Netflix uncovers mythical European culture
Ratings suggest that a pan-European audience does indeed exist – but it took an American company to find it.
Alpha Males is brilliant. The Spanish sitcom, by turns funny and thoughtful, follows four men in their 40s as they navigate the changing expectations of masculinity in Spanish society, alongside the eternal questions of ageing, romantic relationships and raising children.
I’m not Spanish and I’ve never lived in Spain, save for a very enjoyable student summer in 2008. But I found it easy to identify with the characters (not you, Raúl) as they try to make sense of a world very different to the one they grew up in.
With a few cosmetic differences, most notably language, their world is mine. Men across Europe are having the same conversations with our own groups of friends, and the equally complex female characters will also be recognisable to people across the continent.
The ratings confirm it. The first season, aired last year, reached Netflix’s Top 10 in 11 European countries, plus three in Latin America. The second season hit 13 European countries and eight in Latin America.
What’s more interesting is that the appeal is not universal: Alpha Males failed to make an impression in North America or Asia. How to explain this? Spain’s cultural ties to Latin America are easily understood through their common language. But what of the show’s pan-European appeal, from France to Romania?
It seems there is such a thing as European culture, after all. Long hidden beneath language barriers, our common sensibilities are now coming to light with the help of advanced translation technology and cross-border transmission platforms.
The towering irony is that it was a for-profit American company, and not the EU’s bottomless cultural grants, that unearthed this broad European audience. Alpha Males would probably still have been produced in a world without Netflix, but it wouldn’t have been widely distributed in other European countries, with every possible combination of dubbing and subtitling making it accessible to all.
From Dark to Call My Agent!, Netflix is full of examples of European shows that found loving audiences across the continent – each one a reminder of opportunities missed by European media companies failing to think beyond their home market.
Some shows may not have been made at all without Netflix because their production, as well as their audience, crossed national borders.
Tour de France: Unchained follows the legendary three-week cycling race that enjoys a fanatical European following from Belgium to Slovenia. With interviews in a range of languages, seamlessly subtitled, the show zooms in on the teams and riders with the most compelling stories, in contrast to national broadcasters focusing on athletes of the same flag.
And with the potential of a cross-border audience, Netflix was able to invest heavily in the production which is, as a result, excellent. It is the European dream, brought to you by American capitalism.
Broad versus narrow culture
Like Alpha Males, Tour de France was a European phenomenon, not a global one. The first season hit Netflix’s Top 10 in 14 European countries and only one other: New Zealand. Once again, we see a distinctly European taste, positioned somewhere between national peculiarities and things with universal appeal.
A person’s cultural identity can be thought of in at least two layers: the ‘narrow’ culture of their immediate surroundings, and one or more ‘broad’ cultures that share some values and ideas. The broader affinity may be weaker, but is still distinct from the universal values shared by all societies, like appreciation for music or love of family.
For most Europeans, nationality defines the narrow culture and Europe is one of the broad cultures. Often there are others: Spain and Portugal share a broad culture with Latin America; Britain and Ireland with other Anglo countries. The idea of the West is also an expression of broad culture – wider still than Europe or the Anglosphere, but clearly distinct from universal human values.
Awareness of this spectrum of cultural affinity is crucial to understanding the world. Right-wing politics often places too much importance on narrow culture, leading to national exceptionalism and a rejection of natural partners – the best example being Brexit. An exaggerated estimation of universal values, by contrast, leads to naivety about the complexities of international relations or migration.
Broad culture creates business opportunities as well, particularly in Europe where language barriers are only now starting to come down. Alpha Males and other Netflix shows suggest there may be a broad European market for more cultural content, and that bold investments could create better productions and unlock cross-border audiences.
And what of the news media? It is just as fragmented as the cultural sector, with European publications focusing tightly on their respective national markets. If even a loose pan-European audience exists, half a billion strong and well educated, there should be space for a wide range of publications to operate profitably.
The Leopard is a way to test this theory. It is written from a deliberately European perspective with a European audience in mind. If it finds a sizeable audience beyond Brussels, that suggests a market exists. If it doesn’t, then perhaps my theory is wrong – or perhaps I’m just a dull writer.