Madhuri Dixit’s digital debut The Fame Game continues to grab eyeballs globally. The suspenseful family drama, created by Karan Johar’s Dharmatic Entertainment, released in February, and is still at the top of the Netflix India charts.

“We are thrilled to see the immense love for The Fame Game, trending at #1 in India and in the Top 10 row in several countries across the world. The series brilliantly captures how the facade of stardom crumbles and family secrets and wounds from the past come tumbling out to expose the truth behind fame. A story as grand and bold required a great team and it has been a phenomenal partnership with Dharmatic Entertainment, showrunner Sri Rao, our directors Karishma Kohli and Bejoy Nambiar, the stellar Madhuri Dixit and our fabulous ensemble cast,” says Monika Shergill, vice president, content, Netflix India. t2 caught up with Monika and Apoorva Mehta, CEO of Dharma Productions, for a chat on the fruitful association, the trends so far and the road ahead.

What’s the association between Netflix and Dharma Productions been like so far?

Apoorva Mehta: We started our journey on OTT with Netflix and that will always remain very, very special to us. We have worked on many things together. Unfortunately, the shooting period of The Fame Game fell right in the middle of the pandemic. We weren’t able to release it earlier, and hence, it’s been a longer journey for The Fame Game, as compared to our other shows like Searching for Sheela and (The Fabulous Lives of) Bollywood Wives. We have also done two-three films with them. Dharmatic hasn’t worked with any platform apart from Netflix so far. Our films like Guilty, Meenakshi Sundareshwar and the anthology Ajeeb Dastaans have done very well because the platform that Netflix gives, no one else is able to.

Look at how well Bollywood Wives has done. Those women went on a world tour... I was in shock! (Laughs) That’s the power of Netflix... the way it reaches so many people in one go across the globe.

Monika Shergill: For us at Netflix, the association with Dharmatic Entertainment, with Dharma Productions, Karan (Johar) and Apoorva is so special. Every time we have come together, it’s been for a defining story... whether it’s Guilty or Ajeeb Dastaans, and even Karan’s story in Lust Stories is so well remembered even now. To partner with Dharmatic for a series as special as The Fame Game is very cherished for us. It’s our first series with Dharmatic and there is a lot of other stuff cooking. There is a very meaningful journey ahead.

Monika Shergill, vice president, content, Netflix India

Monika, what about The Fame Game appealed to Netflix?

Monika: On streaming, there is a certain perception of the kind of stories that should be told. Crime stories and thrillers do well. But even from a global perspective, family-driven and relationship-driven stories are far less on streaming platforms. At Netflix, one of the earliest stories we wanted to tell was a true-blue family drama with complexity, with rich layers, with things that the viewer can relate to... and yet, new things of a world that you are not familiar with. This show makes us realise that whatever the situation, families go through the same experiences and the same complexities. The fault lines between families, the secrets that we all keep from each other, how we hurt each other and yet how much we love each other.... That’s the kind of narrative we wanted to tell, and the fact that it’s a suspenseful family drama adds a layer to it. That’s the excitement and the newness of it.

What have been the biggest highs and the foremost learnings from this association so far?
Apoorva: The Fame Game has been our first attempt at doing a scripted series and there was a lot of hand-holding that Netflix gave us. We have excelled at making films, but The Fame Game has been a first for us. We have learnt a lot. It is a different format and at times, we were stuck. The narrative has to keep holding across the episodes and it is infinite in that sense as compared to a film which is of two hours. One needs to understand how audiences consume streaming content. I think we were lucky because we had training from Netflix. We were able to use all of that to make the show sharper, smarter and much more engaging.

Monika: The rigour and vision with which the team at Dharma works is unparalleled in the industry. You will see it in every frame and every nuance... there is a different cinematic quality and emotional scape. The one common factor between the teams at Dharmatic and Netflix is the passion and the fire. When we are in meetings, we disagree with passion and then we agree to move forward with passion.

The Fame Game can’t be boxed into a specific genre. Is the audience of today drawn more towards multi-genre, layered stories?

Apoorva: The audience today is looking at content that engages episode after episode, season on season. Putting in plain vanilla content is not going to work. The viewer is looking for content that’s real, which has its twists and turns, which has layers, which stir up emotions within you....

Monika: The viewer now has access to content from different countries. People are watching a lot, and everything that they are watching is whetting their appetite for new things. But while a show like The Fame Game is complex and layered, at its heart it also has a lot of simplicity and a lot of relatability. That’s the balance that a good writer brings in. The idea is to create a story and a universe of characters and their arcs that will move from one season to the next. If we don’t do that now, we stand to disappoint audiences. The desire within the audience has always been for richer storytelling, and with the advent of streaming platforms, we are now being able to do that.

Apoorva Mehta, CEO, Dharma Productions

The Fame Game is led by a female protagonist. How important is it for Dharmatic and Netflix to focus on female-forward content?

Apoorva: It’s very important for us. But that’s not what drives us... we don’t start off by saying that we want to make a story just because it has a female protagonist. What drives us is that we want to tell a story that’s engaging and what we feel passionate about. We are fortunate that The Fame Game was written with a female protagonist and with someone as big as Madhuri Dixit.

Monika: At Netflix, we consciously work towards commissioning such stories because women are underrepresented despite being 50 per cent of the planet. We bring in female creators, their voices and talent. Even in an ensemble, we look at creating women, even minor characters, who are impactful and powerful. And then we have the big women-centric shows like Bombay Begums, Masaba Masaba and Bulbbul. Over the years, Netflix has worked with over a thousand female crew and 30 content creators. But it’s not a tick mark that we have. Ultimately, a good story is a good story.