The story
Founded by Dmitry Lesnevsky and Irena Lesnevskaya in 1997.1
Production company
The history of REN TV is connected to the effects of the August Coup, when former heads of Soviet Central Television Irena Lesenskaya and her son Dimitri decided to create their production company. The company was registered under the name «ЛИС и С» («Лесневская Ирена Стефановна и сын») on 19 August 1991, but due to political chaos, as well as a similar name being registered at the time («ЛИС’С», Sergey Lisovskiy), the registration was delayed. Two weeks after the coup the company was registered under the name «REN» (formally registered on 1 October 1991).
Its first programs were Astrological Forecast (13 November 1991, RTR) and the Christmas special The Irony of Fate, or Merry Christmas) (24 December 1991, First Channel of CT SSSR, days before its dissolution). These two were followed by other productions for national channels, such as To Those Who Remember, Rost's Stable, Man-to-Man Talk from Eldar Ryazanov to Boris Yeltsin Dog-Show: Me and My Dog and The White Woodpecker Club. At the time of founding, its staff consisted of only nine people, though ten years later, it rose to over 500.
Becoming a channel
In the spring of 1996, REN-TV became the main shareholder of JSC Joint Stock Company Accept, a television company that owned a license to broadcast on UHF channel 49 Moscow (occupied at the time by the local channel M—49, launched on 1 January 1994). In May of the same year, the production company REN-TV started work on the creation of its full-blown homonymous television channel. It was assumed that the schedule would consist of its existing original productions. Irena and Dmitry Lesnevsky talked about getting Channel 49 at their own disposal as follows:Volodya Molchanov and I were in Israel. <...> And there I found a man who said that he had read somewhere in an interview that I dreamed of my own channel. And then this man, who escaped from Russia and once worked for the Ministry of Communications, said that he took a license for himself, he now had a channel in Moscow, but few people watch him — Channel 49. <...> I was given a meeting with this man who said: "I've been waiting for you! People come to me with sacks of money. But I would like to give it not to people who will make money from it, but to a production company so that there is content, so that there is television." I say, "So you're also an ideologist!" He says, "Well, I still dream of returning to Russia someday." <...> In short, we agreed on a certain amount, extending the payment for two or three years. Then he demanded more and more every time, until we sent him. But we paid him everything, and he was still complaining when we sold it — he realized that they had made a fortune out of nothing. Not only did the Kremlin want to take it away, but also the Germans came in with the money. He decided that we hadn't paid him, that we should give him some kind of percentage. But it was actually funny. He didn't put anything into it at all, except for the license.Irena Lesnevskaya There are four UHF channels that can be developed: 31, 49, 51 and 27. Anyone in Moscow can become accessible to the widest audience, free of charge, according to the same scheme in which TV-6 was introduced. We have held talks with channel 49. And in February we managed to buy it. <...> We bought a transmitter, a small staff of ten people, and debts that were immediately paid off. From that moment on, a new era began for us, the transition from an ambitious production company to an equally ambitious broadcasting company.Dmitry Lesnevsky
Since that time, M-49's network started to serve as a test broadcast for the new REN-TV channel, whose launch line-up consisted exclusively of productions from its first three to four years of operation, that it made for other networks. According to the founders, REN-TV was supposed to be "an intelligent channel, a space for talented people who cannot achieve their goals on existing TV channels": It was in this "intelligent" format that the channel carried out its programming format during the first few years of operation. Under the leadership of Irena Lesnevskaya, the first generation of post-Soviet Russian journalists appeared, such as Eldar Ryazanov, Yuri Rost, Grigory Gorin, Bulat Okudzhava, Alexander Shirvindt, Yuri Nikulin, Vladimir Molchanov, Arkady Arki, and Leonid Filatov.
As a sign of gratitude for Yeltsin's support in his election campaign, REN TV received the right to broadcast in Moscow. In the fall of 1996, Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov supported the creation of Irena Lesnevskaya's new TV channel and became the head of its board of trustees. It also includee Egor Yakovlev, Alexey Simonov, Alexander Kabakov and Nikolai Petrov. According to experts, the mayor's participation in the creation of the TV channel, which at that time actively provided the floor to the Moscow administration, could indicate that Luzhkov had already begun preparations for the next presidential election and had presidential ambitions. At the same time, the Bank of Moscow, controlled by the Moscow authorities, provided an initial loan for REN-TV, which was repaid a year later. Teaser videos of the TV channel began to appear on NVS in mid-December 1996.
1995-2005: REN TV under the Lesnesvkys
On 1 January 1997, REN-TV began broadcasting instead of NVS, but at the same time it briefly left the name of its predecessor on its logo, this being rendered as REN-NVS. Initially, the channel began broadcasting between 13:15 and 17:00 Moscow time and ended it around 01:00, and the amount of airtime varied from 9 to 12 hours a day. Later, the broadcast began at 14:00. The channel was broadcast to the regions through local affiliates (Reg-TV in St. Petersburg, Network NN in Nizhny Novgorod, Afontovo in Krasnoyarsk, Everything for You in Tambov, Channel Four in Yekaterinburg, TV2 in Tomsk, Takt in Kursk, Akhtuba in Volgograd, SKAT in Samara, Expovim in Rostov-on-Don, Istoki in Orel, Bars in Ivanovo, Yekaterinodar in Krasnodar, and others), which have been receiving satellite signals since NVS existed. Until 1999, REN-TV broadcast its programs without time zone adjustments, using a single feed calibrated to Moscow's timezone, and at night and in the morning, for the network's affiliates outside the European part of Russia, it delivered a full or partial relay of the following day's schedule in order to retransmit them by partners at a more convenient time for them. On 6 September 1999, REN-TV began time-sensitive broadcasting throughout Russia, having four time zone feeds: +0 (for European Russia), +2 (for the Urals and, until 2016, Western Siberia), +4 (for Siberia, until 2016, for Central and Eastern Siberia) and +7 (for the Far East), becoming the third TV channel in Russia to launch such a service. By the end of the 1990s, the channel's broadcasting was extended to most of the country, while until 2003 it was carried out exclusively on the network principle - with retransmission in all regions except Moscow through the frequencies of its regional affiliates. REN-TV
To compete with the larger Russian TV broadcasters, the channel, led by Irena Lesnevskaya and her son Dmitry, began to actively develop its operations. Positioning itself as a general TV channel, REN-TV included news and current affairs programs, entertainment and music programs, author programs (programs produced by a single presenter), sports programs and events in its network, television series, mostly American, animated series and feature films from international catalogues.
In 1997-2016, the in-house productions were made by CJSC REN-TV, later having its name dehyphenated to CJSC REN TV. In entertainment programs, both of its own and third-party production since 2003, the legal entity Acceptance LLC (REN TV Television Channel) generally used. 70% of the programs aired on the REN-TV channel were owned by the television company of the same name.
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From 1997 to 2000, 70% of the shares of the TV channel belonged to the Lukoil oil company. In October 2000 (May 2001 according to other sources,) this block of shares was bought by a subsidiary of RAO UES, the Settlement Optimization Center. By that time, the channel's share was already of 3.5—3.7% of viewers in the country (by contrast, in 1997, its viewing figures were only 1%, which was roughly comparable to STS, Channel Five and AST-2x2 and significantly less than those of the perceived competitors of the larger channels NTV and TV-6). The reason for the sale of the channel's shares was that the management of REN-TV and, personally, Irena Lesnevskaya were not satisfied with the quality of the information provided in the newscasts produced by Alexander Gurnov's news agency Television Service of News (TSN) (also owned by Lukoil), which was broadcast on the channel from 28 February to 12 June 2000. The RAO UES subsidiary did not participate in determining the information policy of the TV channel; in those years, only its managers controlled REN-TV's broadcast. The political position of the then REN-TV was in many ways similar to NTV before the scandal that caused its acquisition by Gazprom.
On 27 August 1999, the TV channel registered a domain name for its official website (ren-tv.com), said website launched in the spring of 2000. On 6 September of the same year, the channel began broadcasting at 07:00 and ended after 01:00, expanding to an average of eighteen hours a day.
Still in 1999, REN-TV began a partnership with animation studio CG-Alliance, providing financial support to it at the stage of creation. The studio, which operated at that time as the "REN-TV Animation Studio" and had a representative office on the internet at animaton.ren-tv.com, has developed and prepared the entirety of the channel's graphic package in the 2000-2002 period and the intros and graphics of some of its programs. The main characters of the channel bumpers, made in the style of CGI cartoons, were anthropomorphic televisions that showed the programs and series of the channel at the time. Later, the Ren FX division spun off from the studio, which took over the special effects for all the series on the channel.
In the spring of 2000, the TV company claimed to be on the air on VHF channel 3 in Moscow, but later, even before the competition for the frequency, it withdrew its application.
From 2002 to 2004, the channel was the official sponsor of the Saturn football club, which it branded as Saturn-REN-TV.
In 2003, REN-TV acquired its first fully-owned regional frequency outside of Moscow, starting with Chelyabinsk, where it won the license to operate on UHF channel 41. and in Yekaterinburg, where it acquired the local TV channel DIA, which at that time was its affiliate. In Vladimir, at about the same time (since 21 July 2003), the channel started its broadcasts through an affiliate, TV—6 Vladimir, which has been in operation as far back as the days of TV-6 and kept its name after its closure. Most of the acquisition of former affiliates happened after 2005. In May 2006, Nizhny Novgorod's "Seti NN" became a REN-TV-owned station. Affiliates such as Reg-TV in St. Petersburg shedded their old brands and joined the federal broadcaster's network completely on the principle of co-branding, receiving names like REN TV Petersburg and a single, unified design for its brand idendity, TV studios and relays with the federal channel.
In early 2005, the TV channel had problems with Rosokhrankultury regarding narcotic drugs and broadcasts of erotic films. The claims owed largely to the content of one of the editions of Artemy Troitsky's author-based program Signs of Life, which was no longer airing new editions in 2005, with the participation of Detsl and Ivan Okhlobystin, who discussed the harm of alcohol and drugs. and also to the airing of erotic films by the Italian director Tinto Brass (shortly before the warning was issued, REN-TV aired his explicit film "Oh, Women!", which caused a stir among the audience, and State Duma deputies accused the TV channel of showing pornographic content). The airing of such movies was temporarily suspended, though was resumed under new leadership in heavily-edited versions. At the same time, the channel's scandal involving the US satirical animated series The Simpsons case, which had first aired on the network in 2002, regarding the legality of its airing in time slots adequate for children, received a new development.
Programming during this phase
The channel's broadcast opened with the New Year's program Hello! with Eldar Ryazanov on 1 January 1997.
Initially, REN-TV had no daily news bulletins, but offered author-based current affairs programs instead: What Happened? with writer and journalist Andrey Illesh, as well as Reputation with Peter Fedorov (a look at Russia from the perspective of foreign correspondents working in Moscow). On 2 February 1998, at 19:00, the first edition of Novosti was broadcast, hosted by Alexey Gromov (formerly a news anchor on the Russian Universities channel). Initially, it had three daily editions on weekdays, since 1 September 1998, the bulletins shifted from a pre-recorded format to a live one, seven times a day every day on weekdays, as well as on weekends and holidays. On September 6, Igor Prokopenko's program Military Secret began airing on REN-TV, which in those years told about the news of Russian and foreign intelligence services.
For a long time (from the late 90s), REN-TV was known for its broadcasts of popular American satirical adult animated series (The Simpsons, Family Guy, Futurama, South Park) and the airing of Premier League and Russian football championship with commentator Alexander Elagin. REN-TV was the first in Russia to show such famous television series as Monty Python's Flying Circus, M*A*S*H and The X-Files, as well as a number of arthouse feature films.
In the 1990s and 2000s, B-movies and C-movies (including little-known ones, by analogy with TV-6 and CTC) were also included in large numbers the network. After showing a large number of action movies and other films of similar content, the TV channel was often accused by a group of patriotic activists of excessively broadcasting scenes of cruelty and violence at times children were exposed to see. Until 2009, dubbing of foreign productions commissioned by the TV channel were performed at the Kiparis Studio, dubs made for other channels or official dubs from the producers or distributors were purchased less frequently, depending on the manufacturer (in the first year of the channel's existence and then occasionally until the early 2010s, foreign films with single-voice voiceover translations were also taken for release on semi-legal or pirated videotapes).
The channel was also distinguished from others by the quality of information, analytical and journalistic broadcasts of its own production (the most famous of them are Novosti 24, The Week with Marianna Maksimovskaya, Military Secrets and Reflection). With the participation of Igor Prokopenko and Oksana Barkovskaya, REN-TV set up its original documentary production unit from scratch. Festive special programs were also produced (That's all-3000, Review-3000, The ravings of a grey mare). For the first time on Russian television, the technical technique of implanting virtual faces of famous politicians into plot sketches invented by screenwriters was tested. The innovation of the later New Year's Eve shows of REN-TV (Shallow Light, a reference to Little Blue Light on RTR) consisted in the synthesis of rock and popular music, which was atypical for Russian television.
Irena Lesnevskaya later recalled:It seemed to me that it was possible to make good television in the most real sense, with interesting interlocutors, interesting political, musical, historical and poetic programs. From there, we will reveal the secrets that were hidden from us and tell our country about ourselves. Something that was not done, neither before nor after Since 1998, REN-TV started broadcasting at 08:30 or 09:00 Moscow time with newscasts. In 1999, journalist Olga Romanova moved from the TV Center channel to REN-TV, where she began hosting her Fifth Column program. The channel's news service was headed by Elena Fedorova.
Since the middle of 2000, REN-TV has been actively developing its TV series unit (under the brand of the established studio «REN-film»). REN-TV's first in—house experience was the Black Room short film project, which was simultaneously broadcast on REN-TV and ORT. With the direct participation of Dmitry Lesnevsky, high-rated television series such as Soldiers, NEXT, Fighter, Nina: The Price of Love and others were produced. In 2003, its first in-house animated series, Dyatlows, was broadcast, and in 2005, the sketch show Dear Transfer (which moved to STS under the name 6 Frames in 2006). With the direct participation of REN-TV and Dmitry Lesnevsky personally, the career of the famous film director Andrei Zvyagintsev began: Lesnevsky was the producer of his first film, The Return.
Between 2001 and 2005, famous journalists and TV presenters joined REN-TV, such as Alexander Gerasimov (former employee of the "old" NTV), Anna Pavlova, Tatiana Limanova, Elena Turubara, Ivan Usachev (all are former TV-6 presenters), Egor Pirogov (former TV presenter), Gennady Klebanov (previously worked for NTV and NTV-Plus), Alexander Bovin, Urmas Ott, Vasily Strelnikov (former VJ and announcer of MTV Russia), Dmitry Yasminov, Alexander Zhestkov, Artemy Troitsky, and Ilya Doronov. At the same time, the channel hosted TV shows that had previously been broadcast on other Russian TV channels, such as Eyewitness, a program dedicated to funny and shocking videos, Big Money, The Press Club (the latest edition) and the game show The People Against.
In early 2003, the scope of the TV channel's content was significantly expanded: the management decided to strengthen the entertainment block and add to the already existing information and political programs and programs devoted to acute social problems, programs of a purely entertaining nature, both its own and third-party production. The original slogan of the, Iskrenneye, was replaced by REN with us, later REN-TV Time. In 2003-2005, the channel's creative team was replenished with journalists who had previously worked with Evgeny Kiselyov on NTV, TV-6 and TVS — among them was Marianna Maksimovskaya., Julia Latynina, Evgeny Matonin, Alexander Nadsadny, Sergey Mitrofanov, Vadim Kondakov, Andrey Kartavtsev, Artur Valeev, Dmitry Shtokolov, Vyacheslav Guz, Georgy Andronikov, Tamara Kartashova, and Sergey Naumov. Simultaneously with the latest sports news on REN-TV, a number of employees of the sports editorial office of the satellite operator NTV-Plus also joined, since, after the termination of cooperation with FC Saturn in 2005, the old sports department on the channel was actually disbanded, and its former premises were transferred to NTV-Plus's employees. Earlier, Vitaly Buzuyev, who also worked with Kiselyov, joined REN-TV.
New leadership (2005—2006)
On 1 July 2005, 30% of REN-TV's share capital, owned by its founders Irena and Dmitry Lesnevsky, went to a German-Luxembourgish company (RTL Group), and the RAO UES package went equally (35% each) to the Russian companies Severstal Group and Surgutneftegaz. The Lesnevskys left the TV channel after selling their shares. From that moment on, only the REN-Film organization was under the control of the founders of REN-TV, which in 2006-2007 was combined with the cable TV channel Mini Movie and the magazine The New Times (formerly the Novoe Vremya magazine) to form the REN Media Group holding company, no longer affiliated with REN TV.
In August 2005, entertainment producer and creative producer Vyacheslav Murugov left REN-TV for STS.
From Wikipedia’s article on REN TV, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.4