Nordic Entertainment Group’s streaming service Viaplay doesn’t exist simply to take Nordic noir around the world, says chief content officer Filippa Wallestam.
Filippa Wallestam
Outside of the Nordics, Viaplay may not be known well enough as a brand to take on the likes of Disney+ and HBO Max in the battle to appear on consumers’ lists of monthly outgoings.
But as the leading streamer in Scandinavia, it is at the forefront of the OTT revolution sweeping the industry, while its move for top sports rights in countries such as the Netherlands highlights its growing ambitions outside the Nordics.
It has already landed in Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland and launched in the US at the end of 2021, while its arrival in the UK is due in the second half of 2022, after which it is set to land in Canada, Germany, Austria and Switzerland during 2023. This will take the total number of countries where Viaplay is available to 16, beating the target of 15 that its owner, Nordic Entertainment Group (NENT), initially set in November 2020.
NENT also upped its 2025 subscriber target to 12 million recently, including six million in overseas markets, which president and CEO Anders Jensen has described as “fairly humble” compared with the likes of Netflix, which boasts 13 million subs in the UK alone.
With the language a show is recorded in seemingly no longer a barrier to whether an audience will watch it, Viaplay is racking up the number of originals it offers, building on its existing slate, which includes Pørni, Shadowplay, Honour and Swedish Dicks.
Viaplay’s offering comprises Nordic, local and international series, films, documentaries and kids’ content as well as live sports in some markets, including exclusive rights to the Premier League in nine European countries. In the Netherlands, where it is due to launch on March 1, it has appointed former Ziggo and Liberty Global exec Yoram Levi as head of international partnerships and commissioned its first local production with a Dutch version of Nippon TV format Dragons’ Den.
Its originals push is being led by Filippa Wallestam, executive VP and chief content officer at NENT. While Nordic noir – those dark dramas that have proved so popular with international audiences – will always be key to Viaplay, Wallestam is keen to see the SVoD service position itself “beyond” the genre.
Viaplay’s Channel 4 collaboration Close to Me
Viaplay produced 50 original shows in 2021 and Wallestam says the plan for 2022 is to have at least 60 more, with shows targeting young adults another key area of focus alongside those dimly lit dramas featuring immaculately dressed but dysfunctional detectives.
Moreover, Wallestam believes that Nordic noir has moved on in the 10 years since hits like The Killing helped bring the phrase into the TV industry lexicon and shape the international drama business.
“In the beginning, Nordic noir was typically dark and gloomy crime shows with misunderstood police officers. Now it has expanded and is a lot more innovative,” says Wallestam, pointing to Viaplay’s Forhøret (Face to Face) as an example of a Nordic noir “with a new twist.”
For Wallestam, Nordic noir no longer refers only to crime shows but to any drama that is particularly gritty and raw. “Nowadays even producers outside of the Nordics are interested in showing real people and not making everything so glossy.”
NENT has set up a distribution arm to shop its Viaplay originals in markets where the service isn’t available. NENT Studios is already working on English-language originals, such as recent Channel 4 collaboration Close to Me. In the pipeline are Lasse Hallström’s biopic of the revolutionary Swedish artist and feminist pioneer Hilma af Klint, starring Lily Cole, and six-part drama North Sea Connection, with Irish pubcaster RTÉ.
As Viaplay’s international ambitions grow and it reaches beyond the Nordics, Wallestam hopes an appreciation of the true value of local programming will differentiate it from its US-based competitors.
“We really understand the importance of local. We are trying to find local executive producers on the ground who can be our representatives and gain from their experience,” she says. And in the not-too-distant future, Wallestam is also keen to see Viaplay mirror the innovative work it does with unproven local talent in markets such as Sweden with new creatives outside of the Nordics.
