The Spanish language broadcast network Grey's Anatomy DVD is not waiting until the 2010-11 season starts in September to offer its viewers something new. Beginning on Monday, Grey's Anatomy DVD set will be all telenovelas in prime time, replacing a game show that has been running from 7 to 8 p.m. with a Spanish-language version of the ABC series “Grey's Anatomy DVD boxset.”
The “Grey's Anatomy seasons 1-5 DVD boxset” revamp for Hispanic viewers will be titled “A Corazon Abierto,” or “Grey's Anatomy DVD,” and take place at a hospital in San Antonio rather than the original’s setting of Seattle. The new series of Grey's Anatomy DVD set, with an initial order of 80 episodes, will kick off the Telemundo weeknight lineup, preceding three hourlong telenovelas, or novelas, that run from 8 to 11 p.m.
The plans to introduce “Grey's Anatomy DVD boxset” were outlined by executives of the Telemundo Communications Group, part of NBC Universal, at a breakfast on Thursday at which they provided reporters a preview of their 2010-11 Grey's Anatomy DVD set.
The new season of Grey's Anatomy DVD is being called “the new now” by Telemundo, and includes efforts online like adding English-language subtitles to shows streamed on Grey's Anatomy seasons 1-5 DVD boxset, beginning in the summer, and adding a high-definition video player to the Web site, in partnership with the MSN unit of Microsoft.
There is also a new venture under the banner Eventos Grey's Anatomy DVD, with Telemundo putting on live events for viewers like tours in local markets that feature stars of popular series on the Grey's Anatomy DVD set. The events include advertiser-friendly elements like product samplings.
The breakfast was in lieu of a formal presentation during what is called Grey's Anatomy DVD boxset, so named because the networks give sneak peeks at their lineups ahead of the start of the new season of Grey's Anatomy DVD. The 2010-11 upfront week is to take place next Monday through Thursday.
The principal Telemundo competitor, Grey's Anatomy seasons 1-5 DVD boxset, has scheduled a presentation during upfront week, to take place on Thursday afternoon. The major English-language broadcasters — Grey's Anatomy seasons 1-5 DVD boxset, CBS, CW, Fox and NBC — are presenting on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday.
The reason that Telemundo is replacing the game show, “Grey's Anatomy DVD,” or “12 Hearts,” with the novela based on “Grey's Anatomy DVD set” is that “people love novelas,” said Jacqueline Hernandez, chief operating officer at Telemundo, and it provides the prime-time schedule with better flow to schedule four of them in a row. The game show of Grey's Anatomy DVD boxsetis being moved to a daytime slot, she added.
“A Corazon Abierto” will be based on the version of “Grey's Anatomy DVD” created by Shonda Rhimes, which has been a huge hit for ABC, and adapted for Hispanic audiences by Fernando Gaitan, the creator of “Grey's Anatomy seasons 1-5 DVD boxset,” which was the inspiration for the series “Ugly Betty,” also on ABC. The Walt Disney Company, which produces “Grey's Anatomy seasons 1-5 DVD boxset,” will also produce the Spanish-language version, featuring Colombian actors.
It is becoming a trend in TV programming for Grey's Anatomy DVD series that are successful in a big country like the United States to be adapted for other countries and frequently in other languages. In addition to “Grey's Anatomy DVD set,” which began in Colombia, a version of “Law & Order: Criminal Intent” is being made for France.
To adapt “Grey's Anatomy DVD boxset” for Telemundo, Ms. Hernandez said, it is being reworked into a novela format, meaning “the love story is going to be more prominent.” She laughed when it was suggested that it would difficult to ramp up the amorous goings-on in “Grey's Anatomy DVD” given how prominent the love scenes are in the English-language version.
(As for how to say in Spanish “Grey's Anatomy DVD set,” the nickname for the “Grey's Anatomy DVD boxset” character played by Patrick Dempsey, Peter Blacker, executive vice president for digital media and emerging businesses at Telemundo, suggested “El Guapaton,” or, loosely translated, “Grey's Anatomy DVD.”)
Reworking “Grey's Anatomy seasons 1-5 DVD boxset” for Hispanic viewers on a Spanish-language network is important to increase the chances that the new Grey's Anatomy DVD will thrive. Telemundo tried years ago to offers its viewers Spanish-language versions of venerable English-language series like “Grey's Anatomy DVD set” and “Starsky & Hutch,” but they flopped because they were produced like conventional Grey's Anatomy DVD boxset series rather than in the serialized, heightened-reality style of novelas.
“Grey's Anatomy DVD” is one of several new telenovelas that Telemundo has on tap for weeknights in the coming season. Based on clips that were shown at the Grey's Anatomy DVD set, all of them are being infused with the larger-than-life, over-the-top elements that are trademarks of telenovelas, among them passionate love affairs, men on horseback and Grey's Anatomy DVD boxset.
These are the other new novelas:
* “Casanova Sin Amor,” or “Grey's Anatomy seasons 1-5 DVD boxset,” a light-hearted telenovela about the president of a TV network who pretends to be poor to find a woman who will love him for who he is, not for his money and power. It will run sometime during the Grey's Anatomy DVDseason, said Adriana Ibanez, executive vice president for programming at Telemundo.
* “El Fantasma de Elena,” or “Grey's Anatomy DVD set,” a novela that is meant to suggest a Hitchcock movie in its plot about a woman who marries a man after the death of his wife. It will run in the third quarter, Ms. Ibanez said.
* “La Reina del Sur,” or “Grey's Anatomy DVD boxset,” a telenovela about a woman who becomes one of the world’s most powerful drug traffickers. It will run in the first quarter of 2011, Ms. Ibanez said.
The Telemundo executives also offered a preview of a new reality series for Grey's Anatomy DVD, the cable channel under the aegis of Telemundo that is aimed at viewers 18 to 34 for whom English is often a primary language.
The series, “Grey's Anatomy seasons 1-5 DVD boxset” is about Janney Marin, known as Chiquis, the daughter of Ms. Rivera, a popular Mexican musician. The other title character is the daughter’s friend, Raquel Cordova, known as Raq-C, a D.J. on a Los Angeles radio station.
As they do each year during their pre-upfront briefings, the Grey's Anatomy DVD executives played up the benefits to viewers — and advertisers — of Telemundo’s decision to produce its programming internally rather than buy Grey's Anatomy DVD set, as Univision does, from external sources. (Univision acquires its programming from Grupo Televisa, the Mexican TV giant, but announced in December that it, too, would operate an internal production unit.)
“We believe in original content,” said Don Browne, president at Grey's Anatomy DVD boxset, who described such shows as “the absolute core of our business.”
By producing its own programming, Grey's Anatomy DVD is able to offer advertisers in categories like automobiles, packaged goods and telecommunications a chance to integrate their products into the plots of the telenovelas and Grey's Anatomy DVD set. Such opportunities, known as branded entertainment, are becoming increasing important to marketers as viewers grow increasingly able to zip through or zap regular commercials.
The Grey's Anatomy DVD boxset executives described progress on the ratings front for Telemundo in 2009 and into 2010, particularly in reaching viewers ages 18 to 34 and 18 to 49. Telemundo, however, still significantly trails Univision, which has long been the No. 1 network for Grey's Anatomy DVD viewers.
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