New Delhi: Actor Ananya Pandey will star in a new series to be produced by Karan Johar’s Dharmatic Entertainment for Amazon Prime Video called Call Me Bae. Pandey was last seen in Telugu-Hindi bilingual Liger that had released in cinemas and Johar’s Gehraiyaan that had also streamed on Prime Video.
Over-the-top streaming platforms are increasingly relying on the innate urge of Bollywood A-listers to find an audience and reach out to the masses, to expand their subscriber base, said media experts.
Shows featuring top stars draw audiences from places beyond the metros, much like the cinemas, and with the successful debuts of Ajay Devgn, Salman Khan and Shahid Kapoor on streaming platforms, it is good news for the likes of Sidharth Malhotra, Kareena Kapoor Khan, Anushka Sharma and Akshay Kumar, who are set to make their OTT debuts, they added.
The appearance of popular actors draws eyeballs and definitely arouses interest around the launch of a show or movie. The relationship between film stars and OTT is symbiotic—while the stars bring in viewers to the platform in the form of their fanbase, the extensive reach of streaming platforms help stars reach a wider set of audiences, senior industry experts and platform executives have pointed out.
For instance, ZEE5 has seen traction for Taapsee Pannu’s Rashmi Rocket, State of Siege starring Akshaye Khanna and Abhishek Bachchan’s Bob Biswas, beside Tamil star Ajith’s Valimai, that premiered soon after its theatrical release.
Kartik Aaryan-starrer Dhamaka, too, did well, featuring in the top 10 global list for non-English movies for weeks on Netflix, and was in the top 10 in more than 10 countries. Tovino Thomas’ superhero flick Minnal Murali was in the top 10 films across 30 countries on Netflix, including Argentina, Brazil, Nigeria, Bangladesh, Malaysia, Maldives, Sri Lanka, Singapore and Saudi Arabia. It had featured in the global top 10 list for non-English films on Netflix for four weeks.
