Johan Derksen and the other two men of VI are on the bench transfer-free now that Talpa has torn their contract. Are they making the switch to a streaming service like Prime Video?
They are currently the biggest crowd pullers in the Netherlands without their own program: the men of VI. It is obvious that a streaming service can put itself on the map in one fell swoop by bringing in Johan Derksen, René van der Gijp and Wilfred Genee for a daily program. A direct threat to RTL’s Videoland.
John to Amazon?
In addition to Netflix and Videoland, a lot of streaming little ones compete in our country for the favor of the viewer, from Viaplay to Prime Video and from Disney+ to HBO Max. They could potentially win hundreds of thousands of subscribers by bringing the men from VI into their home, because there is nothing comparable in the Dutch media landscape.
Format developer Kirsten Jan van Nieuwenhuijzen, who started his career as one of John de Mol’s first four creatives, does not consider a VI transfer to Prime Video inconceivable. He points out in his podcast Content Wars Note that the older men of Top Gear also made a new start at Prime in 2015 when they were canceled by the BBC.
‘Just might’
Kirsten Jan is curious if this will come of it. “The moment you have 700 or 800,000 viewers… Many streamers sign up for that, you know. It wouldn’t be a weird proposition at all. Many of those streamers naturally target a younger audience. VI’s target group was relatively old, but young people also looked at it.”
He continues: “It could very well be that they would receive such an offer from a streamer. That just might happen. I haven’t heard anything about that, but I wouldn’t be surprised.”
Much more money
It’s no secret that VI’s men at Talpa were paid incredibly well. That could be even more with a streaming service, according to Kirsten Jan. “The joke, of course, is that the three men from Top Gear, who are also a bit older, were extremely popular with the BBC, but Amazon offered them a lot more money.”
Will the men of VI follow in the footsteps of the men of Top Gear? “It just might happen. These are also three older gentlemen who do make slightly different TV, but I don’t know. Maybe Amazon is offering them something. It would be news.”
Weak of Talpa
In any case, it is very stupid of Talpa that they let VI go so easily, Kirsten Jan thinks. “I think Talpa’s weakness is that they didn’t stand behind him and say, ‘Come on, let’s just keep going. This is what everyone expects from your program and this is what makes the program so successful.’”
According to him, TV is becoming immeasurably boring now that RTL and Talpa are increasingly afraid of sponsors who are now behaving like ‘holy beans’ under pressure from Twitter opinion. Streaming services are less dependent on that. “I have the feeling that streamers dare to go a bit further in their programming.”
Fragment
An excerpt from the Content Wars podcast:
