« Home | Lebanese Forces militia rearming » | Syria's Grand Mufti accepts Pope's apology » | The view from Italy » | Syria and the US working together » | Last Israeli troops to leave Lebanon by Friday » | Israel wants to prosecute MPs who visited Syria an... » | How to get Hizbollah to disarm, an easy guide » | US: Syria is doing a good job on the Lebanese border » | Evidence that a Syrian opposition party is working... » | Germany: give Syria a bigger role in international... » 

Sunday, September 24, 2006 

Syria takes over the Arab World

Today the airwaves are filled with the Syrian dialect.

Syria is once again producing most of the Arab World's Ramadan television. A quick flick through the channels shows Syrian series on almost every channel. From the classical Arabic history dramas on Moroccan TV, to the comedies on Tunisian TV and the challenging socio-political dramas on TV stations in the Gulf.

Ramadan has begun across the world. It is the Muslim holy month of fasting. The evenings are lit up with food and musalsalaat - the TV series which run every day through the month.

30 episodes are produced, starting at the beginning of the month, and climaxing just before Eid. And they don't stray away from tough subjects.

Syria's 'Gazelles in the forest of Wolves' deals with poverty, abuse of women, and independence.

Damascus is one of the Arab World's most active TV production centres. More than 100 private companies operate here, it's considered something of a creative centre. And they are given relatively free reign to produce what they like.

The Heathens tackles terrorist attacks - with the action shifting from city to city.

Egypt, the traditional entertainment heavyweight, is producing 50 series - Syria has created 45. But look at the figures here: Syria has sold rights to all of its programmes, Egypt was struggling to sell half of them last week.

And looking at the quality of production, it is clear that much has improved over the last year in Syria. Egyptian production, while still one of the most important, is criticised for sloppy technical detail.

And Syria is entering new markets like Morocco, by producing dramas in classical Arabic, where the Syrian dialect is not widely understood.

This is a clear indication to the inovations that the Syrians can do when the Gov is off their back ,the Syrian Gov should take that and give more freedom to Syrian on the economic front and setle for taxing profit and stop setting prices for everything from coffee to Nargeli to intrance ,let the maket deside the prices.norman

Post a Comment

About me

  • Written by sasa
  • From Damascus, Syria
  • From Damascus to London via Beirut. Based in and out of the central Damascene hamlet of Saroujah. News and feelings from the streets every day. I'm talking rubbish? Leave a comment. Welcome to the information democracy. See below for info about this site.
My profile

Syria News Wire discussion

Syria News Wire - the most comprehensive source of Syrian news on the web

  • The Syria News Wire now provides news for Cafe-Syria. To find out how to get exclusive Syrian news for your site, click here.

Get Syria News Wire EMAIL UPDATES

  • the important stuff: you can cancel any time, your email address wont be used for anything except Syria News Wire updates - this is an ad-free site
  • Enter your email address below to subscribe to The Syria News Wire...


Archives