking over exhibition.
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For this final iteration, a total of 130 exhibitors – among them Federation, Beta Film and Paramount Global – are awaited on the Palais floor, where NBCUniversal will showcase the Tom Hanks-narrated event series “The Americas” before offering a case study of the travel-reality competition “Destination X,” which the broadcaster co-commissioned alongside BBC.
Of course, the two broadcaster’s previous co-commission, “The Traitors,” will cast a long shadow over all proceedings. As should come as little surprise, the flamboyant competition was the past year’s top exported format – and will no doubt come up early and often throughout this year’s many conferences. At the same time, the format’s irresistible mix of gamesmanship and gloss has helped reshape the landscape, fueling both streamers and linear broadcasters’ hunger for high-verve, premium fare.
“[Programs like ‘The Traitors’ and BBC’s recently revived ‘Gladiators’] reminded people that it’s not impossible to have multigenerational moments,” says analyst Clare Thompson of consulting firm K7 Media. “Those shows become part of the national conversation, getting people of different ages to sit together. As that kind of appointment viewing becomes more precious, the shows that can make that happen become more valuable than almost anything else.”
Still, with that greater value comes a commensurate rise in cost. Ever the market drivers, streamers might have turned toward formats to counter the rising price of scripted, but they still require a level of production value that befits a premium service. And where streamers go, linear broadcasters soon follow.
Citing examples like All3Media’s “The Underdog,” TBS’s rebooted “The Joe Schmo Show,” Nippon TV’s “Suspects on the Set,” and ITV’s “A Party to Die For” and “The Fortune Hotel,” Thompson has seen a pronounced uptick in formats that blur the lines between scripted and reality. All across, trendlines converge around celebrity casts, elements of mystery and deceit, and glamorous, luxury locales that evoke “The White Lotus.” The trend calls for investment – though not wholly from the commissioning broadcaster.
“Buyers want high production values at a lower cost,” says Thompson. “Broadcasters and streamers are looking for fewer, bigger, better shows that can create a lot of impact, and they want producers to bring money with them.”
“Increasingly, the unscripted world is facing the same concerns as film and drama, where it falls to the producer to piece together bits of money,” she continues. “If you’re creating non-scripted with such high production value, then eventually you’re going to have to start finding quite a few people to come in and pay, because it’s going to be too much for any one buyer.”
Here, both Thompson and MipDoc keynote speaker Dawn Porter see a new role for TV markets to play. “Just getting something made has become more complicated,” says Thompson. “[TV markets] are no longer showcases for new formats. People attend to look for money and potential partners; it’s more about doing deals, making those relationships, and perhaps coming in earlier on projects. There’s a lot more to be done in facilitating coproduction.”
“We have to work harder, smarter and with less money than before,” says Porter. “[These events] must serve their audiences with concrete information, advice and networking. We have to educate our buyers, and we need to better understand these other markets, how to access and engage with them. Because with decreased budgets, that’s where the last 25% of our financing may come from.”
