“That seems to keep the audience happy”: ‘Drive to Survive’ Producer Reveals the Success Recipe When Other Sports Documentaries Have Failed

Drive to Survive has adopted a simple strategy – a formulaic recipe as old as time – to turn just another sports documentary into the most addictive and profitable saga in recent entertainment history.

Netflix’s twist on the Formula 1 Grands Prix held across the globe every 12 months is a visionary saga as tragic and electric as a Greek epic where friendships crumble, rivals are born, and every moment hangs in a limbo between life and death.

Despite earlier efforts of other studios and documentary crews to make the sport as addictive as it can be in reality, F1 has always failed to translate on the screen with the same magnitude of stakes and drama. However, Netflix has cracked the code with Drive to Survive, and the recipe is so simple that it almost insults Hollywood’s intelligence for not getting it any sooner.

Drive to Survive cracks the code for all documentaries

An audience simply does not feel the same rush when watching sports in a condensed and edited format, whether via film or a limited series, as they would have while following a team throughout its entire season of stunning victories, heartbreaking defeats, and eventual progress.

Formula 1 is no less electrifying than any other championship game, similar to the season-long arc of football or basketball. Throughout the year, real lives are put at stake while supercars race for the grand prize at the end of the road. Drive to Survive captures that rush of adrenaline within a 10-episode arc that a traditional F1 fan gets watching every Grand Prix throughout its year-long arc.

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The secret to its recipe is all encoded in the Netflix docu-series’s post-production process. While other documentaries stick as close to the facts as possible, Drive to Survive strays away from the beaten path by choosing to garnish the truth with a little bit of drama to make Formula 1 seem a bit more sensational to a novice viewer.

Drive to Survive producer credits Netflix’s model

While countless drivers, team principals, and other F1 personnel have come forward decrying Netflix for misleading and misrepresenting the sport for the sake of clicks and views, Drive to Survive barely shows any signs of repenting or slowing down. If Netflix keeps pursuing its current model, the series will keep hooking viewers into the storyline, but at what cost?

The omniscient Netflix crew now has access to the paddock, every team’s garage, and the drivers themselves. Jokes, jibes, and rapport that were previously secret are now caught by the boom mic that looms at every corner of the F1 grid. Privacy is a thing of the past, and every second of every conversation is now at the risk of being eavesdropped upon by the Drive to Survive film crew.

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Tom Hutchings, series producer, has claimed in an interview with The Guardian:

However, turning Formula 1 into a reality TV soap opera is more detrimental to the sport than not exposing it to the broader demography. F1 has lost all authenticity in its search for exposure and popularity in the new world and the audience is barely beginning to catch up to the trickery, although not fast enough.

Drive to Survive Season 7 is streaming on Netflix.

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