When there’s news about WarnerMedia and streaming services, it’s generally about the new media entity’s upcoming HBO Max. But there’s another streamer growing within its ranks: digital sports brand Bleacher Report’s B/R Live, which offers live streams of sports games for $9.99 per month, and which is gradually being merged with the brand’s eponymous, ad-supported sports news app to form one subscription service.
To create original programming for this eventual merged app/streaming service, Bleacher Report recently launched B/R Studio. And now, B/R Studio has a lead content developer: Epix’s (now former) head of unscripted programming Rachel Brill, who’s onboarding as the studio’s SVP and GM.
Brill’s job is to establish a voice for the service that’ll appeal to Bleacher Report’s Gen Z and millennial fans, and that will set it apart from the millions upon millions of hours of sports content available across the web and on competitive services like DAZN and ESPN+, Deadline reports. As for third-party content available on the streamer, B/R Live (which launched in 2018) already has exclusive streaming rights to number of soccer and basketball games, as well as golf tournaments.
Brill will “rapidly focus our newly formed B/R Studio teams toward developing and producing a wide range of original content,” Howard Mittman, Bleacher Report’s CEO, said in a statement.
B/R Studio’s team is a mix of Bleacher Report staffers and new hires, Deadline reports. The entity’s first production, Battlestations, profiles athletes who also love video gaming; the first two 11-minute episodes of that series are premiering on B/R Live this month.
Brill will be based in New York City, and will report to B/R Studio’s chief content officer, Sam Toles.
“Rachel brings exactly the right mix of an impressive track record developing ultra-premium content coupled with a digital first storytelling sensibility that aligns perfectly with our ambitions,” Toles said in a statement.
Update, Oct. 6: This story has been updated to more accurately reflect the relationship between…
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