According to Variety, Meta is closing the Facebook Watch originals group, whose small slate of shows included the hit “Red Table Talk” hosted by Jada Pinkett Smith.
A Meta representative confirmed the company’s decision to close its originals division but declined to comment further. Deadline was the first to break the story.
Mina Lefevre, the group’s head of development and programming, is leaving the company as a result of the shutdown of Facebook Watch originals. After serving as MTV’s head of scripted development, Lefevre joined Meta (then known as Facebook) in 2017. Lefevre reported to Ricky Van Veen, Meta’s VP of creative strategy.
Lefevre’s departure comes as Meta is laying off 10,000 employees, following an 11,000-person layoff at the end of 2022. On Wednesday, Meta announced first-quarter 2023 earnings that exceeded Wall Street expectations, while revenue increased by 3%.
Facebook Watch’s originals began with a mix of scripted and unscripted shows, but in recent years, the company has shifted entirely to unscripted fare. Its current programming includes “Red Table Talk” and the Steve Harvey talk show “Steve on Watch.”
Westbrook Studios, cofounded by Jada Pinkett Smith and Will Smith, produces the “Red Table Talk” series; the company is said to be looking for a new distributor now that the Facebook Watch deal has expired. Pinkett Smith, Willow Smith, and Adrienne “Gammy” Banfield-Norris (pictured above) appeared on the Daytime Emmy-winning talk show. “Red Table Talk” has 11 million Facebook fans. Westbrook also created a spinoff series called “Red Table Talk: The Estefans,” which starred Gloria Estefan, her daughter Emily, and her niece Lili.
Some of the social platform’s original shows, such as Jada Pinkett Smith’s “Red Table Talk” talk show and drama “Sorry for Your Loss,” starring Elizabeth Olsen, about a woman grieving the death of her husband, have tapped into the zeitgeist. And Facebook is expanding its presence in the talk format by reviving Steve Harvey’s daytime show, which was canceled by NBC: “Steve on Watch” will premiere on Facebook on January 6 and run for 10 weeks.
Prior to joining Facebook, Lefevre was in charge of all of MTV’s scripted development and programming, as well as films. She joined MTV as SVP of scripted programming in 2013 and has worked on shows such as “Teen Wolf,” “Scream,” “Finding Carter,” “The Shannara Chronicles,” and “Faking It.” Prior to joining MTV, she worked for ABC Family (now Freeform) for 12 years, where she was VP of development and programming and oversaw the launch of the network’s breakout hit “Pretty Little Liars.”
