ITV

Tag: Indrajit Ray

  • Take a chance at love with ‘Love by Chance’

    Take a chance at love with ‘Love by Chance’

    MUMBAI: You see your parents bickering at one another, and yet not being able to see each other in pain. Rather confusing, isn’t it?! Makes you wonder, how did two people, who are poles apart, stumble upon one another only to have their “happily ever after”? Well, chance encounters do happen, and they do lead to ‘happily’, ‘ever’ and ‘after’ (not necessarily in that order!).

     

    Inspired by true stories of people who have found love through serendipity, Love By Chance, a new original 26-part anthology series to be aired on bindass is aimed to evoke just the type of ‘love’ly feeling that will pluck at heartstrings every week.

     

    Starting 31 May, the series will be telecast every Saturday at 7 pm, showcasing a ‘falling in love’ story between two young people who stumble into love just by chance!

     

    Disney India executive director – content group Indrajit Ray opines, “Since the success rate of most Indians in securing themselves a date is lower than you might think, we decided to create a show that will not only entertain these insecure hearts, but also provide them with a learning experience that will make these timid few let go the barriers they’ve created for themselves.” Let go and believe. Believe in your knees going week. Believe in that momentary stimulation in your nerves. Believe in love, by chance.

     

    To evoke the feeling of first love and chance encounters, bindass has roped in “a pool of writers” spearheaded by Vaibhav Modi of Bolt Media (a division of Balaji Telefilms). With a process that started 7-8 months ago, the network execs at bindass brainstormed on ideas circulating around the channel’s sole motto, “enabler of purpose of action” and pitched them to the production houses, which led to a script orders, and from those, a few pilots were ordered.

     

    The pilot of Love by Chance was shot a few months ago, and then screened privately across the country. Based on the optimistic audience reviews and early critical acclaim, Love by Chance was ordered for a 26-episode first season. The show is being used as a prototype by bindass soon to be followed by more scripted light-hearted romantic series that are just as entertaining as they are routed in reality.

     

    “We are aiming at the 15-34 year age group. Well, there are older people who want some nostalgia induced retrospective programme to reinvigorate their young spirit,” continues Ray.

     

    bindass’ marketing strategy for Love by Chance is a week long campaign starting from the series premiere with its off-air creative being by Marching Ants. The show also has a unique soundtrack to complement the anthology series. Composed by Abhishek Arora (Yeh Hain Aashiqui), the network has released a promotional music video for the series.

     

    Through its Facebook page/Twitter handle and Instagram account, bindass aims to push stories which will be all about chance encounters between two people. These will be in the form of Facebook posts in the Love by Chance template and further posted on Twitter. Approximately 15 such short stories will be pushed to generate interest and also to crowd source such stories. The aim is to get #LoveByChance to trend and all the tweets will be curated.

  • Disney Channel gets talking with ‘Captain Tiao’

    Disney Channel gets talking with ‘Captain Tiao’

    MUMBAI: Back in 1989, Hollywood flick Look Who’s Talking made ‘baby talk’ fashionable. Two-and-a-half decades later, Disney UTV’s tent-pole channel, Disney, which is known for its differentiated content is taking it a step ahead.

     

    Starting 2 March, the channel will premiere a one-of-its-kind talk show called Captain Tiao to be aired every Sunday at 10:00 am.

     

    Nine-year-old Sadhil Kapoor, who won hearts with his turn in Devon Ke Dev Mahadev, will host the show as ‘Captain Tiao’. He will interact with celebrities from all walks of life, cornering them with funny, intriguing questions about their childhood fears, guilty secrets, favourite snacks et al. The Q&A will be followed by ‘Captain Tiao’ challenging the guests to perform entertaining tasks, beating him at the game.

     

    Discussions are still underway but some of the celebrities who have confirmed their appearance on the show are Mahesh Bhupathi, Jaaved Jaffrey, Kapil Sharma and Navjot Singh Sidhu. Apparently, such celebrities have been selected who inspire children and whom, they can look up to, whether in sports, entertainment or politics.

     

    Explaining the rationale behind the new show, Disney UTV Media networks content head Indrajit Ray says: “Disney Channel is always exploring different formats and content that kids as well as their families can enjoy together. It is important to keep a conversation going and surprise them with new shows that bring alive the Disney Channel promise of Express Yourself, Believe in Yourself and Follow your Dreams.” 

     

    On roping in Kapoor as ‘Captain Tiao’, he says: “What we also love about Sadhil is the fact that he is a natural – curious, energetic and uninhibited… a personification of what a child at that age should be. We sincerely believe that a child’s curiosity should not be curbed in any way and it is that environment that will eventually allow him/her to blossom and follow his/her dreams. Sadhil possesses these qualities and hence we thought it best to give him a platform to do just that.”

     

    According to Ray, brands have responded well to the show. “Our partners, having worked with us, recognise this strength that Disney brings to the table and have collaborated with us in creating many successful partnerships,” he says.

     

    Asked about the Sunday slot, he says: “At Disney Channel, we believe in creating shows that appeal to both kids and their families. We have historically seen Sunday mornings as a band where the entire family can come to enjoy shows on TV together as a unit.”

     

    This isn’t the first time Disney has tried its hand at differentiated content; earlier too, it has aired shows such as Best of Luck Nikki, The Suite Life of Karan and Kabir, and Disney Q.

     

    However, ‘Captain Tiao’ is not only being seen as continuing the tradition but also as an experiment in short-format shows in live action.

  • Bindass climbs the rating ladder with content that connects

    Bindass climbs the rating ladder with content that connects

    MUMBAI: It seems content and digitisation has helped Bindass in a big way. The channel climbed the TV ratings ladder in week 46 of TAM TV ratings with 20,533 GVTs, leaving its rivals MTV and Channel [V] far behind with 14,160 and 16,576 GVTs respectively.

     

    “Both our content as well as digitisation has helped our channel to a great extent. It has helped us reach out to our core TG which is the youth,” says Disney executive director content media networks Indrajit Ray.

     

    Digitisation, according to Ray, has led to democratisation of channels. “Earlier there was limited penetration of channels and thus only the popular channels with better resources could reach every household. Digitisation has helped us to increase our reach,” he says.

     

    According to the ratings provided by Bindass, the top five shows for the week in the youth space were: Yeh Hai Aashiqui (1,852 TVTs), Channel [V] Gumraah Season 3 (1,056 TVTs), Emotional Atyachaar on Bindass (882 TVTs), MTV Webbed (628 TVTs) and [V] Crazy Stupid Love (208 TVTs).

     

    The channel has been working towards improving its GVTs for a long time now. “It is not a week’s work, but a long process. The ratings are not a result of one single promotional activity,” remarks Ray, attributing the growth in ratings to Yeh Hai Aashiqui. He also informs that the channel’s team has formulated an aggressive plan to offer more. “Currently, we have two hours of original content, we plan to increase this,” he adds.

     

    The growing number of GVTs is an indication for the channel that brand Bindass is being accepted among newer audiences. “We believe this was largely on account of its popular mass narrative based on youth themes,” remarks Ray, who also thinks that the channel has been able to strike a chord with its audience because the content reflects the thought of today’s youth in the best way. “Our content is a reflection of what the youth feels today. Relationships, which are the most important part of any youngster’s life has been underserved,” adds Ray, emphasising that Bindaas is a platform for many youngsters to raise their concerns on issues that interests them.

     

    Talking about the reach, Ray says, “We have a fair equitable reach in the Hindi speaking market. We are strong in the north and now have also become popular in west and central India. Our core TG is between 15-24 years, but we do not restrict our programming to this age group. Our shows also cater to older people.”

     

    Bindass, for Ray, is a channel that brings to the fore issues that are brushed under the carpet. “We do not sensationalise but reflect the truth,” he says with hope that the channel will continue to be on the growth trajectory.