Eighteen months ago, Guy Shimoni said, no one wanted to hear about microdramas. Now, the founder and CEO of Shortical says Hollywood is knocking on his door.
The founder said the once-taboo format is drawing interest from traditional entertainment players who see the revenues coming in. At TheGrill 2026, Shimoni joined Mansa co-founders David Oyelowo and Nate Parker and aTwist CEO Jana Winograde to discuss how the microdrama boom is opening new avenues for talent, experimentation and investment as Hollywood’s traditional pipelines contract.
Oyelowo and Parker co-founded their streaming platform Mansa to platform Black creative voices. Within the last year, that expansion has included an increased investment into vertical storytelling.
The multi-hyphenates came from the traditional entertainment ecosystem — Oyelowo known for starring in films like “Selma” and “Queen of Katwe,” Parker for directing and starring in “The Birth of a Nation” — but realized they could do more for marginalized voices in the lower-budget space.
“It was about embracing a process that we had been forced into just by being filmmakers of color,” Parker, co-founder and CEO of Mansa, said onstage at the DGA Theater. “Not everyone can make a film for $5 million, $10 million, $20 million, so the idea of having to make something that is good, fast and cheap is constantly the Rubik’s Cube that we had to solve.”
Mansa’s verticals range from production budgets of $100,000 to $250,000. These productions allow for more iteration and testing in real time. Oyelowo said that audiences have been supportive of their experimentation, too.
“There’s a lot of malleability. You can really test the market,” Oyelowo said. “You can really test the audience, and they will go along with you because they’re enjoying even that process of you testing what it is that they’re gravitating towards, without it being the thing that’s going to tank your business.”
For Shortical’s Guy Shimoni, that iteration has included a greater investment in AI. The company is set to release a feature-length AI film “Inevitable” later this month. Shortical is set to do $100 million in revenue by the end of the year. Shimoni says that is in large part because of the scale they are able to create by using AI filmmaking tools.
“Our business has doubled ever since we started rolling out AI content. We’re able to do more genres. We have superheroes going on,” he told me at TheGrill. “Ever since we started rolling out our AI content, we’ve been able to double down on serialized content, and we are now doing longer series, not 60 minutes any more.”
Shortical has a microdrama series in the works with James Franco. As their business grows, Shimoni said that this is not the only interest he has gotten from the traditional players.
“I think 18 months ago when we started talking about short form content, mobile streaming, microdramas, no one wanted to hear about it. It was a taboo,” he said. “Now everyone is knocking on our door and looking for ways because they see the revenues coming in.”
He imagines that this trend will continue with AI content in the years to come as the industry eases its frustrations with the technology.
aTwist co-founder and CEO Jana Winograde was previously a television executive for decades of her career. The professional pivot to microdramas was largely because of the growing opportunity in the space.
The company has established a slew of traditional entertainment partnerships even before they officially launched in early September. Winograde and her partners are using a traditional entertainment playbook to hook audiences on serialized content.
Winograde in particular was heartened by the microdramas industry’s ability to platform emerging talent. While they have some celebrity cameos, including Mario Lopez, the platform largely uses vertical stars or highlights unknown talent.
“As Nate has said, there are so many amazing actors in this space that do not have the opportunity to work right now that we have had the opportunity to work with, and it’s been amazing. It’s not just actors; it’s directors, it’s writers,” Winograde said.
“It just doesn’t seem that there are the same opportunities for people who are unbelievably talented to get their break, and we’re really proud to be giving people that opportunity.”
For Mansa, they wanted to platform emerging talent, too, but also fill a gap in the market for Black storytelling.
“One of the reasons we started Mansa is to continue to populate the pipeline with people who look like us, with diverse stories from around the world,” Oyelowo said. “You see contraction in every part of the industry and what microdramas present is a fiscally responsible, possible and plausible way to put people to work to cultivate talent.”
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