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The new multi-platform studio

Vuguru's story is based on the philosophy that audiences love great stories & want to consume them in a multi-platform environment. We’re seeing this reality unfold every day & month across online video sites including AOL & Hulu, services like Netflix, and on millions of iPads & other devices.

As such, a growing opportunity exists to expose innovative, scripted programming to a rapidly expanding audience. In the same way that cable networks became the new birthplace for groundbreaking content this past decade, we believe that digital platforms will yield the next wave of original premium content.

Indeed, preeminent cable networks have migrated over the years from reruns of feature films & broadcast-TV content to brand-defining original programming. Vuguru is deeply committed to the fact that the same transformation awaits the multi-platform video marketplace.

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The latest from Vuguru

Partnership Will Create Multiple Premium Scripted Series Exclusively for Yahoo!

 

BEVERLY HILLS, California, March 12, 2012 –  Vuguru, an independent studio that finances world-class story-driven multi-platform content announced today a deal with Yahoo!, the premier digital media company to develop and finance premium content. Yahoo!, with 20 out of the top 25 most-watched online Web series and 35 million unique visitors a month that view original video programming (comScore Custom Report), will work with Vuguru to develop multiple original scripted series for exclusive U.S. distribution on Yahoo! Screen – the ultimate video destination online.
 
This multi-project licensing commitment by Yahoo! underscores the strategy of bringing the best storytellers to a global audience and further solidifies Vuguru as a leader in creating high quality content for screens of all sizes.

Vuguru CEO, Larry Tanz, and Yahoo! Inc's Erin McPherson, who serves as the Head of Video, announced the news of the licensing deal at the "Times are a’Changin: Digital Storytelling Today" panel at the South by SouthWest Film & Interactive Conference in Austin, Texas. 
 

“Yahoo! has demonstrated a serious commitment to premium content, and their ability to reach a massive audience world-wide makes them an ideal distribution partner for the upcoming series of Vuguru-financed shows,” said Larry Tanz, CEO of Vuguru. “We look forward to working closely with Yahoo! to develop and produce shows that the Yahoo! audience will love.”

“Our established portfolio of original programming stands to benefit from the creative input and expertise of our newest partner Vuguru,” said Erin McPherson, VP & Head of Video at Yahoo!. “Through this partnership, we will develop stories that are based on our deep knowledge of what our audience wants, in the context of our leading content verticals and we will continue to create unique and compelling content experiences for our users."


As the premier digital media company - with 700 million users worldwide - Yahoo! sets the bar for best-in-class original video programming – which is why its original programs reel in more viewers than many other websites combined.  With a recently launched video destination - Yahoo! Screen, the development of Women's and Comedy Slates and partnerships with world-class storytellers and original voices like Tom Hanks, Robert Redford, Bill Maher and others, Yahoo! continues to build on the leadership position in video and to provide our consumers and advertisers with the best premium content on the Web. With creative partners like Vuguru, RedHour, Funny or Die, Broadway Video and others, Yahoo! is continuing to aggressively grow slates of video programming to include shows that will captivate and entertain new online video audiences now and well into the future, and evolve the way we work with Madison Avenue and Hollywood. 

The Yahoo! deal comes on the heels of a banner year for Vuguru. The studio recently released the critically acclaimed series The Booth at the End starring Xander Berkley that was distributed by Hulu and Don’t Ask Don’t Tell, a film adapted from the timely one-man Off Broadway show by Marc Wolf, chronicling both sides of the controversial Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell repeal. In 2011, Vuguru financed and produced seven full-length scripted projects and announced a major partnership with Stan Lee’s POW! Entertainment to launch a premium YouTube channel called Stan Lee’s World of Heroes.

 

About Vuguru

Vuguru LLC is an independent studio that develops and finances scripted, story-driven content for digital and international platforms. Founded by Michael D. Eisner’s Tornante Company and backed by Canada’s Rogers Media, the company brings premium content opportunities to distribution partners, enabling them to bring premium original content to their audiences. Vuguru programming has been distributed in over 40 countries around the world, and in 2010, the company structured a first-of-its-kind international sales & distribution commitment for ten projects with UK-based Content Media Corporation. In the US, Vuguru has a six-project licensing and distribution deal with AOL.

Vuguru’s inaugural series Prom Queen pioneered the online serial space with its unique format and distribution. Most recently, Vuguru’s The Booth at the End was licensed to Rogers Media for multi-platform distribution in Canada, FOX International Channels for distribution across its entire network of pay-TV channels and online sites, and Hulu for streaming distribution in the US. Additional Vuguru series include Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell; Pretty Tough; The Millionaire Tour; Nuclear Family, Off Season, Little Women BIG CARS, Fetching, Crawlspace and the Emmy-nominated Back on Topps.

 

About Yahoo!


Yahoo! (NASDAQ:YHOO) is the premier digital media company, creating deeply personal digital experiences that keep more than half a billion people connected to what matters most to them, across devices and around the globe. That’s how we deliver your world, your way.  And Yahoo!’s unique combination of Science + Art + Scale connects advertisers to the consumers who build their businesses.  For more information, visit the pressroom (pressroom.yahoo.com) or the company’s blog, Yodel Anecdotal (yodel.yahoo.com).  


Yahoo! is the trademark and/or registered trademark of Yahoo! Inc. All other names are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of their respective owners.


DKC (for Vuguru Communications):

Ann Hinshaw, 212-981-5160, ann_hinshaw@dkcnews.com

Yahoo! Corporate Communications:

Kristen Morquecho, 310-907-2802, kristenm@yahoo-inc.com, Follow us @YahooInc
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Film timed to historic September 20th repeal date

Don’t Ask Don’t Tell – Written, Created by & Starring Marc Wolf; Directed by John C. Walsh; Produced by Daryl Roth; Creative Consultation by Mary Harron

BEVERLY HILLS, CA (August 31, 2011) – Timed to the historic repeal of the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy, independent studio Vuguru today announced completion of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell, a film that tells the stories of eighteen real-life characters and depicts the profound impact on both sides of the controversial “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” rule.

Don’t Ask Don’t Tell uses three years of interviews with hundreds of soldiers and veterans, male and female, gay and straight and transforms those conversations into powerful performances that explore every facet of this hot button issue.  In the film, Wolf re-enacts, from a first-person perspective, conversations and personal anecdotes ranging from former US Army Staff Sergeant Miriam Ben Shalom detailing her dishonorable discharge from the military; US Navy Officer Al Portes testifying before a congressional hearing that he “will refuse to serve with gays in the military”; an anonymous colonel describing the U.S. Marine Corps as a "hotbed of homosexuality"; Prof. Charles Moskos, the creator of the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy, justifying it’s creation; and a mother recounting the life-altering experience of being asked to identify of the remains of her dead son, killed by his squad because he was gay. Don’t Ask Don’t Don’t Tell adapts Marc Wolf’s Obie Award-winning one man show Another American: Asking and Telling, marking the first time an Off-Broadway show has been tailored for multi-platform distribution. 

Marc Wolf noted “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell has always been, and will always be, about Silence.  In the late ‘90s, I started interviewing military personnel who were silenced by our federal government because of their sexual orientation, and my goal is to tell their stories to as many people as possible.  With the imminent fall of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” this series becomes the story of the struggle to break the Silence.”

“This project deals with a major socio-political issue facing our country and Marc’s riveting stage performance needed to be seen by as broad an audience as possible,” said Larry Tanz, President of Vuguru. “We have an exciting multi-platform distribution plan that will be unveiled in the days to come, in the meantime we’re thrilled to be able to share the trailer for this compelling narrative.”

Vuguru’s Chief Creative Officer Kristin Jones added “In collaboration with Marc Wolf, Don't Ask Don’t Tell’s talented filmmakers have translated the material from a contained one-man show into a compelling cinematic experience which only serves to enhance Marc’s groundbreaking performance.”

Don’t Ask Don’t Tell Producer Daryl Roth, a distinguished Theatre Producer who fostered the play from its inception Off Broadway to film, holds the singular distinction of producing six Pulitzer Prize-winning plays, including Anna in the Tropics; August: Osage County; How I Learned to Drive; Proof; Wit; and Edward Albee’s Three Tall Women. Roth also produced the 2011 Tony Award-winning revival of The Normal Heart.

“Marc Wolf’s brilliant and provocative Don’t Ask Don’t Tell is more important now than ever,” said Roth. “As the law finally changes, the timeliness of this message and the compelling and powerful stories he tells are particularly poignant as Marc gives voice to those who were unable to speak for themselves.”

Other key behind-the-scenes participants in the project include Director John C. Walsh, Creative Consultant Mary Harron (American Psycho, I Shot Andy Warhol) and Producers Tara Power and Joselyn Allen (Decoupage Productions).

Vuguru has created multiple social media channels as a forum for news and information about the repeal, and encourages everyone to join the dialogue and share their views and experiences surrounding Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.

To view the trailer for Don’t Ask Don’t Tell visit:  www.vuguru.com/projects/don’t-ask-don’t-tell

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Digital studios such as Vuguru are adopting Hollywood rituals for their new media series and applying traditional business models to underwrite production costs.

July 11, 2011 |...

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July 11, 2011 | By Dawn C. Chmielewski, Los Angeles Times

Nine studio executives sat in a glass-enclosed conference room in Beverly Hills, discussing potential snowy locales for filming later this year.

Utah was a viable option, advised the head of production. So, too, was upstate New York — in part because of tax credits. Over the course of the hourlong production meeting, the executives also received casting updates, discussed social media plans for one soon-to-debut series and mulled over a festival screening strategy for another project.

Such a session would not have been out of place at any major studio. That it occurred at the offices of Vuguru, the digital studio founded in 2006 by former Walt Disney Co. Chief Executive Michael D. Eisner, is a sign that Web video is growing up.

"It's a little bit like when TV guys were no longer considered ghetto people, we could actually grow into being the movie business," said Eisner, who spent his early career at ABC television before running Paramount Pictures. "Slowly, the people who work in the digital space are no longer considered odd and strange. … And advertisers think these guys may be the new breed."

Vuguru, the creator of such Web series as "Prom Queen," is doing more than adopting the rituals of Hollywood. The studio is applying familiar "old-media" business models to underwrite the cost of digital production. Vuguru strikes foreign distribution deals that can cover roughly half a given project's budget, in a funding approach borrowed from the world of independent film. And it structures its original series like interlocking Lego bricks that can be snapped together or pulled apart for viewing on multiple platforms.

Take, for example, a scripted series like "The Booth at the End," which makes its U.S. debut this week on online video site Hulu. It can be watched in two-minute vignettes on mobile phones (62 episodes in all), as five half-hour TV episodes or as a single full-length movie. This approach is designed to attract advertisers who are eager to follow audiences onto the Web and portable devices — but also is packaged in a familiar-enough format to be placed on TV.

The potential for more ad revenue translates to healthier production budgets. The $300,000 spent to create "The Booth" — in which a mysterious man sitting in a diner grants wishes while posing moral dilemmas for the requesters — shows how far digital video has come from its early, DIY phase. That's about one-sixth of what a network typically would spend on an hourlong TV drama.

"As the market matures, maybe we increase our budgets as it makes sense," said Vuguru President Larry Tanz. "It's all about being disciplined."

For the moment, Web-exclusive video is far from a moneymaker. One study of 250 new media titles made available on YouTube, Hulu, Netflix and other major digital platforms revealed that such entertainment attracted sizable audiences — about 1.3 billion views. But the payback to producers was relatively paltry: a combined $15 million paid by 13 major distributors last year.

"This is a tough business to make money in," said Arash Amel, the digital media researcher at IHS Screen Digest who conducted the study. "Original new media brands are just voices shouting in the wilderness, without the support of a major media marketing campaign to make them stand out for the consumer."

That's why digital studios like Vuguru script and structure their new media series with old media in mind. Fox International Channels, News Corp.'s international multimedia business, acquired rights to "The Booth at the End," which it aired on its pay-TV channels, as well as on the Web.

"They're rolling it out online, putting it on TV; they're experimenting, cross-promoting," Tanz said.

Media companies are betting that these new platforms, including cellphones and tablets, eventually will become big business. Eisner predicts that digital distribution will one day be the first stop for new projects, in the same way cable channels HBO, AMC and FX now compete with networks.

"Digital distribution is so obviously the future," Eisner said, adding, "That is happening, but there's a long way to go."

The desire to find programming suitable for leaping from the smallest screen to the living room TV is part of what attracted an investment in Vuguru in October 2009 from Rogers Communications Inc. The Canadian company's vast media holdings span television and radio stations, Web properties, mobile phone service, cable TV and Internet access.

"Digital cuts across all our assets now," said Jason Tafler, chief digital officer for Rogers Cable. "The way you program and distribute that content has to change. We're really just following our audiences across all these devices. There's a lot of flexibility in the way Vuguru creates content."

Because of Rogers Communications' reported multimillion-dollar investment, Eisner spun off Vuguru as a stand-alone company and began assembling an executive team with experience in film, television and new media. Its president, Tanz, has a long list of digital credits, including serving as chief executive of LivePlanet Inc., an entertainment company founded by Matt Damon and Ben Affleck that created the Emmy-nominated TV series "Project Greenlight" for HBO.

Vuguru Chief Creative Officer Kristin Jones spent five years as senior vice president of production at Miramax Films, where she oversaw projects including Academy Award-nominated films "Gone Baby Gone" and "The Queen." She said Vuguru offers the same creative freedom of independent film.

"I joke with everybody — you know, there's no Internet jail," Jones said of her meetings with talent agents to discuss opportunities with Vuguru. "There's a lot of opportunity for people to take risks they could not necessarily take in TV or features."

To be sure, there are compromises: Vuguru seeks to match the quality of other TV shows — but must do so on a tight budget and on a compressed schedule.

Consider the accelerated pace of Vuguru's "The Millionaire Tour," a thriller with elements of Tom Cruise's 2004 cab driver hostage drama "Collateral" and Kevin Spacey's suspenseful 1995 crime mystery "The Usual Suspects." Jones said she read the script in February. The series started shooting in May. In the feature film world, such development could take 18 months or longer.

Dominic Monaghan, who has appeared in the "Lord of the Rings" trilogy and on the ABC-TV series "Lost," said he was attracted to "The Millionaire Tour" because of the quality of the script as well as the opportunity to be in the vanguard of the changing media landscape.

"Right now, there is a slight novelty value … to making a movie that is specifically made for an online release," Monaghan said. "But I think in the next five to 10 years, everyone will be doing it and this film will be recognized as one of the forerunners. And that's important to me."

http://articles.latimes.com/2011/jul/11/business/la-fi-0712-vuguru-20110611

5-Part Multi-Platform Series Starring Xander Berkeley & Directed by Jessica Landaw to Premiere Exclusively on Hulu

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BEVERLY HILLS, CA  (June 14, 2011) – Independent studio Vuguru yesterday announced the upcoming U.S. release of the multi-platform series The Booth at the End premiering exclusively on Hulu beginning July 11th.  The psychological thriller created by writer Christopher Kubasik and directed by Jessica Landaw (One Tree Hill, Cold Case, Judging Amy) stars Xander Berkeley (Nikita, 24, CSI, Kick-Ass, Terminator 2: Judgment Day) and an ensemble cast. As part of an exclusive first-run, multi-year streaming distribution license, a new 22-minute episode will be released every Monday on Hulu.com and the Hulu Plus subscription service.  

In the series, a mysterious man sits at the booth at the end of a diner. People approach him because they’ve heard The Man has a gift. He can solve their problems: a parent with a sick child, a woman who wants to be prettier, a nun who has lost her faith. The Man can give these people what they want. For a price. The Man makes a proposition. In exchange for realizing their desires, these individuals must complete a task, return to The Man, and describe every step in detail. The trick is that these tasks are things that would normally be inconceivable to them. But the Man never forces anyone to do anything. It’s always up to the individual to start – or stop. The Booth at the End asks the question: “How far would you go to get what you want?”

“We’re extremely excited to launch the much-anticipated The Booth at the End in the U.S. and to be part of Hulu’s exciting summer line-up of exclusive programming,” said Larry Tanz, President of Vuguru.  “Christopher Kubasik, Jessica Landaw, Producer Vanishing Point Entertainment, and a powerful cast led by Xander Berkeley created a truly incredible series that has been intriguing and surprising viewers in territories worldwide. There’s no better partner than Hulu to distribute this groundbreaking multi-platform series to U.S. audiences.”

“I was hooked on The Booth at the End after watching episode one.  It’s exactly the kind of show we want to make available for our users – it’s engaging, high-quality, and grabs you from the very start. The team at Vuguru has done a wonderful job with the storytelling and production of this show,” added Andy Forssell, SVP of Content Acquisition and Distribution for Hulu.

Vuguru will also be working with Attention Span Media (ASM) to identify The Booth’s most ardent fans across multiple platforms, engaging them and harnessing their enthusiasm to grow the fanbase using its audience-development service, Fanatical. ASM builds and manages audiences for clients like AOL/The Huffington Post and Simon Fuller's 19 Entertainment.

"We're thrilled to be working on this outstanding project alongside Vuguru," said Attention Span CEO Josh McHugh. "No one in digital content has a stronger creative bloodline or a better track record."

The Booth at the End has been rolled out as a truly global, multi-platform property: short-form episodes on mobile, compilation videos online and traditional half-hour episodes on television and VOD. The series was originally licensed in Canada to Rogers Media for distribution across all of Rogers’ platforms, including online, mobile, VOD, Citytv and a custom iPad application. Vuguru licensed The Booth’s international sales rights to Content Media Corporation plc, which in turn licensed the series to Fox International Channels, part of News Corporation, for distribution across its entire network of pay-TV channels and online sites. The series’ UK-premiere via FX consisted of online and television distribution and quickly earned critical acclaim, being lauded by The Guardian as “intense, compelling…impossible to stop watching.”

Accompanying the U.S.-launch of the original scripted series, Vuguru will also release The Deal, a Facebook-based social game inspired by The Booth at the End. In the narrative-led game, players complete tasks set by The Man in order to unlock new mysteries. Along the way they collect virtual tokens and receive rewards. The ability for players to engage with each other is instrumental in developing the overall narrative of the game, creating a unique playing experience.  The game was developed in partnership with Fox International Channels and Two Way Media.

 

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