Netflix bags Norwegian drama

MIPCOM NEWS: Netflix’s chief content officer Ted Sarandos this morning confirmed his company’s acquisition of a new drama starring The Sopranos star Steven van Zandt.

Lilyhammer (8×60′) follows a Mafia hitman who moves to Norway as part of the Witness Protection Program. It is a Rubicon TV production for NRK in association with distributor SevenOne International.

The deal gives Netflix exclusive rights to premiere the first season in the US, Canada and Latin America.

The move is part of Netflix’s new strategy to “aggressively” push into original productions, in an effort to compete directly with premium US cable networks like HBO and Starz, Sarandos said.

During his keynote at Mipcom, Sarandos said the economics of highly serialised TV shows are challenged because “a big chunk” of their revenue comes from DVD sales, which are declining, and syndication, which is a tough area for heavily syndicated shows.

Sarandos fears that fewer big-budget dramas will be produced. “In the US, the growing audience for it is typically in pay television – Showtime, HBO and Starz. Those guys are the ones that are least likely to want to sell their shows to me in the season-after model,” he said.

“So I figured at some point we would have to develop the muscle ourselves of creating and distributing this content.”

Although Netflix does not have its own development department, earlier this year it started to buy up first-run rights to premium dramas.

In March, the online subscription video service grabbed the rights to the David Fincher-directed House of Cards, starring Kevin Spacey. It also recently secured North American rights to big-budget European drama Borgia, through a deal with distributor Beta Film.