April 1, 2021
For the past week, my mind’s been stuck on the politics of measurement. What gets measured, and how, why, and for what ends? Perhaps it’s the roll-out of the vaccines – we’re getting daily updates on how many people have been vaccinated. Or maybe it’s the plateau – we’re also getting daily news that covid-rates aren’t going down in the US, they’re plateauing, which is not a good sign. Or maybe it's the curbing of voting rights, which changes whose vote counts. Or maybe it’s the disturbing daily news of increasing attacks on Asians and Asian-Americans, another statistic that demands action. Wherever you turn, we have new data, new numbers that need to be counted, and new threats to who gets counted or not, and why.
James Gustave Speth, an environmental lawyer and economist said: “We tend to get what we measure, so we should measure what we want.” (note: I learned this quote just this week in the New Yorker). In the film world, for a very long time, we cared about butts in seats, so we measured box office, and it dominated the film news and conversation. I knew it had gotten bad when my non-industry friends would talk about per screen averages as readily as Rotten Tomato scores. Now, we live in a subscription world, and only three numbers matter – subscriber numbers, how fast those increase, and churn – or how quickly people unsubscribe. The first of those two numbers are in the news for every SVOD platform daily, and while churn is less reported, it’s followed by every company and looked into by every analyst.
On the positive side – counting what we want to see is starting to work on one front – diversity, equity and inclusion. For the past few years, we’ve been getting increasingly better sourced data on who is behind the camera, what stories are being told, and even of the audiences watching these films. While it’s still slower than necessary, we’re also seeing results. More and more companies are committing to hiring more BIPOC creators to tell stories, are diversifying their storylines, are increasing gender equity, and are seeing that audiences respond in kind. We have a long way to go, but by insisting on data – on measuring what’s getting made and by whom, we’re seeing some progress.
Just this week, the Beyond Inclusion collective called out PBS for its lack of diversity. A group of over 150 filmmakers signed an open-letter to PBS President Paula Kerger calling for more diverse voices in the films being commissioned and made, as well as in the management ranks. This stems from a brilliant piece that filmmaker Grace Lee wrote for the Ford Foundation, calling out PBS for putting so much support behind Ken Burns, while not providing equal opportunities for BIPOC creators and stories (and the lack of BIPOC leadership at various PBS strands), and then Kerger responding that this wasn't correct.
And what’s central to their letter and argument? Measuring the data. From their letter:
“Keeping this collective vision in mind, when Lee questions the network’s over-reliance on one white male filmmaker you “respectfully disagree” with her argument. We respectfully ask to understand the basis of your disagreement. Specifically, is there data to support it?” And later, in their suggestions for next steps, they go back to specific, measurable goals:
“In the spirit of open, constructive and honest fact-based communication, we invite you to share the following data with us as a starting point.
- How many HOURS of PBS non-fiction television have been directed or produced by BIPOC filmmakers vs. by white filmmakers over the past ten years?
- Of all SPENDING on PBS non-fiction television over the past ten years, what percentage has been directed or produced by BIPOC filmmakers?
- Of the top 25 production companies that have produced the most content for PBS over the past ten years when measured according to budget, how many of them are BIPOC-led vs. white-led?
- How many PBS management staff (including individual stations and major strands) are BIPOC vs. white? How do these numbers compare to the numbers from ten years ago?
We also welcome the above answers along lines of gender identity, ability and sexual orientation and look forward to discussing these issues with you in person.”
That’s a great example of measuring what you want to see. We need more efforts like this, but I’m not too worried about that – the community is demanding this data, real answers, real metrics and real change. We’ll see more of it, because it’s becoming politically untenable not to share it, and act on it.
But when it comes to other data we need - we’ve got a problem. As I mentioned above, we’re letting the gatekeepers dictate the metrics. What matters to them is subscribers, or attendance, or numbers of submissions, or how many films they program or offer. Sure, that data matters, but mainly to them, and that’s why you see those numbers in the press – which in the film industry, just goes along with the press release and never actually looks into the data we need.
Instead of subscribers, we should be asking - how much are they watching? Of which shows/films? For how long? And what keeps them there? And for producers of this content, not only all of the above, but who is getting paid what for all of this stuff? And what’s the correlation between what is being paid, and what is being watched, and what is driving subscriptions, or stopping churn? What’s actually of value here, and what’s being obfuscated by the data being selectively shown?
In the film festival world, attendance remains the measurement everyone wants – or at least every film fest believes this, so over the past, weird covid-year, we got a gazillion reports of how many more views every festival got, and how that was an increase over their audience pre-covid, and therefore a marker of success. Anyone who knows online viewership data knows that this is a very slippery slope, before you even factor in the politics of perception that every festival uses, aka bullshit. I know, because I’ve done it. When I ran a film fest, we would count every attendee of every screening, panel, and maybe anyone seen walking past the theater in our attendance counts each year. Now, anyone who clicks on a film by mistake for ten seconds is counted as a view, whether or not they make it to the end of the film.
Not that any of those numbers matter – we should really be counting how many individual viewers watched a given film, which of them watched more than one (and that counts as one attendee), and how many watched the majority of the film. And this should be reported to filmmakers in an industry-standard report. But while every festival claims they share data, I just released a film I produced to over 20 film fests, and only two of them bothered to send us any kind of report at the end (much less the revenue share that was promised… kudos to the few that really did this). As festivals become the de facto exhibition mode for most films, the “real” attendance and viewer numbers matter even more, and as festivals move to the hybrid world, these should be ever easier to standardize and report.
But we won’t get the data we need unless there’s some kind of political pressure put upon the powers that be to give us the measurements we want. When it comes to festivals, and maybe even indie cinemas, that might not be so hard. I’ve heard a few of their leaders agreeing to these needs on the zooms. But when it comes to the data we need from the SVOD platforms… good luck. Or as they say back home… wish in one hand and shit in the other, and see what comes first. But maybe if we start talking about the measurements we want, we can slowly get some momentum for action on this front. I’m glad it’s working for diversity first – in the grand scheme of things, that matters a lot more than who watched my film, for how long. But I’d love to see a transparency data movement grow out of those discussions into something that gives us some metrics more aligned with what we want to know.
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WHERE’S THE MONEY? Take the Indie Film Financing Class
I was recently introduced to the prolific indie film producer Stu Pollard (Rust Creek) by a mutual friend. Stu has put together a pretty great course on indie film financing - everything you need to know about raising equity financing, including things like business plans and investor relationships. While I've not yet taken the class, we spoke about what he covers, and I've seen enough to say I can vouch for both his knowledge of this subject and the value of his class. I highly recommend it to anyone new to the equity financing game - whether you are a producer, a potential financier, or a brand moving into this space. From Stu:
If you’re coming out of the pandemic in a fog about where to find funding for your next project, one place to consider looking for inspiration is the newly launched LunacyU. The brainchild of longtime indie producer Stu Pollard (Rust Creek), this educational platform’s first offering is called Indie Film Financing, and it’s a straightforward, honest, and in-depth course on equity financing, covering everything from business plans to investor relationships. Stu has raised $10 million in production funds over his career, helping finance more than two dozen features in the process. He’s had plenty of ups and downs, and he’s shared that experience in the classroom for 15+ years as a teacher. Many successful filmmakers have taken - and benefited from - his financing class, including 2021 Sundance award winner Marion Hill (Ma Belle, My Beauty) and 2021 Indie Spirit Award nominee Kara Durrett (Producers Award).
Indie Film Financing provides 4 hours of on-demand video content plus loads of downloadable documents and templates. The next class begins April 19th, and includes 4 Zoom coaching sessions (once a week) and a dedicated Slack group to discuss concepts, share ideas, and form meaningful connections. You can view a free sample module of the course here. Registration is now live. Use the code SGM100 for $100 off the course. For more information email them, or message LunacyU on Facebook or Twitter.
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Film
Netflix going Carbon-Neutral by 2022: Everyone is going carbon-neutral these days, it seems, which is great. This week, Netflix announced (Variety) a pretty significant commitment to go neutral by 2022, which is super-fast, and their plan looks pretty comprehensive. You can read their full plan on their site, and it includes everything from reducing the impact of their streaming to what's done on set on their films. They also put together a pretty stellar advisory board. You can also read this summary of their plans from GreenBiz, a newsletter (daily), which takes a tough look into all of this stuff, and pretty much thinks Netflix is doing a good job. Kudos to Netflix, and I hope more entertainment companies follow their lead, and speaking of measurement above - this is another thing we should be demanding more transparency around from multiple companies.
Alamo Drafthouse Has Plans to Emerge from Bankruptcy: Variety takes a deep-dive into the recovery of the industry this week, and one of their longer articles is about Alamo Drafthouse's bankruptcy and their plans to re-emerge stronger than before. I know some of their board members, and have spoken with Tim and their new-ish CEO, Shelli Taylor, and I have no doubts that they'll survive and thrive. This bankruptcy allows them to get out of some bad leases - which bad landlords wouldn't negotiate - and they'll likely buy up some other struggling theaters, something they hint at in the article, and come out of this with more screens, not less. I'll be cheering them on.
Social Media impact on SVOD: An interesting report from MediaPlayNews (h/t Erick Opeka at Cinedigm) that those SVOD players who are running more social media are also performing better. And it works. For example, "Netflix’s award-winning series, “The Queen’s Gambit,” a major hit in 2020, generated 46% of its viewership through social media searches on Facebook. About 11.7 million viewers were generated by social media influencers, including sketch artists illustrating lead actress Anya Taylor-Joy, and the chess community turned on its ear by the sudden cultural popularity; followed 6.6 million driven by media attention, i.e. TV talk shows, trade publications, etc.," That's a pretty stunning result - that their social media drove that much more viewership than traditional media. Something I figured, but this is the first time I've seen any real data on it - again, another metric we need.
Keri Putnam Leaving Sundance: This week, Keri Putnam announced that this Summer will be her last one leading the Sundance Institute. Kudos to her on leaving at the ten year mark - I think every nonprofit leader should be required to leave after ten years (I used to say five) - and for leaving the place in better shape than it was when she took it over. I've met a lot of nonprofit leaders in the arts, but none that are half as smart, dedicated or as forward-thinking as Keri, and she did a great job keeping Sundance vibrant through a lot of change, and a pandemic. I can't wait to see what she does next. Former Sundance staffer Joe Beyer penned this great toast to Keri on his blog, and I recommend reading it.
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Branded Content
Why brands like Pepsi, Anheuser-Busch and others are creating TV shows: Digiday takes a look at the number of brands moving into episodic content and TV shows, which is increasing because that's what people are watching. From the article: "As we think about the fragmentation of the media landscape and the skippability of ads — people want to watch the content that they want — there certainly still is a role for advertising,” said Todd Kaplan, vp of marketing at Pepsi, of the company’s marketing strategy, adding that the show is just one way the company is promoting its new flavor. “But as far as engaging consumers and getting a deeper connection, you’ve got to talk to them on their terms.”
P&G launches Widen The Screen project to increase Diversity Behind the Camera: AdAge reports on this new program from P&G, which will see an expansion of their spending with Black owned media, more films and entertainment from such creators, and which will support inclusion efforts at agency partners.
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Miscellany:
Warhol 'Prince' Silkscreens Ruled NOT Fair-Use: A pretty stunning decision, not well-reported but covered in Deadline and Artnews came down this week - that Warhol's use of a photographer's photo of Prince for his series of prints was not fair use. This one should get interesting.
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