MBC’s Fadi Ismail

PREMIUM: Fadi Ismail, group director of MBC, shares with TV MEA his perspective on programming and producing for audiences in the Middle East and beyond.

TV MEA: Tell us about your overall scripted programming strategy at MBC.
ISMAIL: MBC has a viewership loyalty second to none, so it has to be careful in what it broadcasts. Whatever we adopt on-screen becomes a trend, and the opposite is true. The MBC bouquet of channels is free-to-air and our reach exceeds 100 million viewers in Arab households. This is a huge responsibility, one which requires properly calculated risks and programming in order not to alienate the trust of audiences whose viewing habits have proved slow to change. MBC has repeatedly raised the bar in its scripted programming strategy, but in a way that is soft, calculated and usually not too controversial.

TV MEA: How are you programming during and around Ramadan?
ISMAIL: It is no secret that viewership habits and trends change during the holy month of Ramadan; expectations make this month the most important season to launch most of the new content [and there are] bigger budgets dedicated to this particular month and season. However, slowly but surely, we find an abundance of new series launched across the entire year.

TV MEA: What is your approach to international acquisitions? Where are you acquiring from? Are you doing output deals or cherry-picking titles?
ISMAIL: MBC’s approach now is very selective and output deals are a thing of the past. Content is king, but quality content is the king of kings. Wherever there is such appealing content, whether from Turkey, LatAm, India or Korea, such content is sought after.

Turkish drama series are still the most successful, followed by some telenovelas. The audience will always look for compelling storytelling coupled with high production values.

TV MEA: What have been some of your biggest domestic successes?
ISMAIL: Saudi comedies such as Selfie have been successful. Also Black Crows, the anti-ISIS drama, was very controversial and highly rated this past Ramadan. The Legend, an Egyptian social/action drama, was the highest-rated drama in 2016 in Egypt. Witch of the South, a horror drama, was a big hit all over the region as well.

TV MEA: Tell us about how you established a drama production strategy with O3 Productions. What were the biggest obstacles?
ISMAIL: O3 was created in response to a need for special projects with big production values and unique stories. Omar was among the first and most ambitious historical projects, and so was Saraya Abdeen. We have been pioneers in innovation. Witch of the South was the first big hit in the horror genre, Ruby was the first adapted telenovela, and Cactus Alliance was the first 15-episode thriller series [aired] outside Ramadan.

The biggest obstacle has to do with working in an irrational and immature market where lots of promises and commitments are changed last minute and unpredictable circumstances make sales contracts sometimes not worth the paper they were signed on. Producing in MENA is a risky business and mitigating risk is never easy.

TV MEA: What’s been the strategy for producing content in Turkey, and why was this important to MBC?
ISMAIL: Turkish drama has become an established part of the daily menu for Arab viewers since 2008. It became important to MBC, as the biggest consumers of Turkish drama, to have a presence in Turkey beyond simple acquisitions. The reason for that was twofold: to become players in the production of drama that primarily targets Turkish broadcasters, and to try to have cost-effective content for MENA. Four years after the launch of O3 Medya in Turkey, it has become one of the most prolific and trusted sources of quality projects and premium Turkish drama, with success in international sales of its series.

TV MEA: How are you fostering talent locally to find and develop the stories you want your audiences to see?
ISMAIL: Fostering local talent is the biggest challenge. Local creative talents who are bold enough to innovate in their writing styles, who will plan what they will write and have clarity on the arc of the season before they write, who can come up with a treatment that can be pitched, who can have captivating storylines with strong climactic moments and cliff hangers. To do all of that we have to educate and experiment. And we are currently doing that. We are investing time, effort and money in developing ideas that can be pitched to a multitude of platforms, to whoever is looking for new, fresh and innovative Arab content. It is a process that will have to take its due course, but it has started and we are getting lots of support from some established international writers and executive producers.

TV MEA: Are you acquiring scripted formats?
ISMAIL: We have always been open to locally producing scripted formats and, in fact, were pioneers of adapting some telenovelas. However, we do not underestimate the amount of creative effort needed for such a localization process. In a few cases, we found that we are almost changing so much of the storylines to the degree that defies the purpose of acquiring a format. Having said that, there will be scripted formats that prove suitable and attractive enough to be adapted.

TV MEA: What trends are you seeing in Arabic-language scripted?
ISMAIL: There is an intense search for stronger and more captivating content and stories from a new generation of younger writers all over the Arab world. However, the limitations and [financial] restrictions of the media market in the region make such an ambition difficult to realize. Many series are unsold, or sold with losses or canceled right before production. The trend of writing and producing 30-episode series that mostly revolve around romance and social issues is unsustainable and will be gradually replaced by shorter series and genres such as sci-fi, fantasy, horror, crime, action, medical and legal, as well as smart comedies. TV is becoming like a global village. Local content will surely remain as king of kings, but it has to evolve to compete and succeed.

TV MEA: What are the biggest challenges in selling MBC dramas around the world?
ISMAIL: The usual number of episodes of an Arab season, 30, is difficult to distribute, especially since the duration of each is no more than 35 minutes. As a result, some series have a slower pace than what is attractive to international viewers. There is also a need for an alliance between Arab producers since the resources needed to market content are greater than the abilities of any single producer. There is also a credibility issue, in the sense that so far, not a single series has been distributed in more than one or two territories. There is a need for one success that will pave the way for many others to follow. However, the time is right for international markets to seek good content and good stories, irrespective of where they’re from.

TV MEA: What can you tell us about your deal with Anonymous Content? Are you looking for other similar pacts with international organizations?
ISMAIL: Any serious effort to go beyond where we are has to depend on co-development and co-producing of content. Anonymous Content was the first to see some potential in our ideas and stories. There are other companies that we are currently exploring [aligning with] and looking into what we can achieve together. We already have signed a three-year agreement with Image Nation and we are in talks with big companies in Europe and the U.S. for different kinds of collaborations and working jointly on projects from the Arab region that are designed with a taste for international markets.