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Netflix’s first original Mandarin series, Nowhere Man, is now available for streaming. Over two years in the making and featuring a star-studded cast led by Joseph Chang and Alyssa Chia, the entire drama was shot and produced in Taiwan. Yet behind the scenes, Netflix’s heavy-handed involvement in the creative process nearly caused director DJ Chen to quit in anger. Nowhere Man’s journey from nothing to completion demonstrates Netflix’s intrepid formula for conquering the globe with original cross-cultural production content.

On the eve of its fourth anniversary in Taiwan, Netflix released Nowhere Man, its first original Chinese-language series, this week.

“Original” means that Netflix was closely following throughout the production, from scripting to casting, shooting, and post-production.

Over the past three months, the Netflix Spain original series Money Heist accumulated 44 million subscriber views in a single month; The Naked Director, produced by Netflix Japan, set new ratings records for the channel; and Indonesia, Korea, and Brazil have all released fresh original content.

And now attention turns to Taiwan as Taiwan stands poised to become one of the world’s top-20 countries for original TV series.

Nowhere Man brings notable talent together, with Alyssa Chia, Mavis Fan, and Po-chieh Wang heading up a powerhouse cast whose star power is rare in Taiwanese television. More than a year ago, Netflix held an elaborate press conference to mark commencement of shooting on the series, yet remained incredibly tight-lipped about the show’s plot all along, priming the audience’s salivary glands.

Taiwanese Gangland, Chinese Worldview

According to Netflix’s synopsis, Nowhere Man tells the story of Ah Quan (played by Joseph Chang), a Death Row inmate waiting out his days in desperation. After learning of his son’s kidnapping, he schemes to break out of jail to save him, only to find himself mired in the thick of an even more perilous plot.

Nowhere Man director DJ Chen describes it as a “modern gangster saga” about a web of love, hate and redemption. On taking up the mantle as a touchstone for the Netflix Mandarin market, Chen says, “I certainly wanted to include a very Asian and Chinese worldview where everyone is interconnected, like different parts of a carving made from the same piece.

Erika North, Netflix’s International Director of Original Content, has been instrumental behind the scenes in getting original Mandarin dramas produced. (Photo by Kuo-Tai Liu/CW)

Erika North, international director of original content at Netflix, spent eight years at HBO Asia, where she ascended to become a top executive in the company’s program production department. The successful series The Teenage Psychic, a joint production of HBO Asia and Taiwan Public Television Service (PTS), is one of the series produced during her tenure there.

Tactic #1: Let Big Data Determine Topics, Make a Taiwanese-style Mafia Flick

Since coming to Netflix, North’s conversations often start something like this: “We’re a technology company…” Wielding Big Data as a weapon for choosing subject matter, she says, “Netflix is always looking for content that the market doesn’t currently have, and working to fill the gaps.”

Another key figure behind the scenes is executive producer Chen Wei-ru of InFocus Asia out of Singapore. Having collaborated with PTS on the documentary A Year in the Clouds: Smangus as well as A Town Called Success and The Teenage Psychic, she is no stranger to Taiwan.

Chen Wei-ru lived in Taiwan for a year and a half while shooting The Teenage Psychic, during which time she learned about the popularity of gangster films in Taiwan. From such films as Monga and Gatao, she slowly began to get a handle on what constitutes Taiwanese style. “I really love the warmth of interpersonal relationships in Taiwan, and the feelings so replete in Taiwanese stories and the choices people make in line with them,” she says.

When the two once again teamed up, they were determined to create a Taiwanese-style gangster film like no one had ever seen before.

Working from past experience and Netflix’s database, they first came up with certain keywords, including “chivalry, the death penalty, prison break, revenge plot.” Having established these as the general orientation, they then approached Taiwanese director DJ Chen.

Source: Netflix

Tactic #2: From “Character Design” to “People” - Breathing Life into Local Creatives

In 2004, then 23-year-old DJ Chen made a name for herself with Formula 17, a romantic comedy that broke the mold of sad and tragic LGBT movies to come away as the year’s top movie at the box office.

However, she turned away from that success by pursuing a career in short films and music videos, becoming the preferred director of pop stars like JJ Lin and A-Mei. This resulted in an absence of nearly seven years from making feature-length films.

So what prompted Netflix to approach her? “A lot of people highly recommend DJ (a nickname; Chen’s given name is Yin Jung), not because she’s won X amount of big awards, but because the things she films resonate with audiences. Plus, she is a director who is great at working with actors.” Chen Wei-ru speaks directly, noting that DJ is skilled at employing the elements of commercial genres.

Although Big Data helped identify market gaps, Netflix originals favor going to local movie directors and production teams to make TV series.

The idea behind using movie directors instead of TV directors is that “movie directors have stronger originality and perspective, to bring out different visual experiences,” says North.

Chen first made a splash with the rom-com Formula 17, taking the year’s box office crown. She subsequently turned to directing short films and music videos, taking her away from making a feature-length drama for seven years. (Photo by Kuo-Tai Liu/CW)

Netflix likes to use the buzzword of “authenticity” to describe the principle that guides how it finds subject matter in different places and looks for cooperative partners.

“Authenticity” has two levels: first is the director, language, history and culture, and location scouting, so that local audiences can identify better with a work, believing that “this is telling my story.” Second is the angle of plot development and character setting, and the human sentiment brought out in the drama, so as to resonate with viewers around the world.

Simply put: Tell local stories, distill universal values, and market to the global market.

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Under DJ Chen’s direction, Nowhere Man goes beyond set gangster film formulas with a script featuring multiple characters and multiple narrative threads to try to give each person in the drama a sympathetic side to further flesh the character out.

“These days, some dramas only go so far as character design, so that you might be able to guess how the character is described in words in the script, but cannot feel them. I want each character to be a ‘person,’ not a ‘cutout,’” says DJ Chen.

Tactic #3: Be True to OTT, Hook Everything, Be Relatable, the 15-minute Principle

“Hook! Hook! They always want a hook!” In relation to drama content, the “hook” can be understood as a lead, metaphor, or suspense. And while shooting Nowhere Man, “hook” is the English word that put the most fear in director Chen.

“What creator doesn’t know about hooks? But Netflix constantly drums it into you, treating it as the foundational element for communicating with viewers,” says Chen. Netflix has a formula for securing the bottom line to keep the target audience from constant interruptions. “Their experience and judgment in this area is very accurate,” she says.

“We’re an online platform, with no commercials, and no ground rules for episode length or number of episodes,” says North. But lack of restrictions can often be the most limiting.

Source: Netflix

Due to the fluid service nature of OTT (over-the-top) platforms, viewers can choose to watch on demand, and stop watching and walk away when not satisfied. As a subscription-based service, to keep members hooked, Netflix is extremely demanding on the rhythmic flow of each program, and is in fact so fastidious that it divides content into 15-minute units.

For instance, Netflix required that the door be opened wide enough during the first 15 minutes of Nowhere Man to entice potential viewers in for a look; each 15-minute interval must be linked with a hook so that people stay put, and know what they have to look forward to; each episode’s ending hits another crescendo of tension, using suspense and anticipation to lead to the next episode.

Tactic #4: Making It Real, From Conflict to Compromise

However, just on the verge of presenting Netflix with a work it could be satisfied with, DJ Chen almost failed to finish that last mile, as she got so upset with Netflix’s heavy involvement in the creative process that she came close to walking away.

Upon completion of the rough cut of Episode One of Nowhere Man, Netflix responded immediately with 40 suggestions, even going so far as to express a desire to switch up scenes, wiping clean the entire structure of the show’s eight episodes. They even provided five different visual revisions for director Chen to follow.

“What Netflix wanted, and what I could give… all the conflict occurred with Episode One,” Chen explains. The other side was afraid that it was not filled with enough emotion, and that the audience would have trouble following along; but she felt that the rhythm closely matched the plot, and wanted to leave appropriate room for the imagination. “Shouldn’t there be some room for people to investigate? You shouldn’t treat the audience as so stupid.”

Source: Netflix

This led to North making a special trip to Taiwan, and a six-hour discussion with Chen.

Chen told North that those changes would make a mess of everything, that no one would be accountable for making amends, and that the compromises would leave nobody happy. “I said, ‘Believe me. I’ll take responsibility for the final product.’” Ultimately the two sides reached a consensus, and Netflix no longer insisted on moving the general structure around, while Chen agreed to make various adjustments to details like background music.

“Everyone thinks that Netflix and IFA are very investor- or production-oriented. But this collaboration is an excellent educational opportunity for the Taiwanese (film and television) industry,” says Chen, adding: “Let’s be real. We’re both on the same side, and the task we have at hand is how to make something good.”

The series title, Nowhere Man, also suggests someone in limbo, and the entire series swings between the reality and the unreal, life and death.

What sort of tensions were sparked when Taiwanese creators met with Hollywood’s production methods? Now it has become “now-here” in the present tense, where at the touch of a button it can be seen by 158 million paid subscribers in 190 countries around the world.

Translated by David Toman

Edited by TC Lin, Sharon Tseng