Shows such as Magnificent Century have come to rival US TV for international popularity, sweeping through the
Middle East, Asia and Latin America. What explains their global success? By Fatima Bhutto
‘The first agreement we should make is: don’t call them soap operas,” Dr Arzu Ozturkmen, who teaches oral history at Boğaziçi University in Istanbul, scolds me. “We are very much against this.” What
Turkey produces for television are not soap operas, or telenovelas, or period dramas: they are dizi. They are a “genre in progress”, declares Ozturkmen, with unique narratives, use of space and musical scores. And they are very, very popular.
Thanks to international sales and global viewership, Turkey is second only to the US in worldwide TV distribution – finding huge audiences in
Russia,
China, Korea and Latin America. At present, Chile is the largest consumer of dizi in terms of number of shows sold, while
Mexico, then
Argentina, pay the most to buy them.