“This is the most unglorified ladder climb in history.”
So said world-renowned “free solo” rock climber Alex Honnold while nearing the very top of his Netflix-produced ascent of a skyscraper in Taiwan, Skyscraper Live.
This originally appeared on TV News Check.
Netflix has been trying to beef up its live event and live sports portfolio. In this case, it seems to have mixed up the difference between the two.
Elle Duncan, a former ESPN announcer, opened the show walking at the camera looking like a runway fashion model and booming about “that man.” Then followed a pan to Honnold, who is such a quiet, unassuming guy that the Netflix-hyped hero worship felt off. But to be fair, I’d just come to the broadcast off the explosive news breaking of about a different Alex — Alex Pretti, killed by ICE agents in Minnesota.
Delayed For Weather But Not National Tragedy?
Netflix had already delayed Skyscraper Live due to rain. Unfortunately, that put the start of this event at 5 p.m. PT on Saturday, only a few hours into an unfolding national tragedy. It was already a massive breaking headline for hours and would no doubt be headlines in Taiwan as the day broke.
To me, Netflix — I won’t attribute this to Honnold — seemed insensitive to charge ahead with the climb amid this chaos. In my view, and perhaps in the majority of our country’s view, Saturday should’ve been Pretti’s alone.
Even if you don’t care about that, what about live, simultaneous viewership? The ICE storm and the ice storms no doubt resulted in fewer viewers seeing it live as a simultaneous, shared experience. Any broadcast network would have recognized a light-hearted spectacle amid the chaos in Minnesota could have downside risks.
Awful Announcing
Four on-air talents covered this climb. Only one was a climber. None of the other three had any experience in extreme or action sports — not climbing, big wave surfing, base jumping, nothing that would bring an authentic, useful perspective to the broadcast.
Instead, Netflix sent a clown. I’m not being flippant — the second announcer was a WWE star, where clownish behavior is in the job description. That’s the skillset Netflix chose to cover one of the most accomplished free solo climbers in history?
This wasn’t just a bad creative decision; it was repulsively commercial, since Netflix has a deal with WWE, which obviously influenced the decision.
The legitimate climbing voice on the broadcast — an actual climber and friend of Honnold’s named Emily Harrington — was consistently minimized and interrupted throughout the production.
The sideline reporter? Duncan introduced him as a “former NASA engineer, YouTuber and expert explainer of all things.” Explainer of all things?
Not weather apparently, as this communicator then noted a “big bank of rain” nearby and mentioned that since they were in a “microclimate, that could change.” That’s not how microclimates work. This isn’t nitpicking. It signals a production team that didn’t understand what they were covering.
Sport? Or Spectacle?
The metadata for the show lists Sports as the genre. There should have been a category for Spectacle.
Approximately 70 million Americans watch action sports, a fact I know from my own #FutureOfTV.Live TV viewer research. This is as authentic an audience as it gets. They’ve watched Olympic climbing, surfing or kiteboarding produced by NBC Sports; they’ve seen CBS Sports coverage of SailGP; they love that Red Bull TV has been successfully blending spectacle with athletic authenticity for decades. They also participate, if only aspirationally.
In short, they know the difference between a broadcast that respects its subject and one that doesn’t. Netflix chose spectacle over substance at every turn.
The production waffled between the incredibly low risk that Honnold saw and wanted to project, and the clownish, dramatic danger that the naïve anchors continued to pretend existed.
**Pardon The Interruptions **
It got uglier as Honnold began to climb.
From the beginning, the communication between Honnold and the desk was technically challenged. That caused a mix of confusion and frustration for not viewers, but also Honnold, who on multiple occasions seemed to have difficulty getting a response from his climbing pal, Brett.
Then, it got ugly. At 15:43 the WWE host starts talking over Honnold, who was troubleshooting with Brett. I struggled to make it out, and the desk missed it entirely. At 21:56, after yelling “this is not normal” three times, literally calling Honnold a freak show, the host interrupted Harrington to yell at Alex: “Dude! Just put your other hand on the thing. Put your other, put, why is … he’s just one-arming it!”
Stay Positive
There were upsides to the broadcast. The documentary-style interview clips produced before the event, including those of Honnold and Duncan in a training gym talking about the climb were polished and compelling, for instance.
Duncan showed off her brilliant ESPN-chops when she was describing the building, the climb’s technical parts and in the training gym clips. It’s a good bet she had little control over the selection of her co-hosts, anyway.
Opportunity Lost
This could have been a landmark moment for something. For climbing, or outdoor enthusiasts, or weather nerds, or extreme sports junkies — heck, maybe even for risk-taking cameramen.
Instead, they brought a blustery clown to the first free solo climb of the tallest skyscraper in Taiwan and ignored what 70 million action sports viewers in the U.S. wanted to see.
Honnold’s Quote, A Steel Twisted Irony
The truth is, when Honnold uttered the quote that is the title of this piece, the context for him was that he was climbing an actual safety ladder to get to the very top of the building, which is where the irony gets really twisted. Again, the anchor desk was talking over Honnold, so they all missed it.
Netflix let him down and insulted 70 million action sports viewers. Worst of all, they put at serious risk the reputation of a legendary climber and star of Oscar-winning documentary Free Solo.
*Brian Ring is president of Ring Digital LLC, which publishes #FutureOfTV.Live quarterly. *