DRAMA


WHAT’S NEXT?


The BBC ordered and f i lmed a remake of Talking Heads dur ing lockdown


that means you can be very light on your feet” when you get to the shoot. Other technologies like remote


viewing will certainly find a place to keep people distanced on set rather than crowding around monitors, or off the set completely and possibly in another country entirely. There’s plenty of other tech solutions too, like remote heads for cameras. Development in lockdown has


seen new ways of doing things too. “We’ve done two writers’ rooms on zoom,” says Benski. “It’s actually been very efficient. People were very intense, very creative and quite ordered. It was quite empowering.” Development has been the winner


during lockdown. “We’ve made some really great gains in development with a number of new developments commissioned by broadcasters,” says Haines. “The way the BBC and Sky in particular kept commissioning and the way our development team has stayed cohesive despite geography and won new commissions have been the real upsides of this period.” Despite many broadcasters finding


themselves in financial trouble, drama producers say the commissioning scene has been relatively healthy, especially from the buyers who were


26 televisual.com Summer 2020


buying big before. “We have a strong feeling that the trends from before just kind of accelerated,” says Benski. “Healthy, financially robust, cash rich companies like the streamers and Sky are actually using this moment to scoop up projects and be aggressive in development and with finished product.” But, he says, unsurprisingly,


“some of the more challenged players are extremely timid. The buyer behaviour is very different depending on the position of the company” but “it hasn’t shut down. People are just taking a little longer, they’re less trigger happy for big things and they’re focusing on priorities.” Producers pitching just have


to be “a bit more tactical now,” says Benski, and not “pitch huge, expensive, multinational shows that travel everywhere. They might want to buy it but you might be better off waiting.” The crisis has been a time


of learning for everyone. And some of those lessons could be here to stay. “Having locked scripts at the start of prep will be a massive help for everyone and something that we should try and


“THE GUIDELINES ARE NOT FOOL


PROOF, SO WE’RE FINDING WE HAVE TO FILTER AND INTERPRET, IN A


FAIRLY GRANULAR WAY, EXACTLY HOW THAT APPLIES TO US”


stick to,” says Fry. “This, as well as having to be more planned going into the shoot, will help us schedule and budget more efficiently. There will hopefully be lots of smaller things that we will learn in every department that will be embraced and continued to implement.” Benski says that “it is actually


going to change behaviour. Maybe people will realise that everyone doesn’t need to travel all the time, or at least make people think twice about some of those things, whether for the cost of production or just overall logistics. If you can simplify things, then I think that’s going to be welcome.” There are other positives too.


“Adversity has forged a bond that only comes with going through the fire together,” says Haines. “I know the same is true of other companies and I hope that the combined knowledge, that we have faced down a huge crisis, will bring an energy and confidence into the industry on the other side. The ‘Roaring Twenties’ followed the carnage of the Great War and Spanish Flu so perhaps we will see our own COVID bounce and another Roaring Twenties of our own!”


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