I wrote about 14 private equity firms ready to pounce on Hollywood, covered media M&A activity so far this year, reported on stars’ big paydays as game show hosts and analyzed who’s seeing upside from the year’s box office wins.
Michael Ellenberg isn’t being diplomatic. When he tells creators they should be platform-agnostic when shopping a show, he means it.
“We’re always surprised,” the Media Res founder says, explaining that a streamer or network that seems tailor-made for a project might be utterly uninterested, while one that feels like a long shot will pounce. “Things change monthly at the buyers.”
And if anyone has a line on what Hollywood buyers are looking for, it’s the guy running the independent television and film studio that’s in business with all of them.
Media Res’ TV crown jewel is The Morning Show, which will return in 2027 with its fifth and final season on Apple TV. Earlier this year Ellenberg’s company premiered Elizabeth Banks and Matthew Macfadyen dramedy The Miniature Wife at Peacock, while its development slate includes The Dealer starring Jessica Chastain and Adam Driver at Apple, crime drama Durango with 20th Television at Hulu and Enigma Variations starring Aaron Taylor-Johnson at Netflix — its first-ever series with the town’s biggest buyer. “It looks phenomenal,” says Ellenberg of Enigma, which is filming in Italy. “They are the kind of dailies you like looking at every night. They make you want to leave your house.”
Media Res also has multiple projects in various stages of development with HBO, including its adaptation of Adrian McKinty’s bestselling novel The Chain, which reunites Ellenberg with The Leftovers showrunner Damon Lindelof, and the just-announced gambling drama Advantage Player from Will Graham (Daisy Jones & the Six), with Riley Keough set to star.
Before founding Media Res in 2017, Ellenberg was the head of drama at HBO, where he oversaw not just Lindelof’s critical darling but also massive hits including Big Little Lies, True Detective and Game of Thrones.
When I talked with him last year about the resurgence of indie TV, Ellenberg was bullish on ambitious television amid out-of-the-box hits like Baby Reindeer and Severance. Since then, you can add Heated Rivalry (Crave/HBO), Widow’s Bay (Apple), Ride or Die (Amazon), Furious (Hulu) and more to the list of breakout shows that prove you can take a swing as long as you know who your audience is.
“The audience is frisky and curious and rewarding big swings,” Ellenberg tells me. “Frankly, the things that feel safer right now are harder to break through.”
In about two weeks, Media Res is headed to Italy as the film adaptation of James Graham’s Tony-winning play Ink opens this year’s Venice Film Festival. Ellenberg optioned the play, and Media Res developed Graham’s script about Rupert Murdoch’s (Guy Pearce) early days owning The Sun with Oscar-winning director Danny Boyle. “It’s a great moment for us. Those are my roots,” says Ellenberg, who spent four years at Ridley Scott’s Scott Free before moving to HBO. “I started in film, and we’re excited that we’re having success there too.” (Ink was produced by Media Res, House Productions and StudioCanal, which financed and will release the film in major international territories, while Netflix picked up U.S. and Latin American rights.)
Ahead of that Venice bow, I caught up with Ellenberg to hear his thoughts on the state of independent TV now, what it takes to successfully sell a show in this market, how he can tell when a series has run its course and why streamers and networks are friendlier than ever to indie companies like Media Res.
In this conversation, edited for length and clarity, Ellenberg gets into:
- The four questions he asks before taking on a project — and the trait he prizes most in creators
- Why it’s getting harder for “safe” shows to break through as audiences reward bigger swings
- The new cost ceiling where buyers won’t budge — and the non-negotiable for any bigger-budget swing
- Why The Morning Show outlasted its original plan — and how producers and stars knew it was time to end it
- How to read each buyer’s wildly different definition of success when “there are no clear rules”
- Why being platform-agnostic may be the most important selling strategy right now
Don’t stop here
Get the rest of this story — and the scoops and intelligence Hollywood reads first.
Already a subscriber?
Comments
Only Ankler All Access subscribers can comment
Already a subscriber?