Country | United States |
---|---|
Broadcast area | Nationwide |
Headquarters | Austin, Texas 274 Fox West Street Glendale, California |
Programming | |
Language(s) | English |
Picture format |
|
Ownership | |
Owner | Robert Rodriguez FactoryMade Ventures |
History | |
Launched | December 15, 2013 (television) August 17, 2021 (streaming) |
Closed | December 31, 2020 (television) |
Links | |
Website | www |
El Rey Network (Spanish for The King) is a media brand founded by Robert Rodriguez on December 15, 2013, that is currently owned in a joint venture with FactoryMade Ventures.
Until December 31, 2020, El Rey was a cable and satellite network, operated and distributed in-partnership with Univision Communications (now known as TelevisaUnivision), dedicated to exploitation-style programming targeting English-speaking Hispanic audiences. By March 2015, approximately 40 million households received El Rey; [1] [2] its carriage would fall to 13 million households by the time of the network's closure. [3]
El Rey Network was one of two ethnic outlets created as part of an agreement between Comcast, NBC Universal, and the FCC as a condition for the merger between the former two broadcasters (the other network being Revolt). [1]
The network's headquarters was in Austin, Texas, and launched as part of the digital basic service on some of Comcast's systems. [4] [5] Comcast announced that the network was expected to debut by January 2014. [6] In August 2012, Antoinette Alfonso Zel was announced as CEO. [7] In May 2013, Univision Communications (now known as TelevisaUnivision USA) announced that it would be an investor for El Rey, handling the sales and distribution of the network. [8] [9]
In November 2013, it was announced that the production of From Dusk till Dawn: The Series had begun. [10] Upon launch in the week of December 15, 2013, [11] El Rey was also offered by cable companies Time Warner Cable, [12] [13] with Bright House Networks offering soon later in January 2014, [14] and Cox Communications by February 2014. [11] Cablevision added the network on April 7, 2014.
The first satellite service to host El Rey was DirecTV in January 2014. [15]
That year, lucha libre program Lucha Underground , featuring wrestlers from Lucha Libre AAA World Wide (AAA) and produced by Mark Burnett, premiered on October 29, 2014. [16] [17] The show would go on to become the network's flagship series and both it, and the corresponding promotion, received positive reception. [18] [19]
Dish Network would begin carrying El Rey in January 2015. [20] The following month, El Rey was made available through cable company Suddenlink Communications in select markets. [21] El Rey was added to AT&T U-verse and Verizon FiOS that same year.
Between 2018 and 2020, various cable and satellite providers began dropping the network. On November 6, 2020, Univision announced it had sold its stake in El Rey, as part of a larger effort by the company to refocus on its core Spanish-language businesses. [22] [23] Soon after, it would be reported that El Rey would cease operations on December 31, though it was speculated that the network would relaunch as a streaming brand. [24] The network went dark at 11:59 p.m. Pacific. [25]
On August 6, 2021, El Rey Network announced a partnership with Cinedigm that would see the network relaunch as a FAST channel. As part of this agreement, Cinedigm will exclusively distribute Rodriguez's 2019 film, Red 11 , and a companion docuseries titled Rebel Without a Crew: The Robert Rodriguez Film School. [26] [27] [28] El Rey would relaunch later that month via The Roku Channel on August 17. [29]
By 2024, Fuse Media would partner with El Rey to launch the "El Rey Rebel" FAST channel; which would air the network's original content, and carry combat sports programming as part Fuse's partnerships with Golden Boy Promotions and Combate Global. [30] [31] In June 2024, El Rey Rebel would begin distribution on DirecTV. [32]
El Rey Network's original programming included action genre series, sports, and lifestyle programming. Annual programming included a marathon of Toho-produced Godzilla films during the Christmas & Independence Day weekends and the Thanksgiving Way of the Turkey marathon of kung fu films. [33]
Robert Anthony Rodriguez is an American filmmaker, composer, and visual effects supervisor. He shoots, edits, produces, and scores many of his films in Mexico and in his home state of Texas. Rodriguez directed the 1992 action film El Mariachi, which was a commercial success after grossing $2.6 million against a budget of $7,000. The film spawned two sequels known collectively as the Mexico Trilogy: Desperado (1995) and Once Upon a Time in Mexico (2003).
Comcast Corporation, formerly known as American Cable Systems and then Comcast Holdings, is a multinational telecommunications and media conglomerate incorporated and headquartered in Philadelphia.
UniMás is an American Spanish-language free-to-air television network owned by TelevisaUnivision. The network's programming, which is aimed at Hispanic Americans in the 18–34 age range, includes telenovelas and other serialized drama series, sports, sitcoms, reruns of imported series previously aired on parent network Univision, reality and variety series, and theatrically released feature films.
NBCUniversal Media, LLC is an American multinational mass media and entertainment conglomerate that is a subsidiary of Comcast and is headquartered at 30 Rockefeller Plaza in Midtown Manhattan in New York City.
Troublemaker Studios is an American production company founded and owned by filmmaker Robert Rodriguez and producer Elizabeth Avellán.
Fuse is an American television channel owned by Fuse Media, LLC, that launched in 1994.
Promociones Antonio Peña, S.A. de C.V. d/b/a Lucha Libre AAA Worldwide (Commonly referred to as simply AAA is a Mexican Lucha Libre promotion based in Mexico City, Mexico. It was founded in 1992, when Antonio Peña broke away from Consejo Mundial de Lucha Libre to set up his own promotion to have more creative freedom.
TelevisaUnivision is a Mexican-American media company headquartered in New York and Mexico City that owns American Spanish language broadcast network Univision and free-to-air channels in Mexico such as Las Estrellas, Canal 5, Foro, and NU9VE alongside a collection of specialty television channels and production studios. 45% of the company is held by the Mexican telecommunications and broadcasting company Grupo Televisa, which was a major programming partner for Univision until the company sold their content assets to Univision in 2022.
Telemundo is an American Spanish-language terrestrial television network owned by NBCUniversal Telemundo Enterprises, a division of NBCUniversal, which in turn is a wholly owned subsidiary of Comcast. It provides content nationally with programming syndicated worldwide to more than 100 countries in over 35 languages.
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John Michael Fogelman is an American entrepreneur. He is the CEO of FactoryMade Ventures, an entertainment and media incubator. Formerly Executive Vice President and Head of the Motion Picture Department and the Intellectual Property Group at the William Morris Agency (WMA), Fogelman was a principal architect of the merger between William Morris and Endeavor Talent Agency, and served as a founding board member and an agent after the companies merged in 2009. He left William Morris Endeavor in 2011 to found FactoryMade.
Revolt is an American music-oriented digital cable television network and media company targeting African Americans that was founded by Sean "Diddy" Combs and Andy Schuon. The TV network launched on October 21, 2013, as part of a larger agreement with Comcast. As of 2024, Detavio Samuels serves as CEO, while the company's employees are the majority shareholding group.
TUDN is a sports programming division of Univision, a Spanish language broadcast television network owned by TelevisaUnivision, that is responsible for the production of televised coverage of sports events and magazine programs that air on the parent Univision network and sister network UniMás, and cable channels Galavisión and TUDN TV channel. The division's premier sports properties are its broadcast rights to Liga MX, select matches involving the Mexico and United States men's national soccer teams, tournament matches from the CONCACAF Gold Cup and Copa América. With the closure of the offices in Miami in late August 2024, the division's headquarters are now in Mexico City, Mexico.
Cristina "Cris" Magno Patwa is the co-CEO of FactoryMade Ventures, a Los Angeles–based entertainment and media incubator.
From Dusk till Dawn is an American media franchise created by Robert Kurtzman, including three films, a video game and a TV series.
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From Dusk till Dawn: The Series is an American horror television series developed by Robert Rodriguez. It forms part of the franchise of film, direct-to-video, and comics of From Dusk till Dawn, expanding on the chronicles of the Gecko Brothers, Seth and Richie; The Fuller family; and Santanico Pandemonium. The series adds to the tone of the film, with new characters and backstories, while expanding the snake creatures' Mesoamerican mythology. The series also references the Popol Vuh, drawing on its rich, mythological history and, in particular, on the legend of the Hero Twins Hunahpú and Xbalanqué to add greater depth to the backstories and to fully flesh out the characters of the show's protagonists.
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Lucha Underground was an American professional wrestling promotion founded in 2014 by United Artists Media Group. Partly owned by Lucha Libre AAA Worldwide (AAA), Lucha Underground also refers to its weekly television program, which featured characters portrayed by wrestlers from AAA and the American and Mexican independent circuits. The series originally aired in English on El Rey Network and in Spanish on UniMás.