Of all the resources available in the entertainment industry, past ideas are probably in the largest supply. It feels as though everything under the sun has been done before at this point, and that means that entertainment companies are looking more and more at older properties. For a little creative inspiration for whatever projects you may work on yourself, here are just a few ways entertainment industries have reimagined what they do.
Casino
It's a safe bet that the majority of people who have heard of casino games are more than familiar with the most common types of games out there. Poker and blackjack are both household names dating back over 100 years and roulette goes back even further than that with fame from both TV and movies. These are all based on classic formulas with fairly entrenched rulesets.
That doesn't mean that the formulas can't be tweaked for great success, however. Variants of poker like Five-Card Draw or Omaha have been popular for a long time, and games like Spin Till You Win as digital versions provide extra features like multipliers to the classic roulette format. In fact, there are dozens of each of the classics available on online casinos, with a different twist on every one.
TV
The realm of TV has to be the most prominent example of the same ideas being used over and over again, and there are even entire websites like TV Tropes dedicated to highlighting some of the most egregious examples. Thanks to that overuse, directors and studios have to be extra careful in reusing old ideas, although the most creative are able to twist those tropes on their head.
A prime example is the old Channel 4 show ‘Misfits', ostensibly a show about super-powered individuals in the same line as ‘Heroes' before it, but every trope is thrown out. There are no noble sacrifices and not too much empathy, with the main characters being inherently selfish and generally unpleasant. Despite that, it still manages to hit the core story beats, just approached in an entirely different way.
Theatre
Theatre has long had a problem of feeling fairly old-fashioned compared to the far more eye-catching formats of TV and movies. If theatre companies stuck purely to the original formats they would have closed up shop years ago, but thankfully they've been able to reinvent their approach time and time again, keeping the same traditions but applying new approaches and technologies to them.
There have been more than a few efforts at immersive theatre over the years, including the famous interactive performances of Cats amongst many others, although now there are big moves towards technology for it. We've started to see immersive theatre experiences using VR headsets to now put audiences directly into productions as a character, and while these efforts are still fairly rare, they are rapidly increasing in number.
With the right creative mind, and the right approach, there is almost no old idea that cannot be made new again. It just takes care to make sure to add your own mark and not to look like you're just copying what already worked in the past!
