Breaking in and Building a Career in Premium Unscripted TV

As you are aware, unscripted television is BOOMING. All the streamers have jumped into the mix and now more and more networks, premium cable channels and even short form platforms like Quibi are diving in with both feet. Creating compelling non-fiction TV requires more than just vision. It involves a gameplan. And it can't hurt to have multiple ideas in reserve or even multiple paths for the same show. This will allow you to not only launch one show, but perhaps lay the groundwork for many shows, essentially building brand recognition for you and for your production company. There is a path to building a scalable business in reality and unscripted and that path is wider than ever. And there's no better person to send you on that path than a guy who has built an empire with his company through producing such shows as Netflix's CHEER and CHEF'S TABLE and many others for streamers and networks around the world.

We all have a desire to tell stories. In an era when technology is rapidly developing and there are increasingly lower barriers to actually creating unscripted content. But an idea is just the start. Often times what we fail to do is understand how to get from an idea, or a series of ideas, to having viable content that a more commercial marketplace is actually looking for. By doing a deep dive into the history, shows and business of the prolific reality production company Boardwalk Pictures, we can better understand how to establish our creative voice and brand in a crowded landscape and determine how best to bring our value to a variety of projects and partners.

Andrew Fried is the Founder and President of Boardwalk Pictures, producers of premium non-fiction content for multiple networks and distributors including Netflix, Showtime, Quibi, YouTube and many others. A recipient of multiple awards and 3 Emmy nominations, Fried and Boardwalk strive to elevate and expand the idea of documentary television across an ever-growing unscripted landscape. Boardwalk has been responsible for some of the most prestigious unscripted series of the last few years. CHEF'S TABLE, now entering its 7th season, has received 8 Emmy nominations, has won 3 James Beard Awards and the IDA Award for Best Documentary Series. CHEER, also on Netflix, has proven to be one of the platform's biggest successes. Other huge commercial hits include Gwyneth Paltrow's THE GOOP LAB, 7 DAYS OUT, STREET FOOD and LAST CHANCE U (now in it’s 4th season), the Showtime series ACTION and YouTube’s BEST SHOT.

Andrew will teach you how to stake your claim in the unscripted marketplace and also how to build an empire in the space. By diving into his journey and the paths Boardwalk Picture shows have taken from concept to screen, Andrew will show you the do's and don'ts of unscripted from the creative and business sides to assure you shorten your path to success. He will speak to the companies origin stories and how Chef's Table became Netflix's first unscripted original series. He will explain how to judge quantity vs. quality, explain the "8th Grade Assembly" test, describe what it means to be storyteller led, and how to identify a void that needs to be filled. He will dive into how to develop your creative brand, define what stories it is you want to tell, and how to approach meetings and networking opportunities to help get your vision to air. He will describe how to add value to just about every situation - so important in unscripted where you're likely to have partners and how to best position yourself to where people not only want to work with you, but will be anxious to hear your next idea and the one after that.

Praise for Andrew's Stage 32 Webinar:

"Fabulous, authentic insights into what makes a successful producer of premium unscripted content!"

-John P.

"Loved it! I especially appreciated his positivity! I’m feeling inspired and I know I’m on the “write” track to creating something wonderful!"

-Edie F.

"Andrew was really great - a total professional who gave a lot of insight into "the business" and what attracts the green light."

-Pooky A.

"Excellent. Honest. Thoughtful. Insightful."

-Tim O.

• Staking the Claim in Premium Unscripted: How Boardwalk Pictures Came to Be
  • Origin stories about how we staked our claim to the “premium unscripted space”
  • How CHEF'S TABLE became Netflix’s first unscripted original series
  • How we built upon the success of CHEF'S TABLE to build a recognizable brand
• Lessons Learned from Understanding the Boardwalk Pictures Brand
  • Quality vs. Quantity
  • The “8th Grade Assembly test”
  • What it means to be storyteller led
  • Looking at the spectrum of unscripted content to identify where there is a void to be filled
  • Who are we, and perhaps more importantly who aren’t we?
• How to Develop your Creative Brand
  • Who are you and what types of stories do you tell?
  • How can your creative identity help people understand what value you can bring to different projects?
  • How to develop succinct talking points to express to people who you are and what you are hoping to do.
• What is “Business Empathy”?
  • We tend to approach meetings and networking opportunities by thinking about what we want to get across – how can we flip that and give people what THEY need from those interactions.
  • How can we develop skills so that we are solving other people’s challenges simply by presenting ourselves in a “value add” type of way.
• Adding Value in a Variety of Ways
  • Not every idea comes from us. How to get ideas coming in to you so you can “do what you do.”
  • Owning creative – understanding that it’s not the idea that’s unique, it’s the execution that really makes it stand apart (Netflix's CHEER example).
  • What does “premium” mean to different distributors.
• Q&A with Andrew

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