A makeshift stage in a posh hotel ballroom, white couches for the actors, and a giant minimalist poster revealing little: this is the usual premise for the launch of a big budget film. The fanfare for the announcement of Sacred Games in Mumbai a couple of weeks ago was of equal calibre, except the adaptation of Vikram Chandra’s novel is not a feature film but Netflix’s first original series in India. The growing popularity of digital content is an undisputed global phenomenon. When Brad Pitt made his surprise visit to Mumbai in May, to promote his Netflix film, War Machine , it was evident that India is a big market for streaming services now. Hollywood is assumed to have comfortably — or to some, grudgingly — welcomed this new era. Giants like Netflix and Amazon Prime are not just wooing bankable actors like Pitt, Kevin Spacey, Edris Elba and Will Smith, but also filmmakers like Woody Allen. And their shows have made rapid strides towards dominating the Emmys (Netflix with 91 nominations and Amazon with 16 in 2017). Closer home, the Hindi film industry has begun to take cognisance. While we haven’t encountered a big online success story yet, Netflix has signed on Bollywood actors Saif Ali Khan, Nawazuddin Siddiqui and Radhika Apte for Sacred Games. A few weeks ago, Amazon Prime started its Indian innings with Vivek Oberoi and Richa Chadha in Inside Edge . Homegrown platforms are not far behind — Ekta Kapoor’s Alt Balaji has cast Nimrat Kaur in The Test Case and Rajkummar Rao in the upcoming period drama, Bose: Dead/Alive .
A ctors down South aren’t far behind either. Rana Daggubati, riding high after Baahubali and Ghazi , will be in a Hindi-Telugu bilingual web series for Viu, titled Social . Telugu actor Sumanth Ashwin Endukila made his online debut with the rom-com, Endukila , on YuppTV and Tamil actor Aishwarya Rajesh is currently shooting for her first series, G-spot .
Lure of the web
With no rules, norms or trends in place, the online arena provides — at least theoretically — a free space for the creative mind. “With the web, you can take liberties; you don’t have to worry about censors,” says Rao, who understands Netaji Bose’s life (and death) to be a controversial one. The platform also provides for roles that mainstream cinema would seldom offer. “Of course I am not the conventional actor to play Netaji,” he says, explaining how he had to gain weight and learn a new language to become Bose. But the preparation process, he feels, is similar to acting in a film. As Rao sees it, there is little difference between the two mediums. “An actor is an actor,” he declares.
This sentiment is echoed by Saif, who plays a cop in Sacred Games . “But we are freer in this platform to expose our weaknesses and strengths,” he explains, adding that it is a little daunting too “because we have no excuses to not do our best”. Being the first A-list Bollywood actor to venture into the digital space, would he have the first mover’s advantage? “I’m not thinking, ‘oh, I’m the first guy to do this’. I think you always need to be careful not to follow trends for the wrong reasons,” he says.
Call of freedom
For others, like Siddiqui, the lack of formal censorship is the big draw. “ Pehle dar dar ke karte the, abh sab khul kar karenge (earlier we worked with fear, now it’s time to do everything fearlessly),” he jests. However, the freedom isn’t absolute. Suparn Verma, director of films like Aatma (2013), who is doing the web series Yo Ke Hua Bro , with Shamita Shetty, explains that while digital takes away the middleman, several streaming services function on self-censorship. “Netflix has very little censorship, but Voot, which is the national conglomerate Viacom18, has certain guidelines; so there’s only so much you can say or show. Yash Raj Films wouldn’t go into the adult zone, but TVF and AIB may push the envelope. It depends on which company you’re making a show for,” he explains.
For Anurag Kashyap, however, more than a lack of censorship, the advantage lies in the choice to work with different languages. Kashyap, who is directing Sacred Games with Vikramaditya Motwane as the show runner, is making the series in Hindi, with some characters speaking in regional languages. “ Sacred Games came to me long back, but they had asked me to make it in English and I said no. But now Netflix has allowed me to make it in Hindi,” he says, adding that Chandra’s novel paints Mumbai as a multilingual metropolis, which can be best retained with the use of subtitles because, in an online format, the target audience isn’t defined. Language is an advantage for Apte, too. The actor who plays a RAW agent in the series, says “It’s quite binding when, say I am doing a Hindi film set in Pune, and they won’t let me speak in Marathi.”
Fresh talent
The sense of liberty that comes with online platforms is spilling into other fields, too. Casting director Mukesh Chhabra, who has worked on Sacred Games and Kabir Khan’s upcoming web series, The Forgotten Army , says the advantage of casting for a web series is that there is no market pressure. “No one tells you, ‘he is the current favourite hero so let’s take him’,” says Chhabra. “It’s dominated by the content”. This also means streaming platforms are providing employment to not just newer faces, but also indie actors who want to reach out to a larger audience. And need we mention, a second chance for the many who weren’t able to stick on in Bollywood — like Ali Fazal (one of the early ones to go online) with Bang Baaja Baaraat , and Lisa Haydon with The Trip .
Meanwhile, Nandini Reddy — a Telugu director, who is the creative head and writer for an untitled web series for Yupp TV, starring Tejaswi Madiwada and Arun Adith — calls the digital space “the Star Trek for writing”. Known for her slice-of-life romantic comedies, Reddy believes web series can tap into an unexplored urban market. “The Telugu television audience is now primarily semi-rural and rural. The urban audience looking for something new finds it on Netflix and Amazon Prime,” she explains.
Crossing borders
One of the biggest challenges in the border-less online world is to maintain high standards of quality. “For the first time, I will be reaching out to the most number of people in my entire career,” says Kashyap. “The fact that you’re going live to 190 countries at the same time, and that your competition is shows like Narcos , Stranger Things and House of Cards is scary,” adds Motwane.
However, the fact that the audience is largely an undefined one is also an asset. “Online shows don’t have to appeal to a pan Indian market; you’re not worried about market dictum. For instance, if Yo Ke Hua Bro were a movie, it would need songs because that is a major part of marketing a film,” explains Verma, adding that here a larger chunk of the budget can be allocated to production rather than marketing and distribution, thereby elevating the quality of the content.
Romance of the big screen
How do filmmakers like Kashyap, Motwane, Nagesh Kukunoor ( The Test Case ) and Hansal Mehta ( Bose: Dead/Alive ) reconcile with the absence of the silver screen? “It’s usually perceived that a web series is inferior to cinema, but it is not. When I came on board, I found the technical standards of Netflix far superior than what we practise in our films,” asserts Kashyap, while Motwane interjects, “Besides now all our so-called water cooler conversations have moved to TV shows.”
With a sizeable rise in budgets over the last two years, Chhabra believes it is only a matter of time before even the three Khans — Shah Rukh, Aamir and Salman — get on board. Earlier this year, Shah Rukh’s Red Chillies and Netflix signed a long-term deal giving the streaming giant exclusive rights to the actor’s forthcoming as well as previous films. This deal, along with his appearance with Pitt at Netflix’s promotional event, could be an indicator of the bigwigs warming up to digital content.
Coming soon
Netflix: It’s espionage and politics for Saif Ali Khan, Radhika Apte and Nawazuddin Siddiqui, as the shoot for Sacred Games kicks off
Alt Balaji: Rajkummar Rao gains weight and learns a new language to become Subhas Chandra Bose in Bose: Dead/Alive
Amazon Prime: Vivek Oberoi gets a leg up with the successful Inside Edge that goes behind the politics and power of T20 cricket
Voot: In Yo Ke Hua Bro , Shamita Shetty returns to the limelight, doing her bit to help two happy-go-lucky men make it big in life
Getting the word out
Unlike cinema, which taps into traditional methods of marketing, promotion of online content is centered on word-of-mouth and viral marketing. For wider reach, Amazon Prime promotes their shows through 360 degree campaigns. “We have invested across television, out-of-home, print, radio, digital and social media, and will continue to do this,” says Vijay Subramaniam, Director, Content, Amazon Prime Video India.
