TV Tales of The Unbreakable Jay Glazer to Creating Competition Shows from American Ninja Warrior to Hell's Kitchen w/ Arthur Smith - BRT S04 EP28 (191) 7-16-2023

TV Tales of The Unbreakable Jay Glazer to Creating Competition Shows from American Ninja Warrior to Hell's Kitchen w/ Arthur Smith

BRT S04 EP28 (191) 7-16-2023

What We Learned This Week:

·    Jay Glazer’s Unbreakable mindset gets him thru ‘the gray’ of his daily life, working on his mental health

·    Arthur Smith’s describes Reach as striving for our full potential to create amazing things

·    Creation of TV Classics like American Ninja Warrior & Hell’s Kitchen

Guests:

Jay Glazer is a TV personality and National Football League (NFL) insider for FOX Sports' award-winning NFL pregame studio show, FOX NFL Sunday. The entire cast, including Glazer, became the first sports show inducted into the Television Hall Of Fame in 2019. He was one of the first ever minute by minute breaking online news reporters in the NFL, first for CBSSportsline.com in 1999, followed by FoxSports.com. 

In 2007, Glazer created the first mixed martial arts training program for pro athletes in America and has trained over 1,000 pro athletes. In 2014, he co-founded the Unbreakable Performance Center, a private training facility frequented by Wiz Khalifa, Chris Pratt, and Demi Lovato, as well as numerous NFL, NHL and MMA athletes. Glazer starred as himself in all five seasons of HBO's Ballers. In 2015, Glazer and former U.S. Army Green Beret Nate Boyer founded the charitable organization MVP (Merging Vets and Players) to assist combat veterans and former professional athletes, who often faced a tough road adjusting to civilian life.

https://www.unbreakableperformance.com/

Arthur Smith, the chairman of A. Smith & Co. Productions, is a pioneering veteran of nonfiction television, known for creating and producing some of the longest running unscripted series in history, including Hell's Kitchen and American Ninja Warrior. Smith was honored as one of Variety's “Titans of Unscripted TV” in 2022, inducted into the Realscreen Awards Hall of Fame in 2021, awarded Broadcasting and Cable’s “Producer of the Year” in 2020, Nominated for several Emmy Awards, and received dozens of awards, including NAACP Awards, Realscreen Awards, and Critics Choice Awards. Smith embarked on his career in television as a twenty-two-year-old wunderkind, talking his way into sports production at CBC in his native Canada.

He quickly distinguished himself as a rising star at the network, where he produced three Olympic Games among countless other high-profile events. At the age of twenty-eight, Smith was named the youngest ever head of CBC Sports. His successful run at the network ended when American broadcasting icon Dick Clark lured him to Hollywood to develop and produce a wide variety of entertainment programming. Then as the head of programming and production at FOX Sports Net, Smith played an instrumental role in the launch and growth of this massive entity, before the biggest reach of his life—the creation of his eponymous production company that has thrived for more than twenty years. He lives in Los Angeles.

In REACH: Hard Lessons and Learned Truths from a Lifetime in Television (Blackstone Publishing, June 6, 2023), Smith shares adventures, triumphs, and hard-won lessons from his astonishing career, beginning with his unprecedented ascension from the ranks of sports production to become the youngest ever head of CBC Sports. Never one to rest on his laurels, Smith then moved from Canada to the United States to produce a wide variety of entertainment programming with his mentor, television icon Dick Clark.

Years later, he spearheaded an entirely new approach to sports television at FOX Sports Net, helping to grow the fledgling business into a true industry powerhouse. In 2000, Smith made the biggest reach of his career with the launch of A. Smith & Co. Productions which has produced over 200 television shows on more than fifty networks. Across genres, formats, and platforms, Smith and his A. Smith & Co. team have earned reputation for original, emotional, buzz-worthy, and deeply personal storytelling. 

In these pages, Smith takes us behind the scenes of dozens of pivotal moments in sports and television history, ranging from the high intensity control room at the Olympics to the development of The Titan Games with Dwayne (“The Rock”) Johnson. We learn about a show that never was with Donald Trump, as well as a super-far-fetched idea that became the bizarro-classic genre-buster I Survived a Japanese Game Show. Through winning anecdotes involving a disparate cast of famous characters, including Marlon Brando, Gordon Ramsay, Magic Johnson, Little Richard, Wayne Gretzky, Simon Cowell, and Microsoft cofounder Paul Allen, Smith illustrates just how far you can go when you work hard, take risks, and reach for your dreams. 

https://www.asmithco.com/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/arthur-smith-91ba76b/

Seg 1

Interview w/ Jay Glazer about his new book, Unbreakable:

In Unbreakable, Jay Glazer talks directly to you, his teammates, and shares his truth. All of his success from his screeching-and-swerving joy ride through professional football, the media, the fighting world, Hollywood, the military-warrior community, comes with a side of relentless depression and anxiety. Living in the gray, as Jay calls it, is just a constant for him. And, in order to work through the gray and succeed, Jay has to maintain an Unbreakable Mindset. With this book, you can:

·       Be of Service-help others and help yourself in the process

·       Build Your Team-give support, get support

·       Never Underestimate the Power of Laughter-never take yourself too seriously

·       Be Proud of Your Scars-our trauma makes us who we are

Throughout Unbreakable, Jay will use his stories-featuring some of the biggest, baddest, and most fascinating characters in the public eye today-to show how he walks this walk, has learned that while the gray is very real, it doesn't have to define him. And it doesn't have to define you either.

Jay takes readers on a behind-the-scenes journey, sharing never-before-heard stories about his own mental health that feature some of the most fascinating characters in the public eye today. The book offers honest, outspoken advice and insights gleaned from Jay's own fight against the dark forces of depression and anxiety, his decades-long journey to the top of sports-journalism and his traumatic survival of a near-death experience. 

From an unlikely friendship with Michael Strahan that opened the door to his big break inside the NFL sports reporting, to helping veterans fight for their lives in the gym and even playing himself on the hit HBO show Ballers, Jay has seen it all. His experiences acting as coach to musicians like Wiz Khalifa and Demi Lovato to award-winning athletes and some of the most powerful people in business have given him the ability to laugh at himself while keeping up the fight against his own mental health struggles.

Seg 2

Interview w/ Arthur Smith about his new book, Reach:

Arthur has been working in TV production for 30 years. He has produced sports and competition and game shows for major networks as well as worked at Fox Sports one. Famous shows he’s created or American ninja warrior and Hells kitchen. He’s also worked on the Olympics multiple times.

Arthur’s approaches simple you need to understand your audience. Do you wanna have in motion and whatever store you were telling to bring people in and make them feel some thing. Try to create storylines that appeal to everybody to gain a wide audience.

American Ninja Warrior was a show of achievement, celebrating the contestants. It was a simple concept that makes you feel good.

Arthur’s worked on multiple Olympic Games. Worked on the 1988 Olympics which was very tough because the winter Olympics were in Calgary that year and the Summer Olympics were in sold. Olympics are very complex production with wide coverage. You have to find stories within the greater competition.

The story of 1988 was the race of the Century with Ben Johnson versus Carl Lewis to determine who the fastest man in the world was. Ben Johnson won the gold and set a new speed record. Then later there was a scandal that Ben had cheated and he lost his medal.

Arthur worked on a TV show with Jay Glazer called pros first Joe’s. Where ex NFL players competed against average people.

These competition and reality shows are the scripting of unscripted. Reality shows that are docudrama Or more scripted. What Arthur tries to do is more unscripted to get real stories. Takes an outline of their life type approach with you over shoot your footage and then find the stories.

Seg 3

2004 who created Hells kitchen which is totally pioneer that type of competition food show. Prior to that there had not been a successful Netwerk food show, it did not exist.

Hells kitchen brought celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay to major fame. Need a title and a star to build a new concept of a shell for fox.

It was going to be a food show competition which chefs going through boot camps and then the competition. It was very authentic with 80 cameras in a studio built restaurant.

In 2000 survivor was a big hit which created many copycat reality competition shows. This is the skeleton model for many shows.

When they created Hells kitchen in 2004, the belief was that reality shows it becomes saturated and it would not work. They started on Monday night on a holiday weekend, the show took off and has been on for 22 seasons.

Author Smith’s book reach, it’s symbolic because when you reach to find out what you’re capable of. He has numerous stories of his adventures with celebrities through the years and creating TV shows.

There’s stories in the book about Gordon Ramsay, Dick Clark, the rock, numerous sports stars, and Rupert Murdoch of Fox fame. Arthur is giving the book proceeds to six different charities. It’s called from here on out is to help young people create a career

Seg 4

Arthur was working at the Fox sports Netwerk in the 1990s. Arthur was living in LA he had moved to sports from traditional TV. Then Fox Sports in the NFL deal was struck in the early 1990s. Rupert Murdoch knew how to build an asset in Netwerk. He needed the NFL to build Netwerk, he needed the asset.

He overbid for the NFL got NFC football from CBS. Then he use the NFL to build the entire fox net work. Murdoch Murdoch had foresight. He understood that there’s 500 channels and cable, and the TV is fragmented landscape. But with football you could still build ratings.

Originally Fox only broadcast a few nights a week and was not on in multiple markets. But once they got the NFL they built out to a seven day a week Netwerk on all around the country.

Live sports is still must see TV. Sunday night football is the highest rated weekly TV show.

Rupert Murdoch Fox took big swings, big risks that can foul or yeah hit it bag. Rupert Murdoch also owns sky Netwerk in Australia. Just like the NFL he cut a deal with the Premier league soccer in England to air their sport.

Arthur has a show template for competition shows that has worked multiple times. Show production process is very complex.

Another show Arthur create it was a family game show called the floor is lava. Show is similar to the old nickelodeon kids competition shows.

Arthur asked himself before creating a show how are you going to challenge people? What is the purpose of the show?

American ninja first started it was on g4 TV. This was a gaming channel that doesn’t even exist anymore. Eventually they moved up to NBC and started airing in prime time. It was a prime time obstacle course show. The athletes root for each other and usually there is no winner. It’s all about men and women competing on the same course.

Ninja warrior is based on Japanese show called the attempt. American ninja Warrior has grown beyond the show to merchandise, you see ninja birthday parties, ninja gyms.

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