The Sales Director of the Spanish group spoke with ttvnews in Natpe Budapest where they are presenting their new productions, led by the Portuguese telenovela Cacao, along with the dramas Heartless and Golden Swam.
Armed with a catalog full of great premieres, led by three productions with great potential for the international market, Onza Distribution made its way to Natpe Budapest to deploy the best of its original productions.
“Natpe Budapest is a fairly important market for us, because as we have a very general catalog, we have content for all types of clients,” Béatrice Nouh, Sales Director of Onza Entertainment, said to ttvnews at the event.
Within this extensive catalogue, the genre par excellence for the European market, explained the executive, are dramas. “In this sense, we came with Cacao, our new telenovela for 2024,” said the Sales Director.
Produced by Plural Entertainment for TVI, in Spain Cacao will premiere on Divinity. Set on a cocoa plantation in Itacaré in Brazil, the telenovela follows a young woman from a Portuguese family named Cacao (Matilde Reymão) who makes chocolate with exotic flavors. Her life changes when the man who seemed to be her biological father, Joaquim, actor Paulo Calatré, reveals her true origins as the illegitimate daughter of Justino, the owner of the estate.
“This telenovela has all the strong points of telenovelas that work: young and handsome actors, exoticism, danger, revealed secrets. It works very well for us. It has been number one in prime time in Portugal since its start in January. We are selling it very well. well to several countries. I think that after these June markets we will be able to announce other sales in the region that we are already negotiating,” the executive revealed.
“We also have Perverso (Heartless),”she continued, “which is an Onza production for Amazon in Spain, TVE in Spain and ViX+ in America. It is sparking a lot of interest in the international market. It is a perfect thriller for platforms and cable. It has very top actors from Spain and Mexico. And we are already closing the first sales. It helps a lot that its launch in April on Amazon Prime Video in Spain was number 2 for a month and a half. Until very recently it was still in the top 10.
Heartless, produced by Onza, has 8 episodes of 45 minutes and is directed by Gustavo Ron and Federico Untermann, with Alonso Laporta and Gustavo Ron as showrunners, who are joined by the scriptwriters J.M. Ruiz Córdoba, Leire Albinarrate, Luis Gamboa, Mariana Palos, Raúl Barranco and Ángela Armero.
Gonzalo Sagardía is executive producer of the series along with Alonso Laporta, Gustavo Ron, José María Irisarri, Santiago de la Rica, Valentina Pozzoli, Luis Murillo Arias and Luis Murillo Moreno.
Heartless tells the story of Haro (Massagué), a refined and Machiavellian aristocrat who is serving a sentence for rape and murder, and who is threatened with death by Óscar (Cornet), a kidnapper who acts against the business elite, of which he is a part. the Mexican Mariana (Pimentel). Taking advantage of that connection, Haro negotiates prison benefits in exchange for collaborating in the investigation of the kidnappings, but in reality he prepares his revenge against Lucía (Miró), the judge who imprisoned him.
“Another title that we are highlighting a lot is Golden Swan. It was produced for Nova TV in the Czech Republic. It is a period drama set in Prague in 1039. It all starts with the launch of this luxury gallery in Prague that opens the day that the Germans occupy the Czech Republic. It simultaneously follows the stories of love and friendship of the main characters in the gallery, in addition to having this historical atmosphere that has an impact on the entire story. It was a great audience success on Nova TV. and we think it will do very well in the market.
The series, created by Filip Bobinski, Jan Coufal and Petr Sizling of Dramedy Productions (The Manor House, Away From You), is a production of Czech channel Nova (Ulice, One Family).
It premiered on the channel’s SVOD platform, Voyo, on January 26, 2023 and was broadcast free-to-air on Czech television on February 2. The second season hit the screens at the end of August, and the third and final season will put the final touch on the series in June 2024. Golden Swam recorded successful audience results in its first season, with a share of 29% and a total of more than 1 million viewers in its most watched episode.
