As movie sales slow, creators have big ideas for the small screen
MORE film companies are entering the drama industry as the domestic movie industry’s sales growth has halted to a stop over the past five years due to an increase in production costs and competition with Hollywood blockbusters.
Moreover, films and dramas are increasingly becoming more and more similar in terms of production value.
A JTBC drama premiering this May, ‘Miss Hammurabi’ will soon begin filming as the main cast has officially been finalised.
The show tells the story of the life of judges and the various disputes that they have to settle. Actress Go A-ra will play an idealistic rookie judge brimming with passion. L, of the boy band Infinite, plays a judge who sticks to the rules, while actor Sung Dong-il will play a down-toearth head judge with years of experience and knowledge.
Along with its big-name cast of famous actors, the drama has also generated interest after word spread that Moon Yu-seok, a judge who wrote the original novel, will be a writer on the series. The drama’s production company Studio&New, a content company spun-off from the film company NEW (Next Entertainment World), invested and distributed several box-office hits like ‘The Attorney’ (2013). The film company also produced the highly successful ‘Descendants of the Sun’, which Studio&New hopes to surpass with its first drama series ‘Miss Hammurabi’.” Like ‘Descendants of the Sun’, the drama will be fully produced before it begins airing.
NEW has signed a contract with television network JTBC that ensures the latter’s support in drama production and organisation for two years. It is also preparing to produce several other dramas based on popular stories such as the film ‘The Beauty Inside’ (2015) and the webtoon ‘Moving’ by the popular cartoonist Kang Full.
“If we utilize content that was successful in the past, we can certainly secure support from fans of the originals,” a spokesperson of Studio&New said. “We will try to develop more varied content derived from originals.”
Film distributor Showbox, which had a hit last year with the film ‘A Taxi Driver’, is also pushing ahead with projects to produce popular webtoons into drama series.
“Webtoons have higher chance of being expanded into various contents with a lower risk of failure,” CEO of the company, Yoo Jung-hoon said. “We are even thinking of expanding original webtoons into other forms of content as well, such as movies.”
Showbox has already proven that this formula can be successful with the film ‘Inside Men’ (2015) based on the original webtoon by the cartoonist Yoon Tae-ho. “It is natural that the line between movies and dramas are blurring as video platforms are becoming more diversified,” Yoo continued. “I anticipate that more production and distribution companies will freely roam across the two fields.”
Hollywood film studio Warner Bros. is also keeping a close eye on the trends in Korea. It started its investment and distribution of Korean films with ‘The Age of Shadows’ in 2016 and entered the Korean drama market with last year’s OCN drama series ‘My Secret Romance’ and ‘That Man, Oh Soo’, which will air this year.
The major film house also began conversations last year with drama production company Studio Dragon, in association with top entertainment company CJ E&M, to jointly produce a drama series. It is currently looking over a project to remake famous international classics into Korean dramas as well.
The company also took over DramaFever Corporation, a video streaming website that posts many Korean entertainment shows and dramas for international audiences. In early January, it established a Korean branch which will be responsible for domestic TV content investment, production and joint production.
“We will focus on selfproduction,” said Park Hyun, CEO of DramaFever’s Korean operation. “Korean dramas are receiving positive responses not only from Asian audiences, but fans across the world as well. We are trying to spread our content to as many areas as we can and to come up with ways to more effectively distribute Korean dramas and entertainment shows across international borders.”