Advanced Television

Original comedy, kids programming from Amazon

May 3, 2012

By Colin Mann

Amazon.com has confirmed that Amazon Studios is expanding its development efforts into comedy and children’s series. Amazon Studios is Amazon’s content development division that uses audience feedback to identify original entertainment that customers will love.

Series creators are invited to upload their proposals for comedy and children’s programming to Amazon Studios at http://studios.amazon.com/getting-started/series. The best comedy and children’s series will be distributed through Amazon Instant Video, Amazon’s digital video streaming service.

“Amazon Studios wants to discover great talent and produce programming that audiences will love,” said Roy Price, director of Amazon Studios. “In the course of developing movies, we’ve heard a lot of interest from content creators who want to develop original series in the comedy and children’s genres. We are excited to bring writers, animators and directors this new opportunity to develop original series.”

Each month, Amazon Studios intends to option one promising new project and add it to the development slate where it will be tested for viability with an audience. If Amazon Studios elects to distribute a full-budget series, the creator will receive a $55,000 payment, up to five per cent of Amazon’s net receipts from toy and t-shirt licensing, and other royalties and bonuses.

Amazon Studios launched in November 2010. Since then, more than 700 test movies and 7,000 scripts have been submitted and 15 movie projects are currently under development.

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