Netflix has been launching original programming for a decade now, as February 6, 2022 marks the 10th anniversary of the premiere of lily hammer on the streaming service. As reported by DEADLINE, Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos released a touching essay commemorating the anniversary and reflecting on the company’s roots in content for an international audience.
“Looking back, ‘Lilyhammer’ may have been an unorthodox choice for our first show. But it worked because it was a deeply local story that we could share with the world,” Sarandos wrote. “The jokes and references worked locally and the more universal themes of the shows traveled perfectly. Since then, we’ve seen so many great local stories that resonate with people in other countries and cultures: shows and movies that take place everywhere and are told in every language.”
Even though many consider this to be the first Netflix original, it has an asterisk next to it. In a video chat on the streaming service’s website, Sarandos and Van Zandt admit that House Of Cards was the first original series to be ordered by Netflix in a huge deal that rocked Hollywood. Both Sarandos and Van Zandt acknowledged that Netflix’s first original was a local Norwegian production with subtitles. The streamer made local production a cornerstone of its global expansion, with non-English shows becoming mainstream and series such as Lupine, Money Robbery and Squid Game to worldwide hits. They have continued to conquer that market, expanding original series and international programming.
You can read the essay below:
What comes to mind when you think of Netflix’s first original series? The White House? The Litchfield Correctional Institute… No, not that one. Our very first original series was Lilyhammer and today, February 6, marks the 10th anniversary of the landmark Netflix premiere. A groundbreaking moment in Netflix history began in a recording studio on the North Sea. Bergen is where Norwegian creators Eilif Skodvin and Anne Bjørnstad approached Stevie Van Zandt about a show they wrote for him in a small Norwegian town called Lillehammer. When I learned a few months later that Netflix was looking for original content, I got a call directly from Stevie, who wanted to send us the series. I asked if we could read the scripts and Stevie said, “Scripts? I can send you the whole season.” We watched it and we loved it, I thought it was a classic fish-out-of-water story, with Stevie playing a part loved by the audience, and the interplay between his no-nonsense hit man Frank Tagliano and the friendly community around him made for a great comedy It was a character so well known in a culture few audiences had seen I wasn’t sure what would come out of that first phone call with Stevie I was (am) a big fan of his music and I loved him in The Sopranos so I was happy to chat with him for a few minutes In his new book titled “Unrequited Infatuations” he says the call led to the best business meeting I remember Stevie being a much better actor and musician than a salesman, he would humbly describe the show as “different, strange, quirky, sometimes it’s in English and sometimes it has subtitles…” almost like he’s probing me honored to talk. What he didn’t know was that we had already seen the episodes and were in love with the show. We agreed to buy it and have a second season made, not knowing that Norwegian TV shows usually only lasted one season and usually took long breaks between seasons when they came back. We came to a deal. “The meeting was great and Stevie loved every idea except one. When I told him we weren’t going to show the episodes one a week, we were going to be delivering the entire season in one sitting. That stopped him in his ‘You work and suffers and someone can see a year of your work in one night? That sounds a bit weird,” he said. “It’s not weird,” I told him. “It’s like working on an album.” He laughed and agreed. After the first broadcast on the Norwegian broadcast TV NRK on January 25, 2012, we debuted “Lilyhammer” on Netflix February 6, 2012, offering all eight episodes to our members in the US, Canada and Latin America (followed by the UK, Ireland and the Scandinavian countries later that year). This was the first time we’ve streamed a show in multiple countries and languages… and it worked. Looking back, “Lilyhammer” may have been an unorthodox choice for our first show. But it worked because it was a deeply local story that we shared with the world. The jokes and references worked locally and the more universal themes of the shows matched perfectly. Since then, we’ve seen so many great local stories that resonate with people in other countries and from other cultures: shows and movies that take place everywhere and in any language be told. “Lilyhammer” was the precursor to so many great shows to come – “Dark Desire” and “Who Killed Sara?” from Mexico, “La Casa de Papel” from Spain, “The Rain” and “The Chestnut Man” from Denmark, “Dark” and “Barbarians” from Germany, “Lupine” from France, “Sacred Games” from India and of course , most recently, “Squid Game” from Korea, our biggest show ever. But the first one will always be “Lilyhammer”. Thank you “Lilyhammer” and Stevie Van Zandt for starting this incredible ten year journey. It’s always hard to predict what’s going to happen in the next ten years, but one thing’s for sure: we’ll have many more great stories from everywhere that can be loved everywhere.
lily hammer lasted for three seasons before ending in 2014. If you missed the series, you can still stream it on Netflix. You can also check out what Ted Sarandos and Stevie Van Zandt had to say about the series in the video below.
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