Hotstar and Applause Entertainment join hands for four shows in 'Hotstar Specials'

In a recent announcement, one of India's popular OTT platforms, Hotstar, had announced Hotstar Specials with an aim to venture into the original digital content.

The development in the same is the news of the platform partnering with Applause Entertainment for the specials with an initial slate of four shows – ‘Criminal Justice’, ‘The Office’, ‘Hostages’ and ‘City Of Dreams’.

The announcement was made earlier this year and as per the industry buzz, this is expected to be a big leap in content space for the OTT platform. The four shows will be helmed by the country's renowned filmmakers and extremely talented entertainment professionals.

• ‘Criminal Justice’ led by Tigmanshu Dhulia and Vishal Furia will be an Indian adaptation of the hit British series starring Vikrant Massey, Pankaj Tripathi, Mita Vashisht, Anupriya Goenka and Jackie Shroff in lead roles. 
• ‘The Office’ which also stars an exciting ensemble will be the Indian adaptation of the international cult comedy helmed by Rohan Sippy and Debbie Rao and Vivek Bhushan.
• Nagesh Kukunoor's ‘City Of Dreams’ - a political drama with Mumbai's backdrop will see Atul Kulkarni, Sachin Pilgaonkar, Eijaz Khan, Priya Bapat, and Siddharth Chandekar
• ‘Hostages’ starring Ronit Roy, Tisca Chopra, and Parvin Dabas will be directed by renowned Sudhir Mishra

Talking about the same, Sanjay Gupta, MD Star India said, “With Hotstar Specials we hope to create the biggest Indian stories delivered to a billion screens. To bring this vision alive we are proud to partner with Applause Entertainment on our first set of Specials.”

Adding to this development, Sameer Nair, CEO, Applause Entertainment, shared his thought and said, “Hotstar is the leader of the streaming services in India and a perfect partner for us. We hope to entertain their audiences, to contribute in a small way to help achieve their business objectives and to ink a deeper, longer-term creative relationship with them.”

The new Hotstar Specials are expected to launch in March 2019.