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Friday, November 09, 2018
How the Entertainment Biz is Rising to Meet Demand for Adaptations
Variety: With around 520 original series set to premiere on television in 2019, a 69% increase in the past five years, the demand for source material and existing intellectual property in Hollywood is greater than ever.
6 comments:
Annika Evens
said...
I had never really considered what goes into figuring out what the concept for a TV is going to be. However, I definitely have been noticing that there have been so many more shows based on books recently. With this increase of adaptations, I find it hard to find shows that are truly original works and previously I have always had some higher level of respect for the completely original works, but this article does make a good point that if a show creator could have two or three original ideas for a show but when they have seven or eight changes to sell shows to companies they need to have more ideas, so turning to books to make adaptations out of is actually a really good idea. I think that making a book into a TV show would take a lot of creativity because taking one book and making it into a movie just takes the story from that one book and puts in it one movie, but a TV show needs to take the story from a book and make it into many many episodes so I do believe that there is probably more room for new ideas and additions to the storyline in a TV adaptation of a book than there is in a movie
While I find the influx of book and literature-based film and television amazing, it’s interesting that it has gained so much popularity. I personally love A Handmaid’s Tale, I think it’s strange that book based shows/movies are getting so popular. I think it says a lot on the way Hollywood works right now. Instead of originals being the “hot item”, pieces that already exist are in high demand. I’m not sure if this is a good thing or a bad thing. It either means that people love books and want to see them on the big/little screen, or it means that people want to know the stories behind these books and don’t have the time to read them or don’t want to read them in favor of seeing them. This means a lot to the authors and publishing companies in that they are selling rights and making exorbitant amounts of money on a few books, but it also means that we’re putting a lot of focus on just a few books over the thousands that are already out there. But still, I can’t get over the benefits of bringing old writings back into pop culture.
TV shows are an amazing way for people to enjoy a story in segments since it allows them to enjoy a story- anticipate its story, track the various character arcs etc. In such a scenario, can someone actually enjoy a television show if it is an adaptation, something whose story characters, setting etc are already known to the world. How can someone anticipate what is going to happen in the story when they are already aware of what the next part of the story is? Adaptations have become the thing of the moment. Several books and films are adapted every year to become a television show. Reasons are several. For one, the producers are aware of the reception that the concerned received, so they can low key eye ball how might the audience like and appreciate the production, giving producers some piece of mind. Second, they have a guideline to follow; they know exactly where the story is headed, so they dont quite have to beat their heads about might come next in the show. There are downsides to these reasons to. Just knowing the reception for the concerned show does not guarantee success for the show because people react to stories in different mediums in different ways. They can either be happy to see what they imagined the story to be like or be distressed about the way their liked story was represented on television. Next, adaptations take away the freedom that story writers have. If it is an original story, writers can easily change the course of the story to make it work in its benefit something which is risky when dealing with an adaptation. It is because of these reasons that I feel like original stories should be preferred over adaptations.
I had never thought about the pressure to produce content inside of the television industry. As people watch more television and streaming services increase the number of shows they produce, we need more good content. And while it can be in frustrating that there is no “new” content, encouraging people to read books is never a bad thing. It's wonderful that producers and writers are looking to books that may have not been read by younger audiences like The Handmaid's Tale. That being said, I don't understand the articles point on how looking to books increases diversity. To me it seem that if you were to look back in time for books, they would primarily be written by white men. Therefore, as producers look to older novels for TV shows, they would be picking ones to produce by those authors. That being said, diversity in TV is continuing to improve so if using books as source material is helping, that's great.
In an industry that’s hustling to create more content, books seem like an adequate solution in the hunt for original storylines, but the trend causes me to have worries. First off, as in any adaptation weather from book to movie to broadway show, the writers are increasing the risk of cliches. For instance when Mean Girls came out on broadway I had never seen the movie, when I watched the show I was unimpressed with the story line: new girl makes friends with mean girls has love triangle with “main” mean girl the realises she wants to be nice. The most cliche story ever. But there is a flaw in my logic. Can Mean Girls really be called a Cliche when it practically invented this cliche? And if not invented it popularised it? Can a storyline created before a cliche was created be considered cliche? My other worry is that books seem like it will eventually become a dying art which to me is very sad. In school whenever we read a book with an adaptation you bet we were gonna walk in to class one day to see that glorious tv on a cart in order to watch it. This was great when only a few of the books we read were adapted to the screen but when that number keeps increasing you run the risk of allowing people to avoid reading the book, especially school-aged kids looking to save a few hours. Overall these problems are minor but will influence the industry in the long run.
This is something that I think we as an industry really started to notice after last years Tony's. Almost everything on the stage that was nominated was based off of something else. Whether that be a movie or TV show or book and truthfully I was worried that we were going to reward that over the creation of new art. I was happy when The Bands Visit won all the awards. That being said I do think that there is a place for the Mean Girls and the Legally Blondes of the world to exist. You are never going to get most every day tourists in Time Square to go to some new and risk taking theater. They just don't want to. So as a way for our business to survive I think it is vital that we learn how to do these adaptations in a better way. Mean Girls is successful because of the movie's success not because the show is good or brings anything new to the table. We have to take these stories and create new theatrical molds for them instead of trying to shove them into the molds that already exist. I love an adaptation as much as the next person but we can't pretend they are high art.
6 comments:
I had never really considered what goes into figuring out what the concept for a TV is going to be. However, I definitely have been noticing that there have been so many more shows based on books recently. With this increase of adaptations, I find it hard to find shows that are truly original works and previously I have always had some higher level of respect for the completely original works, but this article does make a good point that if a show creator could have two or three original ideas for a show but when they have seven or eight changes to sell shows to companies they need to have more ideas, so turning to books to make adaptations out of is actually a really good idea. I think that making a book into a TV show would take a lot of creativity because taking one book and making it into a movie just takes the story from that one book and puts in it one movie, but a TV show needs to take the story from a book and make it into many many episodes so I do believe that there is probably more room for new ideas and additions to the storyline in a TV adaptation of a book than there is in a movie
While I find the influx of book and literature-based film and television amazing, it’s interesting that it has gained so much popularity. I personally love A Handmaid’s Tale, I think it’s strange that book based shows/movies are getting so popular. I think it says a lot on the way Hollywood works right now. Instead of originals being the “hot item”, pieces that already exist are in high demand. I’m not sure if this is a good thing or a bad thing. It either means that people love books and want to see them on the big/little screen, or it means that people want to know the stories behind these books and don’t have the time to read them or don’t want to read them in favor of seeing them. This means a lot to the authors and publishing companies in that they are selling rights and making exorbitant amounts of money on a few books, but it also means that we’re putting a lot of focus on just a few books over the thousands that are already out there. But still, I can’t get over the benefits of bringing old writings back into pop culture.
TV shows are an amazing way for people to enjoy a story in segments since it allows them to enjoy a story- anticipate its story, track the various character arcs etc. In such a scenario, can someone actually enjoy a television show if it is an adaptation, something whose story characters, setting etc are already known to the world. How can someone anticipate what is going to happen in the story when they are already aware of what the next part of the story is?
Adaptations have become the thing of the moment. Several books and films are adapted every year to become a television show. Reasons are several. For one, the producers are aware of the reception that the concerned received, so they can low key eye ball how might the audience like and appreciate the production, giving producers some piece of mind.
Second, they have a guideline to follow; they know exactly where the story is headed, so they dont quite have to beat their heads about might come next in the show.
There are downsides to these reasons to. Just knowing the reception for the concerned show does not guarantee success for the show because people react to stories in different mediums in different ways. They can either be happy to see what they imagined the story to be like or be distressed about the way their liked story was represented on television.
Next, adaptations take away the freedom that story writers have. If it is an original story, writers can easily change the course of the story to make it work in its benefit something which is risky when dealing with an adaptation.
It is because of these reasons that I feel like original stories should be preferred over adaptations.
I had never thought about the pressure to produce content inside of the television industry. As people watch more television and streaming services increase the number of shows they produce, we need more good content. And while it can be in frustrating that there is no “new” content, encouraging people to read books is never a bad thing. It's wonderful that producers and writers are looking to books that may have not been read by younger audiences like The Handmaid's Tale. That being said, I don't understand the articles point on how looking to books increases diversity. To me it seem that if you were to look back in time for books, they would primarily be written by white men. Therefore, as producers look to older novels for TV shows, they would be picking ones to produce by those authors. That being said, diversity in TV is continuing to improve so if using books as source material is helping, that's great.
In an industry that’s hustling to create more content, books seem like an adequate solution in the hunt for original storylines, but the trend causes me to have worries. First off, as in any adaptation weather from book to movie to broadway show, the writers are increasing the risk of cliches. For instance when Mean Girls came out on broadway I had never seen the movie, when I watched the show I was unimpressed with the story line: new girl makes friends with mean girls has love triangle with “main” mean girl the realises she wants to be nice. The most cliche story ever. But there is a flaw in my logic. Can Mean Girls really be called a Cliche when it practically invented this cliche? And if not invented it popularised it? Can a storyline created before a cliche was created be considered cliche? My other worry is that books seem like it will eventually become a dying art which to me is very sad. In school whenever we read a book with an adaptation you bet we were gonna walk in to class one day to see that glorious tv on a cart in order to watch it. This was great when only a few of the books we read were adapted to the screen but when that number keeps increasing you run the risk of allowing people to avoid reading the book, especially school-aged kids looking to save a few hours. Overall these problems are minor but will influence the industry in the long run.
This is something that I think we as an industry really started to notice after last years Tony's. Almost everything on the stage that was nominated was based off of something else. Whether that be a movie or TV show or book and truthfully I was worried that we were going to reward that over the creation of new art. I was happy when The Bands Visit won all the awards. That being said I do think that there is a place for the Mean Girls and the Legally Blondes of the world to exist. You are never going to get most every day tourists in Time Square to go to some new and risk taking theater. They just don't want to. So as a way for our business to survive I think it is vital that we learn how to do these adaptations in a better way. Mean Girls is successful because of the movie's success not because the show is good or brings anything new to the table. We have to take these stories and create new theatrical molds for them instead of trying to shove them into the molds that already exist. I love an adaptation as much as the next person but we can't pretend they are high art.
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