Ramadan TV viewers seek escape from reality, or an explanation of it
Television during the holy month is big business. This year, the shows that drew the most attention were those which explained some of the worst aspects of the modern Middle East or that offered pure escapism, writes Hala Khalaf
Television viewing in the Arab world skyrockets during Ramadan. From 90 to 120 new television shows – ranging from soap operas to religious programmes to prank shows to serials to sitcoms to satirical comedies to chat shows and more – are produced and released each year during the holy month, because no other time during the year can guarantee as humongous a viewership as the 30 nights of the month of fasting. As much as they might offer a form of escapism, Ramadan television serials are often an accurate barometer of interests of Arabic speakers. Looking at the predominant themes of the shows is almost like glancing at a reflection of what the Arab world is feeling, what Arabic speakers are concerned about and interested in, as well as what they’d like to escape from. Whereas comedies and romantic series used to amass the most interest among viewers, soaps that tackled extremism, terrorism and the instability of the Middle East have emerged as popular viewing this year.
Judging by the furore on social media, audiences were hooked on the MBC- produced Gharabeeb Soud ( Black Crows), a noeasy- viewing drama de picting the life of women under ISIL. With a US$ 10 million budget and a cast of actors from seven different Arab countries, the show was making headlines across the world before it had even begun airing. Everyone, it seemed, wanted to watch Black Crows and see how women and children were being recruited into ISIL, and how the inner workings of the terrorist organisation would be depicted.
“The series does a wonderful job of revealing life inside ISIL recruitment camps and the ways the radical organisation follows in bringing in recruits from all corners of the world,” said Egyptian television and film critic Tareq El Shennawy.
Commenting publicly and extensively about Black Crows, El Shennawy has said, “Arabs took too long to make a production about ISIL and its crimes. Ar- abs’ interest in finding out the truth behind ISIL pushed them to watch the series. It is the first production going into the dark depths of ISIL circles, and it has made way for other productions to go even deeper in exposing the organisation.”
People are interested in any ISIL-related production, maintains El Shennawy, because the average Arab-speaker does not feel removed from what’s being portrayed on the news. Acts of terrorism hit close to home for everyone; the effects of extremism are on everyone’s minds.
Which is why, perhaps, so many Ramadan shows tackled extremism in one way or another.
Selfie, a comedy sketch starring Saudi comedian Nasser Al Qasabi, also aired on MBC and mostly tackled controversial issues. Different issues are tackled in each of the 30 episodes, and this year, the majority of skits centred around the refugee crisis, extremism, gender inequality and sectarianism.
“Selfie is a picture of our society. It’s holding a mirror up to our problems, events and domestic issues,” Aws Al Sharqi, director, has said about his show. “It captures our problems, our flaws, our everyday.”
Similarly, Al Sadma ( The Shock), a hidden camera-type show that uses shock therapy to examine human behaviour in certain situations, garnered high ratings this year, with more than 50 per cent of episodes depicting scenarios that featured refugees, survivors of extremism or the displaced children of Iraq and Syria.
Add to that the Syrian show Buq’at Daw ( Spotlight), a satirical comedy show featuring a pan-Arab cast and boasting a cult following. Spotlight’s cast this year portrayed everyone from Donald Trump to ISIL militia, commenting on political events across the region and focusing heavily on the horrors of ISIL’s antics and methods.
The message is clear: terrorism, extremism and ISIL are foremost in the viewer’s mind. Whether explaining ISIL or attempting to showcase how ISIL’s spread has affected everyday life for the average Arab, Ramadan shows, this year, were overshadowed by the darkness of extremism, and most viewers couldn’t help but be drawn into this microcosm of the life they are currently living.
Take Kuwaiti telecoms giant Zain’s Ramadan ad this year. Every Ramadan, the mobile operator produces a three-minute feel-good commercial to mark the start of the holy month, and in that regard, this year was no different.
The short video featured Emirati star Hussain Al Jassmi singing for peace, walking through the streets and leading people in a different sort of uprising, one where people are united against a would-be terrorist who had intended to blow himself up. The video’s message is reiterated continuously through the Arabic lyrics of the song: “Bomb violence with mercy”. Al Jassmi sings, “Let’s bomb hatred with love, let’s bomb extremism with a better life.”
When it was first released at the start of Ramadan, it took only a handful of days for the video to go viral and garner three million viewers; it’s now been viewed over 8.5 million times on YouTube.
The video also features cameos of the real-life victims who have survived attacks by ISIL and Al Qaeda across the Middle East, including Jordanian bride Nadia Al Alami, whose wedding lasted mere minutes before exploding in tragedy with the death of her father, father-in-law and 36 family members and wedding guests during the 2005 Amman bombings.
The ad was always meant to go viral; as significant as Ramadan may be for actors and directors and production companies and regional studios, it’s even bigger for advertisers. Millions are parked in front of a TV set after breaking the fast, with MBC reporting that the average viewers watches six to seven hours of Ramadan TV every single day.
So, much like the Super Bowl, ads have a heightened potential to go viral, which is what happened with Zain’s antiterrorism piece. It was shared hundreds of thousands of times on Facebook.
On the other side of the spectrum are the shows that offer an escape from all this harsh reality, and are as far removed from terrorism and the political ramifications of extremism as can be.
As popular as shows like Black Crows became, so too did shows like Ramez Taht El Ard, an annual prank show that sets up celebrities in near-death situations and offers zero value, or Fe El La La Land ( In La La Land), an Egyptian comedy that combines silly antics and jingles to tell the story of a bunch of interesting characters whose plane crashed on a deserted island in Thailand.
The latter starred Egyptian singer and actress Donia Samir Ghanem as Etab, a flight attendant on the plane who developed amnesia because of the crash. In each episode, Etab experiences spurts of “memories”, which turn out to be scenes from cartoons and Hollywood films, all of which have an underwhelming comedic value and yet have proven highly popular, if Twitter and Facebook shares are anything to go by.
The situation is clear enough: viewers are either tuning in to that which offers an explanation on extremism, or choosing to watch that which offers escapism instead.
Perhaps they’re having it both ways; just as our masochistic nature makes it near impossible for us to turn away from examining every horrible detail of a car crash when we come across one on the road, we are similarly unable to tear our eyes away from the staged horrors unfolding on our television screens, because we get to glimpse this reality without allowing ourselves to be physically harmed by it.
And then, when it becomes too much, when we realise we’ve had enough and need to recharge our positive state of mind, a little bit of mindless entertainment offers the relief and escape we had been craving, to help us move forward. In the end, we have not made any sense of the extremism that has firmly entrenched itself in our region, but at least we managed to escape it for an hour every night, for 30 days straight.
Hala Khalaf is a freelance journalist and music instructor living in Abu Dhabi