On today's episode, Variety's Leo Barraclough talks about the mood and the buzz along the Croisette on Day 2 of the Mipcom content market in Cannes, France. He also details his sit-down with Mattel Studios president Robbie Brenner. Plus, highlights from Variety's C-Suite Conversations session with Banijay CEO Marco Bassetti, who was honored at Mipcom with the Variety Vanguard Award for contributions to the global television industry.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:14):
Welcome to Daily Variety, your daily dose of news and
analysis for entertainment industry insiders. It's Tuesday, October fourteenth, twenty
twenty five. I'm your host, Cynthia Lyttleton. I am co
editor in chief of Variety alongside Ramin Setuda. I'm in
La He's in New York and Vrity has reporters around
the world covering the business of entertainment. In today's episode,
(00:37):
we'll talk to Leo Barakluff, Variety's International features director, about
his sit down with Mattel's Studio's president Robbie Brenner on
day two of MIPCOM, the International Content Market in can France.
Today's episode is entirely mipcom tastic. After we hear from Leo,
we'll have highlights from Variety's C Suite Conversation track. On Monday,
(01:01):
Fanaje CEO Marco Bissetti discussed how the French TV and
film production conglomerate that he leads has grown by adhering
to strong business fundamentals. He's more than happy to admit
that he'd much rather make money than win an oscar
or a golden lion at Venice. But before we get
(01:22):
to all that Here are a few headlines just in
this morning that you need to know. This is a
whole different kind of Pentagon papers. The nation's largest news
organizations are standing up to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and
his troubling efforts to clamp down on traditional news gathering.
The Department of Defense has been trying to force journalists
(01:44):
to agree to restrictions on reporting in order to maintain
their access to the Pentagon compound in Virginia. The joint
statement issued Tuesday morning by ABC News, CBS News, CNN,
Fox News, and NBC News says, in part, the policy
is without precedent and threatens core journalistic protections. We will
(02:06):
continue to cover the US military as each of our
organizations has done for many decades, upholding the principles of
a free and independent press. En Netflix is inc To
deal with Spotify to bring a batch of top original
podcasts to its platform. The trend of podcasts to TV
is unmistakable. Just take a look at ESPN's afternoon lineup.
(02:30):
One of the very buzzy topics at Mipcom this week
is microdramas, or vertical dramas as they're sometimes called. This
is content designed to be watched on the iPhone vertically.
Sag After has jumped on this trend and has unveiled
a new contract that it calls a Verticals Agreement for
projects with budgets under three hundred thousand dollars. This is
(02:54):
a space to watch. All of these stories and so
much more can be found on Variety dot com right now.
Now it's time for conversations with Variety journalists about news
and trends in show business. Here's Leo Baraklof talking about
his busy day two at MIPCOM on another beautiful day
(03:16):
here in the South of France. Leo Beerakluff, Variety's International
Features director, Thanks.
Speaker 2 (03:21):
So much for joining me, my pleasure.
Speaker 1 (03:24):
Well, you're in the Midcom press room, which is a
good place to be. How is your day too of mipcom.
Speaker 2 (03:29):
So my main task this morning was interviewing Robbie Brenner,
the president of Mattel Studios, and we looked at the
full kind of range of projects that are being developed
or in production. And it's impressive because she comes out
of the independent film world and they have faith in
(03:51):
her to take their toys and make them into fantastic
stories and amazing films and tvc She does.
Speaker 1 (04:00):
Have that infectious producer's enthusiasm. She was an independent producer,
a scrappy independent producer, pulling together financing for adult dramas,
nothing that was terribly family friendly. But she has always
credited Mattel's CEO Inon Cries as seeing that she had
the skills, even if nothing in her background said family entertainment.
(04:22):
He saw something in her, and she really credits that,
and she always says she's surprised herself that she took
this turn in her career. She obviously absolutely hit it
out of the park with Barbie. That's a well known
story now of Greta Gerwig coming in but two summers
ago now that Barbie lit up the box office, and
(04:43):
you can tell that, like all good producers, they recognize
that there is a bit of luck and magic and
all of that stuff to every big hit. So it
was interesting to see her reflect on that with a
little bit of distance from Barbie.
Speaker 2 (04:57):
Yes, and she understands as well. Producers understand that you're
only as good as your last here. So there's a
lot riding on the next films, including Matchbox, which is
going to be an action thriller and Barney. There's a
whole range of films and series coming up.
Speaker 1 (05:16):
It's definitely not cookie cutter, made for low end video
like the Barbie related content used to be.
Speaker 2 (05:24):
She says she wants to choose projects that scare her
a little bit, that kind of push it to the
edge and surprise her.
Speaker 1 (05:32):
From my vantage point, the body language was extremely confident,
a lot of excitement. What else did you in your
travels walking around seeing people? What was your sense of
the crowd on day two.
Speaker 2 (05:43):
One thing that comes up time time again is that
the convergence that we've been speaking about for years, if
not decades, is actually real.
Speaker 3 (05:52):
Now.
Speaker 2 (05:52):
People like Banejet as well as the TV series are
now stepping up their activity in film, but they're also
investing in YouTube creators and that they're pushing further into
live events, so that diversification is going on everywhere that
you look. BBC, ITV, a Freemantle talk about it. I mean,
(06:16):
Freemantle have this show that was a great success in
the Netherlands on YouTube and they took it and the
creators on that show and they put it on a
mainstream streamer in the Netherlands and they didn't sanitize it.
It's quite edgy, and it's brought the audience over from
(06:37):
YouTube and that they think it's great, but it's a
little bit risque, but people have realized that they've got
to do it like that.
Speaker 1 (06:46):
There's optimism among the Europeans that the European majors are
in better financial shape than a lot of their counterparts
in the US. And you can just sense that there
is a feeling of truly global opportunity and a sense
of going for it. And a lot of the Americans
that I talked to here are like, Wow, there's a
lot of optimism. There's a feeling that people are like
hoping to also tap into and you know, maybe bring
(07:08):
some of that back with them from can. I found
that interesting. Leah, you live and work in the UK.
What do you think the mood is?
Speaker 2 (07:17):
No, you're You're right. They're very confident. You know, they've
grown to a size that they believe works. So there's
been a lot of consolidation, but it's working. It's delivering
and the quality of the shows is quite high, whether
it's scripted or unscripted, and so they're finding buyers worldwide
and they're making the ecosystem work for them. So you know,
(07:41):
there's been quite a few deals here, which is a
sign that business is good. And I think people think
that Europe is a good place to work and that
are quite happy to push their careers forward in Europe
rather than maybe in the past people decided to go
over to la I don't get that feeling anymore.
Speaker 1 (08:03):
It's very interesting and it's again why you travel and
why you go to a place to really sense it. Also,
you know, again a big Asian footprint. Korea is the
country of showcase this year. I went to a content
showcase and boy was it rapid fire. It was just
one right after the other. Boom boom boom, the super
super concentrated sales pitch. It was really funny. It actually
(08:25):
made me think put a little shark tank in it
and this really could be a television show. But anyway, Leo,
thank you for being here and juggling panels and writing stories.
That's the way of a market.
Speaker 2 (08:37):
I'm very happy to chat to you and look forward
for another day. Here.
Speaker 1 (08:46):
Now we turn to some highlights from the conversation that
my colleague Elsa Keslassi and I had at MIPCOM on
Monday with Marco Bissetti, CEO of Banaje. Bassetti is this
year's recipient of the Variety Vanguard Award, which recognizes individuals
who have made significant contributions to the global television business.
Bassetti worked his way up to the CEO ranks after
(09:09):
starting at the bottom of the ladder as a producer
in his native Italy. Here he talks about the company's
big bet on buying Endemol Shine in October twenty nineteen.
It could have easily tanked the company. Instead, it positioned
Banajet for much growth.
Speaker 3 (09:27):
It was the only way to survive in this market,
and we were a lot of concern because, as you remember,
the integration between andemon Shine and Core was not so successful,
so everybody was looking as how you could be successful.
There are a few reasons why we were successment. First
of all, because Stefan is coming from Mdemore like me.
(09:48):
I was in charge of Mdemore for a few years,
so I know quite well the company. But we strongly
believe that if you want to slive in this market,
you know, you should have a very strong footprint, you
should have a lot of strong ip in order, let's say,
not just to be very frank with you not to
(10:10):
be screwed by your kind and to have leverage it
means to retain IP. It means a so that you
are in control of your IP and you can exploit
it in a different way your AP not only in
the channel that you are to selling the IP. And
that was the decision, the rationale of this acquisition, by
(10:31):
the way, this time, but the Jay we don't We
did not have the footprint that we have now. We
don't have such a strong distribution that and the Mahas
at this time we don't have the scripted business and
we saw the descripted business we stream will start to growing.
So for us was a perfect match.
Speaker 1 (10:49):
But speaking of your m and A strategy, do you
feel now that you achieved like the scale that she
wants or are you still looking for opportunities.
Speaker 3 (11:02):
Let's elaborate a little bit. Yes, I think that we
have the scale in our business that we should have.
I don't think that geography is speaking. We need to
have the other territory. Maybe we need the same to
improve in some genera in charity that maybe we are
not so strong. It should be until twenty twenty two
(11:23):
or be too twenty three. We did a lot of
after random, a lot of small acquisition ergy. You know that,
let's say two to feed our machine and to have
everything we need so we can give to our client,
to a commissioner, what they're asking for today, just a
(11:44):
pure many market buying small company. I don't think that
is anymore there because there is a significant difference compare,
which is let's say the demand that you offer. Okay,
if you saw the multiple today where other company are
listed and the money that we could pay. By the way,
(12:05):
we never buy a company because we want to buy
a bida never, so we will never on this game.
We believe that this game was very dangerous. Today we
saw that we are positioned in the market like a
kind of natural consolidator. There are more and more talent
that they like to come to work with us, and
(12:28):
we split with them the value that we can create together.
That it makes much more sense. We saw every day
small company, but also medium company. They cannot survive anymore
on the market, so that's for us and it's a
real opportunity for increase our market share, but also to
create a new ap so instead of spending money with
(12:52):
their office, with their service and every day they could
spend their money in creativity. That's for us and OPITU
need not only for us, so for some of our
competitor and I never saw so many talent deals like
last year. Talent they would like to have a safe
home where they can keep their own independence and they
(13:17):
can also to work just not just for one or
T to streamer o client, but they have the capability
to work with all of them. That's something that is
coming more and more. And on the other side, I
should say that also the Globals team they feel comfortable
to work with the kind of natural consulator like us
because they could have much more opportunity, a big range
(13:38):
of opportunity for talent and geographic clicking, also to decentralize
some stuff hub on this kind of thing. So I
believe that this is an opportunity for international producers like
us and coming here.
Speaker 1 (13:57):
As we close out today's episode, here a few things
we're watching for. It's hard to believe, but earning season
is upon us. Netflix kicks it off as usual with
its third quarter report on October twenty. First. Friday is
going to be busy at two film festivals over the
next two weeks. This week at the Middelburg Film Festival
in Virginia. We will honor Wicked director John M. Chew
(14:21):
with our Creative Collaborators Award the following week at the
Savannah Film Festival in Georgia. We'll unveil our ten artisans
to watch selections before we go. Congrats to Mark Hamill.
The Star Wars Legend will receive the Gregory Peck Award
at the San Diego Film Festival on October sixteenth. Thanks
(14:41):
for listening. This episode was written and reported by me
Cynthia Littleton, with contributions from Leo Baraclub Stick's Next Hick Picks.
Please leave us a review at the podcast platform of
your choice, and please tune in tomorrow for another episode
of Daily Variety. Add you
Welcome to Daily Variety, your daily dose of news and
analysis for entertainment industry insiders. It's Tuesday, October fourteenth, twenty
twenty five. I'm your host, Cynthia Lyttleton. I am co
editor in chief of Variety alongside Ramin Setuda. I'm in
La He's in New York and Vrity has reporters around
the world covering the business of entertainment. In today's episode,
(00:37):
we'll talk to Leo Barakluff, Variety's International features director, about
his sit down with Mattel's Studio's president Robbie Brenner on
day two of MIPCOM, the International Content Market in can France.
Today's episode is entirely mipcom tastic. After we hear from Leo,
we'll have highlights from Variety's C Suite Conversation track. On Monday,
(01:01):
Fanaje CEO Marco Bissetti discussed how the French TV and
film production conglomerate that he leads has grown by adhering
to strong business fundamentals. He's more than happy to admit
that he'd much rather make money than win an oscar
or a golden lion at Venice. But before we get
(01:22):
to all that Here are a few headlines just in
this morning that you need to know. This is a
whole different kind of Pentagon papers. The nation's largest news
organizations are standing up to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and
his troubling efforts to clamp down on traditional news gathering.
The Department of Defense has been trying to force journalists
(01:44):
to agree to restrictions on reporting in order to maintain
their access to the Pentagon compound in Virginia. The joint
statement issued Tuesday morning by ABC News, CBS News, CNN,
Fox News, and NBC News says, in part, the policy
is without precedent and threatens core journalistic protections. We will
(02:06):
continue to cover the US military as each of our
organizations has done for many decades, upholding the principles of
a free and independent press. En Netflix is inc To
deal with Spotify to bring a batch of top original
podcasts to its platform. The trend of podcasts to TV
is unmistakable. Just take a look at ESPN's afternoon lineup.
(02:30):
One of the very buzzy topics at Mipcom this week
is microdramas, or vertical dramas as they're sometimes called. This
is content designed to be watched on the iPhone vertically.
Sag After has jumped on this trend and has unveiled
a new contract that it calls a Verticals Agreement for
projects with budgets under three hundred thousand dollars. This is
(02:54):
a space to watch. All of these stories and so
much more can be found on Variety dot com right now.
Now it's time for conversations with Variety journalists about news
and trends in show business. Here's Leo Baraklof talking about
his busy day two at MIPCOM on another beautiful day
(03:16):
here in the South of France. Leo Beerakluff, Variety's International
Features director, Thanks.
Speaker 2 (03:21):
So much for joining me, my pleasure.
Speaker 1 (03:24):
Well, you're in the Midcom press room, which is a
good place to be. How is your day too of mipcom.
Speaker 2 (03:29):
So my main task this morning was interviewing Robbie Brenner,
the president of Mattel Studios, and we looked at the
full kind of range of projects that are being developed
or in production. And it's impressive because she comes out
of the independent film world and they have faith in
(03:51):
her to take their toys and make them into fantastic
stories and amazing films and tvc She does.
Speaker 1 (04:00):
Have that infectious producer's enthusiasm. She was an independent producer,
a scrappy independent producer, pulling together financing for adult dramas,
nothing that was terribly family friendly. But she has always
credited Mattel's CEO Inon Cries as seeing that she had
the skills, even if nothing in her background said family entertainment.
(04:22):
He saw something in her, and she really credits that,
and she always says she's surprised herself that she took
this turn in her career. She obviously absolutely hit it
out of the park with Barbie. That's a well known
story now of Greta Gerwig coming in but two summers
ago now that Barbie lit up the box office, and
(04:43):
you can tell that, like all good producers, they recognize
that there is a bit of luck and magic and
all of that stuff to every big hit. So it
was interesting to see her reflect on that with a
little bit of distance from Barbie.
Speaker 2 (04:57):
Yes, and she understands as well. Producers understand that you're
only as good as your last here. So there's a
lot riding on the next films, including Matchbox, which is
going to be an action thriller and Barney. There's a
whole range of films and series coming up.
Speaker 1 (05:16):
It's definitely not cookie cutter, made for low end video
like the Barbie related content used to be.
Speaker 2 (05:24):
She says she wants to choose projects that scare her
a little bit, that kind of push it to the
edge and surprise her.
Speaker 1 (05:32):
From my vantage point, the body language was extremely confident,
a lot of excitement. What else did you in your
travels walking around seeing people? What was your sense of
the crowd on day two.
Speaker 2 (05:43):
One thing that comes up time time again is that
the convergence that we've been speaking about for years, if
not decades, is actually real.
Speaker 3 (05:52):
Now.
Speaker 2 (05:52):
People like Banejet as well as the TV series are
now stepping up their activity in film, but they're also
investing in YouTube creators and that they're pushing further into
live events, so that diversification is going on everywhere that
you look. BBC, ITV, a Freemantle talk about it. I mean,
(06:16):
Freemantle have this show that was a great success in
the Netherlands on YouTube and they took it and the
creators on that show and they put it on a
mainstream streamer in the Netherlands and they didn't sanitize it.
It's quite edgy, and it's brought the audience over from
(06:37):
YouTube and that they think it's great, but it's a
little bit risque, but people have realized that they've got
to do it like that.
Speaker 1 (06:46):
There's optimism among the Europeans that the European majors are
in better financial shape than a lot of their counterparts
in the US. And you can just sense that there
is a feeling of truly global opportunity and a sense
of going for it. And a lot of the Americans
that I talked to here are like, Wow, there's a
lot of optimism. There's a feeling that people are like
hoping to also tap into and you know, maybe bring
(07:08):
some of that back with them from can. I found
that interesting. Leah, you live and work in the UK.
What do you think the mood is?
Speaker 2 (07:17):
No, you're You're right. They're very confident. You know, they've
grown to a size that they believe works. So there's
been a lot of consolidation, but it's working. It's delivering
and the quality of the shows is quite high, whether
it's scripted or unscripted, and so they're finding buyers worldwide
and they're making the ecosystem work for them. So you know,
(07:41):
there's been quite a few deals here, which is a
sign that business is good. And I think people think
that Europe is a good place to work and that
are quite happy to push their careers forward in Europe
rather than maybe in the past people decided to go
over to la I don't get that feeling anymore.
Speaker 1 (08:03):
It's very interesting and it's again why you travel and
why you go to a place to really sense it. Also,
you know, again a big Asian footprint. Korea is the
country of showcase this year. I went to a content
showcase and boy was it rapid fire. It was just
one right after the other. Boom boom boom, the super
super concentrated sales pitch. It was really funny. It actually
(08:25):
made me think put a little shark tank in it
and this really could be a television show. But anyway, Leo,
thank you for being here and juggling panels and writing stories.
That's the way of a market.
Speaker 2 (08:37):
I'm very happy to chat to you and look forward
for another day. Here.
Speaker 1 (08:46):
Now we turn to some highlights from the conversation that
my colleague Elsa Keslassi and I had at MIPCOM on
Monday with Marco Bissetti, CEO of Banaje. Bassetti is this
year's recipient of the Variety Vanguard Award, which recognizes individuals
who have made significant contributions to the global television business.
Bassetti worked his way up to the CEO ranks after
(09:09):
starting at the bottom of the ladder as a producer
in his native Italy. Here he talks about the company's
big bet on buying Endemol Shine in October twenty nineteen.
It could have easily tanked the company. Instead, it positioned
Banajet for much growth.
Speaker 3 (09:27):
It was the only way to survive in this market,
and we were a lot of concern because, as you remember,
the integration between andemon Shine and Core was not so successful,
so everybody was looking as how you could be successful.
There are a few reasons why we were successment. First
of all, because Stefan is coming from Mdemore like me.
(09:48):
I was in charge of Mdemore for a few years,
so I know quite well the company. But we strongly
believe that if you want to slive in this market,
you know, you should have a very strong footprint, you
should have a lot of strong ip in order, let's say,
not just to be very frank with you not to
(10:10):
be screwed by your kind and to have leverage it
means to retain IP. It means a so that you
are in control of your IP and you can exploit
it in a different way your AP not only in
the channel that you are to selling the IP. And
that was the decision, the rationale of this acquisition, by
(10:31):
the way, this time, but the Jay we don't We
did not have the footprint that we have now. We
don't have such a strong distribution that and the Mahas
at this time we don't have the scripted business and
we saw the descripted business we stream will start to growing.
So for us was a perfect match.
Speaker 1 (10:49):
But speaking of your m and A strategy, do you
feel now that you achieved like the scale that she
wants or are you still looking for opportunities.
Speaker 3 (11:02):
Let's elaborate a little bit. Yes, I think that we
have the scale in our business that we should have.
I don't think that geography is speaking. We need to
have the other territory. Maybe we need the same to
improve in some genera in charity that maybe we are
not so strong. It should be until twenty twenty two
(11:23):
or be too twenty three. We did a lot of
after random, a lot of small acquisition ergy. You know that,
let's say two to feed our machine and to have
everything we need so we can give to our client,
to a commissioner, what they're asking for today, just a
(11:44):
pure many market buying small company. I don't think that
is anymore there because there is a significant difference compare,
which is let's say the demand that you offer. Okay,
if you saw the multiple today where other company are
listed and the money that we could pay. By the way,
(12:05):
we never buy a company because we want to buy
a bida never, so we will never on this game.
We believe that this game was very dangerous. Today we
saw that we are positioned in the market like a
kind of natural consolidator. There are more and more talent
that they like to come to work with us, and
(12:28):
we split with them the value that we can create together.
That it makes much more sense. We saw every day
small company, but also medium company. They cannot survive anymore
on the market, so that's for us and it's a
real opportunity for increase our market share, but also to
create a new ap so instead of spending money with
(12:52):
their office, with their service and every day they could
spend their money in creativity. That's for us and OPITU
need not only for us, so for some of our
competitor and I never saw so many talent deals like
last year. Talent they would like to have a safe
home where they can keep their own independence and they
(13:17):
can also to work just not just for one or
T to streamer o client, but they have the capability
to work with all of them. That's something that is
coming more and more. And on the other side, I
should say that also the Globals team they feel comfortable
to work with the kind of natural consulator like us
because they could have much more opportunity, a big range
(13:38):
of opportunity for talent and geographic clicking, also to decentralize
some stuff hub on this kind of thing. So I
believe that this is an opportunity for international producers like
us and coming here.
Speaker 1 (13:57):
As we close out today's episode, here a few things
we're watching for. It's hard to believe, but earning season
is upon us. Netflix kicks it off as usual with
its third quarter report on October twenty. First. Friday is
going to be busy at two film festivals over the
next two weeks. This week at the Middelburg Film Festival
in Virginia. We will honor Wicked director John M. Chew
(14:21):
with our Creative Collaborators Award the following week at the
Savannah Film Festival in Georgia. We'll unveil our ten artisans
to watch selections before we go. Congrats to Mark Hamill.
The Star Wars Legend will receive the Gregory Peck Award
at the San Diego Film Festival on October sixteenth. Thanks
(14:41):
for listening. This episode was written and reported by me
Cynthia Littleton, with contributions from Leo Baraclub Stick's Next Hick Picks.
Please leave us a review at the podcast platform of
your choice, and please tune in tomorrow for another episode
of Daily Variety. Add you
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