FRIDAY'S ESPRESSO - 1st December

The most followed newsletter about unscripted in the world

1. FOR THE LOVE OF A THIRD

After the success of I Kissed a Boy, that premiered last May on BBC Three (see FE 27th May), LGBTQ+ formats are becoming more and more popular. They generally belong to two specific genres: dating show (as I Kissed a Boy itself, For the Love of DILFs and others) or factual/docu (as the German Family of Choice, the Mexican Gemelas Transgénero and others).

Looking for a Third, that is slated for release in 2024 on the LGBTQ+ network OUTtv, belongs to the first group. As the title suggests, one gay couple and one lesbian couple are in a beautiful villa and search for a third person to create the perfect throuple amongst a selection of singles.

The host is Tiffany Pollard (pic), one of reality TV’s most iconic stars, and the prodco is Daddy TV, the same producing team behind For The Love of DILFs.

2. SEX IN THE UNSCRIPTED

Also transforming a scripted series / movie / franchising from scripted to unscripted is becoming an important trend. Apart from the recent Squid Game: The Challenge (see FE 17th Jun) and - partially - 007: Road to a Million (see FF 1st April 2022), which are proper spin-offs of their respective series/movies, we can also remember, among others, The Real Dirty Dancing (see FE 28th Jan 2022) and The Real Love Boat (see FE 1st April 2022).

Now Bunim/Murray Productions has announced the unscripted dating format Is There Still Sex in the City, in partnership with the best-selling author of Sex and the City creator Candace Bushnell (pic).

Four fifty-something women (and above) who are looking for a love do-over will leave their busy city lives for a dating utopia. They’ll live together in a country chateau where they’ll have their pick of a different group of men in each episode. They’ll try the boy toys, sample a senior age player, be romanced by the rich guys and even get to flirt with their fantasy man.

But at the end, will our ladies be able to bring sex back to the city?

3. THE ULTIMATE HUSTLE IN LONDON

Content London closed its door yesterday 30th November, and in the next issue one of the protagonists will write a report about it.

For the moment we focus only on the Content London Global Entertainment Formats Pitch 2023, a cornerstone of the three day Formats and Factual strand. The winner was The Ultimate Hustle, by Irish production company Animo TV, selected from 80 entries, that will receive a £30,000 marketing prize from C21 Media to support development and pre-sale promotion of the show.

This is the description of the show: “In The Ultimate Hustle, 10 broke but hopeful wannabe entrepreneurs live together for 25 days. With a strict rule book and under the guidance of a presenter (a self-made entrepreneur) they try a new ‘side-hustle’ each week, competing to make the most money from each hustle they try. The person who banks the least each week goes home. The twist is that the winner of the series gets to keep all the cash while the others go home empty-handed”.

Let’s hope that events like these will bring some new blood and creativity to the format business, too filled with countless reboots, spin-offs and this kind of stuff.