tvN turns disadvantages into critical edge

A poster of tvN's reality travel program "Grandpas Over Flowers" and sci-fi drama "Nine." The overseas demand for the broadcaster's content and its production knowhow is on the rise. / Courtesy of tvN

CJ E&M affiliate grows with new export items: format, knowhow

Lee Deok-jae, executive
director of tvN

By Park Si-soo

tvN, a cable television channel that began operating in 2006, is young and inexperienced. So are its directors and film crews.

Yet the company, which is part of entertainment business giant CJ E&M, has successfully turned these apparent shortfalls into fodder for collective creativity and new export strategy for cultural content: exporting format and production knowhow.

It's a novel recipe in an industry long accustomed to exporting "finished" content.

Early this year, the firm struck multiple deals at the world's biggest TV content convention NATPE in Miami, the U.S. They include the survival game "The Genius" to the Netherlands; "Super Diva," a singing contest open exclusively to housewives, to Mexico, Colombia and Argentina; the drama "Yellow Boots" to Italy and Ukraine; and another drama "Crazy Love" to Mexico.

A Chinese satellite TV station is currently shooting a reality travel program based on the format of tvN's smash hit "Grandpas Over Flowers," under the on-site guidance and quality control of tvN directors.

"Being young and inexperienced is good on the one hand, but it's also risky on the other," Lee Deok-jae, executive director of tvN, told The Korea Times recently at his office in Sangam, northern Seoul.

"I think we are able to generate more creative ideas than big and old TV stations. That's a great positive for sure. But we lack stability," Lee said.

He said the company's achievement was largely attributable to the rough but creative ideas of young employees and a corporate culture that is ready to embrace them. But making the company stable in management is also crucial, he added, to ensure the firm's long-term survival.

In fact, tvN falls way behind domestic broadcasting giants such KBS, MBC and SBS in many aspects, including manpower, budget and experience. The average age of its 160 employees, including 90 directors, are as young as 31.3. Consequently, field experience of its content creators is mostly short and limited, ranging between one and three years.

Lee, a veteran director who worked at several cable TV stations for many years, joined CJ E&M in 2003. He began to lead tvN in 2008, overseeing core affairs, including content planning, production and distribution. He is credited for developing such acclaimed hits as drama "Reply 1994," "Grandpas Over Flowers" and "SNL Korea."

Globalization

tvN's move to export program formats and knowhow started in 2011 with the establishment of a global content team.

"The team analyzes the taste for cultural contents by regions or countries. It also collects and studies internationally successful programs to sort out things we need to benchmark," he said. "Everything done by our team laid the bedrock for the export of formats," he added, showing a thick collection of steel-clipped A4 papers which he referred to as his "format bible."

With this, he noted, any broadcaster around the world can "perfectly reproduce ‘Grandpas Over Flowers.'"

"It has everything. That's why we call it a bible," Lee said. He didn't allow this reporter to look through the papers. Instead he explained that the bible precisely stipulates everything necessary to make a reality travel program featuring four veteran actors in their 70s as travelers and a 40-something actor as their porter.

"The bible includes the program's objectives, target audience, an ideal makeup of performers, who to cast and how it should be done, the outdoor recording skills depending on situations, and even possible disputes on duty and their solutions," he said. "We have seven bibles of this kind. Six of them were already exported to at least one country." He said several broadcasters in the U.S., U.K., Singapore and Taiwan are interested in buying the "Grandpas Over Flowers" bible.

Media experts say format exports are much easier than that of finished program because the former gives buyers the leeway to localize.

In addition, as is the case with "Britain's Got Talent" that was reproduced in Korea and many other countries, a format with universal appeal can make an international hit, they said.

Recipe for success

The executive director said a hit program normally has something that viewers can learn from.

"Why do you think Grandpas Over Flowers was so successful? I think it's because the program dealt with the universal issue of declining communications between old and young generations, and suggested solutions in ways that entertain viewers," he said. "I think entertainment programs people watch only to kill time are quickly losing ground. For a program to have wide appeal and good feedback, it has to contain either a lesson or warm hearts or suggest something productive."

He went on, "I'm keeping up with major social issues and trends, and trying to find something that can become a new program idea."

A trend he is monitoring with keen attention is empowering ordinary citizens.

"I have doubts whether young and handsome/pretty stars are essential to make an entertainment program successful," he said. "What about making a program only with ordinary citizens? That's one of my unanswered questions."

He said he pushes forward tvN staffers as strong as he can in order to make its programs always "fresh, different, apprehensible, exciting and fun."

"A TV program can change life of many people. Therefore, we should do work with strong sense of responsibility and duty," he underscored. "I will make my utmost effort to keep up the tvN's identity." tvN's motto is to become "No.1 Trend Leader."

CJ E&M, which owns tvN and 17 other entertainment and movie-only channels, posted 1.7 trillion won in sales last year with its operating profit estimated at 58.5 billion won. It's uncertain how big tvN's contribution was.

Lee said he will try to generate 30 percent of tvN's sales in overseas markets by 2020 with aggressive marketing campaigns in China and other Asian countries.