Erik Barmack’s Wild Sheep Content to produce fiction series set around Latin American football team
Wild Sheep Content, the production company led by former Netflix VP Erik Barmack, is producing a fictional series about the ultras of a Latin American football club, the executive revealed at Content London.
Erik Barmack
“The series is filming now and offers a look at the ultras of a particular club, in a similar spirit to Sons of Anarchy. It is, in essence, a family and romantic drama set in a world where football is a central passion,” he said.
Although he could not reveal more details, he said that it is “a very famous club in Latin America” that is involved in the series.
“The club is interested in this project because it is a way to create quality fiction that they can associate their brand with, which generates great drama and also legitimacy.”
Barmack made the announcement at the Skin In The Game panel at C21’s Content London last week, where he discussed why the entertainment industry is increasingly looking to create content around football and sport in general.
Barmack earlier this year engaged in an attempt to purchase a stake in Scottish Premier League side Motherwell, where he had a deal in place with BBC Scotland for a series on the club, but withdrew interest after failing to agree terms with the supporter-owned club.
Asked if the genre could continue to exist on All Or Nothing-style ‘ride-along’ obs docs, following multiple individual football clubs through their seasons, Barmack said: “Are follow docs sufficient? The answer is no, and the content is going to change very dramatically by country.”
“This is all relatively new. If you think about it, three or four years ago this didn’t exist as a genre, and I think the common thread is that people are very passionate about football or their favourite sport. And that gives rise to very interesting shows that go beyond traditional documentaries.”
According to the former VP of international content at Netflix in the coming months and years we will see “a lot of new content” linked to sport in much more creative fields.
“Content will have to adapt to the narrative forms we have. There will be premium content, yes, but we will all have to be good at making short-form content and sponsor-funded content, which today are part of the survival tactics of all producers,” he added.
He compared the 70 clubs in the top divisions of English football to “70 books of scale that if you could bid on, you would in a heartbeat.”
