Apple TV+ Doesn’t Micromanage Its Creatives (At Least Not All of Them)
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Apple TV+ has long been known for micromanaging the creatives that produce its streaming content. However, a new report from The Los Angeles Times indicates the main thing Apple worries about is its brand image. The service has fewer projects in the pipeline than many other streaming services, allowing Apple executives to pay closer attention to the projects they are producing.
The Times report is a wide-ranging article that indicates that while Apple TV+ still has a long way to go before it can genuinely compete with more well-established streaming services like Netflix and Amazon Prime Video, it’s doing its best to catch up.
When Apple TV+ launched in November 2019, company executives knew the service would need to hit the ground running, so it had several high-profile projects in production. The service put up considerable sums of money to attract projects headed by major talent, like The Morning Show, which made Reese Witherspoon and Jennifer Aniston some of the highest-paid TV stars in Hollywood.
The service today continues to make deals with several popular stars, including Jon Hamm (Your Friends & Neighbors), and Miles Teller and Anya Taylor-Joy, both of whom starred in The Gorge (Both of which are recommended watches, by the way).
Apple TV+ will release the Brad Pitt starring vehicle F1 in theaters in June, which will be followed by a run on the streaming service. Comscore analyst Paul Dergarabedian says it’s a “huge movie for Apple.” Apple is obviously hoping the film will perform better than some of its less-than-successful films, such as Argylle or Killers of the Flower Moon.
Dergarabedian says Apple managed to pick a perfect project that can increase both its filmmaking acumen and relationships with filmmakers.
Apple’s willingness to provide large budgets for its productions has earned the company plenty of goodwill with filmmakers, who see Apple as supportive.
Recently, the producers of the Owen Wilson vehicle Stick were given a large enough budget to travel to North Carolina to get access to PGA Tour commentators Trevor Immelman and Jim Nantz.
Meanwhile, Tomorrow Studios president Becky Clements praised Apple for allowing her studio to produce Physical, which was a seriocomic 80s period piece about a woman’s struggle with anorexia and how she found herself through aerobics. Clements praised Apple for avoiding micromanaging the series while it was in production.
However, things have not always been this way. Early on, Apple got a bit of a reputation for meddling with show production. One example was The Problem with Jon Stewart, where Apple executives attempted to dictate what topics the politically-based show should avoid, eventually leading to its cancellation.
In April 2024, Stewart alleged that Apple instructed him not to interview FTC Chair Lina Khan on a podcast. Stewart also claimed that Apple refused to allow him to discuss the subject of Artificial Intelligence on the show.
In March, The Studio star and co-creator Seth Rogen also revealed that Apple criticized some of his decisions during the series’ production. Pre-production discussions about the show included Apple’s concerns about cameos that Rogen wanted, as it doubted celebrities would be willing to make cameos. However, Rogen was able to get nearly every celebrity that he had on his wishlist to make an appearance.
