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Part 3: OTT – The Futuristic Sky and Rose- Colored Glasses

by Anup Chandrasekharan
May 16, 2022
in Exclusive, Featured, OTT
Reading Time: 6 mins read
Part 3: OTT – The Futuristic Sky and Rose- Colored Glasses
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This is the part 3 of the discussion which I am actually proud in sharing for the simple reason  that it throws light on so many perspectives of the OTT industry and it’s challenges. To travel  through the pathways of every platform and reason out the face of every platform was  achieved through this dialogue. And here it continues 

Anup: Siju, what immediately comes to our mind when we think of Zee5, is those family centred, traditional kind of content. Is it the mirror image of your motherbrand, that you are  creating in Zee5 as well? 

Siju: Yes, we do have a strong tv legacy, which we are very proud of. As Gaurav was  mentioning, this was built brick by brick over the years, and that is an audience which was  the first to be tapped. When the OTT structure was evolving where we didn’t have such a  strong content ecosystem as we have, while we know films were there always, but that is the  legacy that we carry, and that is something which still contributes substantially to our base.  Having said that, I think our story telling has evolved, as we heard speakers in the morning  talk about the real need of what the viewer wants today is more nuanced story telling, clear  narratives, and that requires a very different thing, we are on a path. We have a lot of new  shows in the regional market which we have been doing, recently in regional languages, a  show called Vilangu which we did and which got a lot of appreciation. We did a show called  Oka chinna family story in Telugu, which was good. We are doing a lot of Hindi stuff with  Sameer and their team where we’ve done Bloody Brothers, Mithya. So, I think every one of  us is trying to get what we do not have. But there is an inherent strength that each one  brings of their legacy. To answer the question that you were asking about what does each  brand represent, while there is a legacy effect to the brand but you want to create something  new, and at the heart of it is still story telling, for each one of us.

Anup: Thankyou Siju. Sameer, now, as far as curating content is concerned, globally 62% of  content is inspired by books, 22% is from formats, and 5% from films. Where do we,  especially content creators like you, draw your inspiration from? And which genre  specifically, is easy to sell to all these platform players? 

Sameer: Actually, inspiration comes from many sources. Obviously, books is a source of  inspiration. There are format adaptations, you get original ideas. Sometimes you see a short  film which you can develop into something else, sometimes you buy the license, sometimes  you rip it off, its just called being inspired. So, there are different sources. What happens with  that, is that the ideas come from everywhere. But the process of show creation is really that  journey of going from idea to screen. And, that is really where the whole challenge lies,  because there are lots of good ideas and to take it to that final step, it’s a big process. We  spend 18 to 24 months before we can go from an idea to get it on screen. So, it’s a much  longer journey and there are different sources. From a point of view of genres, at one level,  as we have heard all of them say, the heart of it all is the story. And at the heart of it is also  story telling, and it has to appeal to the audience, whether its called mass or niche. Its got to  be economic too. It has some driving sources. Sometimes its star driven, sometimes actor  driven, sometimes genre driven. But there are some learnings. I would always believe that it  is not so much that the content has changed, it is the distribution method that has changed.  Because as you see, humour is still the same, evolving though needless to say, we’ve all  evolved. What our parents saw and what we see, we have different taste and our kids have  a different taste. But in that sense, we are still telling stories, movies still have a start, middle  and an end; our web series still have an arc, it promises a second season; daily soaps still  don’t end – so, lots of things are the same. So, what we are looking to do, I guess, is look at  a lot of universal themes. In general, people like crime. That’s the kind of viewership that it  draws. Because, most of us don’t have the boldness to commit a crime. But we like to see  other people do it, and then we like to see them get caught, and justice be served. That’s  why we watch that. Similarly, romance, action, drama, thrillers, horror – all of them. So, I  think it’s a big market. The deciding thing with the whole streaming space is that TV was a  one size fits all, the saas – bahu show became such a big dominant programming strategy  because it was single tv in the house, mother is in control, and that’s the kindof content she  likes. The streaming world now allows you to create content for the mass and niche. You can  tell all kinds of stories, different groups of people can watch it and enjoy it, so it really opens  up the world. So it’s a big opportunity but it comes with a dented risk.

Anup: Sameer, how many years did Scam take from pitching to getting it executed, till  seeing it finally on air? 

Sameer: Well, actually er live a little dangerously. So, pitching comes the last stage in our  lives. So, Scam took us three years, from the time we acquired the book, then we signed up  Hansal Mehta. Then we started working on it. Hansal was recovering from his movie Simran.  So that factor came into play. He went away to be the creative director for Accidental Prime  Minister in between, then he directed a movie called Chalaang. We continued writing it in the  meantime. It took us about two years to write, we changed producers four times. Then,  finally we shot it in about six months. I think we finished shooting a week before the  lockdown, the first lockdown. So, we did post production in the pandemic, and then released  it. So, it took us almost three years. 

Anup: Thanks Sameer. Monica, do you agree with Sameer when he said that crime is easily  marketable to the platform players? Or, are there interest levels in other genres as well? 

Monica: I think crime is by far one of the most popular genres. And Sameer is right in saying  that. We see that on television also, be it Crime Patrol, or Savdhaan India, and so many  other shows… like CID has been running forever. There are different kinds of crime shows,  and they’ve been very popular. But I think there are many many genres and sub-genres and  mixed genres actually, which are becoming very popular. Its also a function of how we program. I mean there are fewer writers out there writing great comedies, or fewer  producers-directors making great comedies, but there would be more coming up. Because  we have seen some of the most iconic comedies across the world, on our service itself we  see so many that work. So, its also a function of what is being churned out more, or being  presented more. For us, documentaries work very beautifully, and I would say very humbly  that Netflix has revolutionised the documentary genre, and within even the scripted genre,  the character dramas work amazingly, the stories based on real events work very powerfully.  So, the good thing is that there is no limit to what we can program, and what the audiences  appetite to consume is. What has happened to K dramas, and I would like to say the Korean content in the last two years during the pandemic, and which has been mirrored in India  through the south content – actually it’s similar. How the Korean content had a break out  journey on the global stage, I think our south stories, and cinema from here had a complete  break out pan India, and it has travelled outside also. So, its really a function of time and  place. There are certain genres which are definitely going to work more, they are the go-to.  Even creators, it’s a default for them to create more of those. But the audience appetite is to  watch everything, so long as every story gets a sizeable audience. That’s very important  even on streaming. And, Sameer said it very well. There are several Morpheus of niche,  right? So, I think it is really about that – what is the size of the audience that are going to  really enjoy these stories. All of us sitting here, are ready to program all kinds of disruptive  and entertaining stories.  

Anup: So, there is a wide space for comedy, is what you are saying? 

Monica: Oh, yes, absolutely! In fact, I think, India is waiting to see a good comedy break out.  So, I think television has really shown the way. I’m not aware in Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam,  or Kannada, whatever are the big ones. I’m saying that very candidly, but what Tarak Mehta  has done on television, and even comedians like Kapil Sharma, and so many others have  done, or the Telugufilm Jaathi Rathnaalu has done, I think people are waiting to see content  in different genres.  

As per the comprehensions on the choice of genres this makes an interesting study of the  contemporary trends of the various OTT platforms. And there’s yet to discuss.

– To be continued.

Article is authored by Anup Chandrasekharan.

Tags: Anup ChandrasekharanCII DakshinManish MenghaniMonica ShergillOTTSameer NairSiju Prabhakaran

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