ZEE5 to premiere new Tamil series ‘Ayali’

ZEE5, the video streaming platform owned by Zee Entertainment Enterprises Ltd, will premiere a new Tamil original series Ayali on Thursday. Produced by S. Kushmavathi’s Estrella Stories and directed by Muthukumar, the eight-episodic series stars Abi Nakshatra, Anumol, Aruvi Madhan, Lingaa and Singampuli in prominent roles.

Video streaming platforms are likely to offer 50-60% of the budgets to southern language content, with these programmes seeing much traction, accounting for 30% of OTT viewership, said industry experts.

Films like RRR, Beast, and Jana Gana Mana were big hits on Netflix, and Amazon Prime Video saw high interest for its Tamil original Suzhal.

Producers and executives also said the other advantage is southern originals are easy to put together as talent costs are not as high as Hindi content. It is estimated that 50% of overall subscription growth in 2022 came from the five markets down south.

“The audience’s pivot to streaming platforms during covid has increased the appetite to consume content across channels. This has led to an increase in the adoption of viewing content across languages, whether with subtitles or dubbed versions. Further, the wide availability of dubbed versions enabled big-ticket south Indian productions to have resonance not only with Indian audiences but also with international viewers,“ Manish Kalra, chief business officer, ZEE5, India told Mint in an earlier interview.

The platform has witnessed a 92% increase in watch time with Telugu content topping the charts, Kalra had added. RRR (on ZEE5, Netflix and Disney+ Hotstar), Karthikeya 2, Valimai and Bimbisara were watched the most and thrillers such as Vilangu and Recce have been well received along with comedies like Aha Naa Pellanta as well as Hello World. RRR, in fact, was the most popular film from India on Netflix globally.