India is on track to be the international production hub for global reality formats “Survivor” and “Temptation Island,” Banijay Asia CEO Deepak Dhar has confirmed.
Dhar had revealed nascent plans for this late last year to Variety and they are now well into fruition. “Survivor” has had more than 50 international versions and “Temptation Island” more than 20.
“Significant progress has happened in the last six to seven months in setting up the runway to really pave a lot of productions to happen in India, both reality and scripted. Reality is something that we’ve been pushing, because of the might of our Banijay Group catalog formats – shows like ‘Survivor’ and ‘Temptation Island.’ We are on the verge of setting up a ‘Temptation Island’ hub and ‘Survivor’ hub and a whole lot of the Banijay Group companies would come film here,” Dhar told Variety.
“This is really giving them a full experience of what Indian landscapes could look like and how it would really enrich their shows and their formats as well. And, of course, importantly, make this very cost effective for them – everybody is wanting to still deliver great content, but also wanting to figure out cost efficiencies as well,” Dhar added.
India will serve as the hub for both Asian and international versions of the shows. “I can’t reveal too much about exactly which countries but imagine a European country coming and filming in India for ‘Temptation Island and ‘Survivor.’ The Asian versions are very easily doable for us, and which is why we’re already moving on some of those pieces at our end,” Dhar said.
“I’m very bullish about setting up India as the outsourcing hub for content. So that’s really going to be the next two to three years as the phase two of our growth. And phase three really would be more productions in Asia and Southeast Asia,” Dhar added. “We have got our roots fairly deep into the Indian market. Now we are going to be really exploring other parts of this region as well. That’s the five-year focus plan that we are working with.”
On the scripted side, The Ink Factory and Banijay Asia’s Indian adaptation of “The Night Manager” has emerged as the most watched series ever in the history of Disney+ Hotstar and the streamer’s “The Trial – Pyaar, Kaanoon, Dhokha,” the Indian adaptation of CBS series “The Good Wife,” began streaming on July 14 to glowing reviews.
“We’ve got massive, massive, roaring success, for ‘The Night Manager’ adaptation that we produced, and that’s really fueling the demand for a lot of these big ticket formats and originals that could be adapted for the Indian market,” Dhar said.
“The Trial” is set to be a multi-season show. “The story lends itself to really great seasons and great arcs and the journey of the lead protagonist, Kajol who’s playing that, lends itself to really being told across multiple seasons. We’re very excited that the first one is all done and dusted and and we’re very soon going to start the next couple of seasons as well,” Dhar said.
Also in the works are adaptations of “Monk” and “House.” Dhar says that there hasn’t been an Indian detective show in a while and the “Monk” adaptation is likely to fill that gap and that a medical thriller like the “House” adaptation would be fresh for Indian audiences.
Coming up for Banijay Asia are new seasons of “Matsya Kaand” for MX Player, “Dahan” for Disney+ Hotstar and “Hunt for the Indian Mujahideen” for Discovery+. There are also plans for family dramas, long running sagas, lives of prominent real-life personalities, true crime stories and original ideas from books and journalism pieces that are being explored as multi-season formats.
The company is also tapping into India’s vast non-Hindi language market. Disney+ Hotstar Tamil-language series “Fall,” adapted from Canada’s “Vertige,” is returning for a second season; long-running Kannada-language soap “Raani” for Disney’s Star Suvarna continues; and there is a Telugu-language show in the making.
“India is a subcontinent of seven or eight different major languages, which consume different kinds of content and [each] has its own set sets of creative talents and celebrities and hence they want their own specific shows and stories to be told,” Dhar said. “We are a content studio not just for Hindi, but across languages and I see massive potential and massive opportunities trying to tell different stories across and different languages and different formats.”