Viaplay expands content offer in Netherlands, Poland
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Editor
| 17 February 2023
Showing no signs of stopping its recent wave of activity in reaching new territories, Viaplay Group has now announced that it is to premiere its first Dutch film and has unveiled its second scripted commission for Poland.
Viaplay Holland 17Feb2023
Viaplay already has more than 1.2 million subscribers in the Netherlands after its streaming service launched in the country on 1 March 2022 and offers a portfolio of Viaplay Films and Series, local and international content as well as premium sports.

The shooting of the film is underway in Amsterdam with a title to be announced at a later stage. It comprises a sharp comedy set around a Christmas dinner where nothing goes as planned, in late 2023. Viewers get to follow a dysfunctional family in the two weeks leading up to their annual festive dinner. Brechtje is a 60-year-old woman who gets cancelled by the entire nation and has no idea why. Martijn is hopelessly in love with his much younger colleague, Bob is stuck with a useless husband and Justus is on a hyper-masculine quest. Finally, Jos is an unstoppable advocate for the most open-minded world possible... until her girlfriend wants a threesome.

The film is directed by Michael Middelkoop in his debut feature and produced by HALAL. The writers are Lotte Tabbers and Isis Mihrimah Cabolet, and the producer is Gijs Kerbosch at HALAL with Kennard Bos as executive producer for Viaplay Group. The film is sold internationally by Viaplay Content Distribution.

Meanwhile in Poland, Viaplay has commissioned eight-part original dramatic comedy Stroke created by acclaimed playwright and screenwriter Paweł Demirski and which will premiere exclusively on the streaming platform in 2023. It stars Jacek Poniedziałek as a Warsaw bon vivant and popular TV host whose life is suddenly turned upside down. Poniedziałek plays a restaurant critic, TV celebrity and the gay king of Warsaw for whom a stroke changes everything and is forced to reassess his priorities and to reinvent himself on a dramatic scale.

“I came up with the idea for this series in spring 2019. No-one had yet heard of the coronavirus pandemic, but there was already a feeling in the air, in cinema and theatre, that things were somehow burning out Paweł Demirski. “Jacek offers another view on the world – one of vitality, of believing that the best is yet to come and that the last word has not yet been said. I am glad that we could turn this idea into a series together with Viaplay.”