4th March, Mumbai: After a three-year-long successful stint, Maddam Sir is all set to go off air soon/has gone off air. Fans were quite shocked when the news came out. The show was by Jay Mehta and Kinnari Mehta’s Jay Production. Looking back, Kinnari talks about the journey of the show, what’s next and more. She also reveals that season two is in the planning stage.
“My show is coming to an end and we all have mixed feelings. We will come up with season 2. And, we would like to thank everyone for their support. It’s been a three-year-long fruitful journey since the Covid times. As a production house there is a difference in the kind of content we make, we want to make and we have to make. Sometimes we have to make content that caters to the larger audience but there is some content that we really want to make, and Maddam Sir falls into this category of stories that we wanted to tell and we got a chance to tell because there were more such innumerable stories with us,” she smiles.
Given all the love the comedy was getting, the question is whether there was a need to end the ongoing season and think about the new one. She explains, “I believe that if you leave the audiences high, there are always chances to maintain the brand and nowadays when you see the television shows which are going from six to seven days, you are just creating content in a very limited span of time. Creativity is subjected to what I am saying and it usually happens that by the time you are a year old, you are just repeating your stories. A show like Maddam Sir is nothing less than a web series. It was difficult to maintain the quality, the creative standards and sometimes the break will always keep the brand alive. I think it’s a good decision because everyone needs a break, including the actors and the team, and then come back with a bang. We can have a longer future that way. There has been a buzz already about the next season being planned so when the time comes the announcement will be made. But, right now, we all just need to take a break. Nothing as of now has been finalised. As the brand has been high, we have promised the viewers to not be disappointed and will be back.”
Bindiya Sarkar, according to Kinnari, is one of her closest concepts. “It’s the story of an ordinary girl driving to become the CM (Chief Minister) and how she struggles. These kinds of strikers should be told especially when it caters to the audiences residing in the cow belt. The women over there feel inspired when they see such stories and right now the show is going through a high because Bindiya is dying in the show. Every time when we have a lead protagonist dying, we do generate more interest. The audiences should watch what is next in store for Bindya and how she will come back. Bindiya will be seen in a new look and entering the house. Some fresh casting will also be happening because we want to bring in some love conflict between hero and a heroine. We are still auditioning and once it’s finalised it will be announced,” she adds.
Speaking about their working style, Kinnari says, “Jay and I have been very fortunate that the way we are, we want to make content for tomorrow’s India. We want to show to the women that India is not just about domestic violence but it is about women with a voice, men with a voice and the recent example of Maddam Sir is nothing less than what we want to portray. Women in the uniform and there are very few shows that show women in the uniform and yet they are vulnerable. Vision wise it depicts what me and Jay are as personalities and we want to do it for the new age India and positivity and happiness is the key to our storytelling.”
If you look at television and the way the newer content is being made there are a lot of shows that are closing down at a faster rate. This change in dynamics has been a point of concern.
“The reason behind this is that now they have too many choices and too many things right from your Instagram feeds to your YouTube viewing. We started producing shows from 1998 and that time it was only DD and I think Zee TV was just coming up and it was easier for content makers to get audiences and in those times shows did run for 2000-3000 episodes. Today audience’s get attracted to newer content and that is the challenge for any content creator, be it a TV producer, a web series maker or even influencers on Instagram. It’s great since it’s a challenge and we should accept it and move on with that. I think everyone is losing patience since the audience is losing patience so the industry is moving at a quicker pace. We are in 2023 and it is not like what it was five years back. We have just too many things happening around us. I think even the makers and producers are very impatient because they also want to play harder and have as many shows on many platforms,” she adds.
Many hit regional shows are remade in Hindi. And, even this remakes are also doing well. “Regional shows when they are adapted are tried and tested, there is sampling of emotions that has already been done and it reduces the risk of both the parties including the broadcaster and producer so why not? There is no harm in repeating good stories,” she says.
The industry has changed and as a content maker she speaks on shows not being able to sustain for long. Kinnari begins by saying that when a show goes off the air it is heartbreaking for everyone involved.
“If you see an average period of any show from the first pitch you make to the day on air is somewhere close to a year, so if it goes off air within 2-3 months, then it is a huge financial and emotional loss. We don’t try to experiment. There are shows that are made with niche audiences in mind, so maybe we should try and cater to the larger masses and larger emotions. That’s why we always get attracted to Rajshri films’ kind of storytelling and Yeh Rishta… for that matter. Rajan [Shahi] Ji knows it so well. The story of mass connect works better all the time,” she ends.