Netflix acquires rights to ‘Pretty Little Liars’ and ‘The Lying Game’
Netflix acquired the rights to the teen drama series “The Lying Game” and “Pretty Little Liars” from Warner Bros. Domestic Television Distribution, which produces the shows for the ABC Family cable channel.
For Netflix, the deal is further evidence of its growing reliance on television content to attract subscribers.
The first season of “The Lying Game” will have its Netflix debut in early 2013 after the premiere of the show’s second season on ABC Family. The first season of “Pretty Little Liars” will launch on Netflix immediately and the second season will be available on July 3, a month after the start of Season 3 on ABC Family.
The agreement between Netflix and Warner Bros. comes several months after the streaming entertainment company struck a deal for shows from the CW Network, which is co-owned by the Burbank studio and CBS Corp.
Although terms of the deal between Warner Bros. and Netflix were not disclosed, typically the per-episode cost for a dramatic show can run from low- to mid-six figures. When Netflix acquired the CW fare, the price tag for “Gossip Girl” was in the neighborhood of $600,000 per-episode. Rights for AMC’s “Mad Men” was estimated to be between $750,000 to $900,000 per episode.
Dramas, particularly serialized shows, tend to do well with Netflix subscribers, which is good news for Warner Bros. since its programs aren’t traditionally in demand as reruns for broadcast or cable channels.
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