While summing up the last decade, the 2025 anniversary edition also looked into our industry’s future: “We will rather want something that we can feel part of, than something meant to be liked by everyone”.
After the so-called drama bubble burst not too long ago, the times are undeniably still challenging for the Nordic drama industry. Allegedly, the amount of work for professionals within Norwegian film and series has decreased by 40 per cent during the last two years, as pointed out in more than one of the sessions at this year’s Oslo Series Days (Seriedagene Oslo).
In spite of this rather bleak situation, the general mood at the anniversary edition of the series festival in the Norwegian capital was certainly not all doomy and gloomy, with a programme that provided insights, inspiration and plentiful presentations of upcoming series highlights.
“We want the Oslo Series Days to be an arena for learning, motivation, inspiration and networking,” the Series Days’ project manager Line Engelsås tells Nordisk Film & TV Fond. “It is important for us to take the industry’s challenges seriously, such as in the session where the tax incentive scheme was discussed. At the same time, the Industry Day should primarily be an arena where you can learn from and be inspired by skilled colleagues from home and abroad,” she says, adding that the Series Days focused particularly on Artificial Intelligence through several sessions this year.
Oslo Series Days is divided into an Industry Day, which took place on Thursday 25 September, and a Masterclass Day on the following date. In addition, the event includes the talent workshop New Voices, as well as a pre-premiere audience screening of the first two episodes of NRK’s new series A Better Man (Ølhunden Berit), during the same week.
The Industry Day gathered around 400 attendants, mainly consisting of Norwegian industry professionals, for a packed programme of talks, discussions and presentations spread across three auditoriums.
Last year, the Series Days wanted to bring hope and inspiration in a dark time for the industry. Was it also an aim this year to look beyond the challenges?
“We seek a balance in the programme, where we both address the challenges that the people in the industry are concerned about and try to talk more about solutions than problems, while we also aim to have content that provides motivation and inspiration,” Engelsås explains.
“We feel that people are definitely aware of the challenges, but we don't think this year's event was characterised by that. What we do notice, however, is that these are people who love their industry and genuinely want to create, learn and share,” she says about her impression of the attending industry members.
While most of the programme focused on what’s ahead, the anniversary edition’s Industry Day started with production house Rubicon’s CEO (and former head of NRK’s Drama department) Ivar Køhn giving a “recap” of the last ten years of Norwegian fiction series production. No less suitable for the anniversary, Köhn opened with the curious fact that his talk was held on the exact same date as the first episode of NRK’s tremendously successful youth series Skam (created by Julie Andem) was published online, on 25 September ten years ago. Also tapping into the backdrop from prior times, Köhn shared an overview of key moments and productions during the last decade, which has seen a remarkable growth and strengthening of Norwegian fiction series, including four Emmy awards.
As many have noticed, Norwegian feature films are presently enjoying unprecedented international success, with for instance Sentimental Value (Affeksjonsverdi) by Joachim Trier winning the Grand Prix in Cannes, and Dag Johan Haugerud’s Dreams (Drømmer) being awarded the Golden Bear at the Berlinale this year. At least to a certain extent, it can be argued that this position is shared by Norwegian series, which have received much and prestigious international acclaim lately as well. Not least at Canneseries in April, where NRK’s A Better Man won three and TV 2’s Nepobaby took two prizes, and NRK’s docuseries The Agent – The Life and Lies of My Father (Agenten – pappas liv og løgner) won one award. Adding to this, the Sámi/Norwegian youth drama series Shut Up! (Oro jaska – Hold kjeft), also from NRK, was recently nominated for The International Emmy Awards in the category Kids: Live-Action.
In the session Engelsås referred to earlier, a panel consisting of industry representatives and politicians discussed the Norwegian Film and Series Production Incentive scheme, which was established in 2016. In line with what seems to be a more or less general consensus among the Norwegian industry, the representatives in the panel presented their wishes for the scheme to be more automatic, and thereby more predictable for the productions. Apparently, and perhaps surprisingly, they were met with both understanding and a rather broad agreement among the attending party members from various sides of the political spectrum. Of course, actual changes to the scheme’s guidelines remain to be decided and manifested. And, undoubtedly, further debated before that might happen.
In their overview of what has happened since the industry got together at Oslo Series Days one year ago, researchers and analysts Vilde Schanke Sundet from Oslo Met and Nils Petter Strømmen from Kantar shed statistical light on shifting viewer habits, including variations between age groups, among other valuable insights.
The one who looked most and furthest into the future among the Series Days programme was the Danish author, trend forecaster and communications agency founder Julia Lahme. In her keynote speech, she outlined major trends and forces that will shape our future, highlighting a rising trend of more body centric living. In her predictions, based on signs of the times we are already living in, the body is back, with an emphasis on all things human – not least as a reaction to the ever more present Artificial Intelligence.
As part of this heightened focus on what it means to be a human being, Lahme claimed that we will not only refuse to be viewed as consumers. We are entering an age of no age, where we will no longer behave according to age or let age define us – making the concept of age-centred target groups obsolete, potentially even offensive. If this sounds like a call for even broader, mass-appealing productions, that does not seem to be the case. In the trend forecaster’s view, we will rather want something that we can feel part of, than something meant to be liked by everyone. This means that the blockbusters will disappear, while narrower and highly niche-oriented content will thrive. Her refreshing lecture, which we are not giving full justice in this brief resume, also described coming concepts such as ephemeral (as in non-physical) consumption and an economy of empathy and emotions.
When touching upon AI, Lahme argued that we have already stopped being afraid of it. Although she also noted that we are about to generally care less about AI, it still seemed appropriate that the sections highlighting AI at the Series Days focused more on the possibilities than the threats from this new technology. The speakers included filmmaker, writer and media creative Albert Bozesan and writers/directors Sam Stephens and Edmond Yang, who gave different perspectives on storytelling and AI, as well as a panel discussion.
We will not go through the whole programme in this report, but nonetheless give highly honourable mentions of two other international speakers. Australian script executive Louise Bowes shared her experiences on the writing and production of one of the world’s longest running series, Home and Away, while American Thomas Moran, writer and executive producer of series such as House M.D. and The Good Doctor, talked about key success factors for medical dramas. In addition to their respective sessions during the Industry Day, Bowes and Moran both gave more in-depth looks at their work and the processes behind them at the Masterclass Day.
Several Norwegian series soon to premiere were presented at the Oslo Series Days, among which the audience were treated with a sneak peak at the first episode of the beforementioned dramedy series Nepobaby from creators Henriette Steenstrup and Siri Seljeseth and director Gunnar Vikene. Prior to the screening, Steenstrup (who also plays one of the central characters), Vikene and actor Nicolai Cleve Broch took part in a talk about their collaboration on the already award-winning series.
Steenstrup was also one of the winners when the annual Series Critics’ Awards to Norwegian series were handed out as part of the Series Days. The fifth and final season of Pernille (Pørni), which she has created and in which she is also playing the titular character, won the prize for Best Comedy Series, while Requiem for Selina (Rekviem for Selina) took home both the award for Best Drama Series and Best Actor. The latter, gender-neutral prize was awarded Elli Rhiannon Müller Osborne for her lead role as the young influencer Selina in the miniseries.
The talent workshop New Voices also ended up with a winner. Out of 30 projects taking part in the workshop, ten are selected for pitching during the Industry Day, with a prize given by the Writers’ Guild of Norway chosen from these “pitching duels”. This year’s award went to Waad Amer for the project First Order Enclave.
A Better Man, Sentimental Value, Dreams, Nepobaby, Shut Up!, and Requiem for Selina are supported by NFTVF.
The Oslo Series Days is organised by Norwegian newspaper Aftenposten in collaboration with NRK, TV 2, Warner Bros Discovery, the Norwegian Film Institute, the Writers’ Guild of Norway, the Norwegian Film Workers’ Union, the Norwegian Producers' Association Virke, and Tono.
The Oslo Series Days’ programme committee: Behind from left: Cecilie Asker (Aftenposten), Jan Strande Ødegårdstuen (NRK), Arna Marie Bersås (NFI), Mimi Cejka (TV 2), Line Engelsås (Aftenposten) and Ingrid Åbergsjord (Aftenposten). In front f.l: Bahareh Badavi (Writers’ Guild of Norway) and Sunniva Bærug (Norwegian Film Workers’ Union). Not present: Willy Martinsen (Tono) and the representative from the Norwegian Producers' Association.
