Eastern Europe’s Latin Flair

June 14, 2012 World Screen Top Stories

NEW YORK: Distributors from Latin America are continuing to find strong interest for their telenovelas in Central and Eastern Europe and are expanding sales into new genres as well.

 

Central and Eastern Europe’s love affair with Latin American telenovelas continues. While a number of territories across the region, such a Turkey, have become adept at producing their own daily dramas, distributors from Latin America are still reporting strong interest out of CEE.
 
“Latin productions are still ‘a must’ in Central and Eastern Europe,” says Adela Velasco, who handles sales for Europe and Africa at Comarex. “Telenovelas are very popular and a prime need for some TV channels in Central and Eastern Europe.”
 
She admits, though, that interest for the product comes in waves. “Some territories will continuously screen telenovelas, whilst others, after screening an overwhelming number of telenovelas, will hold back for a short period and will then start over again.”
 
Velasco calls telenovelas Comarex’s “star product,” and says that the company has been starting to offer shorter-form series, of around 20 hours of programming. “These are doing extremely well, too,” she adds. Velasco highlights Daniela, Morena and Love Me Again as recent bestsellers, but hopes to close new sales in the region for The Bride Behind the Veil and Love Me at NATPE Budapest. “Our telenovelas are innovative, offer great story lines, are full of suspense, romance, drama and of ***Azteca’s The Bride Behind the Veil***course true love—a winning combination that appeals to buyers and engages audiences.”
 
Roberto Corrente, sales executive for Eastern Europe and Asia at Caracol TV Internacional, believes it’s the high production quality that has buyers so enamored. “Our productions dare to catch the essence of the real life that surround us, leaving our audiences everything but indifferent,” he says. “We now are able to offer an incredible combination of content that will absolutely catch the attention of these exigent, differenced and content-thirsty audiences.”
 
Pablo Escobar: The Drug Lord is based on articles and real-life testimonies surrounding the life of the notorious drug kingpin. “Shot in HD with a cinematographic approach and techniques, the series is the most ambitious production ever produced in Colombia,” says Corrente. Caracol will be presenting ***Caracol’s The First Lady***the title at NATPE Budapest alongside Made in Cartagena, The First Lady and Where the Heck is Umaña?
 
“For NATPE Budapest, our main goal is not only focused on the growth we have experienced recently, but to be able to offer more and better content,” says Corrente. “And, most important, to reach as many viewers as possible, through a market strategy that includes not only fresh and innovative productions, but also the flexibility that eventually allows us to customize our content to the local programming needs of each market.”
 
Televisa Internacional has an established track record with selling its more traditional, classic telenovelas in the region, according to Hugo Treviño, who manages logistics and events at the company. This time around in Budapest, however, Televisa is looking in a new direction.
 
“This year, in particular, we are interested in opening new business opportunities with other successful titles oriented to family, children and young audiences,” Treviño says. He points to Miss XV, Rebelde Rio and CQ.
 
In the tradition of a classic telenovela, Valiant Love tells the story of Camila and Daniel, who meet under adverse circumstances but whose true love overcomes all obstacles. Televisa is offering the 150×1-hour program as a finished series as well as a format. Both the finished version and format are also available for Miss XV. Televisa bills Me, Her… and Eva! as a telenovela with an unconventional twist.
“Besides our series and telenovelas we are also happy to bring to this market two of our best entertainment formats, Parodiando and Pequeños Gigantes, which is in its second season with amazing success,” Treviño says.
 
Telefe International has already managed to secure deals for a number of its formats in the region. “The Man of Your Dreams has been optioned as a format in several countries in Europe such as France, Italy and Spain, and it is currently under negotiations in Russia, Greece and Turkey,” explains Michelle Wasserman, Telefe’s head of international business, programming, formats and production service. The series tells the story of Hugo, who is unemployed and feeling the pressure of money problems. Hugo takes a job at a matchmaking agency, where he must play the role of the ideal man for every woman who calls for services.
 
Also on offer from Telefe is Graduates. The romantic comedy features the reunion of two high-school groups 20 years later: the popular kids and the others. “Graduates has already had a strong appeal in several countries,” says Wasserman. “Romantic comedies have taken over a very important place in Europe, especially as a format to be adapted.”
 
She adds, “Candy Love has been very welcomed too, and the ready-made is being negotiated in several countries. It is considered a classic but very appealing telenovela.”
 
Argentina’s ON TV is touting a fiction-heavy slate for NATPE Budapest. “When we do fiction, we always aim to tell our stories in new, different ways,” says Claudio Villaruel, the president of ON TV. “On the one hand, we incorporate current issues in universal narratives, which we in turn relate to the problems facing present-day societies. On the other, we strive to achieve a certain aesthetic that breaks with ***ON TV’s Against the Ropes***the structure of traditional audiovisual narrative.”
 
The 60-episode soap opera Against the Ropes, from ON TV, tells the story of an amateur fighter who is forced to leave his hometown for the big city. There, he reunites with his brother who he hasn’t seen in years, and also falls in love with a woman. In a romantic twist, the woman winds up being his brother’s love as well. ON TV also offers TV for Social Inclusion, an anthology series that takes real-life stories and turns them into fictional tales related to current issues.
 
The ON TV portfolio also includes 360 TV, Argentina’s first HD network specifically created for DTTV. “It was conceived as a new concept in television, driven right from the start with the new multiplatform era in mind,” Villaruel says.
 
Making its first trip to NATPE Budapest, Fox Telecolombia is bringing with it a slate of telenovelas, series, documentaries, reality and variety shows. Among these offerings is Lynch, a series produced for Moviecity, which operates a bouquet of ***Fox Telecolombia’s Lynch***premium cable networks in Latin America.
 
Kdabra, currently in its third season, has been a success in Latin America, says Ana María Barreto, the commercial director for Fox Telecolombia, who hopes to bring the show into territories across Central and Eastern Europe. Another sales priority is Tabú Latin America, a documentary that explores the practices of different cultures across the continent.
 
“We are looking forward to learning about this emerging and important market,” Barreto says of her goals for NATPE Budapest. “For the last year we have contacted clients in this part of the world that we haven’t met personally and we are glad that we will have the opportunity to do so. And, of course, we are excited that we will have the chance to show our company and its products to new potential clients.”