Veteran filmmaker Robert Rodriguez’s new cable channel is aimed at a young Hispanic audience that is more likely to watch English-language thrillers than telenovelas.
SNAKE DANCE: Robert Rodriguez with a character from his new show. El Rey NetworkLast week in New York, Robert Rodriguez gazed down at his iPhone, watching work in progress on his first television series. On the screen, a video feed from the cameras in his studio in Austin, Texas, let Mr. Rodriguez monitor rehearsals and footage in real time. When he noticed that an actor looked too low in a chair, he sent a text message to the director on set. Moments later, someone appeared with a pillow to boost the actor in his seat.
A veteran filmmaker known for action movies such as “Spy Kids” and “Sin City,” Mr. Rodriguez is an executive producer of the new TV show, which premieres Tuesday and is an adaptation of his 1996 movie “From D1usk Till Dawn.” He had another incentive for checking in on the production from afar: He’s also an owner of the new cable channel which will air the series.
His fledgling El Rey Network exists in the hinterlands of the channel menu and isn’t available on all cable carriers, but its appearance marks a notable experiment in niche programming. El Rey primarily targets young U.S. Hispanics, an audience that grew up speaking English and whose TV diet is as likely to include the “The Walking Dead” or “American Horror Story” as anything on Spanish-language networks like Univision or Telemundo.
The Films of Richard Rodriguez
‘From Dusk Till Dawn: The Series’ El Rey Network
Apart from its name—”el rey” means “the king”—the channel’s intended audience won’t necessarily be obvious. That’s because Mr. Rodriguez, a 45-year-old Mexican-American born in San Antonio, is programming the channel to please viewers with certain tastes, not just a specific language or ethnicity. El Rey went live in December with a schedule of vintage TV shows (“Starsky & Hutch,” “The X-Files”) and cult movies from the categories of grindhouse (“Switchblade Sisters”), horror (“Fright Night”) and Kung-Fu (“Five Fingers of Death”).
Mr. Rodriguez directed the movie “From Dusk Till Dawn,” a bloody vampire film starring George Clooney and Quentin Tarantino, who wrote the screenplay. The director is hoping the continued popularity of the film (which spawned two straight-to-video sequels) will draw attention to his unknown channel, which joins a crowded field dominated by networks such as AMC and FX.
As does the movie, the show follows two bank-robbing brothers (played by D.J. Cotrona and Zane Holtz) who flee to Mexico and stumble into a world of demonic creatures. Mr. Rodriguez, who directed four out of 10 episodes, says he is using the show to explore stories from Aztec and Mayan mythology.,
On Saturday in Austin, the TV show gets a red-carpet premiere at the South By Southwest festival. TV networks have a new foothold at the sprawling nine-day event built around interactive media, film and music. “From Dusk Till Dawn” is screening in a new SXSW category called “episodic,” which gives film-festival treatment to shows from AMC, HBO, Hulu, Fox and Showtime.
El Rey came out of Comcast’s merger with NBCUniversal in 2011. As a condition of its terms with the FCC, Comcast agreed to distribute at least 10 new independent channels, with a priority on minority-owned networks. Those offerings include Magic Johnson’s Aspire and Sean “Diddy” Combs’s music channel. Mr. Rodriguez co-founded El Rey with FactoryMade Ventures, a Hollywood incubator.
The channel has financial backing from Univision, and Mr. Rodriguez is creating customized ads for launch sponsors Heineken and General Motors. El Rey’s biggest disadvantage is its lack of promotional clout compared with established networks, said Scott Sassa, the channel’s vice chairman: “We have to compensate by being nimble.” El Rey has about 60 employees, some of them at Mr. Rodriguez’s Troublemaker Studios, based at a former airport in Austin. In the past, startup networks could build audiences by simply loading up on licensed movies and TV reruns in syndication. Now, viewers use DVRs to follow favorite shows and care less about which channels carry them.
New networks have to produce original programs to use as bait. El Rey’s budding roster will also include “Matador” (created by “Star Trek” writers Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman), about a CIA operative who uses his career as a soccer star as cover. “Lucha Libre” (named for a culture of Mexican wrestling and produced by Mark Burnett of “Survivor” and “The Bible”) involves everyday folks overcoming evil. Mr. Rodriguez hosts a show starting in April on which famous directors interview fellow directors.
Mr. Rodriguez said, “I have five kids. I know they have nothing on television that represents who they are in this country—English-speaking Hispanic. But anyone can tune in, because it’s cool.”
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