Content is still king without a doubt, but the throne is more of a moving target. A decent program might hop platforms, become its own global franchise or disappear.
The inaugural Business of Entertainment track at this year’s NAB Show, produced in partnership with Hollywood business publication The Ankler, will feature entrepreneurs and executives navigating the mutability of today’s entertainment market.
The BoE track will feature 10 sessions Sunday and Monday, April 6-7 (W217-218), and a Main Stage event with WWE President Nick Khan and WWE Chief Content Officer Paul “Triple H” Levesque, Wednesday, April 9, from 10:30 to 11:30 a.m.
Khan and Levesque, also a longtime grappler, will discuss how they envision the 72-year-old wrestling juggernaut’s future, with The Ankler’s Sean McNulty moderating, Wednesday, April 9 from 10:30 to 11:30 a.m. An Exhibits Pass is required.
“NAB is thrilled to have Nick Khan and Paul Levesque to take the stage for this all-new programming track,” Karen Chupka, executive vice president and managing director, NAB Global Connections and Events, said. “We’re also excited to work with The Ankler to bring the very latest and most well-informed perspectives to these sessions.”
Other topics in the track include a look at the vast category of unscripted TV, leveraging a brand, what attracts investors
and more.
As co-founders and co-CEOs of Candle Media, Tom Staggs and Kevin Mayer are on the leading edge of content investment. Blackstone-led Candle was formed less than four years ago and quickly made several acquisitions, most notably, Reese Witherspoon’s production company, Hello Sunshine.
In a Monday session titled “Navigating the Future of Hollywood: Opportunities in Uncertain Times,” from 11:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m., Mayer and Staggs will share their insights on how major Hollywood players are regrouping after work strikes, a spending contraction, evolving audience habits and profoundly destructive wildfires. The duo will discuss where content investment and production is heading and how to stay ahead of the curve.
The unscripted genre, once the unsophisticated sibling of scripted series, now dominates the content landscape. In “Reality Check: The New Rules of Unscripted TV,” Tuesday from 3 to 4 p.m., Ankler entertainment journalist Elaine Low will lead a discussion with reality execs and entrepreneurs that focuses on evolving viewer habits, the impact of content globalization plus the role of AI and social media.
Low will be joined by Emmy and Peabody winner Andrew Fried, founder and CEO of Boardwalk Pictures (“Where’s My Jet?,” “The Black Godfather,” “Val”); Critics Choice Awards winner and Pantheon Media CEO Jennifer O’Connell (“The Way Down,” “Heaven’s Gate,” “What Happened, Brittany Murphy?”); food, home and lifestyle content maven Courtney White, president of Wheelhouse Entertainment; and Emmy winner Howard
Owens (“Running Wild With Bear Grylls,” “Life Below Zero,” “The Biggest Loser”), founder and co-CEO of Propagate.
When it comes to leveraging a brand, few have mastered it so well as Fenton Bailey and Randy Barbato, co-founders of World of Wonder and executive producers of “RuPaul’s Drag Race.”
Creating content, scoring distribution and making it stick is a feat in the evolving platform ecosystem, so Bailey and Barbato built their own platform and created a global phenomenon in the process. In the session “Werk Ethic: The Art of Building a Global Brand, Drag Race Universe and Beyond,” Monday, 1:30-2:15 p.m., Bailey and Barbato, executive producers of “RuPaul’s Drag Race,” will discuss how they have managed and grown the success of the drag performance competition show with 29 Emmys, now in its 17th season and franchised in more than 20 countries.
The pair launched their own streaming app, WOW Presents Plus, eight years ago on the strength of the “Drag Race” brand.
Sessions and speakers were still being added at press time. A complete lineup of the Business of Entertainment track will be available on the NAB Show session search site.
© NAB
