BRITISH FILM COMMISSION
UK IN FOCUS 2016
been a loyal partner for UK companies, airing
the popular
Downton Abbey
and acquiring the
upcoming ITV series
The Halcyon
(currently
being produced by Left Bank Pictures). Now
A&E Networks is also showing interest in UK
product, picking up gothic thriller
The Franken-
stein Chronicles
, Agatha Christie adaptation
And
Then There Were None
and Tolstoy adaptation
War & Peace
for its flagship cable networks.The
latter, a complex co-production that was a rat-
ings success for BBC1 in the UK, has sold to
more than 20 markets around the world, with
Russia’s Channel One an eye-catching customer.
Other high-profile deals include the sale of
Sherlock
to China and South Korea, where the
recent
The Abominable Bride
special has taken
in excess of $10m at the box office. Prior to
that, season three of
Sherlock
aired on video
website Youku.com and received 5 million
views inside 24 hours. Days later, the figure
had accelerated to more than 70 million.
Success in multiple territories is not unusual
for UK drama, says Clarke, who cites examples
such as
Marple
,
Poirot
,
Mr Selfridge
and
Vera
from her company’s catalogue. “One thing we
have become good at is evolving and support-
ing our successful franchises,” she says. “Think
about the way
Lewis
and
Endeavour
grew out of
Inspector Morse
. Soon we have
Tennison
, our
1970s-set prequel to
Prime Suspect
,written and
executive produced by Lynda La Plante.”
Jill Green, founder and MD of indie producer
Eleventh Hour Films, has seen similar success
with
Foyle’s War
, a crime series created and
written by Anthony Horowitz and set during
and after the Second World War. “
Foyle’s War
travels because it is authentic and sophisti-
cated,” says Green.“The show [which is distrib-
uted by All3media International] knows its
world in the way a show like
Mad Men
knows
its world, and viewers respond to that no mat-
ter where they are based.”
The UK success story is not just about the
sale of completed shows.As the tectonic plates
of the international drama business have
shifted, the UK has proved to be very adept at
forming innovative international alliances.
Marigo Kehoe, co-founder of leading producer
Left Bank Pictures, says: “We’ve made scripted
series like
DCI Banks
that are aimed at the UK
market and also have a fanbase internationally.
But at the same time, we always felt there was
an opportunity to become an international-
facing production company. We were ahead of
the market in that respect.”
Early examples of Left Bank’s international
approach were the UK version of Swedish crime
franchise
Wallander
and the Sky/HBO co-pro-
duction
Strike Back
, shot in South Africa and
Hungary. This has provided a platform for the
company to secure some hugely ambitious com-
missions including
Outlander
for US premium
cable network Starz and
The Crown
, a $145m
(£100m), 20-part epic for Netflix looking at the
life of Queen Elizabeth II (see page 16). The
company is also co-developing high-end Eng-
lish-language drama with China’s CITVC, with
the resulting shows airing in China and being
distributed internationally by Sony Pictures Tele-
vision,the US company that now owns Left Bank.
International prowess
Left Bank’s international deftness is far from an
isolated example. Neal Street’s
Penny Dreadful
works as well for Showtime in the US as it does
for Sky Atlantic in Europe, while Kudos’s
Humans
is a groundbreaking co-production
between Channel 4 and US cable network AMC.
Other landmarks include BBC/AMC co-produc-
tion
The Night Manager
and supernatural crime
drama
Houdini & Doyle
; the latter is produced
by Big Talk Productions and Shaftesbury in Can-
ada as a UK-Canada co-production, and has
been picked up by Fox US—a rare commitment
from a US broadcast network.
Callender, who is working on a TV adaptation
of EM Forster’s
Howards End
,is part of a growing
cadre of UK executives who understand how to
make deals like this happen: “I think a lot of
Brits were intimidated by the complexity of the
US system,” says the executive, who has previ-
ously worked with HBO. “But working on both
sides of the Atlantic has given me an under-
standing of how to navigate the difference
between audiences and talent and processes.”
Red Planet Pictures founder and CEO Tony
Jordan is another home-grown talent who has
embraced the opportunities of the interna-
tional scripted market. New productions for
2016 include
Hooten & The Lady
, a family
adventure series for Sky 1 being shot in South
Africa and other locations worldwide, and
Downton Abbey
Sherlock: The Abominable Bride
Adrian Lester in Undercover
“
there was an
opportunity
to BecoMe an
INTERNATIONAL-
facing
proDuction coMpany
”
Marigo Kehoe, Left Bank Pictures
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