Time to ditch the weekly TV release, says ‘House of Cards’ scribe

TORONTO – It’s time to rethink the way TV shows are released to the small screen, says “House of Cards” writer Beau Willimon.

Voracious viewers increasingly refuse to be bound to the TV schedule so why not give them what they want when possible, says the Oscar-nominated scribe, who co-wrote the George Clooney film “Ides of March.”

Netflix released the entire first season of Willimon’s political drama on its streaming service earlier this year and plans to do the same with the upcoming horror “Hemlock Grove” and rebooted comedy “Arrested Development.”

“There’s no reason for shows to be done week-to-week anymore,” Willimon says in a recent interview from Costa Mesa, Calif.

“That harkens back to the days of live television when the cameras had to roll at a certain night at a certain time and it was being broadcast live. And then you move to shows being pre-taped with live studio audiences … and people were conditioned for a certain night and a certain time and that’s how you sold advertising.”

Subscription-fuelled networks including HBO, The Movie Network and Movie Central make their money by signing up viewers, rather than advertising. They would be best primed to shift to the all-at-once release, he says.

“There’s absolutely no reason to do a week-to-week release with that model. The only argument to be made is that there is a marketing strategy in which over 10 weeks you’re able to build a sort of slow burn marketing campaign and the show remains relevant in the press for a 10-week period,” he says.

“But we didn’t do that and I’m still on the phone with (press) eight weeks after we launched all 13 of our episodes. So I can make the argument that there’s ways to stay relevant for just as long as a show that’s doing it week-to-week.”

Willimon is set to share his thoughts on the TV business and the craft of writing at this weekend’s Toronto Screenwriting Conference.

He’ll be joined there by speakers including Glen Mazzara, who just ended a stint writing for “The Walking Dead,” “Suits” creator Aaron Korsh, writer Bob Kushell of “Anger Management,” and writer David Hudgins of “Parenthood” and “Friday Night Lights.”

Mazzara admits to being a big fan of TV binging because it allows him to more deeply immerse himself into a show.

Even though AMC’s “The Walking Dead” wasn’t necessarily crafted for bingers, he says he considers the last season to be a “movie told over 16 parts.”

He wishes some of its critics could see it that way, too, noting that some fans are quick to complain about episodes that seem to be slower-paced than others. He says there’s a larger arc at play.

“When it airs every week some people may feel ‘Oh, this is a slow episode. Now the show’s always going to be slow.’ This is part of the online feedback from fans. Fans get very frustrated when the episode does not meet their expectation,” says Mazzara.

“These critiques go away when you watch it all the way through — when you watch the episodes back-to-back…. Sometimes the show will play better in one or two sittings.”

Holding all episodes until the entire season can be released allows creators to go back and tweak things as shooting evolves, says Willimon.

“You learn things as you’re shooting. For instance, we discovered along the way that Corey Stoll, who we knew was a great actor, was a phenomenal actor and whenever we put him on the screen with Kevin Spacey it was electric,” he says.

“I made some pretty monumental changes to the story in the midst of production that required a lot of rewriting. When you make choices like that they have a ripple effect and they’re going to change some of the notions you might have had for Season 2 because you’re now adapting or responding to discoveries that you couldn’t have foreseen.”

And because Netflix ordered two seasons of “House of Cards” when it bought the series, Willimon could map out storylines in season 1 that might not pay off until late in season 2.

“You have a much broader canvas to work with and you’re not playing the ratings game week-to-week early on in your first season just to stay alive,” he notes, adding that he’s already got big ideas for season 2.