Middle Earth - China’s cultural industry podcast

Send us Fan Mail China’s card and board games market size was valued at $580 million in 2018, and is projected to reach $1.6 billion by 2025. On this episode we dive into the strengths and weaknesses of China’s market, how to protect your intellectual property, and recent trends in the industry. Featuring Minlu Chen : Co-Founder & CMO of Gstone Games Hao Zhang :Founder of Labyrinth Culture Ire...

Send us Fan Mail Leading the world in the LED market, it was only natural for China to join the fun of light art  (also known as luminism) that is growing around the world. Art curator and co-founder of Kaleidoscale Marcom, Drue Chiam shares her experience on how this market has developed over the years she was in China, talent procurement, how to protect your IP and, of course, how COVID-19 impac...

Send us Fan Mail “If Mulan doesn’t work in China, we have a problem,” said Alan Horn, the co-chairman of Walt Disney Studios, to the Hollywood Reporter. Unfortunately, the film had a lot of issues: inaccurate storytelling, cultural appropriation, and political scandals, not to mention a poor showing at the box office. What were the hurdles the movie faced and how Mulan could be a lesson for film s...

Send us Fan Mail China’s entertainment industry has undergone staggering changes over the past two decades. The content, the ways it's delivered, and even the stars themselves are taking shape in a manner that is unique to China and reflects a new type of user — one who has come of age in the digital era. Provincial governments partner with stars to sell goods as arbitrary as farm equipment....

Send us Fan Mail Hollywood's studios are increasingly wary of provoking China’s government by making films that contain “sensitive” content. Some films have even self-censored portions of their own films intended for the global market, in fear of retribution. On today’s show the conversation dives into the origins of how and when Beijing’s cultural policy began to impact Hollywood decision ma...

Send us Fan Mail Founded in 2003, Mahua FunAge (开心麻花) is a cultural company that focuses on comedy content, including plays, musicals, children’s shows, improv, online TV series, and films. As of 2020, it has produced six successful feature films and 40 plays with the support of 400 staff members. Leer Cheng, vice president of the company, joins the show to discuss its recipe for success and h...

Send us Fan Mail Of the 3,000 film studios located in China, Xiangshan Global Studios in Ningbo is one of the most important. Felix Lou , vice managing director of its international development division, joins Aladin to discuss the origin of the studios, its business model, the talent needed to maintain the operation, and some of its current international collaborations.  Middle Earth is made by C...

Send us Fan Mail Raz Gal-Or is the founder of the Foreigner Research Institute (wāigǔorén yánjiū xíehuì 歪果仁研究协会), a successful online platform that promotes foreigners creating content in China. Now known as Y-Platform, it has garnered a following of 80 million through 30 channels and influencers. In March 2020, Raz’s company raised $5 million from Sina Weibo and the online gaming company B...

Send us Fan Mail As content and movie creation continues to surge inside China, the need for more film industry professionals is now more pressing than ever. One role that lies at the center of creativity and technicality lies the score composer - the individual responsible for creation of music to accompany a film. On the podcast this week, film composers Liu Ye and Sean Calvo explain the work th...

Send us Fan Mail In 2014, the Chinese government released a policy document — now referred to as Number 46 — that outlined China’s plan to create the biggest sports industry in the world, with the target of $700 billion in annual revenue by 2025.  We discuss the country’s national policies on sports and the business and collaborative opportunities in this industry.  Featuring Jonty Dixon : Sports...

Send us Fan Mail Once Chinese companies rise to the top of the domestic market, another challenge emerges: publicly listing on one of the major U.S. stock exchanges. Among the more recent listings, there is Bilibili and iQIYI for video, and Lizhi and Tencent Music for audio. In that episode guests explain the requirements of going public in the United States, the knowledge gap between Chinese comp...

Send us Fan Mail Intellectual property protection on copyrights is seen as being nearly nonexistent in China, but does that argument really hold water? What are the general positions of the Chinese government on international protection in the television and film industries? Featuring Mathew Alderson : Partner, Harris Bricken Li Jianbin : Copyright & Distribution Specialist Frank Yang : Senior...

Send us Fan Mail John Dietz of BangBang Pictures has worked on over 30 movies in China, ranging from blockbuster films to micro-budget independent projects. He has seen the domestic visual effects (VFX) industry grow tremendously since moving to China in 2009, and works as a third party who handles top-to-bottom implementation of VFX for film projects. He shares a few tricks of the trade, includin...

Send us Fan Mail For years, Chinese producers only had eyes for the “Hollywood model.” That is, big-budget projects and, hopefully, even bigger returns. After volatile times for the Chinese film industry, and events like the Fan Bingbing tax evasion scandal, producers realized that other business models can exist. We explore how this industry with Bridging the Dragon . This association has connect...

Send us Fan Mail Key opinion leaders, or KOLs, have a strong connection to Chinese internet users and are now highly sought after to sell products to huge audiences on ecommerce websites and streaming platforms. We dive into the reasons why this growing industry works so well in China and how, eventually, live streamers may end up consuming the same brands that hired them in the first place. Featu...

Send us Fan Mail China’s culture and entertainment industry is bracing for serious challenges amid the COVID-19 epidemic. This particularly applies to the film and tourism sectors, which are facing significant headwinds. Yet while people remain quarantined at home, short-video apps and the gaming sector are seeing massive traffic spikes. Featuring Terry Mieremet : Entrepreneur in the Tourism Indus...

Send us Fan Mail Dalian Wanda Group, led by billionaire Wáng Jiànlín 王建林, invested heavily in China's movie industry over the past decade. In 2014, at the cost of $8 billion, Wanda Studios Qingdao was founded. This move was aimed at establishing a dynamic supply chain that would be able to facilitate the creation of entire films, from production to distribution. After debt issues forced Wa...

Send us Fan Mail How do the Chinese government and companies engage with the public in Africa? Nillah Nyakoa (journalist at China Radio International), Eric Olander (managing editor of The China Africa Project), and Maria Repnikova (assistant professor of global communications) join host Aladin Farré to explore the different ways China sells, and fails to sell, its story to an entire continent. Mi...

Send us Fan Mail Professor Federico Castigliano is the author of Flâneur: The Art of Wandering the Streets of Paris , which was published in English and Chinese by the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences in 2018. he talks about the process of writing and publishing a book in China and how it compares with the process in Europe and the U.S. Middle Earth is made by China Compass Productions and hoste...

Send us Fan Mail This week on Middle Earth, Aladin and his guests take a look at the film production industry in Europe. Li Boyan and William Wang, both industry professionals working and living in France, help provide some insight. They reflect on what they’ve experienced over their years shooting and producing film projects and advertisements, describe what it’s like working as middlemen for Chi...

Send us Fan Mail Song Wen, founder of the FIRST International Film Festival, discusses the history of one of China’s most promising festivals for the visual arts. Once in danger of being shut down by the authorities in Beijing, the festival has found a new home in China’s west — the provincial capital of Qinghai Province, Xining. This year, hundreds of films were screened to more than 30,000 audie...

Send us Fan Mail What is it like to work as a storyteller in the Chinese film and TV industry? What is the relationship between producers and scriptwriters? How can one write a story that will resonate with Chinese audiences, and what is the market looking for? This podcast, recorded live at the The SLab in Beijing, explores these questions and the trials and tribulations of writing for the big sc...

Send us Fan Mail Ruby Chen, one of the founding members of the Hong Kong–based China Next (CNEX), tells the story of their nonprofit, which is aimed at promoting and producing Chinese documentaries. She describes her work in identifying and cultivating promising Chinese documentary filmmakers, the challenges and advantages these filmmakers are faced with, and how younger artists are taking novel a...

Send us Fan Mail The pace of urbanization in contemporary China is nothing short of dizzying. Seventy years ago, at the time of the establishment of the People’s Republic of China, 80% of the population were farmers based in rural areas. Now, over 60% of all Chinese citizens live in cities of various sizes, and it is projected that by 2030, the number of urban dwellers will exceed 1 billion. As on...

Send us Fan Mail Lured by a potentially large and lucrative market, major theater productions are increasingly making the jump from the bright lights of Broadway or the West End to the less familiar but no less lively avenues by the Bund or the Second Ring Road. Yet, according to Gaultier Létourneau-Ross, director of operations at a Canadian company that assists foreign theater troupes seeking to...