Carnival Films CEO Gareth Neame Sold Peacock’s ‘Day of the Jackal’ to an ‘Unusually Strong’ 200 Territories – Here’s How

Gareth Neame, whose Carnival Films shepherded “Downton Abbey” to international success, “could not have anticipated” that the British period drama would not only become a worldwide hit, but launch a successful film franchise, with a third film due September 2025.

But Carnival’s success isn’t limited to the moonshot of “Downton”: The British powerhouse, which sold to NBCUniversal in 2008, just launched “The Day of the Jackal” with Eddie Redmayne and Lashana Lynch for Sky/Peacock and has the upcoming dramas “Lockerbie: A Search for Truth,” starring Colin Firth, and the hotly anticipated “All Her Fault,” Sarah Snook’s first series since “Succession” wrapped.

Neame talked to TheWrap about how his series’ successes have changed the landscape for other U.K.-based productions and how Carnival still feels like a “boutique” studio despite being part of one of the biggest media corporations on the planet.

Read his full Office With a View Q&A below.

How has “Downton Abbey” changed the world of British TV?
The landscape now is completely different from when I put “Downton” together, which was all about making a U.K. presale. Nobody would pre-buy a British show then, with the exception of “Masterpiece” on PBS. From time to time, other platforms like A&E had come in and partnered on British shows. But 15 years ago, you couldn’t really see a British show [in the U.S.].

After “Downton,” all the streamers moved to London and set up offices. They saw the value in U.K. content. The cable companies have people here now. People started to realize you could make hits from other countries … Obviously, the value that we have unlocked is huge, and it’s altogether a more interesting environment.

How does your relationship with NBCUniversal work?
Before “Downton,” I couldn’t make a British show that would have the value of a U.S. network television show. I had a very good sales team at Universal who said the show is as good as anything they’ve ever made, so it was quite groundbreaking.

Before I sold the business, I had the backing of an Australian media group that had a small boutique distribution business, and I wanted a major distribution engine behind what we were making, I wanted to scale the company up, and I felt I could only do that by being part of a major studio.

It’s a very hard time to be a pure independent producer in the U.K., and television must be very, very hard. I’m glad that we’ve been part of a big media group. That means we can deficit finance, we’ve got development budgets. We’ve got the distribution muscles. So if I can make a good show with my colleagues, I know that our sales team will really capitalize on that. We want to be a big global presence.

You also make American shows, like “The Gilded Age” for HBO. How is that different from working in the U.K.?
The physical production is not very different at all. It’s the same sort of processes. But that is an HBO series. I’m on that show as an executive producer, but it’s a HBO Studio project, so it is run under their processes, as opposed to the way I would do something from Carnival. But the physical production staff, the scripts, the casting, the shooting, the editing, post production is all pretty similar,

You were talking about the independent sector in England. How would you compare that with what the production model is here in the U.S.?
There isn’t really an independent sector in the U.S., and you could argue there’s a declining independent sector in the U.K. There was a really active independent production sector [20 years ago], but with the scale of the challenge, the size of budgets and all of that, very many of us decided to make relationships with major studios.

We’re still the boutique of coming up with ideas, but we’ve got this big machine that can underpin our production costs and access the biggest distribution platforms. That has worked for me, and for independent producers, even in the U.K., it would be really hard without that infrastructure.

When you create shows, who do you imagine the audience is going to be?
When I can, I make shows for me. I make shows that I like and stories that I find appealing. What I’m trying to do is create shows that have global impact, like Hollywood shows, but that are expressly British.

“Day of the Jackal” is a very European brand with a British assassin at the heart of it, and leans into the British tradition of spies and thrillers and cat-and-mouse.

I’m usually trying to find things that are expressly British but will have global appeal, not local appeal.

After “Downton Abbey,” it seems like every platform has their own period piece.
I think audiences do love period pieces, but Hollywood continues to be very cautious. Anything historic is outside its comfort zone. It’s not to say they don’t get made. But it’s not an area where executives are always comfortable buying. I think it is exotic because there aren’t castles and things like that within half an hour of most Americans.

I wish sometimes that buyers would let me make more of these. But every producer says this. If you’re passionate about an idea, but you can’t get it away, that is deeply frustrating.

You don’t have carte blanche even after “Downton”?
I don’t think there ever comes a point, even when you’ve had notable success in the genre, when they go, “We trust you.” There’s always a bit of caution.

What’s the biggest shift you’ve had to make recently?
I think it’s about globalization. The model is now at a different price point, a different budget level, and a different expectation in global reach and global sales. Before, you were making shows for a U.K. license fee and hoping to sell further down the road, if you were lucky.

Have the projects also become more global?
In “The Day of the Jackal,” the first five to 10 minutes of the pilot episode is mostly in German. I was quite concerned about that, because 20 years ago, even 10 years ago, you probably wouldn’t have done that.

But now, research shows that domestic audiences feel that it gives real authenticity when you’ve got local languages. And I joked, “Oh, my God, we’ve got 10 minutes of German in ‘The Jackal.'” But then I watched “Shōgun” and I thought, “We’ve got nothing to worry about.”

What sets Carnival apart from other production companies, especially other British production companies?
I’ve always wanted to make popular shows. We won many awards from Emmys to BAFTAs to Golden Globes, and they’re critically well received. But also, we aim to make very commercial shows that sell widely. And “Downton” sold to every territory on the planet. I don’t think “Jackal” is that far behind. It already sold to 200 territories, which is unusually strong.

We want to be a big global presence. We’re a commercial business. We’re not arty-farty, creative producers. We like to deliver to the bottom line. We want shows that make money. We want to change the perception that foreign content is [not] also of huge value, and I think we’ve done that. That’s our brand.

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