Sooraj Barjatya talks about bringing family-oriented romantic dramas

OTT shows have primarily become about personal viewing experiences As filmmaker Sooraj Barjatya forays into the OTT world with Bada Naam Karenge he hopes the nineepisode series will take people back to the culture of family viewing In conversation with midday the showrunner talks about making content for Gen Z why his projects always boast of greenflag characters and how a section of OTT viewers misses family dramasEdited excerpts from the interviewWhere did the story originate fromIt was narrated to us by S Manasvi he came up with the concept in 2013 We were struggling with the climax then In 2020 when we had a meeting with SonyLIV they wanted a Rajshri show They wanted to recreate the world of Hum Saath Saath Hain 1999 and Vivah 2006 on OTT So we met Manasvi and cracked the story Irsquom grateful that the streamer backed our vision The other platforms told us that OTT is a younger and urban spaceTell us about the storyItrsquos about a boy from Ratlam who wants to expand the family business and a woman from Ujjain who wants to do her Masters in microbiology They are not able to fit in in Mumbai nor are they able to fit in where they come from The story is about how they fall in loveSooraj BarjatyaThrillers and gangster dramas dominate OTT entertainment Will a romantic familyoriented show find its placeAfter the pandemic a lot of people have moved on to the fire stick But there are many who want to see something different who are not happy reading subtitles or watching gore I believe there is an audience for everything So why shouldnrsquot I make a romantic family drama I think itrsquos the right time for us to enter with Bada Naam KarengeWhat did you learn while making the seriesThe platform was clear that they wanted to bring the audience from Tier II and III The best thing about the project was to get Gullak director Palash Vaswani as a director He comes from this world and is experienced Wersquove made a lot of films and television shows but he guided us on how it is different from television It took us almost a year to write two years to get this project through and postproduction took another six months The web is a beautiful medium to tell a storyDo you think you can bring the familyviewing culture back with this showI think we will and we should It is a necessity of the day If you talk to the OTT platforms the money is missing So we need everyone to come together and watch Today big televisions screens are back This culture has to come back where everyone watches content together For my movies youngsters would come less to theatres But theyrsquod come to show the film to their grandparents and parents That is what we are aiming atFor people living in the rightswipe generation how will you convince them that oldschool romance is realHere we are catering to the audience that wants fastpaced content That is the world Palash has brought I feel we try to show youngsters as kids who are partying taking drugs drinking or smoking but thatrsquos not true I look at my own kids who make mistakes are stressed but they rise again I think Gen Z will connect with the story especially kids from small towns the BharatAll your characters are green flags Isnrsquot that far from realityIn this show they are not entirely green flags But a lot of people tell me that my depiction isnrsquot the reality I feel at least one in 10 would be like my characters but they donrsquot show that because they want to fit in I want to show dreams If we are only going to show how bad society is what are we showing our kids My daughter is 26 and wants to get married but she doubts the kind of partner shersquoll get If they are not like my characters at least they can try to be and they may get a Poonam Amrita Raorsquos character in Vivah