Bangla actors speak on the ground realities of the vibrant Bangla OTT space

SVF Entertainment-owned regional OTT platform, Hoichoi, the only platform to create more than 100 originals in a single language, completed five years on September 20, 2022. The year 2022 saw Hoichoi record the highest ever direct subscription revenue across India, Bangladesh and international markets. The OTT platform is eyeing a 50-75% growth in revenue by the end of FY23.

As it starts its 6^th year, Hoichoi has announced 25 new shows (21 from India and 4 from Bangladesh), where Raj Chakraborty and Arindam Sil join the pool of the top existing creators, including Srijit Mukherjee, Anirban Bhattacharya, Dhurbo Banerjee, Sahana Dutta and others. In order to cater to the audiences present across strata, new experimental genres have been added to the mix of the tried and tested genres. Hoichoi now aims to offer content which falls outside the group of detective thrillers and family dramas.

In the past year, Hoichoi recorded a 50% growth in direct subscriptions with a 20% month-on-month increase in watch time, during the post-lockdown phase, with a 40% rise in the number of monthly active users and international yearly subscriber base. As of the year 2022, Hoichoi is currently a P&L profitable business. Hoichoi has partnerships with Amazon Prime Video channel, JioFiber, Banglalink, Grammen phone, Airtel Xstream, Robi, Dish TV and Tata Play, besides having partnered with numerous e-commerce, ISPs, and OTT aggregators. It has also launched a revamped android UI using MVI, Jetpack compose, and with Media3 ExoPlayer. Among the new shows for the upcoming season, are ‘Professor Bhootnath’, ‘Mr. Kolketa’, ‘Kaiser 2’, ‘Eken Babu 6’, ‘Karagar 2’, ‘Indubala Bhaater Hotel’, ‘Gora 2’, ‘Bodon’, ‘Hello Remember Me’, ‘DM Mallika’, ‘Troilokkyo’, and ‘Jaatishwar’, among others.

What has made Hoichoi’s journey memorable is the stellar team and actors who have contributed immensely to the success of the platform over the years through their work. Hoichoi has time and again come up with interesting original content that the audiences are able to relate to as well as a great catalyst to strike up their imagination and look at life from different angles. Recently it held the world television premiere of the iconic film ‘Belashuru’, directed by Shiboprosad Mukherjee, Nandita Ray. With a line-up of diverse content, Hoichoi has stepped onto its sixth year.

Adgully spoke to some of the popular Bengali actors who are part of Hoichoi and drew interesting insights from them about how the OTT ecosystem was like five years ago when Hoichoi launched and how is it now…

“For me I don’t really know when the OTT wave really started because I’m not big on binge watching. There are a few shows on Prime, Netflix, but I’m more into Live sports. I have a few favourite shows. Hoichoi has generally revolutionized it for the Bengali entertainment industry and now more so with both Indian and Bangladeshi content. So it’s a massive platform, audiences are loving its shows, which is the main intention behind everything, as Bengalis are everywhere all around the globe. So content is being consumed and created, both with newcomers, behind the camera and in front of the camera and with superstars behind the camera and in front of the camera. Its wonderful to see what hoichoi has almost single handedly for the Bengali entertainment industry,” said Arjun Chakrabarty, who started his career with the Bengali show ‘Gaaner Oparey’.

He added. “I have thankfully been a part of many interesting projects, there was Mahabharat Murders based on the novel by Arnab Ray, there was Murder in the Hills, Murder by the Sea, by Anjan Dutt, I was a part of Byomkesh Season 7, which was based on the novel Chorabali, and many others. Hoichoi has always come up with original and diverse content.”

His upcoming projects include Karnasubarner Guptodhon, part III in the Guptodhon franchise, directed by Dhrubo Banerjee, and stars Abir Chatterjee, Jeet Sengupta, Isha Saha and him.

Actress Riddhima Ghosh shared her views on the OTT landscape by saying, “OTT has come a long way in general, but I would like to congratulate Hoichoi in particular, because for the last six seasons, Hoichoi has really made it big and has reached so many people’s hearts, and has won it. I’m sure they are going to do much better work, bring much better content and not disappoint their audience. I’m very happy to be a part of the Hoichoi family. Now because of the entire lockdown situation and everything that we have been through the past two years, OTT has become a very important part of everyone’s lives, and we are very much depended on the web, in general, definitely cinema has its place, for me personally, I’m a big fan of cinema, but I can’t imagine my life without OTT.”

Speaking about her upcoming projects, she said “Byomkesh is coming up next where I’m playing Satyabati.”

“Obviously, the market has evolved according to me and this I speak as a consumer, because I really have no idea how the business angle works,” said Anindya Sengupta. “I can only speak as a consumer or just an actor. As an actor its brilliant that the OTT market has evolved because that means for content creators, actors, performers, there is a bigger scope to perform different various kind of characters, as far as the consumer is concerned, Hoichoi has compelled other OTT players to come in the market and what it has done by trying to push the level, the boundaries, it is trying to also challenge all the content creators out there to pull up their socks, so that we are able to dish out the best possible palatable content, for the viewers, which can compete globally, because that’s very important. Right now I’m a part of Hostel Days, which is a series involving primarily three friends and food playing a huge factor, the rest I’m not allowed to say.”

Actor Saurav Das remarked that five years back, people did not know what OTT was or what a web series or an OTT film was. “They did not know of this and now they are into it, so the boom that Hoichoi has done, is immense and the projects are so well organized, well curated and people are loving the content at this point of time. I will be working on Montu Pilot 3, and a film Hridoykund, as well as Karnasubarner Gupto Dhon.”

“My first OTT work was in Mumbai long back. It was for a YouTube Shorts, at that time Netflix and Amazon prime were very new. When we started Hoichoi in 2017, things were different for us, but we knew about the other platforms in Mumbai, plus the other platforms, so we knew what was OTT, what was web series, and we were excited, but post 2020, things have really changed, and work got lesser, but OTT kept us going, actors, technicians, DOPs’, everyone they were fit with work and good work, and now we all have family, mothers, relatives who were always hooked up with TV series. So, especially during 2020, when serials were off, they got used to watching OTT platforms, and to watching series. Now people are smarter, they know about contents, and I feel really proud for Hoichoi” said actor Rajdeep Gupta.

He further said, “Being a Bengali actor, being from Bengal, Hoichoi is actually giving us a lot of good content, and competing with the international market. My upcoming show will be my 11^th or 12^th show with Hoichoi.” Speaking about the closest project to his heart, he said, “The closest one is the first one, the first work, the first love, first everything is very close to you and special to you. So, ‘Japani Toy’ has always been the closest to me, it will always be special, and I’m going to go to my grave with it!”