TVN It closed the year 2023 with a decision that is unprecedented on the local screen. Through an agreement that remains confidential, the public channel sold the adaptation rights of at least 3 original television series to Mega, its direct competition. The first one in the production process is already known: it is The Lord of La Querencia (2008).
This agreement has generated a stir in the industry, due to its unprecedented nature and because in 2023 the project was different. Roberto Cisternas, then programming director of TVNwanted to take advantage of the channel’s extensive library of intellectual property – most of it available to the public on the signal TVN3 since July of last year – and produce new versions of classics, also successfully revisited by today’s audiences in different formats on the internet. With this idea, the executive hoped to lift the depressed screen of the public channel, resuming the tradition of making television series and taking advantage of the good tunes provided by the Santiago 2023 Pan American and Parapan American Games.
The model was low cost for the channel, which would only provide the original script, the studios and the screen space. The rest of the production would be on behalf of Rio Estudios. Actor Pablo Díaz’s production company offered itself as the main investor and manager of agreements with an OTT platform, such as Netflix or Amazon.
The idea of making remakes It’s nothing new. Currently in the streaming new versions of the Brazilian can be found Pantanalor the Mexican ones Passion of Hawks y Cradle of wolves, among other. The adaptation business is not a mystery to us either. TVN. For two decades, the television station has sold dozens of adaptations abroad, such as Where is Elisawhich has been sold to 16 countries, Market loves y Partners in crimeamong other.
The “traced” business
In this case, Rio Estudios showed the numbers and signed with TVN a confidentiality agreement on the details and costs to implement the business. In October they had – according to project collaborators – a draft contract. But Roberto Cisternas’ management already had little support in the teams, in the commercial area and in the board of directors, where this idea of raising the screen with new versions of classic dramas was never among the priorities.
The figures from the financial report did have an impact, which showed losses of $4,732 million in the January-September 2023 period. In September, Finance Manager Verena Horst resigned, while Cisternas left her position on October 5 and was replaced by Eduardo Cabezas. , who dedicated himself to producing the summer festivals and the remakes was left on hold. Finally, the agreement with Mega It was signed in November.
Now, the contingency of tragedies at the national level, and before the internal controversy over the Featherweight affair, caused this business to be relegated from the most important things. Inside the public station, the agreement with Mega –With which TVN competes for the advertising pie – is well evaluated, taking into account the financial situation of the channel, which requires liquidity to function. Nor does the agreement mean the end of the project that existed with Rio Estudios, they point out.
But in the production company the relationship with TVN It is too distant to continue “exploring” any association in the future. Although at Rio Estudios they are careful that the business is not “traced” to the one they designed for the public station and which was detailed in the confidentiality agreements. Among others, which was evaluated Someone is watching you as another possible adaptation.
Sell the recipe
Aware of the agreement with Mega –that the Bethia group station keeps in reserve – they affirm that among the titles sold to the competition there are great classics from the Sabatini-Rencoret era, such as The fair o Market loves. These sources estimate the price of each title at US$200 thousand, so it is not an agreement that could impact the finances of the public channel. But it does have a reputational effect, contrary to the deployment led by Francisco Vidal, the president of the board of directors, who announced changes and highlighted the social role of the station in the conflict over the event for the victims of the fires.
“A channel that sells its intellectual property to the competition is selling the recipe to the competition. It is selling your heart,” says a union leader who asks for reservations. The decision of TVN It is an alert on. “It is a business that shows a channel adrift, looking for easy money, without strategy or vision for the future,” complements the leader.
Among television drama writers, they see the adaptation of The Lord of La Querencia, and others that Mega may do in the future, as a possible flank of conflict. There was already a similar one in 2021, when Pablo Illanes and other scriptwriters sued TVN for not complying with the payment of 4.5% of the sale of rights abroad, which was stipulated in the contracts. The 1st Civil Court of Santiago ordered arbitration between the parties. In this case, the consulted authors do not rule out legal actions to protect their intellectual property.
At the same time, TVN At the end of January, it signed an agreement with the Corporation of Audiovisual Directors and Screenwriters (DYGA), chaired by Vicente Sabatini, to regulate “the rates and payment conditions for the public communication in our country of audiovisual works whose repertoire is managed by said entity. of collective management”, according to the agreement, which does not contemplate adaptations abroad, much less on the competition screen.
In Mega take the new version seriously The Lord of La Querencia and they would already have Gabriel Cañas – the star of Generation 98his success currently on air – as an actor for the leading role and, in addition, there would be advanced negotiations with a platform of streaming.