I think Jimmie’s got the right thought in this Netflix mini-thread of his:
https://twitter.com/JimmieWrites/status/767539551074222081
To summarize the thread: Netflix had to go for independent programming because the movie/TV studios assumed that they could aggressively gatekeep their existing content and there’d be no blow-back. Turns out that that was wrong, and now an increasing number of online streamers are getting a piece of a revenue stream that they’d previously thought was beyond their reach. I’ll add here that it’s getting cheaper and easier all the time to produce a television show with acceptable production values: get decent actors, and you’re all set. Well, generic ‘you.’
Anyway, the moral of the story? Pay close attention to your price points. Too high a price can actually cause your product to lose a discernible amount of perceived value, and the value of a thing is the price it will bring.
There are a heck of a lot of wanna-be actors out there, looking for their big break. Some of them may be horrible, but with an ok director, a part that isn’t too wacky compared to their real life [no Canadians trying to play someone from rural Georgia, or vice versa], and enough time that you can try a scene, watch it, and try it again, over and over, I tend wonder at least if the actor’s skill at “acting” is the least important part.
I dunno. The kids (particularly Dustin) in Stranger Things were perfect and I can’t see the show being nearly as good without them.
It’s really weird to think about how different, for example, the Terminator franchise would have been if the original concept – the Terminator as a guy of *totally average* build and looks, not a walking tank – had been made.
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Every now and then, the audition tapes (or, even more rare, some scenes) of one actor playing the part that another “made his/her own” bubble up, and we get glimpses of the world we could have had.
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Mew
I dunno either, and haven’t seen the show. But is that because they’re amazing actors, and would do great in any part? Or is that because there was a decent casting director, who could fit basic personalities into a slot?
Netflix wanted to *deliver* content, not *make* it, but ..
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Funny thing. Video rental stores – pre-Blockbuster** – didn’t want to *make* content either .. but they ended up distributing plenty of low-budget films that weren’t all that bad.
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Like this one: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0090192/?ref_=filmo_li_tt
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(I’d include a couple others here, but .. I don’t want to make more work for Moe cleaning his spam filter)
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So .. back when Netflix started as a DVD-rental-by-mail business, they used a similar model .. and had most of the same low-budget oddball stuff the mom-n-pop VHS shop across from the pizza place used to have .. only they’d save me having to walk three blocks carrying a pizza.
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Now? It’s the same model, just with another update.
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Mew
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** If you don’t recognize this store name, kids, go ask your parents.