Dutch fund pumps $2.3m into high-end TV

The Netherlands Film Production Incentive has invested more than €2m (US$2.3m) in five high-end TV series, including a forthcoming BBC1 drama based on David Nicholls’ novel Us.

Us (4×60′), which was first announced by the UK pubcaster in 2016, has been granted €104,720. The series comes from Drama Republic and is being coproduced with fellow UK firm Bandstand Productions and Halal Productions in the Netherlands.

Directed by Lisa Siwe and written by Nicholls, Us tells the story of a troubled married couple who go on a family tour of European cities.

Elsewhere, the fund has invested €963,259 in IRA: The Dutch Connection (4×50′), which comes from Pupkin Film and is set during the early 1990s.

In the show, with the southern part of the Netherlands startled by IRA attacks aimed at British soldiers, a Dutch detective must fight against not only terrorists, but also international bureaucracy and opposing intelligence services.

The other series to have received funding are Camp Kookiness (8×25′, €419,416), from NL Film & TV; In Memoriam (4×50′, €593,570), from De Familie; and docu series The Sad Champion (3×50′, €141,202), from Bind & Willink.

The latter tells the story of table tennis champion, womaniser and successful entrepreneur Robert Hosé, who became the role model of a new, self-aware generation of black Antilleans in the early 1970s on Curacao, according to the programme’s producers.

The next application round for the Netherlands Film Production Incentive for both film productions and high-end TV series begins on August 27.

The scheme offers a financial contribution in the form of a cash rebate on the qualifying production costs that are demonstrably spent in the Netherlands.