At NAPTE global television market this past week in Miami, Netflix Chief Content Officer, Ted Sarandos announced that they aim to debut as many as 20 original series per year. Its an ambitious production schedule for the digital platform..
“I think that we probably can launch around 20 original scripted shows a year,” he said, while speaking on a panel with two of Netflix’s most popular producers: Vince Gilligan, executive producer and creator of AMC’s Breaking Bad, AMC’s upcoming Better Call Saul and CBS’ upcoming Battle Creek, and with Mitch Hurwitz, executive producer and creator of Arrested Development.
Netflix has had great success with original programming. The popularity of shows like House of Cards and Orange Is the New Black, has garnered Netflix a lot of respect and helped to create more interest in original scripted programming throughout the industry.
“TV has never been better. I think the reason why TV has been able to displace movies in our culture is because distribution has never been better. Now people have no reason to miss an episode of their favorite show,” said Sarandos.
Surprisingly, Sarandos does not however, expect to release Netflix’s original productions into syndication or to be distributed on other platforms any time soon.
“I think the exclusivity is the value,” he said. “You get more return out of growing the audience that way.”
Gilligan, whose beloved series Breaking Bad concluded in September 2013, is preparing to debut the show’s spin-off Better Call Saul on AMC on Feb. 8. It will become available on Netflix two weeks prior to the show’s second-season premiere on AMC, likely in early 2016.
Gillian praised Netflix for helping the success of Breaking Bad. “The truth is I don’t think I’d be sitting up here right now if Netflix hadn’t started streaming our show,” Gilligan said. “With a hyper-serialized show like Breaking Bad, it’s very hard to catch up if you are watching it in typical broadcast fashion.”
Breaking Bad debuted on AMC to relatively small numbers, but the show’s audience grew every year — including in its fifth and final season — as viewers caught up in between seasons.
Netflix has also stepped in to save canceled shows, like Fox’s Arrested Development and A&E’s Longmire, which will premiere its fourth season on the service later this year. “That felt like show for which we could serve its passionate audience and grow it with past seasons. We’re able to make that work by being aggressive and creative,” Sarandos said. That also raises hopes of fans of other dead shows: “I get tons of emails, voice mails and so forth every day from people who loved Draculaand all these different shows, asking to bring it back. I still get boxes of peanuts from people asking about Jericho.”
Similarly, now that Netflix has produced another 15 episodes of Arrested Development, which were posted on the service on May 26, 2013, fans are back to asking whether there will be more.
“We don’t have an update on whether there’s a second season,” Hurwitz said. “I think everybody wants to do it. It’s a complicated endeavor that involves successful actors and a studio that owns it. We’re trying to make it work. We all want it to come back.”
Napte 2015: Netflix Ambitious Series Launch
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