“The New Mr. Peabody and Sherman Show,” is a 13-episode half-hour series is based on the ’60s four-minute shorts from animation legend Jay Ward that first aired in his “Rocky & Bullwinkle Show” from 1961 -64. In those shorts, bespectacled canine Mr. Peabody and his adopted kid compadre Sherman get into the way-back machine, “WABAC” and travel through time to meet famous historical personages. “The New Mr. Peabody and Sherman Show” is inspired by the original shorts and  from the 2014 feature film by the same name. In the series they host a zany late-night comedy show broadcast from their swanky penthouse in front of a live studio audience where they interview historical figures. Guests from bygone eras will include Mozart, Napoleon and Edgar Allan Poe, as Mr. Peabody and Sherman embark on new adventures using their famous WABAC machine. “We loved the straight-up lampooning of historical figures,” Executive Producer Dave Smith said. “We mixed it up a lot, while retaining the comedy of the Jay Ward show.”

Beasts of No Nation is a 2015 West African war drama film based on the 2005 novel of the same name by Uzodinma Iweala. The novel follows the journey of a young boy, Agu, who is forced to join a group of soldiers in an unnamed West African country. The film stars Idris Elba, Ama K. Abebrese, Abraham Attah, Grace Nortey, David Dontoh and Opeyemi Fagbohungbe. It was screened in the main competition section of the 72nd Venice International Film Festival where it won the Marcello Mastroianni Award.

“Hemlock Grove” is in its third season, Season1 launched in April of 2013 and Season 2 followed a year later. The show examines the strange happenings in Hemlock Grove, a fictional town in Pennsylvania. Roman Godfrey, heir to the town’s wealthy Godfrey family, befriends the town’s newcomer, Peter Rumancek. Recent brutal murders in the town have stirred up rumors, and the two work together to shed light on the case while also hiding their own dark secrets.

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Using this data helps Netflix to validate the strategy of releasing a whole season at one time. None of the shows Netflix studied hooked viewers with the pilot and in two cases, “Arrow” and “How I Met Your Mother” it didn’t happen until episode 8.

“Given the precious nature of primetime slots on traditional TV, a series pilot is arguably the most important point in the life of the show,” Netflix chief content officer Ted Sarandos said. “However, in our research of more than 20 shows across 16 markets, we found that no one was ever hooked on the pilot. This gives us confidence that giving our members all episodes at once is more aligned with how fans are made.”

 Read more here:

 http://variety.com/2015/digital/news/netflix-tv-show-data-viewer-episode-study-1201600746/

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“The change in behavior is stunning. The use of streaming and smartphones just year-on-year is double-digit increases,” Alan Wurtzel, NBCUniversal’s audience research chief, told The Post. “I’ve never seen that kind of change in behavior.”      Read More

Why this matters: as the erosion of traditional liner television viewing accelerates, the urgency for new & accepted techniques in audience measurement becomes ever more critical —  if great content is to be anything other than a charitable / voluntary affair.

The post Watch-list: Millennials Ditching Their TV Sets at a Record Rate appeared first on Digital Bucket.

One of the original Over-The-Top video efangelists, Erik Huggers, believes he is finally being vindicated after over 20 years of pitching the idea of TV as an app.

from linked-In:

“Even though we are all amazed by the success of Netflix, Amazon and YouTube, its still early days. The next wave of innovation is happening as we move from general purpose SVOD platforms to more genre based SVOD verticals. Early cable programming pioneers like John Hendricks are betting big on that with projects like CuriosityStream. Add to that the increasingly video rich experience on social networks and communication platforms, and we have the making of a perfect storm.”

Why this matters:  Although Huggers seems to be stating OTT developments that have been pretty obvious for at least the last year, plus we have big concerns he fails to factor in old-school content platforms & funding that generated a huge foundation of what is currently streaming over OTT – Huggers is one of the original OTT guys and many of his observations deserve thoughtful consideration.

Read More of Huggers’ posting

The post 2015 Is The “Breakthrough Year” – Is “TV” Finally Just an App?! appeared first on Digital Bucket.

from Digital Bucket:

I have a place on my phone where I try and jot down recommendations for “must see” entertainment: movies, TV series, specials, blogs – just about any video content that has been enthusiastically suggested. I intended to create a self-styled Dewey Decimal To-View List of sorts. The sad truth is that my shorthanded watch-list is a veritable junk drawer of disassociated titles, partial names, and unexplained details, that must have seemed helpful at the time. But in my moment of viewing need – there never seems to be quite enough attributes to help me make good choices. Thus the fame factor.

I often make my viewing choices based on the celebrity fame of the actor, author or director involved. I’m also brand conditioned enough to have leanings toward certain studios or networks, but my sense of fame is the overriding influence. It has served me well, even as I consider my short form internet viewing options.

However, I’m questioning if it is still a valid, or manageable filter for my ever growing to-view list.

Here Today, Gone – Today

Of course, fame has never been a foolproof guide to great viewing. We’ve all been caught off guard by the uncomfortable realization that the fame was, well, rooted in luck, or the aging celebrity burn victim look (unfortunate ambitious cosmetic tweaks). Or, even the sometimes unimaginable misbehavior that celebrity seems to breed (the spice of fame – I guess). I do expect some of that when using fame as my true viewing north. However – my current issue is that I’m becoming overwhelmed by the shear quantity of fame out there and my inability to incorporate it all as a guide.

As NYT’s Alex Williams recently chronicled in 15 Minutes of Fame? More Like 15 Seconds of Nanofame,  not only fame’s huge growth in numbers, but also it’s perishability; a transition from the celebrity of “microfame” to “nanofame”.  He suggests that the power and length of fame continues to diminish in the internet age.  I agree, thus my dilemma.

Left: Perez Hilton: snarky celebrity and pop-culture blogger.
Right: Left Shark: awkward fish-suited backup dancer during the Super Bowl halftime show. Credit J. Emilio Flores for The New York Times; Timothy A. Clary/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

It all gets very interesting when you consider what the face of fame might look like in the next decade- but that’s another post. When it comes to making the best viewing choices, you could argue that I should cast fame aside. Or- we just quantify a new sort of celebrity fame. Let’s not only consider the scale of one’s fame, but also their longevity of ongoing fame. Of course name it: Sticky fame? O’Reliable fame? Tenacious fame?

And even with Reliable Fame, what about binge viewing of series? Could one argue that a Sunday spent watching a year of Claire Dane’s work be as nanofame as the Sunday exposure to Katy Perry’s “Left Shark”? God I hope not. But such questions will arise. In the mean time, as I add Alex Gibney’s Going Clear: Scientology, Hollywood and the Prison of Belief, to my personal watch-list, the annotation will certainly include: Cruise, Travolta.

Editor’s note:  The barriers to facilitating content discovery are getting higher all the time. Here at Digital Bucket, one of our big interests is how great stories, and as a result great content, can be discovered.  It is a confounding fact that the very ecosystem that has created all this rich new content – has also made its discovery nearly impossible.

It may not always be easy to find – but great content endures. Great stories are still valued and eventually – hopefully- discovered. Over the coming weeks we will continue to explore the solutions, the resources and how viewers find their way to great content. We’d love to hear how your precious “viewing time” choices are made.  Please leave thoughts or links in comments.

The post Watch-list: The Fame Factor appeared first on Digital Bucket.

With a market capitalization currently north of $ 27 Billion Wall Street darling Netflix has a few options your average TV production company does not: Debt issuance. Netflix just issued another $1.5 BILLION in debt, which according to Stream Daily will be used at least in part to help fund new original content. After all, bringing House of Cards back for a third season certainly won’t come cheaply. Variety has the details.

by Todd Spangler, Variety:

Netflix is raising $1.5 billion in additional long-term debt — up from its original $1 billion target, announced earlier Monday — the proceeds from which the company said it plans to use for content acquisitions and other general purposes, including potential acquisitions.

The company late Monday announced the pricing of an offering of $700 million aggregate principal amount of 5.50% senior notes due 2022 and $800 million aggregate principal amount of 5.875% senior notes due 2025.

Netflix said the sale of the debt is expected to close Feb. 5, 2015, subject to usual closing conditions.

Read More @ Variety.com

The post Netflix Issues $1.5 BILLION in New Debt to Help Fund Content appeared first on Digital Bucket.

We’ll get to the epic and wonderful Game of Thrones in a second, but first let’s get something straight. With Hollywood movie revenues down more than 5% in 2014, we here at Digital Bucket maintain that there are three very good reasons for the continuing plummet in receipts at the box office.  So here goes.

The post Hollywood Is Losing The Battle To Epic TV — Like ‘Game of Thrones’ appeared first on Digital Bucket.

Okay. So maybe the Friends opening credits without music isn’t quite the level of originality and/or genius of Mario Wienerroither’s Musicless Musicvideo of Dancing in The Street. But it’s close. Seeing the kids dance and splash around without the jingly-jangly pop soundtrack is amusing, and a bit unsettling. It’s enough to make Chandler say, “could this be any more awkward??”

The post ‘Friends’ Theme Song Will Not Be There For You appeared first on Digital Bucket.

We learned to love him for affably dealing with Larry David’s manic antics on HBO’s Curb Your Enthusiasm and more recently as Murray Goldberg, the cranky Dad on ABC’s new comedy smash hit The Goldbergs.  But did you know that without Jeff Garlin there would likely never have been a Curb Your Enthuiasm in the first place?

In this must-listen addition of the Marc Maron podcast Garlin reveals that in 1999 he was invited to consult with his friend Larry David on creating a one-hour comedy special for HBO.  So Garlin pitched David on the idea that the special itself be nothing more than a disastrous narrative setting up the comedy hour, that in the end never happens. Larry’s response:  “How can I NOT do this?”  So they did. Garlin and David’s chemistry was so spot on from the start that Curb Your Enthusiasm was born.

And the rest is history.

Listen to the entire interview HERE.

The post ‘Curb’ & ‘The Goldbergs’ Jeff Garlin Gets To the Heart Of It appeared first on Digital Bucket.

from TMZ,

Patrick Dempsey is headed for the single life but it’s not his doing … we’ve learned his wife has filed for divorce, and 10’s of millions are on the line.

Jillian Fink filed for divorce, citing irreconcilable difference. Fink, who is repped by disso queen Laura Wasser, is asking for joint custody of their 3 kids, a 12-year-old girl and 7-year-old twin boys. She also wants spousal and child support.

We’ve learned they do NOT have a prenup. Patrick is reportedly worth around $40 million. The couple has been married for 15 years.

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