European Commission
cover of the publication - graphic in yellow and purple showing text "Creative Europe Monitoring Report 2019"
In 2019 Creative Europe accompanied key policies by developing specific measures in close dialogue with stakeholders and by experimenting new forms of support in areas such as the circulation of audiovisual content, music diversity, mobility of artists, international cultural relations, greening and gender equality. Overall, the budget was fully deployed, thus showing that it has excellent absorption capacity.
Supporting AV professionals
In particular, the MEDIA Sub-programme - focusing on the audiovisual sector - advanced in supporting scaling-up and promotion of cross-border distribution of films in Europe and beyond. MEDIA offered support to the sector at every stage of the production cycle: from training to over 2200 professionals, development of over 430 film scripts, production of 44 high-quality TV series and distribution of 290 films, to supporting 75 festivals and dozens of companies experimenting with new online distribution models. In 2019 alone, 21 MEDIA-supported films received 40 awards at the 7 most prestigious film festivals around the world.
Promoting cross-border collaboration
In all its schemes MEDIA encouraged and promoted cross-border collaboration between beneficiaries in order to expand the scale of activity beyond national markets. As a result, most of the works supported in development and production were co-productions – for example, in 2019, 35 out of 44 TV-series whose production was supported were co-produced.
Reaching new audiences
MEDIA undertook also endeavours to reach-out, develop and communicate directly with the audiences. In 2019, this took the form of a series of open screening events in summer (A Season of Classic Films) and in winter (The European Cinema Night), as well as two competitions for cinephiles to win trips to the Cannes Film Festival and European Film Awards. All together these initiatives reached no less than 36 000 citizens.
In addition, the MEDIA-supported Europa Cinemas network experienced an outstanding share of European films and organised film education activities for the youth. The network sold 42 million admissions to European films, compared to 39 million the previous year.
What is more, the total number of new films produced in Europe reached a new record high of 1881 in 2019, compared to 1807 in 2018 (source: EAO Focus 2020 p. 14). MEDIA kept its share in supporting the creation of new films, by supporting the development of 430 (413 in 2018) new projects.
Enabling access to finance
Finally, under the cross-sectoral strand, where projects combine audiovisual with other cultural sectors, Creative Europe addressed common challenges. In particular, access to finance was strengthened by the CCS Guarantee Facility which was made available to 1547 CCS SMEs (800 in 2018) to finance projects worth EUR 1.08 billion.
The new Creative Europe, which is expected to enter into force in January 2021, will play a key role in the recovery and long-term development of the CCS by bringing our creative talents together, across borders and between sectors.
Find out more about the performance and impact of the programme in its Monitoring Report 2019.