Dan Morrell: When the Netflix series Geek Girl debuted this summer, it quickly became the second most-watched show globally on the platform. Based on the young adult book series by author Holly Smale about an awkward high school girl who unexpectedly becomes a supermodel, it was adapted for streaming by executive producer Jeff Norton (MBA 2003).

In this episode of Skydeck, Norton talks to contributor April White about process of getting Geek Girl from the bookshelf to streaming, offering a behind-the-scenes look at what it takes to succeed the post-Peak TV era.

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April White: I know that over the course of your career, you have been involved in production of a lot of TV and movies, but I want to talk about Geek Girl specifically today, and that just debuted this summer and it became sort of this instant hit, but I know it wasn't an instant process. So I want to talk about the process.

Jeff Norton: Yeah, it's an overnight sensation, seven years in the making.

AW: Where were you in your career seven years ago when you first came to this project?

JN: It's even longer than seven, I suppose. I came across this book when it first published, so it was about 2013, and it really kind of burst on the scene as this fun, funny, very joyous “clean teen” read. At the time I was in the UK, I had been doing book to screen adaptations both for adults and for children, and I had also started to turn my hand at writing my own works. And so my first book that published, which is called Meta Wars, came out around the same time as Holly's book. And so I was on the hunt looking for things that I thought would translate well specifically to TV. And I remembered the book. I remember falling in love with the character of Harriet Manners. And I think the thing for me is Harriet is a very specific character, but she kind of represents everybody in a way because she comes across as an outsider. And that idea of feeling like an outsider, I think is incredibly universal. That's the thing that sparked for me. Obviously I love the fashion world and the high jinks of high school and all that stuff, but really at its core was this sort of theme of trying to figure yourself out and trying to navigate the world when you're constantly feeling like you don't belong.

AW: Take me into the mind of a producer. What makes a book a good adaptation?

JN: The two things that I found, I wouldn't say they're rules, but the two guiding principles. The first is character. You've got to have a main character or a collection of characters that you think the audience will fall in love with. You don't even have to necessarily like them because there are a lot of unlikeable characters, but you want the audience to need and want to spend time with these people. And then the second thing is there has to be something universal in the theme because television is a global business, and for something really to work, you want it to find the widest possible audience. You want to have a kind of universality of theme.

AW: What was your pitch to the author Holly Smale when you wanted to adapt this into a TV show?

JN: I made three key core promises to Holly, and the first was that I would keep it British. There's always a temptation in adapting books from abroad. There's a sort of American lens on the world that, “oh, it's got to be set in New York and not London.” And it was really important to Holly, and I think really important to the characters that this stays British. The second thing is I absolutely made a pledge that I would keep Holly very involved creatively and in fact build the creative team around her. And sometimes, sadly, what often happens with Hollywood adaptations is the first person to get fired from the project is the author. And as a fellow author, I knew how important it was that things from the story universe and the characters don't always make it onto the page. So there's more in the author's head and there's more in the author's heart than makes it into the final edit.

And the third thing, which was particularly important and actually revealed itself later in the process is that we would keep the character of Harriet neurodiverse. Holly herself was diagnosed later in life, knocking on age 40, as autistic. And for her it was a huge moment of revelation because suddenly for her, so much of her teenage years and her life made sense to her. And so we wanted to honor that in the adaptation, but critically we decided not to name it. We didn't name Harriet and label her as being autistic because the character herself did not know, just like Holly when she was a teenager, didn't realize she was autistic.

AW: What did you originally go out there and tell people this was going to be, I'm just curious about how close that's going to be to what I watched in the end.

JN: When you take a project to market, there's always a type of negotiation between what you want the project to be and what the buyer is able to buy. And when I say the buyer, I mean the platform. So that could be Netflix, Disney+, HBO Max, Sky, BBC. There was a couple of things that both Holly and I felt very strongly about when we took the project out. One is that we wanted it to stay clean, okay? There's a type of teen show that's out there which believes that you've got to be edgy to resonate. I don't believe that. I think you can have a great, fun experience without some of those incredibly edgy and, some would say, inappropriate for a younger audience, themes and executions. And so we wanted it to stay “clean teen.”

The actual execution ended up being very, very close to what we pitched.

But one of the things I found through the pitching process is that we would constantly get passes. So I would pitch this and a buyer would say, “it's not edgy enough.” Or I'd pitch it and some people would say, “I don't like the world of fashion.” So it's obviously, it's all subjective. And so every buyer just kind of had their own, I don't want to say excuse, but their own reason. And probably for their own platforms at that time when they were commissioning, they were probably the right reasons, but you just kind of keep going and keep going. And it's exhausting, right? This business is a business of rejection, and so you're constantly being told no because it's fundamentally a risk-averse industry. In fact, different teams within the Netflix organization for their own reasons, had turned it down that there was an LA team that turned it down because it was too British. There was a British team that turned it down because it was too young skewing. And then I just happened to get very fortuitously introduced to a different team that was specifically looking for this type of demographic and specifically a type of business model that would have a co-production element to it. They fell in love with it in the room. I've never had that experience in my career where somebody said, “Yep, we get it. Let's do it.”

AW: Well, let's talk about this co-production model that you mentioned. What pieces did you have to bring together to make this work?

JN: It's an interesting time in the industry right now because we were past what they've called Peak TV. We've had this golden age of scripted drama, and a lot of the services, the streaming services in particular, have been investing very, very heavily in user acquisition. And they've been doing that by pumping a lot of money into content. And a lot of them have now gotten to the point where all of a sudden Wall Street actually wants to see profitability, and so the commissioning dollars are getting clawed back. One of the opportunities both commercially and creatively is co-production. It means that you can take finance from two different places, and ultimately what it means is you may have two buyers, each of whom comes in for a little bit less, but both partners get something that maybe they couldn't afford on their own. And that's, I think, where co-production is very interesting today and very interesting in the industry right now.

AW: I'm curious to understand how the industry, from your perspective, changed over the period of time you've been thinking about Geek Girl and how that hurt you or benefited you in terms of putting this production together.

JN: When I first spotted the book, there weren't very many avenues or platforms to bring it to. And then the streaming world kind of exploded, and there became many, many more opportunities, particularly in young adult. And then by the time we actually landed it, we'd almost gotten through that Peak TV model and then now this contraction, it's almost like the dot-com boom and bust over the past seven years or so. But the audience still has a voracious appetite for great content. There's this sort of consumer expectation that they're always going to be served up something special, something surprising, something new. And I think what we need to find is a way to match that consumer demand with the industry supply in a sustainable way.

AW: What do you anticipate is next for TV and for streaming?

JN: There are a couple forces at work. As I mentioned earlier, I think there's still a consumer demand. I think the consumer has now been trained not only to expect new and exciting content, but also to expect content that can come from anywhere, that a great story can come from anywhere. And by the way, it doesn't have to be in English. And I think that's actually incredibly exciting. The second thing that's happening is, right now, there is a painful transition from linear to digital. A lot of consumers are watching less linear and therefore the advertising dollars are not there. And there's a downward spiral that goes with that, and that's got to sort itself out. There is still value in the linear platform, and a lot of consumers still really enjoy a lean-back experience, right? They like turning on the television, flipping the channels and seeing what's on.

And then I think the third thing is from the supply side, I think prices and costs have to be wrestled down. There's a real issue with cost-per-episode or cost-per-season being so high that if the services can't see a return on investment, that on the margin they'll commission less. And I think one of the big opportunities is for the production community to help the services get to a point where they can afford to do more. There is an opportunity to say, “does a show have to cost a hundred million dollars?” Well, maybe there's an opportunity to field five shows for that money.

AW: Tell me what's next for you in this sector.

JN: I basically spent the summer reading—looking for what's next. For me, the threshold's pretty high. If I'm going to go on a five-to-seven year journey to try and get something made, I want to really fall in love with those characters and obviously have a real good relationship with the author. And then of course, we're crossing our fingers for more Geek Girl, that can't say anything right now. But I think it's fair to say that everybody involved in the project is very much hoping that Harriet's adventures will continue on screen as they have continued in the books.

Skydeck is the Harvard Business School alumni podcast featuring interviews and insights from across the world of business. It’s produced by the External Relations Department at HBS. Our audio engineer is Craig McDonald.

It is available on Apple, Spotify, and wherever you get your favorite podcasts. And if you could take a moment to rate and review us, we’d be grateful.

For more information, or to find archived episodes, visit alumni.hbs.edu/skydeck.

Featured Alumni

Jeff Norton

MBA 2003

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