When the coronavirus outbreak led to shelter-in-place orders across the country, Audrey Morrissey had to act fast. As an executive producer at NBC, she had to figure out how her team could finish filming and editing its live competitive singing show "The Voice," which was in the middle of its current season when the crisis started.
In normal times, the show brings performers from all over the country to Universal Studios in Hollywood, California, to battle it out on stage while being mentored by celebrity coaches like Kelly Clarkson, John Legend, and Nick Jonas. But with rules making it impossible for anyone to be together, Morrissey had to figure out how to tape the coaching sessions and performances remotely instead of in-person as well as how to edit and broadcast a live show with a dispersed team.
To tackle these challenges, she and her fellow producers turned to Microsoft: They used its chat service Teams and its line of Surface devices to continue filming, producing, and editing the show remotely. NBC was already a Microsoft customer so it was a natural place to turn.
The pandemic has forced many industries to completely rethink how they do things — including shooting live television. Meanwhile, a slew of tech companies like Microsoft have stepped up to show off how their tools can extend beyond office work. Microsoft Teams' usage has skyrocketed to 75 million daily active users as of April as new and existing Microsoft customers increase their usage. Beyond "The Voice," Microsoft Teams helped the NFL broadcast its draft remotely earlier this month.
"Without a system such as this, we wouldn't have been able to work remotely — either among our teams in general or our own staff and crew— or get to shoot remotely," Morrissey told Business Insider.
Pivoting to producing a live show remotely
The pivot to remote operations happened in the middle of the show's current season, which made it slightly less challenging than it would have been if the season was just starting, Morrissey said. The show starts out with auditions and live elimination rounds with the judges before ending with a few final contestants that viewers can vote on.
By the time production had to halt in March, the show was in its final phase. The first step Morrissey and other show leaders took was calling every single person involved with production to figure out their normal tasks and workflow so they could come up with a plan to recreate it all using remote technology.
"We quickly realized, 'Guess what? Nobody's going to be back with us,'" Morrissey said.
Contestants and coaches would be stuck at home for the rest of shooting, which meant that NBC needed to find a way to capture good audio and video from people's homes without a crew. The production team sent cameras, microphones, lights, and Microsoft Surface 7 Pro laptops to all of its contestants and coaches, who used Teams to make video calls for what the show calls "coaching sessions."
Producers could use the audio and video of those calls — streamed in real-time into a control room studio in Los Angeles — to recreate the live filming experience, while Morrissey and others could use Teams channels to monitor the process, as well.
Producers ultimately decided to pre-tape the actual performances in case live feeds were interrupted by poor internet connections within the contestants' homes. Host Carson Daly came back to the actual stage with a skeleton crew of about 30 people to host the show, without an audience and with extensive social distancing precautions in place, and the coaches streamed in via Microsoft Teams to give live feedback on performances.
The challenges and potential long term changes
Morrissey admits none of it was easy: Production felt like it took five times longer than it ordinarily did. Pre-taping and editing the performances required teaching the contestants how to set up equipment in their own homes, elongating rehearsals and taping. Additionally, the live shows required a lot more coordination with over 20 different video feeds coming into the control room and satellite trucks.
"It was really taxing on the artists and our crew because we're spending all that extra time with all of them," she said.
Still, she was surprised at how smoothly the shows actually went — the last episode of the season airs Tuesday.
"It was very exciting to be forced to stretch in new ways and think creatively about how to get something done," Morrissey said. "Being separated has oddly made things more intimate."
That's what Microsoft hoped to enable with its technology, said Kathleen Hall, a brand executive at Microsoft. As a huge fan of the show herself, she felt that even though the energy of a live audience was missing, the approach helped give a more personal look at the show's participants, even the celebrity judges.
"I think that there's something about Kelly Clarkson and her giant glass of wine that just humanizes her in her Montana house — I think they're going to find ways of keeping it as an element of the production," Hall told Business Insider. "I think they're never going to want to lose that component of connectedness and personality."
Hall said she's long thought that the "real-time collaboration" technology in Microsoft Teams could help the broadcast industry rethink how it operates long term. The current pandemic could force that innovation to happen a lot fast than anyone previously thought.
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