MIPCOM Spotlight: CJ E&M

CJ E&M is in Cannes spotlighting a range of content, including the legal thriller Stranger, which centers on a prosecutor who does not have the ability to feel human emotions.

CJ E&M is presenting Stranger to international buyers in Cannes alongside Shadow Singer, a music entertainment series that gives undiscovered singers a chance to shine under the guise of a celebrity clone, and Youn’s Kitchen, a travel/food reality show in which amateur celebrity chefs open a Korean restaurant on a foreign island for ten days. The latter highlight comes from the creator/producer of Better Late Than Never. There is also Leaving the Nest, an observational reality show.

“Game shows and singing shows are still [going] strong,” says Jin Woo Hwang, the head of formats and global content development at CJ E&M. “However, the [demand] for singing shows is not for nationwide talent-search formats but rather for light, fast-paced musical entertainment.” Hwang adds: “Earlier this year, CJ E&M recruited some of Korea’s finest creators and producers to our creative/production arms. We have been working together for some time to bring the freshest formats [to the market], and we are very happy to release the results at MIPCOM.”

“CJ E&M is providing fresh local hits from our new creative talents to the global arena,” he adds.

The company is also showcasing the medical series Live Up to Your Name and Emergency Couple. “Live Up to Your Name and Emergency Couple both have doctors as their main characters, but how they are linked to each other is quite extraordinary,”Hwang says. “The former is about two doctors traveling 30 years back and forth, and the latter is about a divorced doctor couple [reuniting] after years as interns at a hospital.”

According to Hwang, CJ E&M has been noticing an increasing demand for titles from its scripted catalog in such territories as the U.S., Turkey, Japan, Thailand, Vietnam and Malaysia. “CJ E&M boasts an impressive slate of scripted [series] from various genres to meet the rising demand from different regions,” he says.

“Our top priorities are always in creating new IP,” Hwang notes. “We are still receiving a lot of co-development requests from U.S. and European partners, and are looking forward to working more on the co-creation and co-development of global IP. We are looking into new markets such as Turkey or CEE where CJ E&M formats could stand out.”