While the demand is still there, budgets for drama across the board are down and producers are having to work smart to get scripted to screen. Pippa Considine reports
While there’s continued high levels of demand for UK scripted originals, there’s no let-up in the pressure on budgets. Below the surface, UK producers are paddling like mad, channelling creativity into finding commercial projects, cost cutting and scoping for digital opportunities.
In 2024, demand for drama in the UK grew by over 19% year on year to reach 42% of the value of all commissions, according to the pact census. That’s £730m. The total of primary international commissions across all programming genres remained steady at around £1.1bn.
The BFI figures for 2024 show inward investment in production spend in the UK growing to £4.7bn, up 43% on a shaky 2023. As a slice of this, HETV was up 25% to £2.8bn.
UKTV and Channel 5 came into drama commissioning in the last few years and are now doubling down, adding hours. Channel 4 is steadily increasing investment, while the BBC and ITV continue with strong scripted slates.
The BBC is the most significant investor in the UK, making 350 hours of first-run drama available in 2024/2025. Director of Drama at the BBC Lindsay Salt cites Stephen Butchard’s This City is Ours as “exemplifying the best of what BBC drama has to offer.”
In 2026, the BBC has James Graham’s adaptation of his football play Dear England in a World Cup year, “an inventive, heartfelt and ambitious take on factual, state of the nation drama,” says Salt.
Everyone is looking for fresh takes, especially in the dominant genres of crime and thrillers. Prevailing approaches include tackling those stories traditionally told through a male lens, from a women’s perspective. Streamer titles Adolescence and Rivals are the shows on everyone’s lips.
Adolescence, with its UK specific setting, fits with the Netflix strategy to commission local stories. Nineteenth century England comes to the streamer next year, with Lookout Point’s Pride & Prejudice.
Disney +, which screens S2 of Happy Prince’s Rivals in 2026, is still spending around £1bn a year in EMEA on content. It’s also seen success with Quay Street’s The Stolen Girl and has Clerkenwell comedy Alice and Steve coming up.
While streamers are still fully-funding, industry estimates put the reductions in streamer spend per hour on drama at around 40%, albeit down from a high point.
Audiences are now tuned in to high-end production values, but with all platforms strapped for cash, they need producers to find cunning cost savings and funding partners.
Pippa Considine
Share this story
