Quick Takes: Alessandro DiGiovanna, Terry Steiner International
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Quick Takes is a Q&A series designed to connect content companies with prospects while in-person events are postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Lights, camera, action!
Alessandro DiGiovanna
Director of Sales and Marketing, Terry Steiner International
Location: New York
How has the pandemic affected your content slate or schedule?
The pandemic didn’t disrupt our content slate as much as it impacted the speed at which we announced titles. Prior to the pandemic, TSI was offering 10-12 titles per month. Now we’ve scaled back to reflect the demand of the industry, we’re offering a maximum of six per month. We’re being very selective with our acquisitions and remain vigilant about offering high quality content to our non-theatrical clients.
What releases are you most looking forward to?
- Queenpins, a funny crime comedy with Kristen Bell and Kirby Howell-Baptiste
- Dog, a road trip comedy starring Channing Tatum and an adorable dog
- Clarice, The Silence of the Lambs spin off series
What is your outlook on the state of the industry moving forward?
We foresee a slower recovery than we had originally anticipated for the in-flight business, with noticeable improvements beginning primarily in Q3 and Q4 of 2021.
With people desperate to travel, airlines will want to have fresh content onboard. But we don’t expect them to refresh as often as they used to until there is more confidence that consistent travel, especially internationally, has officially returned.
Do you find peoples’ viewing habits have shifted in terms of what they watch and how they watch it? How does your company’s content adapt to this new reality?
Documentary series and lighthearted content have rapidly grown in popularity over the last year. People enjoy the captivating narratives of docuseries but also crave something light, even peaceful, to distract them from the harsh realities caused by the pandemic.
TSI is making a conscious effort to acquire titles that offer escapism, such as Sylvie’s Love, which is a beautiful story about love, life, and jazz set in 1950s Harlem.
Additionally, TSI has partnered with Sharecare Windows, offering wellness and relaxation content that’s primarily dialogue free, making it accessible to all airlines around the world.
We’ll also be working on entertaining series such as Playing with Power: The Nintendo Story to offer engaging insights into topics audiences love such as video games.
Theatrical windows have been all but eliminated, do you think this is temporary?
Yes and no. For blockbusters, we anticipate a theatrical window remaining if the title is important enough to a major studio. We believe there will be different types of releases depending on the title, but the window will definitely be shorter. For independent films, day and date releases have been a common occurrence for years – so unless it’s a buzzy title, we expect this tradition to continue.
Read more about the impact of coronavirus on the air travel industry, including APEX’s position on the matter, and subscribe to the APEX Daily Experience newsletter to stay up to date.