NBCUniversal Streaming Strategy, Name, Revealed Programming

NBCUniversal unveiled the name, initial programming and strategy of its future streaming service.

The consumer-centric platform, directly funded by advertising, will be called Peacock. It will be launched in April 2020 with programming of over 15,000 hours of content, including exclusive library titles such as Parks and Recreation and originals, including reboots from Battlestar Galactica, saved by the bell and Punky Brewster. Peacock will occupy a central place in NBC's coverage of the summer Olympics in 2020, when the entire NBCUniversal group will end up behind the platform through a massive marketing promotion campaign of the service, the originals to be launched after the Games.

"The name Peacock pays tribute to the quality content that the public now expects from NBCUniversal – that it's all about cultural dramas that define the culture of innovative creators like Sam Esmail, from comedies out loud. legends such as Lorne Michaels and Mike Schur, from Universal Photos blockbusters, or an animated and scriptless programming of those who work best at Bravo and E!, "said Bonnie Hammer, president of direct broadcast companies to the consumer and digital. "Peacock will be the favorite place for the present and timeless moment. – Olympic moments not to be missed and the election of 2020 to the classic favorites of fans like Office. "

Peacock will be the exclusive broadcast house for both Office and The parks, while other library books are expected to debut at the time of their launch on the service, they will ultimately be exclusive to the platform. These titles – which are almost all from their Universal TV and UCP studio counterparts – are 30 Rock, Bates Motel, Battlestar Galactica, Brooklyn Nine-Nine, Cheers, Chrisley Knows Best, Secret Business, Downton Abbey, Everyone Loves Raymond, Frasier, Friday Night Lights, House, Keeping Up with Kardashian, King Queens, Married … With Children, Monk, Parenthood, Psych, Royal Sore, Saturday Night Live, Superstore, The Real Housewives, Top Chef and Will & Grace.

The titles of the group's feature film library, including those of Universal, DreamWorks Animation and Focus Features, will also be available at launch, but not exclusively. Peacock will also use Universal's long division to create television series from its established film franchises. Library titles available at launch are American Pie, Bridesmaids, Stunned, Meet the Parents, Meet the Fools, A Beautiful Mind, Back to the Future, Brokeback Mountain, Casino, Dallas Buyers Club, Do What's Right , Erin Brockovich, ET, Field of dreams, Jaws, Mama Mia, Shrek and The breakfast club. the Bourne, despicable me and Fast furious Franchises will also be available.

More than 3,000 hours of NBCU Telmundo content will also be available on Peacock, including an original comedy drama Armas of Mujer and a handful of library titles.

The first Peacock artist series will consist of a new interpretation of Battlestar Galactica of Mr. Robot the creator Sam Esmail; Dr. Death, with Alec Baldwin, Jamie Dornan and Christian Slater; Brave New World, formerly developed for the United States and starring Demi Moore; limited series Angelyne, of Esmail and starring Emmy Rossum and based on a Hollywood Reporter functionality; and thriller One of us is lying down. (The latter will be a pilot.)
On the comedy front, the original list includes an updated version of Saved by the gong Tracey Wigfield (Good news) Rutherford Falls, co-created by Mike Schur (The right place), Ed Helms and Sierra Teller Ornelas and starring Helms; pilot Direct conversation, by Rashida Jones and starring Jada Pinkett Smith; a Punky Brewster continued (also a pilot) with Soleil Moon Frye; and the second spin-off of psych. Those who join the previously announced NBC import A.P. Bio on the service.

On the non-scripted front, the platform includes SNL docuseries Who wrote this, the creator Lorne Michaels; an original talk show by Jimmy Fallon; a late-night weekly show featuring Seth Meyers' Amber Ruffin; and a fallout from Bravo Real housewives franchise.

Price details and an official launch date will be announced at a later date. The platform will also feature news and sports content that will also be revealed in the weeks and months to come.

Peacock is the latest addition to the increasingly crowded broadcast space as established media brands such as Comcast, Disney and WarnerMedia attempt to compete in the digital age with players like Amazon and Apple. The strategy of relying on the brand and intellectual property of the larger company is the main focus of Disney + HBO Max and WarnerMedia. Disney +, for example, will be the home of streaming Disney, Pixar, Marvel and Lucasfilm libraries, as well as new series in these worlds.

Downstairs, Hammer talks with The Hollywood Reporter on what to expect from Peacock.

Your slate leans heavily in the Comcast brand with reboots of library titles and new originals from Universal TV and leading UCP producers. What is the pitch of the investor community?

First of all, we are excited because, like everyone else, we have access to an amazing place where NBCU is behind us, with its movie studio, DreamWorks Animation, broadcast, cable channels, news, sports. etc. We are incredibly lucky because we start with a safe of content from which we can play. Then you add the originals to this and our ability to be both timely and timeless – we can be up-to-date and relevant, as well as back to our wonderful headlines. We will also be able to commercialize the largest event of the 2020 Olympics. We can use Symphony to help present and present Peacock – by the way, we love our name – and use it as a marketing ground for our originals that will follow. We will benefit greatly from Symphony, which promotes and markets the entire society for a singular purpose at one time, and broadens its scope to help us promote each other. So, between Symphony, the Olympic Games, the libraries in depth and being topical, we are excited because it shows our legacy.

How is the original programming on Peacock different from USA, Syfy and NBC? Many of your original originals were developed for these outlets or could simply have been placed on these platforms.

Because we are connected to NBC as a whole, we have the ability to remove from each of these entities and to develop and produce essentially something very specific, which corresponds to what we want, which is current and relevant, which lives in our family and comes back to the head. inheritance and is cool for what we want to do. In our library, we are fortunate to have Saved by the gong and Punky Brewster. To restart a specific show, why not do something that can be relevant and timely with a classic loved one? Work with Mike Schur connected to Office and Parks and recreation, Rutherford Falls should work well on Peacock because it will have the same sensitivity of the content we can offer. We can sell from one to another, but also have the tone and sensitivity that are so close to what we have in our library and something new, fresh and relevant. And the same with the drama.

So why put these shows on Peacock and not on NBC? The right place ends, why not put the new Schur show on the linear network? Unless you subscribe to Comcast, you will have to pay to see this now.

We want to create a competitive, relevant service and we develop very specific titles for us. Obviously, there are discussions going on in society, in terms of what we want in relation to others, but for the moment, my goal is to launch in a relevant and strong way. We are currently working with Jimmy Fallon or Seth Meyers. We will select content and develop programs that we believe will work in conjunction with other elements that are directly broadcast on Peacock. For NBCU, why would we have developed something for USA Network that could have gone on NBC? It's our choice of where we want to invest and how we want to target the audience we want to get on Peacock.

Who is the target audience for Peacock? Do you have a demo in mind?

We will be very, very wide. We believe we will have something for everyone. We have two ways of seeing things: we have content to acquire – target and acquire people who want to view noisy originals – and you also have content that we put on the service – which means "hyper frenetic" content. We will probably have the best content worthy of the name with our library of great series and what we want to do is make sure we can run libraries with fresh, relevant content. Not like doing a restart of Saved by the gong and Punky Brewster and BSG – It's stuff we already have that are hyper-worthy that we will add new, fresh and relevant [material to].

How much will Peacock be indebted to Comcast for buying and working with outside studios?

We are connected to all our internal studios – UCP, UTV, DreamWorks, the film group – we will produce a lot internally, but we will not turn away from third parties either. We will go where our strength lies, but we are in business.

Will the Peacock originals have a second window on the linear jacks and vice versa? Brave New World has been developed for USA Network, for example. Is it going to be on Peacock first and then may be on the linear network?

It will be case by case. There is no one size. We sometimes share and we belong completely to others.

Do you plan a weekly deployment for the originals or the pattern of excessive consumption?

We have not made any final decisions. We are looking in every way what makes sense to us.

Library titles are in increasing demand – with Office move to Peacock for $ 500 million just for national rights. You obtain The parks Back from Netflix. How competitive will you be exclusively with these libraries?

Right now we have Office and The parks exclusively. As we progress, more and more titles will be available and you can expect more titles and exclusive content on this service. There is a lot to do with the market right now and what is available and what is not. We will invest smartly and strategically.

With The parks, did you have to go through an "arm's length" negotiation period and if so, would it be the model for everything?

We never talk about points of agreement but I can tell you that we were competitive and very fair.

You pay millions to recover these broadcasts rather than libraries generating revenue from sales to third parties such as Netflix. Should the banner fill this financial gap?

We try to be strategic and invest where we think it makes sense for Peacock. We search where we want to go, what will be the originals, how the originals relate to the inheritance and the library. Like any startup business, we will strategically invest, be smart and be cautious. Our way of thinking and our strategy is to invest in products such as Office that we believe, one way or another, that we will pay back quickly. How that is calculated, we will see later. But you can not create a service without having content and you can not have content unless you pay for it. I think we are doing it the right way and we are not going to random. we do it with a purpose.

Does this mean that HBO's feature film contract with Universal Pictures is coming to an end?

No, we will work with our brothers and sisters from all over the company. We do not try to stop their business; we try to be strategic about what comes to Peacock and when they shoot their movies and make outside deals. It will be case by case. The films we are announcing today for Peacock are not exclusive at the moment.

Will Peacock be a global service?

We start in the United States and ultimately we intend to globalize. But it's a bit down the road.

What is the pricing strategy? This is free for Comcast subscribers, with a price for ad-free subscribers and another for non-Comcast subscribers. Is this still the case?

There will be discussions on long-term pricing. But the strategy is always the same.

How will news and sports be reflected in Peacock?

We see ourselves as timely and timeless, so the news and sports, as well as the pop culture of E! – will be a big part of the streamer. This is one of the reasons that helps us to differentiate. We will be working with our colleagues in the sports department and with Andy Lack and his press service to find ways to be and feel very current. The Olympics being the biggest event of 2020, we will work with the sports team to use the Olympics as one of our launching pads. Olympic Games. We will certainly have enough sports content on Peacock to excite and interest sports fans.

Peacock is launched after Disney + and Apple and around the same time as HBO Max. How are you going to catch up?

The concept is that we will launch in April but our big push starts with the Olympics. Nobody has it but NBCU and Peacock. This will be our starting point, it is here that our marketing will fly and it is at that time that we will start promoting with Symphony. We are deploying 15,000 hours of content in April and starting from there. There will be Olympic content on Peacock.