The New Kid in Town - Move Over TV & Film!

TV and Film Entertainment has always been the darling of Hollywood but there’s a new kid in town and he’s got his eyes on the bigger prize – more revenue than both TV and Film last year combined.  And the new kid is called ESports.  It’s competitive, exciting, intoxicating and at times, completely voyeuristic if you happen to just check into any of the live gamers talking, playing, yelling, comparing and basically socializing in their video game world. 

ESports is an advertisers dream.   TV and Film tried to do it with merchandising the heck out of their popcorn movies but there really isn’t anything to compare because TV and Film aren’t participatory and don’t make you feel part of their world. You’re just a viewer, just an audience member, and only for a short period of time.  But put a game in front of any kid from the age of even five, six or seven, and they are hooked.  And just want more.  When my daughter was two years old, she loved playing a simple video game.  She was captivated at two! Although a rudimentary hide and seek type of game, she instinctively knew the basics. What’s even more amazing about exposure at these young ages are the games become a huge driver to play and purchase even more.  Almost half of any audience attending an eSports event will go buy content related to that game played.  Talk about retention rates.  Advertisers have the benefit of attracting demographics from kids 6 to 60, both men and women and when the kids are under 18, it’s the parents opening up their wallet and spending the money.   

Films today really try to target the younger audiences in hopes they see a movie they like and go back again and bring their friends.  But these days they don’t’ go to the movies as much.  But the baby boomers and Gen X still do!  Gamers are really solid 18-34 year olds. And almost half of them are college grads these days.  The state of the gamer business is booming and growing each week.   You can spend quite a bit of your day just reading about the eSports business.   It’s the new media frontier all over the globe.   And it’s about community.  It’s one big club and you don’t have to be a huge fit guy who spends all his time in the gym, nor training in the cold or heat or taking special supplements.  You just have to like to role-play, have good hand eye coordination and keep practicing.

And what makes a great game?  Surprisingly enough, it doesn’t’ have to have the greatest storyline but you do have to connect with the characters.  And you do have to enjoy the total experience of the game you play to come back to it over and over again.  It’s important to have something different to enhance your experience which is what the successful games endeavor to achieve.  It’s an ‘all-in” experiential
immersion into that world of game.

When I started to really learn about the industry I sat down one evening to understand why would anyone want to just sit back and watch someone else play a video game?  Was it like going to a baseball game or basketball game or any major league sport? No. It certainly was not. And yet I found myself immersed in the banter, the competition, and the true voyeuristic experience of how they compete against each other in a game where it’s not the best athlete in the room winning the game. It was who mastered the play.  It’s beyond physical.  The competitive excitement of it all and how quick the game moves is intoxicating. And I watched and I watched and 28 minutes went by.  Twenty-eight minutes!

So move over TV.  Sorry Film.  The new big kid is in town and he’s taking over and he’s not going to even have to worry about competing with you ever.   Because the gamer owns the block, the city and the highway when you are just asking to rent some space from on the corner.

Don’t get me wrong.  I love television. I love going to the movies.  But watching a gamer in a huge arena or even from the privacy of my own computer.  I’m fascinated.

THE BOYZ CLUB IS ALIVE AND WELL

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I’ve never really considered myself a feminist.  The picture the word feminist creates in my mind is a women protesting with a big sign basically complaining about something that will not affect change by yelling in a group.  Sorry, but it almost seems comical to me.   Growing up in Los Angeles, the entertainment capital of the world and the ‘land of hopes and dreams’ give everyone a fair chance but in reality, nothing is fair about it--and especially if you are a woman. So here’s a bit of my story some things no one will tell you and some encouragement for the up and comers, the college grads, the dropouts and all those the tenacious girls in the world. 

Tenacious.  You have to be out there pushing it every day. I started my career working for music mogul lawyers.  No women lawyers, all guys, an all men’s club objectifying women.  We just kind of accepted it and took it as the way it was.  I learned very quickly to stand up for myself and drew the line at a major music attorney who decided to throw a lamp when his addiction became apparent and he could no longer use it to manically make deals with record labels and the powers at be.  He doubled my salary when I called him on it.  It changed the course of my career because now I was looked upon as someone who could handle crazy people.  I quickly moved into a bigger league, a major studio, and then a major film company.  Working for crazy people.  And then I caught a break because I had put in my time and became a TV syndicator when the business was booming.  The age of Oprah. Love @Oprah. No offense, but she was so good at ‘breaking the 4th Wall” that I once told Roger King I could ‘phone in those TV station deals.’ He laughed so hard and told me I was right. He actually said he should fire all his sales guys the next day.  But of course, he didn’t.

Sell yourself even if you don’t know what you're selling. Fast forward from TV Syndication in the 80’s and 90’s to 2000.  I was hired from an Internet posting to run a global IT division for media and entertainment.  And I was hired because they wanted a woman.  I thought the roles were changing.  But the clients had not.  Another major studio.  And when I led a team that discovered $14M of lost revenue, the male CFO called me directly and asked me who the hell I thought I was? Would it have been better if it were a guy?  Who wants some young girl telling a major studio head you don’t know where your money is leaking?

Flirt vs. Fact. Raising money as a woman.  Now that’s fun.  It’s the strategic game that honestly and unabashedly crosses the line between flirt and fact.  The flirt works when they are narcissistic smaller men in stature.  The fact works when they are smart and like the idea of a woman that is smart, can pitch in a room, and get it done.  Combine the three and you hit a home run.  I’ve hit home runs in a lunch and in a week. Millions of dollars. 

Don’t be afraid of the back seat. To be a woman in this business puts you in the back seat.  Be the back seat driver with some proficiency.  Heck, even my fiancé lets me drive at this point. But he’s a unique creative composer genius who actually loves women – a rare find and another blog.  

The new marketplace. The new young millennial girls entering the marketplace are finding out very quickly that times indeed have not changed.  Even my assistant came to me recently and said “Does any guy take a girl seriously when they are networking for a job or is it all about getting my phone number?”  The truth is no. No guy every takes you seriously.  They want your phone number.  They are primal.  It’s a fact.  The smart ones just curb their inner ape.

Be the woman in the deal.  I am the woman in multiple deals these days and the boyz club comments still continue.  You have to have a great sense of humor to tolerate the mediocrity of some men.  I was actually told as recently as this week that I shouldn’t come to an investor meeting because I was a WOMAN and the investor was from the Midwest and it probably wouldn’t be a good idea!? I laughed so hard at this comment because it exemplifies the radical intimidation that we women need to bottle and use every day of our lives.  And just so its clear, my other partner was banned from the meeting because he was too smart (a Yale Grad) and too nice!  Talk about equality. 

Create opportunity with other girls. I’ve never had the opportunity to pitch a women investor.  Always wanted to get in front of Christy Walton and/or Abigail Johnson at Fidelity and definitely Marissa Mayer at Yahoo so if any of you are reading this or know them, please share.  Thanks @KerryDolan for the great article on Forbes.   The time will come for The Girlz Club to be Alive and Well… I’m doing my part as I always try to help women at any age. It’s not like we want to eradicate the future domination of the male corporate executive, but its time they don’t mind getting in the back seat and letting us drive.

I plan on driving that bus SOON.😜🎬

Gayle Dickie

GAYLE DICKIE Hey Girl Hey Entertainment SPEAKS OUT AT LACC "INDEPENDENT PRODUCING"

No Saturday is too busy to spend time with aspiring students interested in the film and entertainment business as a whole.  It's important to give back and guide the inspired to inspire us in return.  That's just what I experienced at LA City College. A group of 50 young, way younger than me, wanting to know what it's really like out there in terms of how to find money, how to package the right film, how to promote it, how to get in a door, any door for that matter. 

And LACC is very lucky as the Hollywood Foreign Press (HFPA) pledged $2,000,000.00 to the cinema and television department . The funds will go to upgrade studio, post production and theatre facilities at the school and in turned will be renamed the HFPA Center for Cinema and Television at LACC.  What a great story. http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/hfpa-makes-largest-gift-ever-793553 .

At Hey Girl Hey Entertainment, my daily job is really about helping people put their ideas and dreams together while finding time to make my own.  My choice is to push as much information out to make a deal happen.  Not any deal but at least one deal from which I can benefit.  My challenge in speaking to a group of aspiring independent film and/or TV producers, writers and creative types is to encourage them wholeheartedly and make sure they truly believe in their dream.  So that's what I did.  I started by making every single student close their eyes and imagine their own film title on the screen.  Watching their faces tells a lot.  Some smile, some grimace, some serious, some relaxed, and some probably didn't imagine anything at all, although I'll never know.  You have to see the dream to make it happen.  It just doesn't happen.  At least I've never met those people in my circles.  Everyone works hard, very hard, and you  just don't see that part.  You only see the first success and glory and the photograph that freezes that moment in time.

I start my presentation by saying, "I'm  Gayle Dickie and I'm a producer but really I am a problem solver because that is exactly what I do most of the day.  I solve problems."  They laugh.  But it's true. Nothing glamorous about producing except the occasional success if you are lucky enough to have one.  

Storytelling feeds the soul.  And to be a good producer, writer, actor, this is paramount. So I tell the students at LACC my story.  Where I grew up, how I got to where I was going, and what I can share as pitfalls and warnings to gain the most success possible out of that classroom experience is key.  

Hey Girl Hey Entertainment is a company I started to do the projects I wanted to do as Gayle Dickie.  I tell the students, make sure you have your own "loan out" company.  It's important for tax reasons and legitimate write-offs and even if you only have a few people working at your company from time to time, this is essential.  I remind the students of the career path you take is important to get your own company going.  I had a plethora of jobs prior to starting my own company.  That discussion gets us into how I managed that transition.

For years, I told people on airplanes that I, Gayle Dickie, managed Pharmaceutical Supplies so no one would make me explain what a Television Syndicator does!  The class finds this entertaining to say the least and we discuss what TV syndication was and is today.  The marketplace has changed drastically and opens up miles of new careers in the business of film, tv and entertainment in new media and especially in terms of how we get our entertainment today... those platforms and distribution verticals have gone through and will continue to go through globally significant changes.   

Everyone in the LACC class of independent production knew what an MCN was.  At least it appeared they did.  But I wanted new filmmakers to be aware that the distribution of our content is not just finding a distributor to get our films distributed on traditional screens.  It's about monetizing our films way beyond the box office.  That information garnered some of the more interesting questions as how 'day and date', 'four-walling', VOD,  PPV, and revenue sharing on various platforms is and has become the new normal. 

Google/YouTube - a Billion Plus people a month are on that platform.  Granted it's messy and awkward and difficult to search, but it is what it is and it's coming for an even bigger change as well.  Can independent producers make any headway on YouTube?   The answers were interesting from the class, but not as well informed as I thought. MCN's are to entertainment as what the cable business was to broadcast television in the 80's.  That's the most important idea and/or statement to understand for this new class at LACC.  A lot of smiling and nodding only confirmed I struck a chord.

And finally, the discussion was PITCH.  And the most difficult skill to manage is how to pitch your movie, your TV show, your book, your idea in a sentence.  They call it the 'elevator pitch.'  And I remind the students you don't want to be chasing your audience out of the elevator to finish your pitch!  Learn how to own the room, set the tone, and make an impression.  Start with a vision and/or a question or brief story that relates to what you are about to pitch. You have a few minutes.  Watch body language. Be aware. Now go for it.  

And go for it they will in the coming weeks, when I return to hear THE PITCH.  I'm excited to be in a classroom again to hear the voice of a new generation that doesn't seem that different from when I went to college and thought I knew more than I did.  Now as Gayle Dickie and along with my company, Hey Girl Hey Entertainment, I'm eager to learn more about what LACC students believe they can produce, create, and successfully achieve.  I remind them. Dream it - Believe it - Achieve it.