"We are not HBO, We are Television". An Etnographic Analysis of the Group Writing of the Series The First Republic

The study of group writing and the value horizons of the actors involved in the production process of The First Republic draws on the methodology of production studies and the ethnography of cultural production, particularly inspired by Georgina Born's pioneering work on BBC production culture. Drawing on long-term participant observation and semi-structured interviews with the main creators, the authors show how and why the original scriptwriter's vision of a gritty realistic story was gradually transformed into a compromised public service version of a soap opera set against a historical backdrop, building on the success of the series Narrate, with the same production company, Dramedy, and partly the same production team behind it. Ethnographic observation makes it possible to reinterpret the resulting series as an index condensing traces of the changing institutional environment of public television, especially the non-standardised division of labour and the unclear relationship between Czech Television and external producers.

Keywords: serial First Republic, TV serials, script, television production, creative groups, Czech Television, independent production