Natalis Chan Gives Feedback on TVB’s Struggle
Veteran actor Natalis Chan (陳百祥) recently appeared in an interview and bluntly said “no one needs to rely on TVB.” Believing that the beloved station is on the decline, Natalis gave his honest feedback on TVB’s future.
While Natalis is good friends with Eric Tsang (曾志偉) who is now TVB’s general manager, Natalis does not hold back. When asked if Eric asked him to tone down his criticism, Natalis replied, “Can he tell me not to speak? I am me and he is him.”
Natalis insisted that he was stating the facts and wasn’t targeting TVB or Eric, “The entire television industry is a sunset industry. It’s losing money. I’ve already thought of the general direction. It has to be online. Now with Alipay and PayMe, it’s why live streaming is successful. We need to transform.”
The actor continued, “Our live streaming gets eight-figure (click-through rates) on the phone. How can TVB achieve that? They can’t. They only have a million-something viewers to get a viewership rating of 20 points. When I did Twinkle Twinkle Lucky Star <運財至叻星>, I already got viewership rating of 30 point. It’s been declining since then, and no one can save it. It has nothing to do with Eric Tsang or anyone else. It’s an industry issue. I’m not targeting him or TVB. I’m just telling the truth.”
Despite Natalis’ strong believes that industry is on a decline, he argued that there is still a place for television stations, “It must exist. A sunset industry doesn’t mean it has to close down. It’s like many shops that are vacant now. People aren’t stopping shopping, right? The TV station needs a turnaround.”
When asked if he has any tips for Eric to steer the ship to the right direction, Natalis replied, “He is the general manager now. I’m not TVB’s employee. Good friends should advise him to quit. I’ve said television is dead. I said it, but he didn’t go in because television is dead. He went in to fire Sandy Yu (余詠珊).”
When probed further, Natalis revealed, “Sandy used to work for StarEast. After joining TVB, Sandy wouldn’t listen to him. At that time, Eric had nothing to say. If your employee doesn’t listen to you, you become their boss and fire them. It’s that simple.”
Source: [1]
This article is written by Sammi for JayneStars.com.
No, TV and TV studio is not dead. But TV studio with own artistes is as good as dead. TVB must now turn fully to production rather than with artiste management. And pay people well, get good writers, get investors, explore other mediums as well. I haven’t watched a TVB series for I think more than 2 years now.