It looks like Spotify wants to expand its original podcasts beyond just listening to them — it wants to turn them into TV shows and movies, too.
The music streaming app announced a first-look partnership with Chernin Entertainment on Thursday with the hopes of turning some of its more than 250 original podcast shows into viewable entertainment.
Chernin Entertainment is the production company behind movies likeFord v FerrariandThe Greatest Showman, and TV shows likeNew GirlandSee. The company will work with Spotify to develop pitches on some of the more popular podcasts on the app.
According toSpotify’s charts, podcasts likeCall Her DaddyandMy Favorite Murderare in the top 10 most popular podcasts on the app, so it’s likely Spotify will turn these more popular podcasts into TV shows or movies before others.
Podcasts transforming into TV shows or movies is nothing new, and some examples of successful podcasts that have done so areDirty John, a true-crime podcast that became a Bravo show, andComedy Bang! Bang!which started as a radio show in 2009 before debuting on IFC as a television series. The scripted-story podcastHomecomingalso moved to Amazon Prime Video in 2018 and stars Julia Roberts.
A Spotify spokesperson told Digital Trends that they have a few podcasts in mind to turn into a TV show or movie, but plan to give them and their creators their own announcements in the weeks/months ahead.
Spotify has quickly become a significant force in the podcast space, especially with last year’sacquisition of podcast companiesGimlet Media and Anchor, and adding the ability for its listeners tocreate new playlists of podcasts. If you are a Spotify user, you should not miss out onthe Premium version.
Perhaps one of the more popular podcasts available on the streaming platform isThe Joe Rogan Experience. The first show on Spotify streamed earlier this month and willmove exclusively to Spotifyat the end of the year.
