Stan expands original local content slate with nine new productions
Streaming service Stan has added nine new productions to its slate for 2020 and announced plans to reach 30 Stan Originals per year in the next five years.
Investment from parent company Nine has allowed the expansion of Stan’s local content, with the entertainment business focusing its own production capabilities towards the future of Stan’s slate.
The new titles include Eden, an eight-part drama from the creators of Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries and Skins; Bump, a ten-part drama starring Claudia Karvan; Dom and Adrian: 2020, an original comedy special from the creators of the Bondi Hipsters; and After the Night, a four-part true crime docuseries about one of Australia’s deadliest serial killers, Eric Edgar Cooke.
[quote] “The expanded original production slate will include investments and co-productions with international partners, including Hollywood studios and major international networks, adding to the global reach and relevance of Stan Originals.” [unquote]
So-called good news regarding Australian screen production (drama in particular) invariably contains such things as “co-productions with international partners” and “Hollywood studios and major international networks.” I have no idea what “global reach and relevance of Stan originals” means, but apparently all this is going to add to it.
There’s little profit to be made in creating content ‘just’ for Australian audiences, we simply do not have the population size to justify the investment cost, so partnering with international networks means the content will have relevancy/buyers/audiences (eg. “Global reach”) outside Australia. Home & Away and Neighbours would have been canned years ago if international markets didn’t buy the broadcast rights.
There is, in fact, a good profit to be made in creating productions just for Australian audiences, unfortunately, there is a bigger and therefore better profit to be made from exhibiting US, British and other exotic productions.
In order to join the international market, ( soap operas aside) we need to lift our game considerably, and we need to work towards better scripting and better theatrical techniques than those currently employed.