TV MEA MIPCOM 2017

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OCTOBER 2017

MIPCOM EDITION

Production Incentives / MBC’s Fadi Ismail

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CONTENTS

On-Screen Heroes

FEATURE 10 FILM HERE! A number of countries across the Middle East and Africa are offering generous incentives to lure international film and television producers.

Writer Malenga Mulendema loved watching superhero toons as a child in Zambia.

But she never saw anyone who looked like her on-screen. So she decided to go ahead and create the kind of show she would have wanted to have seen growing up.

Ricardo Seguin Guise Publisher Anna Carugati Group Editorial Director Mansha Daswani Editor Kristin Brzoznowski Executive Editor Joanna Padovano Tong Managing Editor Sara Alessi Associate Editor Victor L. Cuevas Production & Design Director Phyllis Q. Busell Art Director Simon Weaver Online Director Dana Mattison Senior Sales & Marketing Manager Nathalia Lopez Sales & Marketing Assistant Andrea Moreno Business Affairs Manager

Ricardo Seguin Guise President Anna Carugati Executive VP Mansha Daswani Associate Publisher & VP of Strategic Development TV MEA © 2017 WSN INC. 1123 Broadway, #1207 New York, NY 10010 Phone: (212) 924-7620 Fax: (212) 924-6940 Website: www.tvmea.ws

One of eight writers selected by South African outfit Triggerfish Animation Studios’ Story Lab initiative, Mulendema was able to travel to Disney’s Burbank studios to work with the animators and executives there. Collaborating with Triggerfish, Mulendema developed Mama K’s Super 4 , about four teenage girls in Lusaka who are recruited by a former secret agent to help save the world. And now CAKE is taking the show out to the global market.

Triggerfish’s Story Lab initiative is just one of several efforts across the Middle East and Africa to nurture new voices whose creative output can then be taken out to the wider world. Image Nation Abu Dhabi, for example, brought together Hollywood and local talent for its legal drama Justice , and subsequently sealed a deal for IM Global Television to shop the show internationally. MBC Group—which has a co-pro alliance with Image Nation—has aligned with Anonymous Content in the U.S. and is exploring other partnerships as it looks to bring its high-end Arabic-language drama to platforms worldwide. Fadi Ismail, who heads up MBC’s O3 Productions business, is featured in this edition of TV MEA, discussing his strategy for content both in the Middle East and Turkey and his international aspirations for that slate. At MIPCOM, attendees can also expect to see a new wave of African content, with a Nigerian pavilion set to showcase the best of Nollywood. For MBC’s Ismail, there’s never been a better time to take content from the region to the global market. Platforms, he says, are on the hunt for “good content and good stories, irrespective of where they’re from.”

This edition also takes a deep-dive into the incentives programs in place in numerous markets across the region to entice foreign producers. The makers of highend scripted projects are eagerly tapping into the incentives available in markets like South Africa, Morocco and Dubai, using their lush locations, increasingly proficient crews and healthy tax breaks to deliver shows that can resonate across the globe.

—Mansha Daswani

INTERVIEW

8 MBC’s Fadi Ismail The pan-Middle Eastern broadcasting behemoth is stepping up its original-content efforts.

Fadi Ismail, general manager of O3 and group director at MBC, shares his strategy.

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Basic Lead DISCOP Johannesburg / DISCOP Dubai DISCOP organizer Basic Lead is gearing up for another event in Johannesburg just after MIPCOM wraps. DISCOP Johannesburg, taking place October 25 to 27, is positioned as the place to acquire and co-produce content made in Africa and sell international film, TV and digital content, adaptation rights and packaged TV channels into Sub-Saharan Africa.

From February 25 to 27, 2018, DISCOP Dubai will bring together 200-plus international and regional distributors and producers with some 400 buyers representing more than 300 public and commercial broadcasters, cable, satellite and mobile pay-TV operators, VOD platforms and territorial distributors primarily from the Middle East, North Africa and the Indian subcontinent. This marks the second year of the Dubai event.

Dubai

FremantleMedia International The Recording Studio / Swaggerz / Golden Kid Ordinary people are given the opportunity to professionally record a song in The Recording Studio, one of FremantleMedia International’s highlights for the MEA region. “The Recording Studio is transformational, inspiring and authentic—it has all the makings of becoming an audience favorite,” says Anahita Kheder, the company’s senior VP for the Middle East, Africa and Southeast Europe.

Swaggerz, meanwhile, is a format that follows five teens from different backgrounds as they join forces to become the next big internet sensation. “Swaggerz is a loud, innovative and exciting format that is set to be the next reality obsession,” says Kheder. Then there is Golden Kid, a reality show that sees young footballers compete for the chance to become professional athletes.

The Recording Studio

“Despite the economic and political challenges that the region is currently facing, our business is going strong [in MEA].”

—Anahita Kheder

SPI International

Singapore International Jazz Festival concert FunBox UHD Patrimonio mundial - Herencia deon la humanidad

FunBox UHD SPI International/FILMBOX recently inked distribution deals with Etisalat and Ooredoo in Qatar to introduce FunBox UHD as the first Ultra HD linear channel in the region. “As a big step to increase end-user satisfaction and provide a better service, we’ve localized and continue to localize our content into the Arabic language as well as French,” says Berk Uziyel, SPI/FILMBOX’s executive director, touting the company’s latest developments in the Middle East and North Africa. SPI’s bouquet available in Africa includes the thematic channels FightBox, which is dedicated to MMA and martial arts programming; Gametoon, a gaming channel for millennials; Glitz Network, an entertainment and lifestyle destination; and DocuBox, which features factual content in the areas of wildlife, science, travel and more.

“In MENA, we are not only serving our channels via satellite but also via various platforms.”

—Berk Uziyel

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TV MEA: How are you programming during and around Ramadan?

ISMAIL: It is no secret that viewership habits and trends change during the holy month of Ramadan; expectations make this month the most important season to launch most of the new content [and there are] bigger budgets dedicated to this particular month and season. However, slowly but surely, we find an abundance of new series launched across the entire year.

TV MEA: What is your approach to international acquisitions? Where are you acquiring from? Are you doing output deals or cherry-picking titles?

ISMAIL: MBC’s approach now is very selective and output deals are a thing of the past. Content is king, but quality content is the king of kings. Wherever there is such appealing content, whether from Turkey, LatAm, India or Korea, such content is sought after.

Turkish drama series are still the most successful, followed by some telenovelas. The audience will always look for compelling storytelling coupled with high production values.

TV MEA: What have been some of your biggest domestic successes?

ISMAIL: Saudi comedies such as Selfie have been successful.

Also Black Crows, the anti-ISIS drama, was very controversial and highly rated this past Ramadan. The Legend, an Egyptian social/action drama, was the highest-rated drama in 2016 in Egypt. Witch of the South, a horror drama, was a big hit all over the region as well.

By Mansha Daswani

The largest media company in the Middle East and North Africa, MBC Group operates a portfolio of 18 channels across a variety of genres, in addition to radio stations and online platforms. To fill its massive broadcast bandwidth on services like MBC1, MBC2 and MBC Action, the group has been acquiring finished content and formats from the international market. It has also ramped up its own production activity, establishing O3 Productions. The division is producing in the Middle East and, with O3 Medya, in Turkey, and, with an eye on broadening its horizons, is looking to align with companies in the U.S. and elsewhere. Fadi Ismail—who spotted the appeal of Turkish drama several years ago and kick-started that genre’s international ambitions—leads O3 as general manager. As group director of MBC, meanwhile, he is also responsible for the company’s overall drama production-and-distribution strategy.

He shares with TV MEA his perspective on programming and producing for audiences in the Middle East and beyond.

TV MEA: Tell us about your overall scripted programming strategy at MBC. ISMAIL: MBC has viewership loyalty that is second to none, so it has to be careful in what it broadcasts. Whatever we adopt on-screen becomes a trend, and the opposite is true. The MBC bouquet of channels is free-to-air and our reach exceeds 100 million viewers in Arab households. This is a huge responsibility, one which requires properly calculated risks and programming in order not to alienate the trust of audiences whose viewing habits have proved slow to change. MBC has repeatedly raised the bar in its scripted programming strategy, but in a way that is soft, calculated and usually not too controversial.

TV MEA: Tell us about how you established a drama production strategy with O3 Productions. What were the biggest obstacles?

ISMAIL: O3 was created in response to a need for special projects with big production values and unique stories. Omar was among the first and most ambitious historical projects, and so was Saraya Abdeen. We have been pioneers in innovation.

Witch of the South was the first big hit in the horror genre, Ruby was the first adapted telenovela, and Cactus Alliance was the first 15-episode thriller series [aired] outside Ramadan.

The biggest obstacle has to do with working in an irrational and immature market where lots of promises and commitments are changed last minute and unpredictable circumstances make sales contracts sometimes not worth the paper they were signed on. Producing in MENA is a risky business and mitigating risk is never easy.

TV MEA: What’s been the strategy for producing content in Turkey, and why was this important to MBC? ISMAIL: Turkish drama has become an established part of the daily menu for Arab viewers since 2008. It became important to MBC, as the biggest consumers of Turkish drama, to have a presence in Turkey beyond simple acquisitions. The reason for that was twofold: to become players in the production of drama that primarily targets Turkish broadcasters, and to try to have cost-effective content for MENA. Four years after the launch of O3 Medya in Turkey, it has become one of the most prolific and trusted sources of quality projects and premium Turkish drama, with success in international sales of its series.

TV MEA: How are you fostering talent locally to find and develop the stories you want your audiences to see?

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ISMAIL: Fostering local talent is the biggest challenge. Local creative talents who are bold enough to innovate in their writing styles, who will plan what they will write and have clarity on the arc of the season before they write, who can come up with a treatment that can be pitched, who can have captivating storylines with strong climactic moments and cliffhangers. To do all of that we have to educate and experiment. And we are currently doing that. We are investing time, effort and money in developing ideas that can be pitched to a multitude of platforms, to whoever is looking for new, fresh and innovative Arab content. It is a process that will have to take its due course, but it has started and we are getting lots of support from some established international writers and executive producers.

TV MEA: Are you acquiring scripted formats?

ISMAIL: We have always been open to locally producing scripted formats and, in fact, were pioneers of adapting some telenovelas. However, we do not underestimate the amount of creative effort needed for such a localization process. In a few cases, we found that we are almost changing so much of the storylines to the degree that defies the purpose of acquiring a format. Having said that, there will be scripted formats that prove suitable and attractive enough to be adapted.

TV MEA: What trends are you seeing in Arabic-language scripted?

ISMAIL: There is an intense search for stronger and more captivating content and stories from a new generation of younger writers all over the Arab world. However, the limitations and [financial] restrictions of the media market in the region make such an ambition difficult to realize. Many series are unsold, or sold with losses or canceled right before production. The trend of writing and producing 30-episode series that mostly revolve around romance and social issues is unsustainable and will be gradually replaced

by shorter series and genres such as sci-fi, fantasy, horror, crime, action, medical and legal, as well as smart comedies. TV is becoming like a global village. Local content will surely remain the king of kings, but it has to evolve to compete and succeed.

TV MEA: What are the biggest challenges in selling MBC dramas around the world?

ISMAIL: The usual number of episodes of an Arab season, 30, is difficult to distribute, especially since the duration of each is no more than 35 minutes. As a result, some series have a slower pace than what is attractive to international viewers. There is also a need for an alliance between Arab producers, since the resources needed to market content are greater than the abilities of any single producer. There is also a credibility issue, in the sense that so far, not a single series has been distributed in more than one or two territories. There is a need for one success that will pave the way for many others to follow. However, the time is right for international markets to seek good content and good stories, irrespective of where they’re from.

TV MEA: What can you tell us about your deal with Anonymous Content? Are you looking for other similar pacts with international organizations?

ISMAIL: Any serious effort to go beyond where we are has to depend on co-development and co-producing of content. Anonymous Content was the first to see some potential in our ideas and stories. There are other companies that we are currently exploring [aligning with] and looking into what we can achieve together. We have already signed a three-year agreement with Image Nation and we are in talks with big companies in Europe and the U.S. for different kinds of collaborations and working jointly on projects from the Arab region that are designed with a taste for international markets.

Saraya Abdeen, set in 19th century Egypt, attracted millions of viewers during the Ramadan peak TV season.

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Starz’s Black Sails, filmed in South Africa.

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Lush backdrops and production incentives are luring international producers to film in locations across the Middle East and Africa.

By Jay Stuart he Sky 1 series Hooten & The Lady saw its protagonists searching for treasure in such far-flung locations as the Caribbean, the Amazon rainforest and Bhutan—mostly while filming in South Africa. The country, with its diverse terrain, has become a popular destination for international producers and is one of several in the region offering a range of filming incentives.

The number of countries in the Middle East and Africa currently offering television production incentives is still small, especially when compared to what’s available in Europe. But the ambitions of those few are big, and the competitiveness of their programs world-class, enabling them to attract significant international projects.

It’s often thought that there are only two places in Africa with incentives, at opposite ends of the continent: Morocco and South Africa. Both are bustling locations. But Mauritius, the small island republic in the Indian Ocean, has also begun attracting producers, with a program launched in 2013. In the Middle East, meanwhile, Abu Dhabi has been the leader in introducing a full-fledged incentive program for television.

In terms of activity, John Hadity, the executive VP of EP Financial Solutions, ranks South Africa first, then Morocco, followed by Abu Dhabi. South Africa offers a 20-percent rebate plus a 5-percent bump for expenditure on local shooting and post-production above ZAR 3 million ($230,000), while Morocco offers a 20-percent rebate. Abu Dhabi is the most generous with a 30-percent rebate. The incentives in all three countries apply to film and TV drama. South Africa and Abu Dhabi also include documentaries.

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In all cases, taking advantage of incentives requires a service provider or production partner on the ground locally.

The local partner would be the recipient of the incentive benefits. A foreign company would then access the incentives through its contractual agreement with this partner.

FLEXIBLE FUNDING One of those companies, Film Afrika in Cape Town, has seen its business grow by leaps and bounds since South Africa introduced its film incentive program in 2004. South Africa’s scheme applies to everything spent locally on goods and services. And since it’s a cash rebate, not a tax credit, it is not necessary to wait for the end of the tax year or other fiscal timelines.

“We submit an audited copy of the finished production to the dti (South African Department of Trade and Industry), and we get the cash to pass on to the producer, which usually takes about four to six months,” says Rudi van As, managing director and chief financial officer of Film Afrika Worldwide. “It’s a simple and reliable system. The impact of incentives has been massive. When the incentive was launched, Film Afrika used to be involved in four or five productions a year; now it’s nine or ten.”

Recent projects have included Outlander and Black Sails for Starz, Roots for A+E Networks and Tutankhamun for ITV. The big current project is the multi-episode Troy: Fall of a City for BBC and Netflix. There are several others in the works that have not been announced.

“We are competing with Canada, American states, the U.K. and, to a lesser extent, Australia and New Zealand,” van As says. “Six or seven years ago, it was quite a sell to get international productions to South Africa. Things have changed. We are a global player now.”

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incentives aligned to a global standard,” observes Paul Baker, who recently finished a five-year stint in Abu Dhabi as executive director of film and TV services in the tax-free media zone, twofour54. “What Abu Dhabi used to have was softer. It was, ‘Give us a call and we’ll see how we can help.’ Dubai is still basically like that. The incentives are about hotel rooms and plane tickets and the like. This can be very significant, but you still need transparency.”

And so the 30-percent rebate emerged. “A cash rebate is what works in our region because there are no direct taxes,” says Jassim Al Nowais, the manager of the Abu Dhabi Film Commission (ADFC).

And speed is a selling point. “We have one of the fastest rebates in the world,” Al Nowais says. “The payout is usually within 60 days.”

EMIRATI APPEAL Image Nation Abu Dhabi is investing in skills development for local crews, who work on international shows and local fare such as the legal drama Justice (Qalb Al Adalah).

The Industrial Development Corporation (IDC) is a key player in South Africa’s incentives picture. On top of cash flowing through the rebate, the IDC can choose to invest in qualifying productions up to 49 percent equity. It’s the only bank-like structure in the country allowed to take an at-risk equity position. The productions must either be structured with approvals from the dti and the National Film and Video Foundation as South African, or as official co-productions under the country’s existing treaties with Canada, Germany, Italy, the U.K.—recently expanded to cover TV— France, New Zealand, Australia, Ireland and the Netherlands. South Africa is looking to add more treaties, especially with Brazil, Russia, India and China, according to Monica Rorvik, the head of film and media promotion at Wesgro, the tourism, trade and investment agency for Cape Town and Western Cape.

Wesgro assists producers who are exploring the idea of working in South Africa, Rorvik says, noting, “We don’t look at scripts ourselves, but we can connect you with the people who will.”

Abu Dhabi has also been ramping up its international production profile. Introducing transparency has been a major factor in the emirate’s success. “When I got to Abu Dhabi, the main thing missing was a lack of transparent

Since its launch in 2012, the program has succeeded in attracting 40 movie and TV productions from Hollywood, Bollywood and the local region, including features like Star Wars: The Force Awakens and Furious 7. It also hosted the high-profile Netflix original War Machine. The satirical comedy, produced by Brad Pitt’s production company, Plan B Entertainment, filmed for 22 days in Abu Dhabi and neighboring emirate Ras Al Khaimah at the end of 2015, facilitated by twofour54. Filming took place at 20 locations around the capital, including transforming parts of Abu Dhabi to create a fictional American embassy in Kabul.

Abu Dhabi’s broadly defined television rebate has also enabled Top Gear and even The Today Show to plug into the generous regime. Long-running soap The Bold and the Beautiful shot briefly in Abu Dhabi and Dubai in 2014.

Abu Dhabi conducted a study in 2016 that showed that it compared very favorably with other locations in terms of its offer for budgets in the range of $40 million. The next step is to build the production vendor infrastructure along with a crew base. At present, there are 11 TV production studios over two locations and 5,400 square-meter and 6,500 squaremeter backlots. The development of large sound stages will be critical.

Red Planet Pictures largely shot Sky’s Hooten & The Lady in South Africa, taking advantage of the country’s incentives and diverse terrain.

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There is, however, a constraint on attracting more expensive international drama series: a budget ceiling of $1 million per television program. That applies whether the show is a one-off or multiple episodes. This works well for Arabic-language series, which have much lower budgets.

A 30-episode series can be brought in for not much more than $3 million, so the rebate would cover a whopping onethird of the total budget. But for an American or European series, the benefit would be less impactful.

Abu Dhabi and Dubai are part of the same country, the United Arab Emirates. You could think of them as being analogous to U.S. states that have their own incentive programs.

The Dubai Film and TV Commission (DFTC), which is the leading voice of Dubai’s production industry, serves as a onestop shop for international producers.

“The DFTC offers cost-reducing soft incentives on a case-bycase basis,” says Jamal Al Sharif, the chairman of DFTC and managing director of Dubai Studio City. “These are available either through special arrangements with major industry partners, licensing and free rebates, or repatriations with services providers, such as discounted hotels, cars, caterers, visas, locations and supplementary support.”

Turbulence in other parts of the world has been an indirect boon for the production business in the Emirates, and the same can be said for Morocco, where a current specialty is doubling for politically unstable places.

Morocco stood in for Afghanistan in Showtime’s Homeland and Yemen in FOX’s rebooted Prison Break. Morocco offers a cash rebate of 20 percent on qualifying local spend for foreign TV movies or series totally or partially produced in Morocco. The number of international productions to receive permits to film in Morocco rose from 699 in 2012 to 713 in 2016.

Pretending to be somewhere else does not work in Jerusalem, which offers incentives for television drama and animation as well as film production via the Jerusalem Film & Television Fund. There is a cultural requirement: the story must be set in Jerusalem. That means Jerusalem must play itself on screen. “We can’t support a production that uses Jerusalem as a double for Damascus or somewhere else,” says Yoram Honig, the director of Jerusalem’s fund. “The story doesn’t have to be about Jerusalem per se. It can be a love story or whatever. But it needs to take place in Jerusalem, at least in part.”

Jerusalem’s fund, the first regional production fund in Israel, gets its money from the government via the Jerusalem Development Authority. For large-budget international productions, Jerusalem offers a 60-percent cash rebate up to NIS 10 million ($2.8 million). The production budget in Israel must be no less than NIS 8 million and at least 50 percent of the planned filming days in Israel must take place in Jerusalem. The incentives helped attract Dig, an American production headed by Israeli producer Gideon Raff, creator of Prisoners of War. At present, Jerusalem offers the only TV series incentives in Israel.

Israel is working on changing the rules to expand support for production to include television. Honig predicts that the change will come in 2018, possibly even in the first half of the year.

“When the national program comes in, our incentives will be available on top of any national incentive,” Honig explains.

“So if a production gets X percent from Israel, it can also access our local benefits by shooting in Jerusalem.”

For Katriel Schory, the executive director of the Israel Film Fund, the main issue is not the rules but the actual money earmarked for production support. The fund that he heads has an annual budget of $6 million, but all of that goes to feature films. “We are not allowed to participate in or part-finance television productions. I pray, we all pray, that this will change. We have tried to enlarge the fund to make it possible to invest in, say, a three-part miniseries, but we don’t even have enough for the movies we’re supposed to support. We’re in negotiations for a new amount of money by the end of the year, but who knows how it will go with this government.”

ISLAND NEWCOMER Mauritius is in the early stages of building production infrastructure and that’s reflected in the generosity of its incentive package, which offers a cash rebate of 30 percent of qualifying expenditure, including travel to Mauritius and accommodation. There is no ceiling on the amount and it is available to domestic film production companies registered in Mauritius, including those with 100 percent foreign ownership.

The scheme covers telemovies or drama series, plus episodes of factual, natural history, lifestyle or magazine programs. For TV drama, there is a minimum production spend in Mauritius of $50,000.

The impact of the incentive program has been dramatic, according to Sachin Jootun, the director of the Mauritius Film Development Corporation (MFDC). “Before the incentive program, not much was happening in Mauritius,” he says. “Now we are starting to attract productions from Hollywood and Europe, as well as India. Once a few productions come, others follow. We are hoping to see plenty of television series taking advantage of what we offer.”

He indicates that speed is a big selling point. “We process applications and respond within five months. Once a production is finished, the rebate is paid within six weeks, at most, from completion.”

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The Jerusalem Film & Television Fund offers incentives for productions set in the Israeli city.

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Morocco doubled as Saudi Arabia in the 2016 Tom Hanks movie A Hologram for the King.

He adds that Mauritius also has the advantage of being a secure, politically stable country.

For any country, the challenge of attracting an influx of production is being able to provide the local infrastructure and personnel.

“Having the skills base means that foreign productions can reduce their international crews,” notes Film Afrika’s van As. “It used to be that every head of department had to fly over and be accommodated. Now, most productions only need to bring over the director and perhaps the designer and director of photography. We also have the production infrastructure.

That means you don’t need to bring in equipment.”

TRAINING DAY Since 2008, the South African industry has invested in building a skills base. This was done through private funding. “We now have at least 200 trainees per year going through the program,” van As says. “It’s a mentorship program and interns are placed on productions to learn on the job. Now South African crews are being recruited to work outside of the country. This is a wonderful result as the crew returns to South Africa with more experience and international recognition.”

Abu Dhabi’s ADFC helps develop skills by “moving people who have worked on Arabic-language series over to Hollywood or Bollywood productions so that they can gain knowledge,” Al Nowais says.

Neighboring Dubai is also focusing on building local know-how so that it can reach the next stage of development as a production center. “At the moment, Dubai’s local talent pool is small, which is hindering the development of a genuine local ecosystem,” DFTC’s Al Sharif says. “We have been playing a key role in developing and supporting local talent and creative individuals, ensuring they are provided with the right conditions to express their creativity and make productions.”

A new initiative launched by DFTC is VIDXB, the region’s first annual gathering celebrating the world of online video. It will take place from December 8 to 9, 2017, at the Dubai World Trade Centre. The event will kick off a year-round series of programs to promote local content, showcase emerging tech-

nologies and facilitate skills development for Dubai’s growing digital media talent pool.

Other talent-building platforms in Dubai include in5, an enabling platform for entrepreneurs and start-ups, offering access to investors, and YouTube Space at Dubai Studio City, an incubator space giving YouTube creators from across the region free access to high-end audio, visual and editing equipment, in addition to training programs, workshops and networking events.

SPREADING THE WEALTH As the global drama business continues to boom, the question now is, will other countries begin offering incentives?

“The challenge in Africa is that the wealth is mainly in the far north and the far south,” says EP Financial Solutions’ Hadity.

“The countries in the middle are just not in a position to offer much. There might be an opportunity in Kenya, but I don’t see anything happening soon.”

Namibia has also been talking about getting into the act since Mad Max Fury Road. In North Africa, Tunisia has potential but is hindered by a perception of political instability, according to Hadity, who was involved in financing the Oscar-winning The English Patient there. “Production has happened there and there is a traditional connection with the Italians, but I think that the location between Algeria and Libya is a drawback, especially for Americans.”

In the Middle East, Jordan might be joining the competition with incentives before too long. Hopes for new initiatives were fanned when Princess Rym Ali spoke at an event hosted

by Jordan’s Royal Film Commission during the Cannes Film Festival in late May. “Jordan is trying hard,” Hadity says. “They appear to be deep into conversations about creating incentives. I see a fair chance that a new policy might be announced by spring of 2018.”

While new competitors mull getting into the game, generous incentives have already put those countries offering them high on the list of potential destinations for many producers. It’s a pretty safe bet that others will be joining them in coming years.

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