Unscripted Market: Who's Buying What in '25, Streamer-by-Streamer
From Netflix to Max: It's not just true crime as nonfiction breaks new ground with IP-based spinoffs, sports docs and MrBeast's $100 million gamble
Elaine Low recently interviewed a TV director helping Angelenos who lost homes to wildfire, reported on self-financing and three more trends disrupting TV, and covered what kinds of scripted shows are being bought at HBO and Max, Netflix, Prime Video, NBCU and Peacock, Disney’s ABC , Disney+ and FX, Apple TV+ and CBS, Paramount+ and Showtime.
It’s a new week, readers. If you’re in L.A., I hope you find yourselves safe and in better spirits than the last. If you’ve been displaced by the fires or know someone who has, here’s a list of resources from last week’s newsletter, which also offers practical and emotional advice from TV director Jeff Hunt — whose Malibu home burned down in the 2018 Woolsey Fire — on what to do next.
This week, we’re taking a look at the unscripted (aka nonfiction) market, a broad category that includes everything from reality shows to competition series to documentaries. We talk a lot around these parts about Peak TV, which crested with 600 scripted series in 2022, but one figure that has remained elusive is the number of unscripted series in the ether. Most producers I’ve spoken to say that nonfiction shows definitely outnumber scripted shows, but the arena is less centralized.
If scripted TV is like New York City, compact and dense and organized on a grid (one that’s monitored by FX’s John Landgraf and his research team, who keep a tally of total titles year to year), unscripted TV is more akin to Los Angeles, sprawling clusters of neighborhoods with unique cultures unto themselves.
Like the scripted market, however, nonfiction is going through a period of creative conservatism. I’m told there’s a reliance on formats and genres that work — viewers can’t get enough of true crime! — and few buyers want to take big risks.
“The market has definitely contracted for a number of different reasons: consolidation, people trying to clean up their P-and-Ls, tremendous debt,” says one nonscripted TV agent. “There’s a dysfunction [among] senior-level executives, in terms of understanding how their companies work and the different platforms, how they all work together.”
And amid seemingly endless rounds of layoffs, the remaining network and studio execs are “more fearful, which, of course, is not great for creativity or taking risks,” this person says. “So there’s been a regression to the lowest common denominator.”
But several nonscripted producers I spoke to believe that vibe could shift in the new year as a few new formats have become notable hits. Look at Peacock breakout The Traitors, for one. The Alan Cumming-hosted murder mystery competition, like so many other great reality series, is based on a Dutch format, and has been crowned as a standout as its third season begins.
Then there’s Netflix’s Squid Game: The Challenge, released in late 2023, a novelty in that it is a competition series based on a scripted drama sensation.
“As nonscripted producers, we can’t control the purse strings or the appetite, but we’re crafty by nature, and it’s just always trying to think of the next thing that somebody else hasn’t thought of,” says Wheelhouse Entertainment CEO Brent Montgomery. “The scripted IP-to-nonscripted [concept] was really genius.”
The broadcast networks still host the grandaddies of the genre, including ABC’s The Bachelor and Dancing With the Stars, NBC’s The Voice, and CBS’s Survivor and The Amazing Race. (All these series of course make their way to their streaming siblings; Paramount+’s reality slate in particular, with a few exceptions like The Family Stallone, comes almost entirely from its network and cable siblings.)
Over on cable, Bravo remains the diva-queen, with seven out of the 10 top-rated cable reality series in the 18-49 demo. But room for new players is scarce on linear, perhaps with the exception of reality broadcaster extraordinaire Fox, which already features a robust slate that includes MasterChef, The Floor and Lego Masters. Helmed by Rob Wade, the linear network is “a very strong buyer right now,” according to a second agent.
So today we’ll be focusing primarily on the areas of growth, i.e. the streaming platforms. I’ll run through Netflix, Peacock, Amazon Studios, Hulu and Disney+, Max and Discovery, Apple TV+, and Paramount+, and you’ll learn:
The unscripted genres that can’t lose (it’s not just true crime)
Which streamer “seems to have lost its wallet,” according to an agent
Innovative formats shaking up reality competitions
How global launches are changing the rules of nonfiction
The megahit that’s opening doors in streaming for digital creators
Which streamer is considered “by far the most dysfunctional nonfiction buyer in the market”
The player punching above its weight in social experiments and dating shows
Why The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives succeeded where other influencer-driven shows have missed
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