What do Indian audiences like?

TELLY VISION

It’s never easy to watch television when the mind is constantly wandering to the seepage in the room. So even if Nigella Lawson, my absolute favourite anchor, on Discovery Travel & Living, slathers some delicious icing on a plain-looking cookie, I start dreaming of slapping fresh coats of paint on my teary walls crying for a makeover.

While my home clearly needs tremendous attention (including a sound investment on a decent TV set, plus a furniture unit for stacking up our growing pile of DVDs), and bare walls and a shoddy TV set give me enough trouble to last endless nights, watching HBO’s Big Love makes me wonder how protagonist Bill Henrickson copes with his crazy house bustling with three wives, seven children and unending demands.

I watched an episode of this amazing original series where polygamist Bill, a successful businessman, who owns a hardware store (ominously named Home Plus), tries his best to balance the emotional, romantic and financial needs of his family.

Speaking of HBO, I remember meeting Shruti Bajpai, country manager (south Asia) HBO Asia, much before Big Love even started, for lunch at Taj Mahal Hotel’s Machan. At that time Bajpai spoke about how international channels like HBO were mapping programmes specifically for Indian audiences, researching thoroughly before actually arriving at content. So thorough was their planning that while we were lunching on some delicious pasta, sea bass and spaghetti, HBO India’s programme planning for 2009 was nearing its completion!

Come to think of it, it’s rather interesting: more and more international channels, with their eyes fixed firmly on the Indian market, are actually tweaking a large chunk of their content to suit Indian audiences. “My competition”, Bajpai had mentioned, “comes from general entertainment channels and not just movie channels.” So obviously, for a channel like HBO, the struggle to not just survive but also to excel becomes doubly difficult. But from all accounts, the channel is doing fairly well and has even re-entered the market with another of its hit shows, Entourage.

A simple act of introducing subtitles, says Bajpai, did wonders to the channel, almost doubling the number of audiences. And it’s something that most international channels of repute entering the Indian market are doing. I’d earlier met Soumitra Saha, senior vice president and general manager for Turner Entertainment Networks Asia, whose company is planning to launch a new general entertainment channel in partnership with Miditech, another English channel in partnership with its sister channel Warner Brothers, beside getting into theatrical business.

The mere fact that Turner, from 50 hours of original content, has already created 200 hours of original content in the past decade, specifically for the Indian audiences, speaks a lot about Indian TV audiences who are hungry for more. The channel, in fact, recently completed its search for best animators for what’ll be called Snaptoons, a programme that’ll make animation programmes based on these winning projects.

And since out of 10 best films, five are from Indian animation artistes, the Indian flavour will obviously get stronger. For the channel, as Saha had informed me, India actually contributes more than 40 per cent of Turner Entertainment Network’s Asia entertainment revenues.

Take a closer look at any of the international channels and the Indian flavour figures prominently. Why, Cheese Slices, another fabulous offering on Discovery Travel & Living, even had Will Studd, its presenter and cheese master, actually come to India as part of the publicity campaign. Now this isn’t a step any channel would’ve taken a decade ago when they were just testing Indian waters.

Clearly, India is the tadka for international channels, and it’s a flavour that’s getting spicier by the minute.

(abhilasha.ojha@bsmail.in)