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Business News/ Industry / Media/  TV is stuck doing the same moronic reality shows: Ashish Patil
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TV is stuck doing the same moronic reality shows: Ashish Patil

The vice-president of brand partnerships at Y-Films on the state of Indian television

Ashish Patil says that in Aditya Chopra he has access to one of the most creative minds in the business and it would be stupid of him to not reach out to Chopra. Photo: Aniruddha Chowdhury/MintPremium
Ashish Patil says that in Aditya Chopra he has access to one of the most creative minds in the business and it would be stupid of him to not reach out to Chopra. Photo: Aniruddha Chowdhury/Mint

New Delhi: Y-Films, the youth arm of Yash Raj Films (YRF) and the creator of popular Web series like Bang Baaja Baaraat, Man’s World and Ladies Room, has been giving multiple YouTube content creators a run for their money. Earlier this week, a Y-Films’ creation—6 Pack Band—also won the Glass Lions Grand Prix at the 63rd International Festival of Creativity in Cannes. In an interview, Ashish Patil, vice-president (brand partnerships and talent management) at Y-Films, spoke about the experience of creating the award-winning transgender band for Brooke Bond Red Label, the state of Indian television and the expansion of Y-Films’ digital portfolio. Edited excerpts:

What was the idea behind the ‘6 Pack Band’?

It’s a classic thing of how your conversation with the transgender community is largely at a traffic light and your typical reaction is to roll up the window. It would often play in my head that they are, for no fault of theirs, not even allowed to make an honest living. There are things you do, not because they could get you ratings, revenue or recognition. There are some things you do just because they are the right thing to do. That was something playing in my head.

And the timing was right. In the last 18 months the kind of stuff that has been happening in this community across the world, from Caitlyn Jenner (an American television personality and athlete) coming out in an interview with Vanity Fair, Laverne Cox (a transgender American actor and LGBT, or lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender, rights advocate) picking up the Emmy for the TV series Orange is the new Black, to an Amazon show like Transparent (about a Los Angeles family which discovers that the person they knew as their father is transgender) picking up the Golden Globe and Emmy, to President (Barack) Obama getting on the cover of an LGBT magazine—Out, the first American president to do so. Even in India, there was a landmark judgement last year by the Supreme Court recognizing the third gender and this is in a country where it’s illegal to be homosexual. So it was the correct time to do something like this.

We’re talking to a very young audience and they won’t listen if you give them gyan. So we did something through real storytelling and through entertainment. That’s where tapping into all the pop culture elements of music and dance, which comes naturally to Y-Films and to this community, came together.

What was the conversation with the brands like?

Brooke Bond and Mindshare actually came into the picture much later. I presumed Mindshare and (Hindustan) Unilever would be very conservative. But you need a little bit of madness to change the world. The team obviously believed that this was not just a powerful idea that could win a lot of awards but also have a tremendous amount of impact. But it was very edgy for a conservative brand like Brooke Bond Red Label: what if its consumers start thinking it wasn’t a tea for their family but for eunuchs. What if this backfires?

I was going to go ahead with this, irrespective of the brand. We spoke to other people. But I saw the most strategic fit with Red Label because of the fantastic position they have taken for breaking social barriers, one cup at a time. And that is exactly what I was trying to do, one song at a time. They were apprehensive but eventually they saw tremendous value in this.

How involved is Aditya Chopra (chairman of Yash Raj Films, or YRF) with Y-Films? Has he ever voiced concerns about the themes and language used in your content?

He’s completely hands-off although he’s one text away for any consultation, advice or input I need. He gives me elbow room because he trusts my creative instincts. Obviously I have access to one of the most creative minds in the business and one of the most experienced film-makers in the country. And it would be stupid to not reach out to him. But across all our content, there is no use of cuss words for the heck of it. Adi (Aditya Chopra) is someone who asks me to push the boundaries. And when there is something edgier like the 6 Pack Band, I do take his input. He loved the idea. I’ve gone to him for my last video for the 6 Pack Band finale where we’re doing a tie-up with his biggest film, Sultan.

Which is your most popular Web series so far?

I would say Bang Baaja Baaraat is among our most popular. And the 6 Pack Band purely because of the Grand Prix, is now known across the world. That’s also what happened with Man’s World because of the tie-up with the United Nations and 22 cameos (by celebrities) in that series. For Ladies Room, I would say it’s our fastest growing series—I mean the pace at which it is growing given the nature of the content. It’s not conventional. It’s very anglicized in terms of tonality. But that’s the reason it’s working. Kids today don’t think in Hindi or Gujarati or Marathi like we used to. We still probably converse with our parents in our mother tongue but these kids speak in English.

What has your journey with YRF been like?

I joined MTV in marketing and moved to creative where I was running programming and artiste relations. Making movies was on my bucket list for the longest time. We were doing a lot of promotional associations with YRF. I was looking at setting up a studio within Viacom (MTV’s parent firm) and wanted to take Adi’s advice. He asked me to join YRF and promised me complete creative freedom.

So I came on board primarily to set up Y-Films. Since these were small films, I had brought in a lot of brands. Two years later, Adi suggested I do the same for YRF. That’s how I started doing brand partnerships for YRF. I also helped clean up the talent management wing at YRF, which wasn’t very active. Additionally, last year, we set up the digital portfolio, something I’ve been wanting to do for a long time. Every feature film that I’ve done at Y-Films has had ancillary digital content inspired by the film—vignettes, animation, stories. With digital we wanted to see if we had it in us to connect with this (young) audience and stay relevant since kids are consuming content on the small screen. That’s when I added Y-Digital to Y-Films.

These nine months have been very overwhelming in terms of the range of formats that we have been able to do. We have done Web series, short films and a range of genres—romance, comedy, satire and drama. Our subscriptions on the YouTube channel went up from 13,000 dormant users to 350,000 to 50 million views across all videos. We should be profitable by October this year, though it’s very small money.

Have you shifted focus to the digital medium completely or will you go back to feature films?

We’ve just finished our next feature Bank-Chor starring Riteish Deshmukh and Vivek Oberoi. It’s our biggest film till date. People forward-integrate from Web series to feature films and we went the other way. So we have the USP of being able to do both. Like Bang Baaja Baaraat is a film waiting to happen.

What is more profitable—Web series or feature films?

It’s not the correct comparison. Features are very unpredictable though they have a certain market, theatrically, satellite TV and so on. Is there a business model for digital content? No. But we have a more holistic approach which is why I will break even this year. I have many more revenue streams compared to any other content creator in this country. The most obvious one, which is non-existent in our country, is subscription. That isn’t happening for the next two years but going by what Netflix has been able to do, it seems if people see quality in your content, they are willing to pay for it.

The primary source of revenue is sponsorships from brands. Every piece of content we’ve put out has a brand or partner associated with it.

Another source of revenue which is small but growing is advertising revenue from Google and Facebook. For every million views, you get a lakh of rupees. We’re hitting a milestone— we’ve just done 50 million views on YouTube for all our films from Y-Films. So that’s 50 lakh which can bring in a whole good-quality Web series for you.

Besides, we have been able to legalize licensing. Like Bang Baaja Baaraat is being syndicated overseas. Man’s World is in very advanced discussion for a US sitcom remake. Additionally, the music that we deploy across online platforms gets us revenue.

Are you open to putting your series on television if a broadcaster approaches you?

These series cannot go on television. Because unfortunately, and it really breaks my heart to say this because I was in broadcasting (12 years in MTV) for the longest time, TV is still stuck doing the same moronic reality shows and really regressive saas-bahu shows where wives are becoming flies or turning into snakes. I don’t know what to say. So creatively our content will never fit. And I think we just throw that audience off. I think the audience watching us doesn’t want to watch Naagin or Sasuraal Simar Ka.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Lata Jha
"Lata writes about the media and entertainment industry for Mint, focusing on everything from traditional film and TV to newer areas like video and audio streaming services. She loves movies and spends a lot of her free time watching them, which makes her job both fun and a bit of a challenge. Lata tries to find and write about things in the entertainment world that most people don't notice, even though a lot of people in her country are really into movies and entertainment news often just talks about the glamorous side of things. "
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Published: 25 Jun 2016, 12:25 AM IST
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