Karan Johar joins hands with Viacom18 Studios for four films
What's the story
Director-producer Karan Johar announced a new partnership with Viacom18 Studios today.
Sharing a picture with Dharma Productions Chief Executive Officer Apoorva Mehta and Viacom18 Chief Operating Officer Ajit Andhare, the filmmaker celebrated an upcoming "exhilarating time for Indian cinema."
As per industry sources, the two brands will be collaborating on four movies.
This news comes a day after Johar's exclusive Netflix tie-up ended.
Announcement
Johar: 'It's time to usher in new & fresh stories'
Posting the picture, Johar wrote, "It's time to usher in new & fresh stories and pave [the] way to an exhilarating time for Indian cinema! Excited to have @Viacom18Studios, steered by @AndhareAjit as our pillars of strength! See you at the movies."
Along with him, Mehta and Andhare also shared the news.
However, none of them detailed the nature of the collaboration.
Twitter Post
Check out Johar's post here!
It's time to usher in new fresh stories and pave way to an exhilarating time for Indian cinema! Excited to have @Viacom18Studios, steered by @AndhareAjit as our pillars of strength! See you at the movies🎬@apoorvamehta18 @DharmaMovies pic.twitter.com/6zQ8aj1yyK
— Karan Johar (@karanjohar) September 22, 2021
Stars
The collaboration will be covering these big projects
Trade analyst Taran Adarsh gave insight into what projects will the studios be working together on.
The projects are going to be Ranveer Singh-Alia Bhatt-led Rocky Aur Rani Ki Prem Kahani; Neetu Kapoor's comeback movie Jug Jugg Jeeyo, starring Varun Dhawan and Kiara Advani; Shakun Batra's next with Deepika Padukone, Ananya Panday, Siddhant Chaturvedi; and, Mr. Lele (starring Advani, Vicky Kaushal, Bhumi Pednekar).
Old relationship
Dharmatic Entertainment content no longer bound to Netflix
Notably, this new deal comes just after Netflix called off its exclusive deal with Johar's digital content studio, Dharmatic Entertainment.
Under this 2019 contract, all Dharmatic content had to exclusively go to the streaming giant.
According to Economic Times, the two will continue to work on the projects already in the planning but any scope of collaboration after that is unclear.
Timeline
Earlier, Dharma was reportedly in talks with Lyca Productions
The partnership between Dharma and Viacom18 has been on the cards for a few months now.
To recall, back in June, reports had suggested Viacom18 has acquired the distribution rights of the "entire forthcoming slate" of Dharma.
After Johar's contract with Fox Star Studios fell through, he was in talks with Lyca Productions but that didn't work out either.
Thereafter, Viacom18 entered the picture.