ZDF/Beta Film’s ‘The Swarm’, a quartet of documentarians praised the public broadcasters’ activity in the space and blamed the streamers’ rowing back from the genre for causing market contraction.
Other execs sounded notes of caution, however, pointing first to the fact that the rest of the world is by no means immune from the effects of the global cost of living crisis, which has impacted budgets and costs everywhere. Stern also sought to downplay the knock-on effect of the writers’ strike and stress a nuanced situation. “You never want people to strike because that means they aren’t making enough money,” she said. “It’s not a good thing and [European creatives] don’t want to sound opportunistic.”