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Speaker 1: Seven ties weekend Breakfast Film and TV.

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Speaker 2: It's eight minutes before eight o'clock, time for us to

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Speaker 2: shift our attention to film and TV. And one of

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Speaker 2: the big stories we're not kind of certainly playing out

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Speaker 2: at the moment is what is happening at Multi Choice

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Speaker 2: following their acquisition by a French giant, Canal Plus. We

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Speaker 2: heard a couple of weeks ago that Show Max would

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Speaker 2: be wrapping up its operations, and then we heard the

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Speaker 2: plans by the French owners to replace Show Max. Now

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Speaker 2: we hear there is a new part in this saga,

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Speaker 2: and it does feel a little bit like we're in

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Speaker 2: an episode of Days of Our Lives. So the latest

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Speaker 2: in the saga is that Portfolio Committee on our Communications

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Speaker 2: and Digital Technologies they're now planning special oversight to visit

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Speaker 2: the broadcasting sector. This is after Canal Plus's announcement that

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Speaker 2: they're going to discontinue Showmacs, which was unprofitable and costing

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Speaker 2: them a lot of money. To give us the latest

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Speaker 2: on this episode, we're joined by TV and entertainment critic

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Speaker 2: he's also an entertainment journalist. Tennis Ferrera joins us on

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Speaker 2: the line. Tennis, a very good morning.

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Speaker 1: Too hellove there.

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Speaker 2: So we now hear that Parliament seems to be planning

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Speaker 2: to step in to address or get involved with the

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Speaker 2: Show Max matter. What do we know?

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Speaker 1: We can maybe send over some great one learn to

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Speaker 1: read books. It seems the parliamentarians haven't really read over

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Speaker 1: the past year and a half, and this week when

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Speaker 1: they discovered that the dear adorable shows on show Macs

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Speaker 1: are ending, they are suddenly up in arms and asking

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Speaker 1: questions like, oh, is the end of show going to

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Speaker 1: lead to job losses? And obviously the answer is yes,

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Speaker 1: So it's not a case of the evil Stefano who

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Speaker 1: abducted Marlena? But can heltlists that obviously promised that they're

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Speaker 1: not going to retrench any Multi Choice workers for a

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Speaker 1: period of three years, But that doesn't include TV and

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Speaker 1: film productions who get commissioned by Multi Choice to make

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Speaker 1: shows for a service or platform like Show Max, who

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Speaker 1: then don't get those commissions anymore. And then imagine, I'm

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Speaker 1: asking you to make me a TV show of form.

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Speaker 1: Then you go and higher between fifty and two hundred

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Speaker 1: people to make a Young Ens or a Spinners or something.

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Speaker 1: Those jobs are no longer going to exist because Multi

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Speaker 1: Choice and Emit are not going to commission that number

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Speaker 1: of shows for Show Mask because it no longer exists.

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Speaker 1: So this week's show Mats also sent out a notification

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Speaker 1: to tell subscribers that the last day that show Maks

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Speaker 1: will exist will be the citieth of April. So the

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Speaker 1: last day that you can pay for that service or

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Speaker 1: user voucher that you bought maybe on your banking app

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Speaker 1: would be the citieth of March. And now the parliamentarians

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Speaker 1: are waking up and asking a lot of these questions

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Speaker 1: that they should have interrogated and investigated and have asked

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Speaker 1: about the year and a half.

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Speaker 2: Ago, right, and so it seems that the question mainly

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Speaker 2: is coming from the eff S Policically, Share contacted the

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Speaker 2: chairperson of the committee, Corsella Samuni Depo and said the

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Speaker 2: multitude should be prepared to answer a number of questions.

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Speaker 2: The one is the definitive timeline and rationale for ending

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Speaker 2: or restructuring Showmax, which that has been given and it's

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Speaker 2: been given recently, a thorough assessment of the potential job

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Speaker 2: losses both at Multi Choice and within the wider film

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Speaker 2: and television industry, and then also the future of existing

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Speaker 2: Showmac's original productions and the accessibility to South African viewers.

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Speaker 2: So interesting that those are the questions that the committee

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Speaker 2: is wanting to get from well, Maunch Choice and or

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Speaker 2: can ow plus.

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Speaker 1: All of the political parties were actually quite prouding the

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Speaker 1: questions that they asked. But unfortunately that horse has bolted.

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Speaker 1: So I'm wondering in what world they loved him to

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Speaker 1: have not have done their proper oversight and duty to

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Speaker 1: ask these sort of incisive questions. They are asking all

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Speaker 1: of the right questions unfortunately it's just a little bit

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Speaker 1: too late now. Once and then they had the KASA

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Speaker 1: and the Competition Commission who were like, oh, nothing was

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Speaker 1: wrong or done wrong or whatever in the takeover transaction.

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Speaker 1: But the Competition Commission was like, oh, we will now

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Speaker 1: investigate the decisions and whether the closure of SHOWMACX is

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Speaker 1: preaching the transaction or whatever. But of course it isn't really.

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Speaker 1: You just can't let go of the actual multi choice

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Speaker 1: fixed appointed staff. So yeah, it's a little bit that

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Speaker 1: caught in front of the horse.

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Speaker 2: Relatedly, right, and so we see that there's also now

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Speaker 2: the committee is going to be doing a special overside

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Speaker 2: visit to the broadcasting sector from the end of March

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Speaker 2: to it's thirty one March into the first of April.

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Speaker 2: They'll do ETV, Multi Choice and other commercial broadcasters. Do

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Speaker 2: we have any idea what that overside visit will be

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Speaker 2: looking for, because I guess the one to Multi Choice

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Speaker 2: is very different to the one the ETV. ETV hasn't

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Speaker 2: just been sold whereas Multi Choice has and they have

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Speaker 2: new owners. But so any idea what those overside visits

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Speaker 2: look like.

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Speaker 1: They usually talk to the executive so they sort of

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Speaker 1: talk to the staff. They've done it before with the

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Speaker 1: SABC as well, and they sort of recently went on

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Speaker 1: a said visit for the Netflix series One Piece, which

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Speaker 1: is the most expensive show being filmed in lighting South Africa,

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Speaker 1: although it's an international company, and they sort of shake

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Speaker 1: hands and drinker Fanta and what I would really like

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Speaker 1: to implore them because the SABC staff have told me

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Speaker 1: that in the past when they sort of come and talk,

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Speaker 1: it's sort of salty cracks and a little bit of

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Speaker 1: tea or whatever. Talk to the actual staffers on the

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Speaker 1: ground level they kind of always being hidden away in

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Speaker 1: the corridors. Go and search them out and ask them

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Speaker 1: how they feel, ask them what's the issues. They will

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Speaker 1: tell you that the microphones in the radio studios that

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Speaker 1: the SABC is not working. Don't just talk to the executives.

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Speaker 1: They're going to give you sort of like a one sided,

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Speaker 1: very rosy story. So these parliamentarians are going to go

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Speaker 1: and talk to a little bit of the lay of

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Speaker 1: the land of commercial broadcasters like ITV and multi Choice,

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Speaker 1: and I really would implore them to actually talk to

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Speaker 1: the rank and file and not to the Marilenas and

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Speaker 1: the Stephanos, who's the faces of these companies.

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Speaker 2: So they're just the in commercial broadcasters, which means the

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Speaker 2: SABC even though they have commercial entities so they've got

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Speaker 2: commercial radio channels and commercial TV channels, they're not going

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Speaker 2: to be included in this round. No.

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Speaker 1: They have previously been at the SABC to talk there

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Speaker 1: when it was the public broadcaster, which is kind of

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Speaker 1: getting arrested this time by not showing the news. But

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Speaker 1: usually when one of the broadcasters are sort of involved

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Speaker 1: in these headline grabbing stories, they go and sort of

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Speaker 1: visit there. So there's time it will just be the

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Speaker 1: commercial broadcasters because the issue that they realize is they

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Speaker 1: are now starting to get worried, which they should have

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Speaker 1: been a long time ago about sort of this intense

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Speaker 1: consolidation of our local media sphere where they are not

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Speaker 1: really diversity and enough companies to when one gets taken over,

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Speaker 1: basically everybody loses.

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Speaker 2: Tennis is always a great pleasure having you on the show.

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Speaker 2: Thank you so much for your time.

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Speaker 1: Thank you.

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Speaker 2: That's independent TV and film critic and journalist Tennis Ferrera

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Speaker 2: taking us to eight o'clock and your laterst Eyewitness News