Amazon MGM Studios’ Spanish unscripted originals chief wants ‘risk and innovation’ in content
CONECTA: Prime Video’s unscripted team in Spain is looking for content that stands out from what broadcast TV already does in the country and that incorporates elements of risk and innovation, according to Amazon MGM Studios’ head of unscripted originals in Spain, Oscar Prol.
Since joining the company in 2019, Prol has greenlit projects such as GEO: Beyond the Limit, documentary series The Challenge and the recent How to Catch a Monster.
Speaking at Conecta Fiction & Entertainment in Cuenca, Spain, he said: “Our team is always focused on two words: innovation and risk. We’re a subscription service, meaning people pay to watch our products. So we have to do something different, because if we’re doing the same thing as free to watch, something’s wrong.
“We always try to look for things with twists, different things that present the viewer with something they haven’t seen before, whether due to the production level or the narrative, which we work on a lot.”
Prol’s other commissions at Amazon include Operación Triunfo (OT), an adaptation of the singing talent show that first aired in 2001 on Spain’s TVE. While he conceded that such a commission could contradict his comments about differentiating Amazon MGM Studios content from free TV, he emphasised that being the first streamer to broadcast a weekly live talent show met the innovation criterion.
“I say innovate, and then we premiered OT, which is from [2001]. But yes, it is innovating because when we announced it two years ago, our strategy didn’t include doing a live show, it didn’t include doing a talent show, it didn’t include taking on a brand that already had a long history of 11 seasons on broadcast television. But when the option came to us, we said, ‘We can be the first to do a daily live entertainment programme with a streaming service,’” he explained.
“And that seems like reason enough to us to bet on something so big, on something that wasn’t part of our strategy, and to believe we could turn OT into an even bigger phenomenon than it was.”
Despite the above, and the success of OT, Prol said Prime Video was not currently looking for more “big shows” of this type: “If it comes, great, but in principle we’re already covered with OT.”
Prol instead highlighted content such as the aforementioned How to Catch a Monster or the yet-to-be-released Blinder in the Bunker as the type of unscripted shows his team wants to focus on.
Produced by Bambú Producciones, the former is a “real-time true crime” show directed by influencer Carles Tamayo and described by Prol as “one of those once-in-a-lifetime stories, like The Jinx.”
Blinder in the Bunker is a documentary film that shows exclusive images and testimonies from a protected witness who managed to infiltrate an animal testing laboratory for 18 months. Prol described it as atypical content, halfway between true crime and thriller.
Beyond those two titles, the exec said he is also looking for comedy content, in line with Amazon’s flagship format LOL: Last One Laughing.
“We’re still looking for the next LOL, we’re still looking for content that’s rewarding, fast-paced, that can be produced, franchised, easily replicated in different countries, and that can be understood across all cultures and all countries. That’s what we’re looking for,” he said.
“As you can see, our line of entertainment content isn’t reality shows, big shows or gameshows. These are genres we don’t normally work with, as we strive for a difference. Fortunately, in Spain, we have a very strong and excellent entertainment culture. Free-to-air television has a lot of content, and we’ve decided to pursue a line we thought wasn’t occupied and where we could stand out with content that was a little different and that could perhaps elevate entertainment.”
