Shooting for Tollywood movies to be halted from 1st August?
Producers of Telugu films are considering stalling shoots beginning on August 1 in an effort to "restructure the industry" as production expenses have multiplied and box office receipts have decreased significantly due to COVID-19. In the past two days, there have been numerous meetings of financiers in Hyderabad, and they have come to the conclusion that strong action like this is required to rectify the situation for the industry.
A financer revealed to the media, "Theatrical revenues, except for blockbuster movies like RRR, KGF-2, and one or two others, have fallen to an abysmal low of 20 percent. This has hit the industry hard, which was already reeling under the COVID impact. Everyone is now worried about the sustainability of the industry in such a scenario."
"Now, even movies of big stars are making it to the OTT within three weeks. This is further contributing to the drop in theatrical revenues. Small (budget) films are unable to survive in such a market," stated one well-known producer.
"We will have further talks in the next few days and arrive at a final decision on the way forward," continued the same producer.
In order to prevent revenue loss, the producers have also opted to wait 10 weeks following the theatrical release of any new film before releasing it on OTT platforms. It will now be interesting to watch if these adjustments benefit Tollywood.
