Makedonia makes room for int’l drama

The Mafia Only Kills in Summer first aired on Italy’s Rai

Greek commercial broadcaster Makedonia TV has acquired additional dramas for its summer schedule following the success of the foreign series strategy it launched last autumn.

Comedy-drama The Mafia Only Kills in Summer, set in the Sicilian city of Palermo in the 1970s, will air on weekends in a primetime 20.00 slot.

Created by Pierfrancesco Diliberto, the 24×50′ show launched on Italian pubcaster Rai in 2016 and is based on the 2013 novel of the same name.

American period crime drama Aquarius, created by John McNamara for NBC and starring The X-Files and Californication’s David Duchovny, has also been scheduled for weekend primetime, airing at 23.00. The 26×52′ series is distributed by ITV Studios Global Entertainment.

Makedonia TV has also acquired eight-part Cold War drama Deutschland 83, which will likely be added to the schedule after summer. A coproduction between AMC Networks’ Sundance TV in the US and Germany’s RTL Television, made by UFA Fiction, the series was the first German-language drama to air on a US network.

Makedonia TV made the shift to focusing on foreign drama last September, aiming to offer acclaimed series to local free-to-air TV viewers for the first time.

The new schedule delivered good results by the end of last year, doubling Makedonia’s audience in total viewing terms and increasing performance beyond that in specific slots. The trend has continued during the spring season.

Although the channel initially scheduled its foreign acquisitions from 17.00 to after midnight, it recently expanded the foreign drama zone by adding Latin American telenovelas in two afternoon slots.