Nielsen released their Top 10 Streamed Programs for 2020 (U.S.) in three categories: Originals, Acquisitions and Movies. Their key metric is Minutes-Streamed-per-Show. In the Originals category, the Top 10 is led by OZARK with 30.5 billion views in 2020. TIGER KING is #4 with 15.6 billion views. When I looked deeper into the data, I …
Ellen Windemuth executive produced Craig Foster‘s beautiful film MY OCTOPUS TEACHER, a new Netflix release. (I’m republishing my popular September 2020 podcast with Ellen in response to the undiminished hit-level appeal of “OCTOPUS” to Netflix subscribers of all ages and territories.) She describes the years’ long journey of her friend, South African wildlife filmmaker Craig …
WATCH HERE… On Saturday January 9, 2021, a livestream event hosted by the Dalai Lama and Greta Thunberg, launched our new short film series on climate feedback loops. The series bridges the gap between climate scientists who are alarmed by the threat posed by climate feedback loops, and the public who knows little to nothing …
David Attenborough is a promotional hook for Monday’s long-awaited launch of discovery+. The 94-year old legend narrates A Perfect Planet, a blue chip series that stands out among the new streamer’s higher quality programs. I am in awe of Attenborough’s lifetime contribution to documentary filmmaking. I earned a credit on one of his hit series. …
by Dan Salerno “Netflix users watched more than 3 billion minutes of The Crown in the week of Nov. 16-22”. That’s The Hollywood Reporter’s headline for its coverage of Nielsen’s latest streaming rankings. Nielsen noted that two thirds of The Crown’s viewers were over the age of 55. That inspires a question: Does the older …
For last week’s World Congress of Science and Factual Producers I reached out to Ed Hersh, industry vet and consultant, to share his top takeaways. It’s always been one of the go-to gatherings of documentary producers, commissioning editors, and funding foundations, but this year it was online instead of in some exotic global city. We …
Here is a selection of the recent torrent of news coverage and social media posts that responded to Netflix‘s cross-promotion of THE CROWN and the documentary DIANA IN HER OWN WORDS. The mix, from The Guardian to TikTok adds up to an valuable Case Study of the landscape through which producers, buyers and comms teams …
Tom Jennings’ DIANA IN HER OWN WORDS became a social media sensation when Netflix paired his documentary with the hit drama series THE CROWN on its user interface. In our podcast, Tom describes the massive, emotional wave that swept around the world, a mood captured by singer Demi Lovato‘s post to her 93.3 million followers: …