TAKING RISKS IN TELEVISION. THE STUFF OF LEGENDS!

not his. It's CEO and MD at ITV Studios. David Mott a man who has made a mark on Australian television with an I for detail, partnership and friendships that have seen him work at Channel seven, Channel nine and Channel ten, famously stopping along the way as Head of Programming and then as Chief Programming Officer at Channel ten. He has danced between networks and production studios for as

long as I've been alive. David Mott has taken risks, played it safe, mixed it up, and he never talks too long without acknowledging the people who work around him. He has been responsible for commissioning some of the biggest Australian content and continues to make programs on Free to wear that you want to watch. So let's get started with some exclusive content on how these shows get made.

take some risk. Nowadays in life they're always considered risks, but if you really want to sort of change the way that people think about content or really take some sort of bold steps, but to do that, you've got to have good people around you, and that's what it is.

But I think for me in the days of I mean, Big Brother was extraordinary in its day, that turn Channel ten around, But you know, it's an interesting cycle in terms of where television was and how you know, these formats come back into play again as Big Brother did, and now we're seeing a third iteration of it. So it just goes to show that those brands that have longevity to them, they will be around for many years to come because they've got something in the dna of

what they are. And sure, other shows come and go, so you try and find that content that really puts people into a great immersive position where it's not another renovation show, it's not another cooking show. And hey, I replaced Big Brother with Master Chefs, so I know about cooking shows. I think something in there. There was Yasin's getting Married, which you know, talk about it, talk about, talk about it, talking about it's actually become the vernacular.

I think in terms of doing a Gasmin Yasmin's getting Married. Could it be that lasted for a big four days on television, But you know, that was all part of it. It was all part of taking risks and going, you know what, you've got to have an each way bet on these things. Arguably Yasmin was where the Bachelor is today or shows of that nature, So maybe it's sort of ahead of its time in terms of that sort of dating genre. And that's the way I always like to look at it anyway, try to put a positive

sort of spin on it. But you know, then you sort of look back with days of Australian I on the innocence of that. I mean that show with Guy and obviously we're working with Guy on The Voice now, which my production company's producing. It's really funny catching up with Guy and thinking back to those very very early days of Australia and here we are ten years later, and look at us even now we've just put in with Channel seven, we've moved the so we've got Jess

Melboy again. It was very much a part of Australian idol. So there's the beautiful things that come out of it as a result, but it was also the innocence of what idol present as well. No one knew what we really had. There'd been pop stars and we just felt that maybe there was something in Australian idol. So there's nothing better than seeing a show come from what was a really good idea to kind of going seeing it being realized and then seeing it and then see it perform.

And yeah, you get the highs and lows, but they're the ones that you have great memories of.

to kind of replace Big Brother with it. It was quite a shift from there, But yeah, I suppose that would have to be arguably the one that was something that not only did it capture the hearts and imaginations of everyone and Shine Back then did a beautiful job and they still do a beautiful job in Australia's First Master. Jeff has to have that kind of genius that sometimes

fails and sometimes succeeds amazing letter. But here's another format that's ten years on and it's lived through many iterations. We've had Junior, you've had Celebrity and the All Stars. Yeah, and the core premise of what that show represents it's still here ten years later, so I think there's something quite special on that. Even thank God you're here and Rode back in the day and the biggest those that

did a fantastic job for the network. We tried to position ourselves at the time of sort of playing in a different place where seven and nine wouldn't play, I suppose, and with that comes as risk. Even Offspring was fantastic sleect Life of Us, some sort of bold dramas that

the others wouldn't play in. I'll be perfectly honest with you, I don't think I could go back to the broadcast business now because I don't know if I'd be any good at it, because it's shifted so much from back in those days when you happily had five chattels to deal with, there were no streaming services and what have you. So I do go. My god, I have nothing but respect for those that are working in that side of it now. I'm very happy to be going in there going hey, by my show.

From a business point of view, it was quite challenging, but there was nothing but support from ten in wanting to and also I think the viewer has got it. Clearly you can't go overseas, so clearly it has to be in Australia. So I think that gave us the license to do that and we're very happy with the result. And I think Channel ten have been great supporters of the show right from the start and got even when I was at Channel ten, we were very close to

commissioning it never did though. It was a risky proposition. It's not a cheap show to produce, so therefore it's not a cheap show for Channel ten to license. So it's a big commitment from them, And probably in its early days it was up against MKR. And when Beverly and I had a conversation around the brand, particularly when she lost the sport, and she said, look, I've been thinking about Celebrity being playing it in January, and I said, I think that's a brilliant move. No one was really

expecting it to go. My god, why can't you put a big show, an investing content in January? And oh, the official rating season don't start in February. Well, you know what, And there's a term that I use in space. No one can hear you scream. If you don't have decent content on, no one's going to be able to see your schedule, your primos and all those sort of things. And quite frankly, it was a brilliant strategic move. Obviously going to say that now it's worked, but it was.

And so here we are sort of six seasons on and we're now talking about season seven.

and then you know, it'll come back. So you've got those brands that just have something quite special about them and so unique. You know, I can understand the broadcasters sort of going, you know what, it's improven brand, we

know how it works. It's time for a reboot, or it's time to sort of bring it back because there's always an audience with it because the basic bones and principle of the show can still work today in today's environment, even though you've got s good players and what have you, and I think certainly a place that the freeedomares need to play them from a free to air point of view.

You know, we could talk about scripted and those areas a bit more challenged from a free to air point of view, but certainly big entertainment shows, we certainly are not moving away from strip reality anytime soon you can see that whether you like it or not, it's what

the audience are wanting. So it's all about finding what that new world could be that you can mine and you can kind of create, and it might be a little show that we have at ITV to go my god, could you actually build that out to be a multi four night week series. So we're always looking for the what that looks like and then mash it in and

then kind of build something out of it. I mean, you know when we did Biggest Loser, that was only a ninety minute show on NBC on Tuesday nights, and we're running the US version and that kind of workdayk do it? Could that become five hours a week? And you know how much weight can people lose? Well a

fair bit. So even now you're talking to the UK and how we as broadcast as promote shows compared to the UK, and I said, look, you've got to talk about shows just for the Australian market and they go, oh, yeah, we know Australia. I said, no, I don't think you do know the Australian market. I don't know the strip sensibility and what are married at first sight? Looks like and what a Lego Master's or a voice is stripped, and you know Survivor is stripped and everything's about this

strip mentality. So what I did by Head of Development MICHAEH. Houston and I we went to a conference pre COVID of course, and we sat down, we showed them some of the pro boats and you know, in the year car to be if if you really don't mind, would you mind watching our show Sunday night at seven o'clock. Jolly good, thank you very much, it'd be nice.

that too, there's definitely room for other content. And I do look at shows that we're producing the Cube at the moment, and we've secured Andy Lee, which is absolutely the right show for him, and I'm so pleased that he has agreed to do it because he brings something very unique to the format and I know that he was a fan of the show, and of course I've known him for years when we did the Caravan a Courage and had them on segments a row, and so I was looking for the right project for him and

he just loves it. So we've just finished filming. At the moment, the format is great in its own right. People are playing these sort of parlor games, if you will, within the confines of a four x fourmut of cube, but under the pressure of the cube, under pressure of a lot of prize money. But then it's a great format in its own right, and so we secured the format for Australia. But then adding Andy's elements to it and what he brings to it is really quite something special.

The games might look simple, but with the whole of Australia watching and a quarter a million dollars in the line, it's not that simple, is it. That launches on ten? But now that's not a strip that's going to be a weekly standalone show. I'm not quite sure We're ten of running it yet, I've got a bit of an idea, but I don't think it's locked in yet. So that's

kind of got to stand above everything else. And that's what I love about it because you know what it does, because it's a very different show to anything else.

it's just all done in conjunction. You know, what are we missing? What do we need again? Alex Is at nine or ten. We'll always sort of look at and he's very good from that point of view and understanding what he thinks the show needs. So there's a lot of work that goes into that casting process. So I think we're all hands in knowing that by and large,

you need a it's going to engage an audience. You need a cast that's going to put their bags down, make a shitloader noise and maybe not last a distance. And then you need those ones that are going to sort of be the ones that will start to shine and come through a week or so later. Introverts, extroverts. You really need an element of that with all your casting. But yeah, it's a process. You work very closy from production to broadcast.

on shows coming out of their own back out. I think they wanted to be a very strong publisher broadcaster and what I mean by that is they wanted to create, own, distribute, do the whole lot. Now, that's fantastic if you can achieve that, but I've got to tell you, having been on this side of the business, it ain't easy. And I think seven of them learned and you look at the success of what they've now done by going, you know what, we just need the best shows in the market.

So whether it's an ITV show, whether it's an Animal Shine Show, Banajay, Freemantle, Warner Brothers, we just want the best shows. And so I think with that they've taken some risks. Now they've taken some risks that are more risky than others, but they've taken and risks, but they've just gone out to the market to say we are open for business. And I remember talking to James Warburton because we work together at ten of course, and James said, we're open for business modey. We just want the best

shows in the market. And it's a tough game when you've got to resource up your business and maybe that's not the best game for you to be in lead that to others, you know. And I do feel that there's now proofs there that that's the right objective, particularly when you've got some great IP. I mean, we will spend in development, probably sometimes up to two years. I'm going back and forward on a show. Is it right

to go to market? Is it timely now? So we have these development meetings with our team, and then we work with the UK, So we're in with the UK with the US TV, and we're going back and forward on content and trends. And broadcasters don't have that much time. They got massive, big they got share, they've got sales clients, they got a whole world of different things that they need to focus on where we can take a lot

of that pain away from them. And I think James certainly learnt that straight away to go, Yeah, you guys have done all that and you've got proof of concept. I would like to see the Australian broadcasters take a few more risks at some point. We've got to sort of step up and go, right, we're going to take on a format that is a paper format, but it's up to us to put the rigor and the focus and the due diligence around to go this is worth

taking a risk on. And I feel that there's not as much of that, I mean, but shows can still be a risk. I mean, Marsa's Cheff was sort of a late afternoon show in the UK, so to put that in prime time was risky and particularly in terms of how we built it out, but it was still a format that existed. So I do feel sometimes we're a bit risk averse. You know. That probably comes with the pressure of the business as well, because you know, I took some risk of my last year at ten

and some went well and some didn't. You know, you've got to juggle those around and kind of that's the tricky part of the business, I suppose. But I do feel there's opportunities to take some of those risks if you've got a platform of content that's working really well, you can afford to kind of take a few risks or some other shows and see where they go, and even start small. Go you know what, I really think, whatdy?

This show could be a big twenty part series eventually, but let's start small and do six or eight episodes or something like that. And that way, you know you're not taking on a massive, big risk. You're giving a go. It's not necessary a format that exists, it's it's from a great, brilliant idea that you go, yeah, we could we take the risk of doing that show. So I do feel sometimes that's hard, but I also get the fact that the business is tough as well.

sort of as it unfolded. How was that moment for you and what did that mean for television?

me up. I was actually literally jumping on a plane to go on a mid year break with the family for a week in Fiji, and the doors were about to close, and he said, I've got something to tell you, and I said, I've just got one question before the door closes. What the hell's a turkey flat? And because I had I had no idea, But you know, we shouldn't laugh about it, but it was. It was clearly very serious at the time, and I think it was probably one of those moments that was possibly a turning

point for the series. It was frustrating because other networks grabbed onto it, so you had current affair, you had a think today tonight it was running and I think for memory that was sort of they was sort of showing the footage or elements of the footage, and we didn't even show the footage, but it was a channel to that was very hard. Normally, normally in television, when a lot of things happened, they happen and they can

be a benefit. That clearly was a bit. It was wrong on every level, and we acted appropriately with those that were subjected to it, those that were involved in the incident, and we acted in an appropriate way. It's just not something that we could ever support, and we were quite shocked.

and what have you. But yeah, it was. It was extremely unfortunate and.

it doesn't mean that it wasn't less engaging. You absolutely would always call it Big Brother because that's that's the heritage of it, and that was the affection of it. But you can always tweak and evolve and pivot in certain directions with any format, but you wouldn't certainly change the name.

in VIVO and building that business. I'm not on the broadcast side anymore, but arguably the conversations that you know I've had with the broadcast is that that's just of equal value. Now. The revenue is not there yet, but through vos and with those ten down what they're developing up, you're going to see how they all about to monetize

that side of the business. Really well, what we've done at ITV in the UK is actually changed the very business model or the model of how ITV operates, and it's very much sort of an on demand lead that is multifaceted, so it's not just free to air. First it could be on demand lead, the free to wear portal, and then a hub portal and then whatever it is.

So it's the way we create content now that doesn't necessarily just have a free to wear lens through it, and that might be from a scripted point of view or even from a nonscripted point of view. It's the term that Kevinligo in the in the UK, who is the director of content at ITV, it's that I've got to know what's underneath the floorboards. So you leave that

moment where you go, what's under the floorboards. I've got to find out because in the streaming world that's what's expected now with the way they produce content in ten seconds, in eight seconds and seven seconds, you're about to see the next episode. I muzzle hang around and what's the next episode? To see what's under the floorboards?

and they're having some great success. I mean, I don't know about you, but I'd be enormously frustrated when you know Billions comes up on stand, I've got to wait a week to see the next episode. I want to watch it now. And so for the broadcast is now it's about okay, we've got to protect the free to wear business. We've got to build the beaver business because look, I've got kids, and I've got a grandchild. And my kids now are in there from their mid thirties down

to mid twenties plus a grandchild. It's hard to get them to go what are you watching on free to wear nowadays? So they will thankfully, thankfully, they like I'm a Celebrity, and I like mad as Hell and a few shows that Dad makes, but not always it's hard to find their way through or they'll catch it up later. So that it's then a shift of how do you correct content that fits in that model as well? So

it's a combination of both. So and when we talk to the broadcasts at the moment, they absolutely look at the BVOD play will this have a BVOD number? Will it connect with those younger audiences. There's a great show that we've just launched in the UK called the Cabins, which is another dating format. It came from the Netherlands called Let Love Rule. In the UK it's called the Cabins. So it launched an ITV too. It's the highest numbers

in b VOD since Love Island. Now, the linear numbers were okay, you know, good, but where they saw the numbers was like the b VOD point of view and they're going, oh, this is fantastic because it's targeted. You can watch two or three episodes fits that demographic, younger audience. So there's definitely shows that have to and always will

be purely free to airplay. But there is those that, in an ideal world, will be shows that can cut across ball and I think that's kind of the golden If you can find content that does that, then you've got a much better chance of getting a commission.

thing about Love Island. The Australian version has performed exceptionally well in the UK exceptionally well, and so our version was in excess of a million viewers on ITV too. So to actually go to screen Queensland, it's a tourism friend to say we can showcase how beautiful Queensland is to the world because our version is shown in some thirty or forty countries, so there's a lot of benefits for it to being in Queensland. That's another big project that needs to get his head around.

So we then s out of the negotiations with Mark and Carl at Shine on the format, which sort of made summer headway. But you know, like anything, it takes time. It takes time. It takes time, and literally I was only days away from doing the upfronts where you showcase all your big new shows for the year. We'd canceled

Big Brother. I didn't have Master's chef and we're literally only days away, and I'm going, oh my god, and I remember Carl and I and Carl won't mind me telling this story, we literally hung up the phone not agreeing to do the show. We weren't going to get there. And it wasn't a creative compensation. It was about the deal,

the terms and all that sort of stuff. And I respect them enormously, don't get me wrong, But it was just one of those conversations I have and I h the phone, I went, holy shit, I've got two days I'm doing these upfronts. And then I was running late. I was going to Kyle's wedding, Kyle Sandalan's wedding because he's on Australia at the time, and so I sort of got my wife and we ran off. Well I could think about, with Jesus, what the hell am I going to replace Big Brother with? And I haven't got

marstership and what have you? And then I think Mark and I and Carl they had another conversation, so literally then it was like the day before when we had the deal done, and then I could go to the upfronts and say, okay, well, big brother you've loved here's a new show called Marstership. And then what what made it worse was that literally we ran this little sizzle from the UK show because we hadn't we didn't have

the Australian show to show them. And I did the big song and dance and now it's going to be great and it's going to be big and all that sort of suff come along for the ride, all these major media buyers. So I did the big song and dance, act, the ship and glitter as I call it, did the ship and glitter, and then literally then there was a pause. And then normally they kind of applause or clap or

do something, there was literally nothing. There was silence and you could hear crickets in the room and I went, oh, well that's gone well. And no one, no one felt that it was a good self, no one felt that it was going to work. And media buyers and we couldn't get a sponsor on the show. We eventually got Coals. Cole's weren't there, and so it was like, what have I done. I've made the biggest blunder of my career potentially, And so there was you know, building up to it

and then going great, I've got this show. Now I'm going to sell it into all these media buys. We're going to spend one hundreds of millions of dollars on Channel ten, and I go and sell it in and then nothing. So it was one of those moments in television. And then you know, I can tell the story now because it then became a great success. So yeah, it was. It was one of those moments where you start to reconsider life in general.