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6 hours ago
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Be honest: how much attention do you pay when you watch TV? If you’re familiar with the ritual of half-watching a series or film – Netflix on in the background while you check out what your arch enemy has just posted on Instagram, say – it may surprise you to hear that Netflix doesn’t just know you engage in this obscene behaviour. It actually wants you to carry on.
The streamer was in the news recently thanks to an excellent piece by Will Tavlin in n+1, which reminded readers of the platform’s microgenre of “casual viewing”: TV shows and movies designed to be watched while doing something else. One paragraph in particular incited a great deal of frustration. Tavlin claimed that Netflix have told various screenwriters to have their protagonists “announce what they’re doing so that viewers who have this program on in the background can follow along”.
Unsurprisingly, this results in atrocious dialogue like the following, from the Lindsay Lohan film Irish Wish.
“We spent a day together,” Lohan tells her fictitious lover, James. “I admit it was a beautiful day filled with dramatic vistas and romantic rain, but that doesn’t give you the right to question my life choices. Tomorrow, I’m marrying Paul Kennedy.”
“Fine,” he responds. “That will be the last you see of me because after this job is over I’m off to Bolivia to photograph an endangered tree lizard.”
Is it inherently bad to cater to people who may prefer their viewing on the more casual side? Is it snobbery to believe that TV must demand all of our attention all of the time?
It isn’t breaking news that Netflix panders to the casual viewer. As well as the award-winning TV it produces (Baby Reindeer won a Golden Globe for best miniseries earlier this month), the streamer has a history of telling showrunners that scenes aren’t “second screen enough”. In other words, if a viewer’s primary screen is their phone, they shouldn’t be so challenged by the Netflix show on their secondary screen that they switch the show off. Above all else, goes the cynical view, Netflix just wants you to have its visual muzak playing for as long as possible. (“Nothing to add from us on this one, but thanks for reaching out,” says Netflix’s PR when I contact them.)
These reports may catastrophise a niche problem. Three writers who have written for Netflix tell me they have never received notes like this from the company. Danny Brocklehurst, who has written several Harlan Coben TV adaptations, says, “Hand on heart, nobody puts any pressure on us from Netflix to make anything simplistic or that you can watch while you’re scrolling through your phone or whatever.” Brocklehurst thinks it’s unfair to characterise the company as one that is simply dumbing down.
“I would be surprised if any exec was basically like, ‘Write this badly,’” says Joe Barton, who has written shows like Giri/Haji and Black Doves for Netflix. “I don’t think there’s a sort of homogenised Netflix. It’s a huge company with many different departments.”
But writers can’t help but be aware that their audience is consuming shows in different ways. James Hamilton has been head writer on the animated Netflix shows Dogs in Space and Jentry Chau vs the Underworld. “I think it’s OK to be mindful of how social media has mashed everyone’s attention spans to a pulp,” he says. “We’d be lying to ourselves if we didn’t admit that most of us find it hard to put our phones down when the TV is on, and we all get distracted very easily. But I’d be very concerned if any exec I was working with was actively trying to give our audience permission to pay less attention.”
Brocklehurst, who admits he might be more “old-school”, doesn’t have much time for the argument that narrative TV should be consumed while on in the background. “I hate the idea that people are watching anybody’s shows, and certainly my shows, with a phone in their hand, scrolling, texting, commenting on the show maybe on Twitter,” he says. “Just watch it. You make television so people will complete it because it’s good and they enjoy it and they wanna watch it. What you don’t do is make it so simple that it’s just like chewing gum.”
As pop culture writer Ryan Broderick points out, however, the casual-viewing phenomenon isn’t a modern one – it was actually commonplace before TV entered its second “golden era” at the turn of this century. Because television storytelling took so many lessons from radio, its dialogue used to be more explanatory. When prestige TV entered the arena in the early 2000s, the medium started inviting comparisons to literature and cinema because of its intricate, all-consuming qualities. Much like you can’t do anything else while reading a novel, you weren’t expected to do the washing-up while watching The Sopranos. “If you’re on TikTok or Hinge or whatever and watching The Wire at the same time,” says Barton, “you’ll probably just turn it off.”
Barton, who once tried to watch Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy at a baby screening and therefore had no clue what was going on, also says that the acclaimed shows of TV’s golden age didn’t necessarily have enormous audience numbers. If you have a bigger audience, you may be forced to explain more in order to include everyone. Shows like The Sopranos, Mad Men and The Wire pre-date Netflix, were never made to be binged, and may have had more artistic freedom than modern TV dramas.
When I email the writer of the Lohan-starring Irish Wish, Kirsten Hansen, for comment, her agent tells me that Netflix never gave Hansen the kind of direction described in Tavlin’s piece. How did the “endangered tree lizard” line come about? “Not her line,” says her agent. “There were changes made by the director/producing team during the production process.” How does Hansen feel about the line now? “She’s not fazed by it,” says her agent. Two other writers of Netflix films declined to comment for this piece.
The question may be one of balance. As long as there are shows that can be consumed casually and shows that demand 100% of our attention, things may be all right. “There’s comfort in having a familiar show or movie on in the background that your attention can dip in and out of,” says Hamilton. “It’d be ludicrous to expect anything to demand everyone’s complete, rapt attention. But none of that means people simply cannot pay attention, or that stories should be intentionally crafted for people who have the show on in the background.”
“I think there are and always have been shows that cater to more casual viewing,” says Barton, who says he feels terrible about occasionally watching shows while on his phone. “I just think it’s about the intentionality of the individual programme. I think the problem would be if every show had to obey those rules.” The other balancing act, one that writers have tried to perfect since the dawn of time, is between subtext and clunky exposition. How do you ensure your audience understands what is happening without spoonfeeding them?
One thing people can agree on, thinks Brocklehurst, is that the streamers are terrified of people straying away from their particular platform. With lines about photographing Bolivian tree lizards unlikely to keep them entranced for ever, Netflix might need to think carefully about how to make casual viewing that’s also good viewing. The two needn’t be mutually exclusive.
“If you’re not paying attention to the story, that’s OK – you do you!” says Hamilton. “But we should be asking how to encourage audiences to pay more attention, not less. I think people are always hungry for stories made with nuance, care and attention to detail, whether they realise it or not. Great storytelling knows how to reward both casual and focused attention.”
