Snabba Cash/A Man Called Ove producer on his alliance with author Jens Lapidus

Strive Stories is set to become a major creative force in the Nordics, through the partnership between former criminal lawyer, best-selling author and executive producer Jens Lapidus (Snabba Cash, Top Dog) and former SF Studios producer Nicklas Wikström Nicastro (A Man Called Ove, Alex, co-producer of The Happiest Day in the Life of Olli Mäki).

After their successful collaboration on the SF Studios/Viaplay series The Lawyer S1-2 (based on a concept by Lapidus), the partners’ first production under their Strive Stories banner is season 2 of the critically-acclaimed Netflix show Snabba Cash, produced with SF Studios.
Producer Wikström Nicastro is reunited with head-writer Oskar Söderlund and director Jesper Ganslandt. The upcoming six new episodes continue the story of Leya (Evin Ahmad) and her contrasting life between a ruthless start-up environment and Stockholm’s underworld. The premiere Netflix is set for 2022.

We spoke to Wikström Nicastro.

You announced in April the launch of Strive Stories with Jens Lapidus. How and why did you decide to set up your own indie production house?
Nicklas Wikström Nicastro: Our first collaboration started with the TV series The Lawyer, but I first got to know Jens when my brother Fredrik [Wikström Nicastro] produced the Snabba Cash [Easy Money] films based on his “Stockholm Noir” trilogy books for SF Studios. After two seasons of The Lawyer, Jens and I started discussing the idea of expanding the Snabba Cash universe and transferring the story to contemporary Stockholm. This is how the crime trilogy evolved as a TV series. We then attached screenwriter Oskar Söderlund and director Jesper Ganslandt.

At the same time, I had been happy at SF Studio, but I started craving for something else than always having to ‘make things work’, ahead of a set shooting date. I was keen to step back, to redefine the type of projects I want to produce and the type of collaborations to develop with talent.

This is when Jens approached me, with his immense energy. He had put his lawyer career on hold and said: why can’t we do something together?

What is your vision for Strive Stories?
NWN: Both Jens and I share the same ambition of competing at the highest level with the big players on the international market. We do great things in the Nordics, and we’re privileged that people are interested in what we do, but there is always room for improvement.

We want to build our company on two things:

• firstly, I really think that we need to tell stories that are more than entertainment. A lot of companies and talents do this, but somehow, they get stuck in an arthouse segment and forget about the audience. That’s not what we want. We want to focus on the audience as well. A Man Called Ove had a strong theme, and was entertaining at the same time. Snabba Cash is an entertaining crime series, but again, it has a lot of layers and tackles important social issues. It has obviously struck a chord with Netflix viewers. Then when you look at Jens’ books - be it his children or adult-oriented books - there is always a deeper meaning to the stories.
  Today, the audience is so much smarter. People want to be challenged. I really believe that.
• secondly, we believe in the team effort and power of the team. We want to build a culture where the creative process is the number one focus, where creative producers and talents run the show, where the best talents are gathered to create the best possible content for film and TV. My job as a producer, is to help, coach and push talents so that they will perform at the top, to the best of their abilities.

Do you see a new wave of talents taking charge of their IPs and projects? Besides you, author Camilla Läckberg has recently teamed up with actor Alexander Karim and his brother, director Baker Karim…
NWN: You do see a number of smaller companies, popping up here and there. And I do believe there will be a boom in the Nordic landscape with more talents setting up their own indie shop. However, to survive, you need to combine creative and business forces. This is precisely what we’re offering with Jens.

How do you intend to expand your team, and do you envisage opening offices in other Nordic countries than Sweden?
NWN: Our plan is to hire 1-2 producers by the end of the year. We do need to have a certain size and the right structure around creatives, to let them focus on their job, not on managing the cashflow and financing. Regarding a footprint in other Nordic countries, this is not our goal. I think it’s better to have a strong base in Sweden and work from there.

Are you keen to develop projects across the Nordics, alongside English language content?
NWN: We’re stronger in Sweden, but we’re considering stories from Norway and Denmark. Language-wise, right now 9 out of 10 ideas are in Scandinavian languages, but we have a few in English-language as well.

What’s on your current slate?
NWN: We’ve just had the greenlit on Snabba Cash season 2, our very first Strive Stories production, co-produced with SF Studios for Netflix. Oskar [Söderlund] and Jesper [Ganslandt] are attached again as well as Evin Ahmad who gives an outstanding performance. Then we have a number of other projects in development that are being discussed with various platforms and financiers. We’re constantly looking for original ideas and negotiating book rights.

What’s your vision for the feature film side?
NWN: It’s an extreme situation in Sweden right now, where the confidence on the TV side is so much higher than on the film side. All platforms, broadcasters are launching fantastic shows -Nent Group, Netflix, C More/TV4, SVT-they all deliver amazing quality content, edgy projects. On the film side, it’s much more difficult. On top of that, you have the pandemic. That said, I love films and at Strive Studios, we want to put efforts into feature film as well.

For you what are the main reasons for the ‘existential’ crisis in Swedish film?
NWN: We do have the talent, but along the way, we’ve lost the connection with the audience. There have been a few quality arthouse films that haven’t really managed to cross-over, then many mainstream family films and comedies, playing the safe card. We haven’t been able to make our films relevant, attractive, or urgent enough. Swedes seem to have a negative vision of Swedish films-that’s not the case with Swedish TV shows. We have to break that pre-conception. The film sector needs a proper shake-up. We have to take risks to restart the machine.