Now that short soapy series coming out of Asia have caught the eye of major American studios and streamers, production on bite-size mobile-first dramas has been thriving in Hollywood North.

Vancouver director Brianne Nord-Stewart recalls seeing a Facebook post looking for someone to helm One Last Temptation Before I Say I Do, a vertical microdrama for the Singapore-based short drama platform GoodShort to shoot locally.

An initially skeptical Nord-Stewart tells The Hollywood Reporter she eventually said yes to the gig because she knew the super short drama’s producer, Sammie Astaneh, and had served as an intimacy coordinator on a half-dozen other local microdrama shoots. “I figured, because it was Sammie, the (production) would be at a standard that I would want to be involved with in making sure the crew was well taken care of. That was my biggest concern,” she recounts.

Directing the fast-paced ultrashort set around a high-stakes dating reality show where eight contestants in a luxurious mansion explore different partners has also been about getting behind a microdrama production boom in Vancouver. “I thought, if I’m going to direct a vertical, it’s going to be because I’m looking to invest in relationships,” Nord-Stewart explains.

Other creatives and crews in Vancouver also chasing work have embraced the city’s watershed moment in microdrama production as much else in traditional film and TV remains uncertain. Having already got to the pinnacle of America film and TV as a major production hub for the major studios and streamers, the Canadian west coast city has now got in on the ground floor as China’s microdrama format boom reaches North America.

“I joke and say they’re like the cockroach of film. I don’t mean they’re gross or they’re lesser,” adds Monika Dalman, a Vancouver-based casting director and consulting producer on microdramas who cast One Last Temptation Before I Say I Do. She has worked with around 20 microdrama apps like GoodShort on local shoots.

The Source: https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/business/business-news/vancouver-vertical-microdrama-factory-1236451859/