Founders Sofie Wanting Hassing, Thomas Gammeltoft, and Millennium producer Ole Søndberg flash European ambitions for their United Artists-inspired group, working with talents Mads Brügger and Kim Fupz Aakeson among others.

The company is being launched this week at the Göteborg’s TV Drama Vision platform.

Founded on the principle of sharing rights ownership with talents and offering them a fully integrated structure of financing, production and distribution, Copenhagen-based True Content Entertainment (TCE) is the new name for the existing group Sweet Chili Entertainment.

The company boasts an impressive group of internationally-established Nordic professionals, backed by solid private financiers including Aino Kann Rasmussen, daughter of Velux founder Villum Kann Rasmussen.

CEO Sofie Wanting Hassing has more than 20-years experience in film & TV and most recently executive-produced the Norwegian series Atlantic Crossing. Executive producer Ole Søndberg was co-founder of the illustrious Scandi brand Yellow Bird and produced over 150 hours of film & TV dramas, including the best-selling Millennium film trilogy and Wallander series. TCE’s creative director Thomas Gammeltoft is a former producer (Shake it All About, Terribly Happy) and CEO of the Copenhagen Film Fund.

“Sofie and Ole contacted me while I was still at the Copenhagen Film Fund, and pitched their idea to set up a united company with talents,” explained Gammeltoft to nordicfilmandtvnews.com. “After numerous discussions, we had interesting thoughts that have now materialised. We also changed our company name from Sweet Chili Entertainment to True Content Entertainment as this is more in sync to what we do.”

In a joint statement the partners said: “True Content Entertainment represents an alternative to the business-as-usual of the movie industry. We believe that the status quo has long ago shown its inherent limitations, both in terms of fairness, quality and creativity. We believe that it is time to unite the forces behind every great story. “

“Our key words are united, transparency and trust,” added Gammeltoft. “We are only as good as our talent, the films and TV series that we produce and distribute.”

Wanting Hassing said the idea also grew from the feedback she got from talents over the years. “We heard that talents were frustrated about the lack of transparency with producers not always sharing rights, IPs with them, so we found a new take on collaborating with talents. We are basically offering them fairer contracts and partnerships.”

Søndberg added: I’ve worked a lot on crime content in the past, and needed something else. I had also distanced myself from talents and really missed that direct contact. I felt that the best way to be close to them was to share rights with them, the control of their projects and this is now a dream come true.”

For Søndberg, the idea is not to flag out this new venture at talents, but to start a process with each one of them and let it grow organically.

Another specificity of TCE’s business model is that each talent will remain separate with his/her project and company, co-owned by the Danish group. “I’ve had companies in the past with creatives, and it can create problems,’ noted Gammeltoft. “Sometimes it starts with four partners and you end up with two. Here talents don’t need to be involved with each other, and we will honour each talent and IP separately. We will be manufacturing something specific for each and every project. But the talents can still work together.”

So far, talents attached to TCE include some of Denmark’s household names. High profile documentary filmmaker and TV personality Mads Brügger (The Mole, Cold Case Hammarskjöld, The Red Chapel), prolific screenwriters Kim Fupz Aakeson (A Somewhat Gentleman, A Soap, HBO’s Welcome to Utmark) and Nikolaj Scherfig (Scandinavian Star, The Bridge episodic writer). More talents are in discussion to join them.

“What attracts me to TCE is the ability to share similar goals and most importantly, ownership of a project, an important lesson that I’ve discovered a bit late in my life,” admitted Brügger who will be show-running his first TV project for TCE, the heist series CumEx.

The ambition for TCE is also to expand beyond the Nordic region: “We are already working on some projects with French, German talents and Sofie, Ole and I have wide international networks. We are not nationality-restricted,” claimed Gammeltoft.

In terms of content, TCE will be looking at all genres and formats, but stories have to be important, as explained by the former Copenhagen Film Fund CEO. “We want stories that mirror the world we live in, the way we live, but they have to be told in an entertaining way to catch wide audiences.”

Three high quality projects in development are on TCE’s slate:

  • CumEx (8x45’ series), created by Germany’s Sebastian Colley (How to Tell Drugs Online, Kroymann). Mads Brügger will serve as show-runner. The series is produced by Ole Søndberg, Caroline Eybye and Michael Polle. Germany’s X-Filme is co-producing.

    The satirical TV series is based on the true story of a group of unscrupulous men who partnered bankers and lawyers to rob European tax payers of over €63 billion, making it the largest heist in the history of world economy.

  • Our House (8x52’ series’), created by Jean Baptiste Delafon (Baron Noir) and Karen Stokkendal Poulsen (The Agreement), with world established Tony Grisoni (The Young Pope) as development executive producer. France’s About premium Conetn (APC) and Belgium’s Czar Films are co-producing.
    Thomas Gammeltoft, Laurent Boissel and Eurydice Geisel act as executive producers.

    Insightful and entertaining drama set in the heart of European institutions. It centres on a young activist, human rights lawyer Sigrid Winther, who is taken in to Danish politics and soon after sent to Brussels as Commissioner for Promoting the European Way of Life. Her political journey becomes a journey into a secret past as she is suddenly being faced with strange family ties within the highest levels of European politics.

  • LIV Feature film written by Kim Fupz Aakeson, to be directed by Hans Petter Moland. The two collaborated earlier on the multi-awarded A Somewhat Gentleman and In Order of Disappearance. Thomas Gammeltoft and Caroline Eybye are producing.

    It’s a reverse refugee story, set in a not too distant future. Rosa (14), Niklas (9) and their parents are on their way to Turkey, fleeing a collapsed Scandinavia and Europe due to climate change. The two children get separate from their parents and only by rebuilding trust with the people around them can they arrive safe and sound to their destination.