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The BBC after a bit more rough and ready in natural history as it aims to inject more drama into series to keep the iPlayer audience on board.
Jack Bootle, head of specialist factual commissioning at the BBC, and Sreya Biswas, head of natural history, shared their vision for the genre at the BBC.
The two outlined what they were looking for in four key areas: blue-chip series, single films, environmental films, series and formats.
First, a blue chip, remarkable streak. Bootle describes the new normal, with an audience built on iPlayer. Perfect Planet aired in January 2021 and was the highest-rated factual series on British television last year. Green Planet can make that claim in 2022, but it is about to be overtaken by Frozen Planet 2. The BBC’s Natural History is in a “disadvantage”, Bootle said. “If I had a criticism, it’s that it can be dangerously the same. There is a dire danger that we end up circling the same species, the same habitats.
So the BBC is looking for new subjects, along with different ways of telling stories and new technological approaches.
Green Planet has taken on an underexploited world of plants. Next year we’ll see Silverback’s Wild Isles (w/t), which applies blue-chip production values and storytelling techniques to creatures from the British Isles. The topic is fresh for blue chips. The format is traditional, closed episodes.
“We have to find a way to break out of the straitjacket of closed episodes. We want content that’s really bingeable,” says Bootle. His team plots the non-linear data and sees that natural history plays out differently than drama. “The ratings are down more steeply than the drama, there’s a steeper drop off, there’s very clearly no compelling reason to keep watching.”
BBC Studios NHU is working on a six-part Kingdom which takes a different approach. Set to ship in 2025, the series follows four animal dynasties – the battles within and between them – with narrative arcs shared across the series. Bootle called it “The Dragon House for Animal Megafauna… That’s totally true and accurate – it’s not Disney – but it’s going to feel like a drama. There will be challenges: will the characters live or die?’
Bootle is interested in any other ideas for breaking the straitjacket.
New technology is always one way ahead. “Think about new themes, new storytelling and new technology and always think about how your series will perform on iPlayer,” says Bootle.
Head of Natural History Sreya Biswas shared the BBC’s direction for single films, which could be hours or full-lengths. She focuses on archival-based ideas; human-animal relationships; and man-on-the-spot ideas.
First, backup. “We’re looking at innovative ways to use an archive in natural history,” she said. One way they work is “a mix of archival natural history footage, but also in-depth interviews, like a history series. it’s a great way to show how a habitat or group of animals has fared over a number of years. She cited the recently released documentary Lion: The Rise and Fall of the Marsh Pride, directed by Pamela Gordon, via BBCStudios NHU. The idea was presented as exciting as any true crime, with murder, death and betrayal. There was also audience love for the original films, including The Big Cat Diaries. It was treated as a historical documentary with in-depth interviews, with filmmakers and local people, but with a narrative coming from the stories of the lions.
Second, human-driven narrative stories. “It’s worth looking at filmmakers and ordinary people with close relationships – whether troubled or symbiotic. Something that gives you a deeper look at not only the animals, but where they live and the people around them.”
Biswas announced a new feature-length documentary My Gorilla Dream, from Off the Fence, with cinematographer Vianet Djenguet, which follows a family of Eastern Lowland gorillas in the hard-to-reach Kahuzi-Biega National Park. Jenget’s own experience was growing up in a family that was terrified of animals, which in turn fascinated him. For the series, he is embedded in their home, along with scientists and conservationists.
“It’s not just about people and animals,” says Biswas. “We’re also looking for people and places – people intrinsically connected to a location, it might be through an extreme outdoor sport or a remote population connected to the natural world where they live.”
Referring to Chris Terrill’s film The Last Mountain, about mountaineer Tom Ballard, who died climbing in 2019, she said: “It’s a really good example of mixing archive with narrative in the present – that’s the kind of documentary I like to a wider audience.
“We want people to think about the form and approach of the individual films.” How do you take a new approach to a well-known subject? She’s interested in finding humor, “they don’t have to be so serious.”
Turning to environmental films as a third key category, Bootle described how environmental messages can be “smuggled” into a film that appeals on other levels.
“Until relatively recently, there was a sense of duty around our environmental shows. What we’ve realized over the last few years is that when you get these movies right, they can really reach and resonate with big audiences and big young audiences.” Extinction: The Facts landed in Fall 2020 and has been viewed by 5 ,1 million. “It’s not Frozen Planet 2, but it’s still a huge figure.”
Interestingly, the audience stayed inside for the duration of the show. “I thought the viewing figures were going to disappear because the film was so relentlessly dark and scary,” Bootle says. “But the opposite happened. People couldn’t tear themselves away.”
The BBC now has an annual installment of Our Changing Planet and environmental reporting led by its stable of natural history presenters, and big-brand shows can engage. “How can we continue to serve this engaged, passionate audience?” Bootle asks.
He talks about “amazing, retrospective, narrative stories that don’t read primarily as environmental, but when you dive into them, they bring up other information.”
“Documentary, history and natural history can meet in exciting ways.” Rise of the Bolsanaros looks odd on the natural history tableau until you see the slant. Bootle describes it as a “political thriller” but also as “a way to understand deforestation in the Amazon.”
Currently in editing is OSF’s Rainbow Warrior: Murder in the Pacific, about the bombing of the Greenpeace ship Rainbow Warrior in 1985. Bootle describes it as “a murder mystery set in the world of ecology.”
“We’re very keen to find ideas that first promise pleasant excitement or intrigue, but then unlock environmental science.”
Biswas then took on the task of non-remarkable series, which would traditionally be on BBC Two, “where you can be a bit more experimental”.
“How do we reinvent the space of the expedition?” And then, “how do we bring some rawness back into filmmaking?” Since the “making” at the end of the big blue chips went down well with viewers, “can we bring back the observational way of watching the series?’
They seek more research or science-based ideas driven by personal passion. Also, using technology to see things from the animal’s POV or find another perspective.
Live programming has been stopped for now as it is counterintuitive to non-linear. (Watches are an exception.) But innovation with talent is definitely the way forward. She released a clip from an upcoming single with Gordon Buchanan, pursuing her personal ambition of sledding with the Huskies. It’s a Scottish co-production, which also signals an increased push to work with regional bases.
Bootle concluded by picking up the call to find a less flawless tone: “The blue chip has gotten so shiny and perfect and amazing that we almost have to take some sandpaper to the edges and clean it up a bit.”
Pippa Considine
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