Industry experts decode Indian OTT’s secret sauce to global success

Since its relaunch in 2020, SonyLIV has cemented its position as a key player in bringing alive real, authentic Indian stories and taking the beyond borders. To celebrate 2-year milestone since its relaunch, SonyLIV brought together ‘Creators’ Round Table’, a panel discussion on ‘Taking Indian Stories to the World’.

The roundtable saw pathbreakers from the entertainment fraternity namely, Ashwiny Iyer Tiwari, Hansal Mehta, Nikkhil Advani, Rana Daggubati, Sameer Nair, along with Danish Khan, Head - SonyLIV, Sony Entertainment Television & StudioNext. Moderated by renowned film critic and journalist, Rajeev Masand, the roundtable saw panellists share their insights and views on what motivates them to tell the kind of stories that they do, the importance of creating stories with the accurate balance of both Indian and global flavours, and what the future looks like for the Indian OTT space.

OTT platforms have the capability of taking local content through global waves. When the panellists were asked about the secret sauce to global success, the responses were intriguing.

For Rana Daggubati, the trick is to tell authentically Indian stories. “This is what appeals to a diverse audience because it is intrinsically us and speaks about our culture as a whole. When we see a ‘Money Heist’ or ‘Squid Games’, we see how Spanish and Korean content has done this. We need to tell our stories locally, things that are unique to us, and can make the world sit up and take notice. We are representing our culture,” he said.

Hansal Mehta decoded the solution in one word: Conviction. “Our conviction, audacity, uniqueness of narrative and the power of storytelling will take us global. The moment we try to ape the West, we will fall into a trap. Just like we can’t make a “Crown”, they can’t make a “Scam”. We should take pride in our stories,” he said.

Ashwini Iyer Tiwary said, “We have a country with so many stories at every corner. When we say let us make a story that looks or feels like the West, it is deception. We live differently and have a different culture. Our screen looks are bound to be different. Emotions are the same everywhere and the way it is shown is different. Where there are subtitles and audio options today, we can up our technical skills, stay true and rooted to our essence to make global waves,” she said.

Nikkhil Advani stressed, “We have to write with conviction. There is no trick. We must keep working and collaborating and producing authentic stories that will connect somewhere.”