![\"TV](\"https:\/\/www.productionbase.co.uk\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/09\/2013-09-25-Maddy-Allen-QA.gif\")
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This week KEO Films’ Head of Production, Maddy Allen, discusses working across a number of platforms whilst juggling ever decreasing budgets.<\/b><\/p>\n
How did you get into television?<\/b>
\nIt was a mixture of luck and determination. Although I had always wanted to work in television, I didn\u2019t do any media courses (I studied German at university). I worked my way through a couple of corporate video companies and became corporate producer at a company that did both corporate and broadcast productions. Then I spent a couple of years learning the skills of production before I moved over to the broadcast side of TV.<\/p>\n
As a Head of Production, I don\u2019t necessarily look for people with a media education. I like to have production crew with a variety of backgrounds so whether you\u2019re a media graduate, have spent time travelling or have been working in other industries, all experience is valuable. I\u2019m far more interested in your innate skills and experience than what grades you\u2019ve got on paper.<\/p>\n
You have recently produced Skint and Bradford: City of Dreams. How have you seen the demand for factual entertainment television change in recent years?<\/b>
\nTrends in broadcasting come and go and obviously how and when people watch TV is changing massively, but I believe that if it\u2019s good TV people will watch it, whatever the genre.<\/p>\n
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Terry Pratchett, Choosing to Die, was a very sensitive programme. How do you go about producing sensitive content but always able to keep the audience interested and engaged?<\/b>
\nAs I said before, I believe that if the content is good and well produced, people will watch it. Never underestimate the audience \u2013 they know the difference between observation and exploitation.<\/p>\n
I think the key is gaining the trust of your contributors \u2013 if you are both honest and open with each other, that trust will come across on screen.<\/p>\n
You have recently opened up a new office in Cornwall for KEO Digital, focusing on online content. In your opinion, how important is it to keep up to date with the online and digital markets?<\/b>
\nIt\u2019s important for a television production company like KEO films to produce content and tell stories across a number of platforms above and beyond just television. In doing so it helps us keep up to date with expanding content market, wider opportunities and digital’s economic production methods.<\/p>\n
Budgets are constantly being stretched. As a Head of Production, how are you able to factor this into your planning, without having to sacrifice the quality of production (particularly when HD is now being expected as standard)?<\/b>
\nEver decreasing budgets alongside ever increasing demands on quality and content are a constant concern. You have to start with the elements of the budget that you know you cannot sacrifice: Don\u2019t fool yourself that they\u2019ll edit it in 5 weeks when you know that they\u2019ll need 7 or that the PD can shoot all day and then data wrangle all the material back at the hotel after a 12 hour shoot day! If you do that, you\u2019re only setting yourself up for an overspend at a later date when it may be too late to find the money elsewhere in the budget.<\/p>\n
Obviously, the longer the schedule, the more impact on the budget so we try and be inventive about how to keep the production weeks down but it\u2019s increasingly difficult. And, unfortunately, production crew are inevitably being asked to take on ever increasing responsibilities in order to cut down on numbers of people.<\/p>\n
Increasingly, co-funding or pre-sales on distribution are becoming the only viable options for making programmes. Producing the content that the broadcasters expect on the budgets they\u2019re offering is nigh on impossible.<\/p>\n
After a project is greenlit, what are the first things you have to think about?<\/b>
\nCrewing it up with the right production staff and working out the budget.<\/p>\n
Is it easier planning and producing one off documentaries, or TV series?<\/b>
\nThey both have their own challenges.<\/p>\n
As a successful, award winning independent production company, how are you able to compete with much larger corporations and broadcasters, who may have a lot more disposable income?<\/b>
\nI don\u2019t believe that larger companies do have \u201cdisposable\u201d income. The larger the company, the larger the overheads and the costs of simply running your business from day to day. Keo is a growing company but we are at a size where we can ensure that our budgets go onto the screen.<\/p>\n
How do you compensate when projects end up surpassing their budgets? Can other departments\/projects suffer as a result?<\/b>
\nI\u2019m very firm that each individual project has to shoulder the burden of any overspend it incurs and that another, perhaps more financially strong project, should never \u201csuffer\u201d \u2013 in terms of taking value off screen – to support a loss making project. I think it\u2019s important as a company to have clarity on which projects \/ type of project is profitable or not. That\u2019s not to say we wouldn\u2019t still take on a programme \/ series that we know probably won\u2019t make a profit, but if we\u2019re going to do it, we need to know what kind of financial performance to expect so we can look to other financing. Of course, on the other side of the coin, there are some kinds of projects, particularly series, which can be very profitable for a company and I don\u2019t think that anyone should be embarrassed of having those shows on their slate. We are, after all, businesses!<\/p>\n
How do you think the industry has changed in recent years? And is it for the better?<\/b>
\nWell you could write a book on how the industry has changed over recent years but I would say two of the key changes for me have been: 1: The wealth of choice of programming and broadcasters, as well as viewing platforms for the audience. With so much choice, it\u2019s given production companies a big challenge to reinvent content and how that content is served to your viewers, which can be very exciting. 2: It\u2019s a constant gripe but the ever-decreasing budgets are depressing. In light of the wealth of competition, production companies are spending more time and effort simply getting the money together to produce the projects when those resources should be going into making great TV.<\/p>\n
Maddy Allen is Head of Production at KEO Films.<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
This week KEO Films’ Head of Production, Maddy Allen, discusses working across a number of platforms whilst juggling ever decreasing budgets. How did you get into television? It was a mixture of luck and determination. Although I had always wanted to work in television, I didn\u2019t do any media courses (I studied German at university). […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"episode_type":"","audio_file":"","podmotor_file_id":"","podmotor_episode_id":"","cover_image":"","cover_image_id":"","duration":"","filesize":"","filesize_raw":"","date_recorded":"","explicit":"","block":"","itunes_episode_number":"","itunes_title":"","itunes_season_number":"","itunes_episode_type":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[192,14],"tags":[79,305],"series":[],"class_list":["post-1527","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-tv-me","category-word-of-mouth","tag-keo-films","tag-maddy-allen"],"episode_featured_image":false,"episode_player_image":"https:\/\/www.productionbase.co.uk\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/TOTI-Podcast-Artwork.png","download_link":"","player_link":"","audio_player":false,"episode_data":{"playerMode":"dark","subscribeUrls":[],"rssFeedUrl":"https:\/\/www.productionbase.co.uk\/blog\/feed\/podcast\/turn-on-tune-in-2","embedCode":"
TV & Me with KEO Films’ Maddy Allen<\/a><\/blockquote>