EXCLUSIVE: Norway‘s latest format obsession, The Box, is getting a second season.
Commercial broadcaster TV2 has ordered a second run of the adventure reality format, in which celebrity contestants placed in separate boxes find themselves dumped in the middle of challenges that they know nothing about. Seafood TV will return to produce.
In Norway, the show launched earlier this month, and its first episode has now consolidated to over a million views, according to producers — no mean feat in a country of just over five million people.
In each episode, contestants immediately find themselves in the middle of a challenge when their yellow box opens and must work out what to do, working with the others to achieve the goal. Each ep ends with a pair of contestants engaging in a duel to stay in the game.
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Seafood TV, the Norwegian indie producer that makes the show, has also been shopping it internationally itself, and we understand another deal with an undisclosed network has set to be be announced. This follows remake agreements with RTL Nederlands and TV2 in Denmark, and Seafood’s Chief Creative Officer, Aleksander Herresthal, has said six local versions are in the works.
The producer had initially sold the idea directly to TV2 in Norway off paper, an unusual and rarely-seen deal type. Known for shows such as survivalist format Kompani Lauritzen (Celebrity Task Force), the biz decided to sell The Box directly, allowing execs to pitch direct to networks.
“We think we have something really special and the reason we did the distribution was Kompani was a hard sell, because distributors would say it is similar to SAS: Who Dares Wins, even though it isn’t,” Herresthal told Deadline. “It’s easier if you pitch yourself, because you have the passion for the project. You are selling yourself and people see that passion. With so many big groups around, you have to find new ways of doing business.”
Entertainment formats are in vogue this January, as the return of The Traitors in the UK and U.S. have driven viewing and media discussion. The start of the year tends to be when many big reality series drop in Europe and the U.S., with the colder weather keeping people indoors during the week. Several other big shows such as The Apprentice are set to drop this month around the world.
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