The dizi that became global behemoths were powered by narratives that pitted traditional values and principles against the emotional and spiritual corruption of the modern world. Magnificent Century, based on the life of Suleiman the Magnificent, the 10th Ottoman Sultan. They’re spending and spending – spending their time, spending their love, spending everything.” But it was in a very fancy world, so people were very interested. “That’s a tiring thing, isn’t it? Being alone, changing partners quickly and searching for happiness, and each time you search for it, it’s a failure. And all the people who were watching those series were very excited about it.” I can only guess he is referring to Sex and the City, but Ergenç doesn’t say. Being, um … ” – he searches for the polite word – “multi-partner at the same time, and searching for happiness. The philosophy of the series was being lonely. “I was thinking of one American TV series – let’s not say its name. Turkey’s gaze was once keenly turned to the west, studying its films and television for clues about how to behave in a modern, fast-paced world, but today, American shows offer little guidance. “They don’t touch the feelings that make us human,” he tells me, nursing a cold cup of coffee, when we meet in Istanbul. Ergenç feels that the runaway success of the dizi is partly due to the fact that American TV is entertaining, but not moving. The international success of such dizi is just one sign of the way new forms of mass culture from the east – from Bollywood to K-pop – are challenging the dominance of American pop culture in the 21st century. It was Magnificent Century that blazed the way for others to follow. Since 2002, about 150 Turkish dizi have been sold to more than 100 countries, including Algeria, Morocco and Bulgaria. Global Agency estimates that, even without counting its most recent buyers in Latin America, Magnificent Century has been seen by more than 500 million people worldwide. Turkey’s minister of culture and tourism even stopped charging certain Arab countries broadcasting fees. Magnificent Century was so popular in the Middle East that Arab tourism to Istanbul skyrocketed. It had multiple historical consultants and a production team of 130, with 25 people working on costumes alone. The foreign press called it an “Ottoman-era Sex and the City” and compared it to a real-life Game of Thrones. When it first aired in Turkey in 2011, Magnificent Century claimed one-third of the country’s TV audience. A largely unknown historical figure, Hurrem is believed to have been an Orthodox Christian from modern-day Ukraine. Based on the life of Suleiman the Magnificent, the 10th Ottoman Sultan, Magnificent Century told the story of the sultan’s love affair with a concubine named Hurrem, whom he married, in a major break with tradition. The show featured a blue-eyed Turkish dreamboat, Halit Ergenç, who would go on to star in the lead role of Magnificent Century. Wherever 1001 Nights was sold – in almost 80 countries – it was a ratings smash. At the time, another Turkish show, Gümüs (Silver), was already a hit in the Middle East, but it was 1001 Nights that became a truly global success. “We want to see the good guy with the good girl, but, dammit, life is bad and there are bad characters around.”Īccording to Izzet Pinto, the founder of the Istanbul-based Global Agency, which bills itself as the “world’s leading independent TV content distributor for global markets”, the upward course of dizi imperialism began with 2006’s Binbir Gece (1001 Nights). The heart-throb has had his heart broken and is tragically closed to love.ĭizi are built, Eset insists, on the altar of “communal yearning”, both for the audience and the characters. Sometimes Cinderella is a 35-year-old single woman with a child sometimes she’s a 22-year-old starving actress.” Eset, who worked on perhaps the most famous dizi, Magnificent Century, recounts the narrative themes that dizi are usually loyal to:Īn outsider will always journey into a socio-economic setting that is the polar opposite of their own, eg moving from a village to the city. “We tell at least two versions of the Cinderella story per year on Turkish TV. They tend to be filmed on location in the heart of historic Istanbul, using studios only when they must.ĭizi storylines, which have covered everything from gang rape to scheming Ottoman queens, are “Dickens and the Brontë sisters”, I am told by Eset, a young Istanbul screenwriter and film-maker. Every dizi has its own original soundtrack, and can have up to 50 major characters. Advertising time is cheap in Turkey and the state broadcasting watchdog mandates that every 20 minutes of content be broken up by seven minutes of commercials. Dizi are sweeping epics, with each episode usually running to two hours or longer.
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