What: Netflix has announced a deal with FMG studios to co-produce 5 shows in Spanish and English.
Why it matters: El Chapo boosted Sunday-night viewership for Univision and was one of the most binge-watched shows on Netflix. Both firms will capitalize on the success of the show’s theme in five more “narcoseries”.
A couple of weeks ago, Netflix announced intentions to continue collaborating with Latin American producers after the positive reception of shows like Club de cuervos and Sofía Niño de Rivera Exposed. The streaming giant partnered up with Univision in 2017 to produce El Chapo, which quickly became a great success and was reportedly the most binge-watched show in Mexico a couple of months after its US release. El Chapo was co-produced with Fusion Media Group Studios, and now they will get together again with Netflix to produce five more shows. Univision will launch each one in the US, while Netflix will release them worldwide.
Netflix and FMG Studios will begin producing Tijuana, a Spanish-language fiction series, next month. The objective of the show will be exposing power corruption networks through the story of a murdered presidency candidate, apparently based on the true story of Luis Donaldo Colosio. The creators of Tijuana are Zayre Ferrer and Daniel Posada, El Chapo‘s showrunner. After this show, the two companies will produce two more fiction series in Spanish, as well as two documentary series in English.
“Tijuana matters because this is a critical time to be talking about what journalists around the world face every day in the pursuit of the truth, particularly in Mexico,” said Camila Jimenez Villa, president and CEO of FMG Studios. “This expansion of our relationship with Netflix re-affirms the value of the content we’re producing. We will be increasing investment in production and expect to have nearly 200+ hours of programming by 2020 across scripted and unscripted in English and Spanish.”
Among Netflix’s most successful original series is crime drama Narcos, which is in production for a fourth season. For Univision, the news comes just over a week after Jessica Rodríguez was named president and COO of UCI Networks.
[Feature image: Univision]
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