In her senior year at UCLA, Karey Burke got an internship at NBC “and absolutely got hit with a lightning bolt,” she said. With plans to be some kind of international business executive, she learned it was possible to make a career in television.
She secured a permanent position as an assistant at the network during, as she put it, the Brandon Tartikoff and Warren Littlefield years, and moved up to development executive.
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For the past three and a half years, she has been president of 20th Television, The Walt Disney Co.-owned studio that produces about 60% of in-house-produced programs for Disney Entertainment outlets (ABC, Disney Plus, FX, Hulu, etc.) and supplies myriad platforms including NBC, Apple TV Plus, Showtime, Fox and CBS.
Building Big Hits
Recent credits include Tracker, the CBS drama starring Justin Hartley that debuted after the Super Bowl and had a successful first season, leading all Big Four network programs in total audience and in the 18-49 demographic. 20th also produces 9-1-1 for ABC, among several other Ryan Murphy Productions franchises; Only Murders in the Building for Hulu; The Chi for Showtime; and Percy Jackson and the Olympians for Disney Plus.
But back to the “Must See” years at NBC. What shows did she work on? Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, L.A. Law and Quantum Leap were the first three she mentioned. “I was lucky enough to work on Friends the year we developed that show, and was able to stay with that for most of my career there,” she recalled.
After segueing to production, partnering variously with Jamie Tarses, Ashton Kutcher and Todd Holland, she embraced the challenge of joining Disney when it was rebranding ABC Family to Freeform. “By that time, my children were in their teenage years and that’s what they were watching, shows like Pretty Little Liars and The Fosters,” Burke said.
She cares deeply and I feel like she leads with her humanity.”
Thomas Kail, Director
From there came “the opportunity I could absolutely not say no to”: president of entertainment at ABC, starting in December 2018. “It was an incredible time, a heady time for the network,” Burke said. “And we took ABC from No. 3 back to No. 1.”
Then, Disney Entertainment co-chairman Dana Walden called two years into that job to discuss a new position that came from combining Fox 21 and 20th Television. “I was honored to get that call again, something I hadn’t done before,” Burke said. “I feel like I’ve always tried to pivot when I could learn something new. I’ve sort of been driven and led by my curiosity, and a hope to grow and keep learning.”
At 20th she gets the chance to, as Disney says, champion an inclusive culture and slate. She cites her work on Freaks and Geeks as an early source of pride, and now she’s particularly proud of We Were the Lucky Ones, an uplifting story about a family of Polish Jews who survived the Holocaust. Directed by Thomas Kail, it recently launched on Hulu.
Kail also directed the musical series Up Here for 20th, which ran for one season on Hulu. “Two shows with great ambition and two shows that were in many ways unlikely to exist,” Kail said, crediting Burke for championing and advocating them. “She cares deeply and I feel like she leads with her humanity.”
Still Bullish on Broadcast
As you might expect, Burke also is a champion of broadcast TV. “I’m bullish. I’m all in,” she said. “There’s no greater reach platform than the broadcast networks. And it’s an incredible place for stories to begin and for libraries to get built over time that ultimately serve our streaming platforms. I think it’s no surprise that when you look at the rankers of shows that do well on streaming services across the business, the bulk of the top 10 are shows that began life in broadcast. A show that we produced, The Resident, that story that popped about how well it’s doing — we’re so proud of that.”
