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Lucky 8 produces across a variety of unscripted genres, tapping into crime, food, science, wildlife and more. Among its current series are Netflix’s Unlocked: A Jail Experiment and A&E’s 60 Days In and Booked: First Day In, all delving into the U.S. criminal justice system. Recent feature documentaries the company has produced include National Geographic’s Jane Goodall: The Hope, Showtime’s Bronx Obama and PBS’s Grizzly 399: Queen of the Tetons. Greg Henry and Kim Woodard, co-founders and co-presidents, tell TV Real about the keys to success for factual programs, securing funding in today’s market and what’s up next for the company.
TV REAL: What’s your perspective on the factual content space right now, especially as an indie?
HENRY: Our industry is more of a business now than it’s ever been. The bar to getting a project greenlit is higher than ever, and there are a number of hurdles that need to be cleared that go beyond just a great idea and great execution. For us, success has come from aligning unique access and a rock-solid premise with the needs of the buyer. We use being an independent shop to our advantage in that we’re able to take big swings in order to make our projects undeniable.
TV REAL: Tell us about Booked: First Day In, 60 Days In and Unlocked: A Jail Experiment. What’s behind the success of these properties, and what’s the goal behind taking a look at the criminal justice system?
HENRY: For any content we produce, we’re always thinking about the takeaway for viewers. Yes, first and foremost, we want our series to be highly entertaining and attract the largest audiences possible, but in our experience, the way to do that is to give them something to think about. That said, our series that spotlight America’s corrections system have been successful for a few reasons. First, they are relatable in that a significant percentage of the country has either been arrested or incarcerated or knows someone who has been incarcerated, and yet, there’s still a lot of intrigue from the general public about what happens inside jailhouse walls. If you look at 60 Days In and Unlocked, baked into the DNA of both series is a critical look at corrections and honest conversation about how the system can be improved.
WOODARD: It also goes back to access. I think it’s safe to say our team has more experience producing television from inside a corrections facility than any other company in our business. The facilities trust us; they trust our approach and that we’ll execute in a way that won’t disrupt their operations. And from a technical standpoint, we know what the challenges will be and how to overcome them.
TV REAL: What other types of Lucky 8 factual productions have found success?
WOODARD: Beyond Unlocked and 60 Days In, our series To Catch a Smuggler on Nat Geo, which follows the work of DHS agents at various entry points across the country, has continued to rate well, and we’ve just debuted a spin-off series, To Catch a Smuggler: Tropical Takedown, on the network. We’re also multiple seasons into our docudramas for History, The Food That Built America and The Mega-Brands That Built America, and, of course, we have some exciting projects upcoming for different streamers and networks. We also continue to produce feature-length documentaries that have debuted at festivals across the country—our most recent, Grizzly 399: Queen of the Tetons, debuted at Big Sky Film Festival this year and premiered on PBS.
TV REAL: What’s been key to securing funding in today’s crowded market and bringing things across the finish line? What has made your properties sell?
HENRY: We’re finding more and more that what’s old is new again. In recent years, it’s been unheard of for a producer to retain the rights to their series, but now, like in the early days of the unscripted business, these discussions are happening again. That said, we’ve been able to retain rights to some of our new projects and to new seasons of existing series, and have been focused on the global market—working with a distributor and international partners to bring content to new territories. To that end, we recently announced that we’ve hired Sarah Bickley to join Lucky 8 as the company’s first head of distribution.
WOODARD: Our team attended MIPCOM for the first time this year, bringing with us a slate of projects. We’re recognizing how valuable the global market will be moving forward, and we want to continue to build meaningful relationships with international broadcasters across Europe and in Australia.
As a producer working in unscripted and documentary—and the owners of an independent company—we’re problem-solvers by nature. We can’t sit around and hope that the business goes back to the way it was in 2018; we need to remain flexible and adjust to meet the market where it is in 2024.
TV REAL: What’s next on Lucky 8’s slate? What role do co-pros play going forward for the company?
WOODARD: Our aim is to keep the momentum going across all key fronts, and that includes premium streaming commissions, the legacy cable business and international sales and partnerships. We have new series in production that will be launching soon on various streaming platforms and cable networks, and as we mentioned before, we’re making a significant push in the global marketplace. We brought roughly ten new projects to MIPCOM—across a variety of genres, from formats to natural history, crime and feature docs—and international co-productions, which we’ve always embraced, will be even more of an emphasis moving forward.
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