During the LA Screenings, Dori Media Group announced “Amia”, a political action drama (8x45min) inspired by the terrorist attacks of 1992 and 1994 in Buenos Aires against the Israeli embassy and the Jewish community, from which the series coined its name. The series is produced by Dori Media and Yair Dori and is set to debut on Reshet 13 in Israel in 2024. Nadav Palti, CEO & President of Dori Media Group, spoke with Señal News about the series and the process it took for its production.
The executive explained that the production of the series started years ago: “We decided it is a very important subject. We think that we can tell the story, but not a documentary, and prepare a good political action thriller. If you want to tell stories for people to know about it, it's better not to make a documentary. People want to watch a drama and then they learn about what happened”. The series was mainly produced in Uruguay, as Palti explained that they were attracted by the country’s economic incentives for production. Moreover, the project received private financing from Chilean group Screen Capital.
Palti defined the production as “a very good drama, but also an important story”. On Tuesday, March 17, 1992, a massive explosion at the Israeli embassy in the heart of Buenos Aires, Argentina, led to the death of 29 people and over 200 injured. Two years later, in the morning of Monday, 18 July 1994, an even more horrific attack on the Buenos Aires Jewish Community Center (Asociación Mutual Israelita Argentina, or AMIA for short) left 85 people dead and over 300 injured. These two attacks were the largest terrorist attacks across the Americas until 9/11. To this day, almost 30 years later, there are still no solid leads, no one has been prosecuted, and no justice has been served for the victims and their families.
In the first season of the series, Palti confirmed that they are planning on making three seasons for the story, Diego, a Mossad agent whose sister was killed in the Argentina terrorist attack, takes a leave of absence and hooks up with Gisela, a local journalist to find those responsible. Their journey to uncover the truth draws them into a world of espionage, intelligence agencies and arms dealers. A dubious world in which lies are truths, and justice and revenge become indistinguishable. The journey that the two embark on will eventually lead to a re-examination of their connection with their families and even their concept of self-identity.
Being a deeply rooted story in Argentina, the company had to find the balance to make it relevant for global audiences. To do so, one of the first things Palti highlighted was the cast, which is composed by actors from Israel, Argentina and Uruguay, and the series’ language, which is mainly Spanish, but also has bits in English and Hebrew. Furthermore, the real story itself allowed the company to make the series more global: “The story is local, but it's kind of international. Also, because the CIA was involved, the SIDE (Argentinian intelligence agency), the Israeli Mossad, other secret services and governments, the Argentinian government, the Israeli government, the U.S. government, a lot of people were involved”, he said.
The company had started pitching the series during the LA Screenings. With two episodes ready, and the rest in production, Dori Media Group is aiming to get the widest audience possible for it: “We aim first to a big OTT”, said Palti. “They have a huge reach, and we want the story to get to a lot of people, and on top of it we want the best compensation we can have (for it)”. The series has already been sold to Reshet in Israel for broadcast, aiming to premiere it during 2024 for two months, with one new episode every week. This first window will allow the company to negotiate with other platforms and programmers to distribute the series to more regions, for which they are still analyzing their options.
By Diego Alfagemez and Federico Martinez
