Independent Production Companies Research Articles

Risks of operation of the Russian gas industry in the newest conditions

The article analyzes the risks and limitations faced by the Russian gas industry in recent years. Russian gas sector faced with the negative influence of a number of internal and external factors («the perfect storm»). Currently, there is unprecedented pressure, that include not only falling export revenues, but also technological limitations. The Russian gas sector has been able to partially adapt to new operating conditions – a more flexible method of gas monetization is coming to the fore. Pipeline gas is increasingly losing its role as the basis for the development of the gas sector in the medium term, giving way to liquefied natural gas. The key factors limiting the operation of the industry are technological risks and restrictions in gas production and liquefied gas production, resource base limitations, risks on the side of the gas transportation system, as well as institutional risks and restrictions. In addition to development difficulties, new restrictions make it possible to reconsider the role of the gas sector in the economy: use more flexible approaches to export issues, develop domestic demand for gas, promote the development of independent gas production companies, and implement programs to support domestic manufacturers of a wide range of gas equipment and gas carriers.

The production of Spanish fiction series for SVOD: evolution, trends and strategies

The consolidation of digital television via subscription video on demand (SVOD) services has created an unprecedented increase in the consumption of serialised TV shows, which has had direct consequences on the content production sector. Faced with an increasingly demanding, hyperconnected and discerning audience and a supply of content never previously seen, television production and distribution strategies are involved in a process of change and adaptation. This paper seeks to analyse the production of Spanish television series created to be distributed on SVOD platforms. The aim is to know the role that production companies play in the creation of television series for SVOD so as to identify strategies and cooperative alliances between production companies and platforms and to detect possible patterns and trends in the operations of the audiovisual market. Using a mixed methodology that combines quantitative study with qualitative data analysis, the 88 Spanish TV series and miniseries that premiered on SVOD platforms from 2016 to 2021 are analysed, taking as a starting point the year in which these platforms began operating in Spain. The results confirm a trend towards cooperation between independent production companies and the platforms themselves, while no presence of in-house production is observed. Likewise, the atomisation of the role of production companies in the context of SVOD is shown, a phenomenon that already existed in generalist television production.

‘It's the Programmes, Stupid’

AbstractPublic Service Broadcasting (PSB) is an eco‐system where the whole is more than the sum of its parts. The BBC is the cornerstone, but ITV, C4, C5 and independent production companies also play a crucial part. The essence of PSB lies in the values which underpin the content, ranging from popular sport and light entertainment to more niche minority strands. The BBC licence fee generates considerable value for the British economy throughout the nations and regions of the UK. This is multiplied by the intellectual property framework for independent production companies. The system is now under threat from the financial squeeze on the BBC licence fee, failure to deliver ‘due prominence’ to commercial PSBs, new technology and changing patterns of consumption. It is essential that a broad range of programmes remain freely available to avoid the cultural, social and political divisions of a two‐tier system of national broadcasting.

‘Praise these daring men’: ACT Films Ltd, 1950–1963

During the 1950s the film technicians’ trade union, the Association of Cinematograph Technicians (ACT), was a significant force in the film industry. At the same time the ‘second feature’ or ‘B-film’ sector was producing a constant stream of low-budget titles. This article examines an initiative which combined the two: ACT Films Ltd, a film production company active in the second-feature sector, which was created by the union to provide jobs for its unemployed members. It explores some of the internal tensions this generated within ACT, the company’s production record, including its occasional forays beyond B-films, and its relations with other industry players. It also sheds light on the role of the National Film Finance Corporation and the distributor British Lion during this period, and their relations with independent production companies.

Are Video Streaming Platforms Stifling Local Production Creativity? The Spanish Case

Abstract International streaming platforms have broken into the European market and are partnering with local production companies to produce content. Online consumption generates a huge database on the tastes and consumption patterns of viewers. Although the business of video streaming platforms is to attract subscribers, all this data could be used to produce content adapted to the different sensibilities of the audience. We want to investigate to what extent entry of the streaming companies has impacted the creativity of the production process in Spain and how creativity may be affected by this. We carried out semi-structured interviews with creative workers who produce for both linear television channels and video on demand platforms. The sample focuses on four workers from independent production companies with years of experience working for the television channels that have started working for new streaming companies. Their responses imply that big data does not appear to reduce uncertainty and is not applied to make decisions in the first stages of the production process. However, production of local shows has changed significantly.

Tools and measures for diversity and inclusion in media industries: International best practice and informing policy change in the Irish film and television sector

This article focuses on equality, diversity and inclusion in the Irish media industry and how it can be improved. The need to develop these policies, tools and measures has become pertinent, considering that the Irish media workforce currently lacks diversity. The aims of this article are twofold: (i) examine the tools and measures from the international media industry that have been developed to improve equality, diversity and inclusion and (ii) interrogate how these tools and measures could work within the Irish context. Through sampling tools and measures developed in varying media industries in English language territories, this research used this analysis as the basis of semi-structured interviews with independent production companies and broadcasters in Ireland, to gauge how the media industry can develop equality, diversity and inclusion initiatives. This article identifies four central areas that would encourage further diversity in the Irish media sector: data gathering and monitoring, developing diversity standards, objective setting and incentivization and diverse recruitment for the industry.

Poorly paid, but proud to work in teams producing ‘quality’: An oral history of women’s experiences working in BBC drama

This article presents a range of hitherto unheard women’s testimonies of their experiences working in the BBC Drama Plays department during the 1970s and 1980s. It incorporates the subjective interview testimony of nine women who all worked on BBC1’s prestigious strand of one-off dramas, Play for Today (1970-84) to reveal commonalities and differences in their gendered work experiences. This incorporates topics such as discrimination, pay, working conditions, emotional labour and trade unionism. There is attention to what made working for the BBC unique, compared to ITV or independent production companies. It is discerned that BBC women workers generally saw the BBC as a meritocracy, but also that some regret the decline in the strength of television trade unions, which they saw as leading to a situation of pervasive exploitation in television today.

How counter-fate relational practices mitigate resource acquisition challenges during project nascence

Research shows that embedded relations can facilitate the resource acquisition process in entrepreneurship. Yet, as relations are dynamic and subject to change, it remains unclear how entrepreneurs can acquire necessary resources when pre-existing ties may not yet or no longer be relevant, sufficient or accessible. Under these circumstances, acquiring necessary resources is a challenge and one that novice entrepreneurs in project-based enterprises face repeatedly as they seek to sustain their businesses. Evidence from 123 projects developed by six newly formed independent television production companies in the United Kingdom shows that new entrepreneurs can manoeuvre around constraints by engaging in one of four counter-fate relational practices: posturing (i.e. exaggerating interest from key ties), status sequencing (i.e. developing key relations in sequence based on status), geographic sequencing (i.e. attaining key ties in sequence based on location), and opportunistic manoeuvring (i.e. manipulating the opportunism of potential resource holders). We contribute to entrepreneurship research by showing how resources can be acquired despite a lack of key embedded ties, and highlight enabling conditions; and to project studies by illustrating how projects progress past nascence to launch and acquire new clients or repeat commissions.

Handmaidens of consolidation in the UK television production sector

ABSTRACT This article analyses the role of intermediaries in the evolution of the UK TV production sector tracking the processes which in the past two decades have underpinned consolidation in the UK TV production sector. The research involved elite interviews with executives at ten UK Independent production companies and two financial intermediaries as well as trade bodies and civil servants. The epistemic work of intermediaries shape transactions in a way that aligned with the buyers’ desire to grow their portfolio of companies by establishing the fitness of companies for acquisition. Through classification, clustering and sorting, they confirm the notion (Knorr Cetina and Preda 2001, 30–31) that knowledge can be treated as a commodity – ‘a more or less valid representation of the world which is “inscribed in and constitutive of economic objects as relevant to the practical activities of economic agents” and purposefully assembled.

How Nascent Projects Acquire Resources to Launch

Prior research has tended to focus attention on temporary projects once they have already been established. This is a problem since it misses the challenge of resource attainment during the critical pre- project phase that leads to temporary project establishment in the first place. While networks are viewed as a key mechanism leading to resources it remains unclear how these can be attained when those seeking to launch new temporary projects are themselves new to project business and face constraints in building key ties as a result. Drawing on 123 nascent projects developed by six newly-formed independent television production companies in the UK our qualitative study finds that they can enhance their prospects of establishing new temporary projects by engaging in one of four behavioural strategies labelled as counter-fate behavioural strategies. This study contributes to research by focusing attention on the neglected pre- project stage of temporary project development. We show how by exaggerating the interest of key ties, paying attention to the sequence in which they are formed, and manipulating the opportunism of potential resource holders they can help to counter some of the inertial constraints that they face. Our work further draws attention to how a coordination role is used as a source of change; and highlights the conditions under which each behavioural strategy may become salient.

‘One woman’s failure affects every woman’s chances’: stereotyping impossible women directors in 1970s Hollywood

ABSTRACT In the 1970s, after decades of exclusion from most creative and technical roles in the American film industry, women worked to break down barriers to their employment through fighting for equity and representation in industry guilds, broadening their access to education and training, and through establishing women-focused film festivals and independent production companies. Five women—Elaine May, Joan Darling, Jane Wagner, Lina Wertmüller, and Joan Micklin Silver—directed films for major Hollywood studios during the decade. Yet each woman experienced gender discrimination that circumscribed her commercial feature film output and Hollywood career. This article argues that even as women made inroads into filmmaking in the 1970s, their progress as directors in Hollywood was impeded by institutionalised and renewed beliefs that women could not manage the financial, logistical, technical, and creative complexities of filmmaking. 1970s Hollywood discourse and practice stereotyped women directors as incompetent and impossible with enduring consequences for women filmmakers.

After the gold rush: industrial re-configuration in the UK television production sector and content

Recent technological and market changes in the television industry appear to have transformed the corporate configurations which conduce to economic success in the production industry. As a result, many leading independent television production companies in the United Kingdom and elsewhere across Europe have become prime targets for corporate activity and many have been subject to takeover, often by the US media groups. Does this matter? Does the concept of ‘national’ television content still have any relevance in the digital era? Drawing on a multiple-case-study-based analysis of several UK-based television production companies over recent years, this article examines how corporate takeovers in the production sector may affect creative decision-making and impact on the nature and quality of television content. Against a background of increased investment interest from multinationals in indigenous players in the United Kingdom and across Europe, the analysis presented makes a timely and policy-relevant contribution to knowledge.

WT2: a low budget experiment in ‘heart, humour and horror’

ABSTRACTIn 1999, the London-based production company, Working Title Films, established a subsidiary called WT2 which was given the remit of producing low-budget films. Between 2000 and 2007, WT2 released 10 feature films including Billy Elliot (2000), Ali G Indahouse (2002) and Long Time Dead (2002) which respectively exemplified the company’s creative agenda of ‘the three Hs’, that is, ‘heart, humour and horror’. This article examines the creative and commercial contexts of filmmaking at play within WT2 and, in turn, considers the company’s position within Working Title and between its major financiers, StudioCanal and Universal. In doing so, I argue that WT2’s films occupy a position between the filmmaking industries and cultures of Europe and Hollywood which is distinct from that of its parent company. On the one hand, a number of WT2’s films engage with established trends in low budget British cinema including social realism and the adaptation of television comedy, and were co-produced by British broadcasters, national film agencies and independent production companies. On the other, these films were largely financed, distributed and marketed by multinational media conglomerates with commercial agendas and transnational or global reaches. Thus, this article examines the ways in which the tension between the national and the transnational was played out in both the company’s operation and output.

Make-and-Ally and Performance: Evidence from the Korean TV Drama Industry

This paper provides theory and evidence about how vertical collaboration between an integrated firm and a focused supplier enhances the market performance of knowledge-based products. We posit that, when downstream commercialization is concentrated relative to upstream product development, products developed via vertical collaboration will exhibit better market performance than products developed autonomously by an integrated firm. Using data from the Korean TV drama industry, we find qualitative and quantitative evidence that collaborative development between network companies and independent production companies improves the viewership ratings of TV dramas. By elucidating a novel connection between corporate strategy and performance, the paper advances our understanding of how organization influences product performance.

Their Satanic Majesties' Celluloid Regret

Their Satanic Majesties' Celluloid Regret Justin J. Morris (bio) Rock 'N' Film: Cinema's Dance with Popular Music by David E. James. New York: Oxford University Press, 2016. 470 pages. $35.00 hardback, $13.45 ebook. Rock 'N' Film: Cinema's Dance with Popular Music, the long-gestating, virtuosic new work by David E. James, primarily known for his work on the American avant-garde in Allegories of Cinema: American Film in the Sixties (1989) and The Most Typical Avant-Garde (2005), tackles the intersection of cinema and the shambolic, transformative, and appropriative cultural amalgamation that came to be known as rock 'n' roll. It is perhaps surprising that this topic remains unexplored, given the ongoing cross-medial nature of pop and audiovisual media evidenced by the recent ecstatic reception of Beyoncé's Lemonade and the ubiquity of televisual "backstage" industry musicals (Empire, Star, Nashville, Sun Records, The Get Down, Vinyl, etc.). Pop music continues to be dismissed as a doggerel and delinquent cultural form that persists in evading even the widening aegis of media studies. James's examination, closely argued with texts obvious and recondite, reveals a heretofore obscured history of pop's transformative influence on Western film forms ranging from classical Hollywood to independent, avant-garde, and documentary traditions. [End Page 132] Composed of eighteen chapters, James's history of rock 'n' roll's interactions with cinema reads as comprehensive yet surprisingly succinct. The author proceeds along a set of familiar dichotomies: low versus high, spectacle versus narrative, communal folk art versus commerce, black versus white, and pop music versus film. James enriches and augments these commonplace axes by suggesting that cinema's intermedial employment of rock 'n' roll served as much as a cross-promotional tool as it did to preserve the established hierarchies of the culture industry. For example, the use of Bill Haley and His Comet's "Rock Around the Clock" in Blackboard Jungle (Richard Brooks, 1955) was greeted with "frenzied jubilation from below augmenting apoplectic fear from above that linked it to threats of communism . . . and the escalation of juvenile delinquency" (25). Producers strove not only to normalize the music's rebellious potential but also to ensure that it "did not threaten cinema's position at the apex of the culture industry" (30). Columbia Studios, the distributor of the independently produced Blackboard Jungle, profited from the controversy surrounding the film, cashing in on a "800% return" on its shoestring budget (42). Rock 'N' Film restores historical significance to the resultant genre, jukebox musicals, feature films that built on the generic traditions established by the revue film, 1930s and 1940s backstage musicals, and the musician biopic genre formed around jazz bandleaders such as Glenn Miller and Benny Goodman (44). Initiated with the Alan Freed–starring Rock Around the Clock (Fred F. Sears, 1956), jukebox musicals were "low-budget films made by small independent production companies, the cinematic equivalent of the small companies that recorded early rock 'n' roll" (43). These particular films worked to normalize the transgressive possibilities of rock 'n' roll by placing an emphasis not on the biracial social interaction beyond the stage but instead on the industry-associated promoter or disc jockey (such as Freed). James reveals cinema's role in the whitening of the music, carefully noting that while these films proved "radically progressive" in "emphasizing the primacy of black musicians and integrating them with whites in concert," black musicians rarely migrated from spectacle to narrative, narratives that primarily concerned white teenagers and industry insiders (45). Often culminating in a televisual special performance, jukebox musicals contributed to the project of distancing rock 'n' roll from associations of delinquency by reimaging the genre as a positive social force while confining its ascendant economic possibilities within an established cultural hierarchy that placed it below cinema and television in mid-1950s America. [End Page 133] In addition to exploring a number of lesser-known musical film styles and stars, Rock 'N' Film also attends to the filmic transformations made in relation to the three most enduring artists of the period: Elvis, the Beatles, and the Rolling Stones. In the tightly composed fourth chapter, James contrasts the star image of Jayne Mansfield (primarily in the...

Television production: configuring for sustainability in the digital era

Over recent years leading independent television production companies in the United Kingdom and elsewhere in Europe have become prime targets for corporate activity, and many have been subject to takeover, often by US media groups. Why is it that nurturing the development of television production companies which achieve scale but, at the same time, remain independent appears to be so challenging? This article considers which factors are crucial to the success of television production businesses and argues that, besides the ability to make compelling content, two key variables which strongly affect commercial success and sustainability in this sector are, first, effective management and exploitation of intellect property rights (IPRs) and, second, scale and configuration of activities. Focusing primarily on the latter, it analyses how changing technological and market conditions are affecting the advantages conferred by size and by adopting differing cross-ownership configurations thus, in turn, fuelling current processes of industrial re-structuring.

Provision, protection or participation? Approaches to regulating children’s television in Arab countries

Free-to-air channels for Arabic-speaking children expanded alongside the emergence of a few Arab national regulatory agencies with varying degrees of independence from government and powers that could potentially influence children’s channels. Even so, the rationales that inform production and acquisition of children’s screen content in the region remain far from transparent, beyond rhetoric about protecting children from material that ‘breaches cultural boundaries and values’. Drawing on theoretical literature that highlights regulation’s effect on policy, and links the principles of provision, protection and participation in relation to children’s media, this article compares regulatory discourses and practices revealed in the documents and speeches of Arab regulators, broadcasters and independent production companies. It finds that, with some exceptions, only the latter advocate measures that look beyond a narrow interpretation of ‘protection’. A dominant consensus around the narrow vision seems to stand in the way of developing more stimulating approaches to regulation.

Early independent production entrepreneurs in the UK television: pioneering agents of neoliberal intervention

This essay focuses on the operation of the UK independent television production sector in the context of the entrepreneurial aspirations of company owners in the 1990s. The calculative practices used running these small and medium sized companies are examined and the experiences in managing them are mapped as they negotiated an evolving fitness landscape. Analysis is provided of the strategies adopted including the need to develop reputation and relational contracts to secure a constant flow of commissions. Conclusions are drawn about this transitional phase of entrepreneurship in this sector ahead of government intervention in the market through imposing new terms of trade between independent production companies and broadcasters.

Early independent production entrepreneurs in UK television: pioneering agents of neoliberal intervention

This essay focuses on the operation of the UK independent television production sector in the context of the entrepreneurial aspirations of company owners in the 1990s. The calculative practices used running these small and medium sized companies are examined and the experiences in managing them are mapped as they negotiated an evolving fitness landscape. Analysis is provided of the strategies adopted including the need to develop reputation and relational contracts to secure a constant flow of commissions. Conclusions are drawn about this transitional phase of entrepreneurship in this sector ahead of government intervention in the market through imposing new terms of trade between independent production companies and broadcasters.

Attaining Legitimacy in Temporary Business: The Case of New Entrepreneurs in the Television Industry

This work seeks to identify behavioral processes that new entrepreneurs can adopt to construct legitimacy in frequently changing temporary business environments. Focusing on independent television content production in the UK, the study finds that new entrepreneurs exploit the varying roles that their projects can play and then sequence these in order to tailor the legitimacy they need to build their business. This research draws on a 5‐year inductive study of 81 projects won by entrepreneurs of five new independent television production companies.