Creative Europe seeks to emulate success of Danish drama

Creative Europe, the European Union’s new programme for cultural and creative sectors that brings together the Culture, MEDIA and MEDIA Mundus, has announced plans to support European co-productions in TV drama. Recognising the international success of the so-called Danish model (based on the success of series such as “Borgen”), the Belgian series “Vermist” and Polish director Agnieszka Holland’s mini-series “Burning Bush”, the goal is to foster cross-border production that gives material a better chance of international exploitation.

Co-productions are very common in European cinema, whereas TV drama tends to be far more local. Nonetheless, there are countries with exceptional backgrounds in TV drama, such as Italy, the UK and Germany.

EUR11.8 million for European TV drama

Concretely, Creative Europe will include specific calls for proposals for television programming, with a budget of €11.8 million for 2014 for independent directors of television contents. To respond to the call, the TV drama production must involve at least three broadcasters and has to be distributed in three MEDIA countries.

No doubt this initiative will be the subject of much debate at MIPTV.

For more details and call for projects, visit Creative Europe.