David Attenborough’s ‘Asia’ BBC Nature Series Sets Chinese Launch

BBC Studios‘ natural history series “Asia,” narrated by David Attenborough, will premiere in China on Nov. 5 across multiple platforms, BBC Studios president of global markets Nick Percy revealed at the Shanghai-London Screen Industry Forum held at BAFTA in London on Friday.

The seven-part series will launch on Dragon TV and streaming platforms iQIYI, Tencent Video, Youku and Bilibili through partnerships with Shanghai Media Group and Phoenix TV. Filmed over nearly four years, the series explores locations from the Himalayas to the Western Pacific, featuring wildlife stories including elephants that have learned to stop buses to steal food in Sri Lanka and sea snakes hunting in partnership with fish.

Percy also highlighted BBC Studios’ expanding partnership with Shanghai Media Group, including the upcoming Chinese adaptation of BBC’s long-running crime series “Silent Witness,” titled “Forensic,” announced at Mipcom earlier this week.

The forum, in its second edition, drew over 230 industry professionals. Jasmine Pang, director of European affairs at Phoenix TV, revealed discussions are underway to increase access for British content in China. “We are working with the [U.K.] Department of Business and Trade to either increase that quota or allocate specific quota for British films and TV series,” Pang told Variety. “There’s a huge fan base back in China for British films and series,” Pang added, citing recent successes including Michael Caine film “The Great Escaper” at Shanghai Film Festival and BBC series “Inside No. 9,” which saw its theatrical screening tickets sell out in under a minute at Shanghai Grand Theater.

The day-long event was attended by Li Liyan, Minister Counsellor of the Chinese Embassy in the U.K.; Fang Shizhong, president of Shanghai Media Group; Luo Yi, deputy director-general of Shanghai Municipal Administration of Culture and Tourism; and Rupert Daniels, director of creative, consumer, sports and education at the U.K. Department for Business and Trade.

The Chinese streaming and production sector was represented by Roy Lu, general manager at Linmon; Chen Zhaoling, COO at Youhug; Geng Danhao, senior VP at iQIYI; Fan Qing, producer at Tencent Video; Zhang Hao, director of content and production at Bilibili Factual; and Kong Lingzheng, planning supervisor at Zhao Dongling Studio.

U.K. participants included André Renaud, senior VP of global format sales at BBC Studios; Daniel Pearl, creative director at Lion TV; Oliver Parker, director of “Johnny English Reborn” and “The Great Escaper”; Tony Reed, production creative director of animation at BBC Studios Kids & Family; and Evan Leighton-Davis, owner at Heatseeker Media and Takedown Pictures.

Liverpool China Partnership president Gary Millar highlighted the city’s screen industry potential, noting that it is the most filmed U.K. city outside London.

Speakers included Jane Turton, CEO at All3Media; Richard Bradley, co-founder at Lion TV; Yang Wenhong, president of Shanghai Broadcasting Film & Television Producers Association; Yang Xiaopei, CEO at Xixi Pictures; and Yang Wenhong, chair of XG Entertainment.

Addressing the question of global versus local, Turton said, “We don’t make things for local or global, or global or local. We make good quality. A good story well told, whether it’s domestic or global, will appeal universally.”

Shanghainese actors Lu Yi (“Never Close Your Eyes”) and Huang Yi (“Wrong Carriage”) also attended the event. Speaking about U.K.-China partnerships, Lu told Variety, “In terms of platform, I think that, apart from traditional media channels, TV films, there’s ample opportunity for new media and short, formatted videos and collaboration in that field, compared with traditional approaches and traditional ways. This new space for collaboration allows for more agility.”

Huang told Variety, “A lot of the overseas media, including Netflix and the BBC have been casting their eyes on the Chinese market, not necessarily just looking at a story, but also to understand better the cultural history there. China, with its 5000 years of history, provides a variety of angles where you could cut in to understand the culture much better, the heritage, including the world heritage that’s really rich in China. Therefore there’s a whole range of perspective that you could take to have a program coming out of a rich Chinese history.”

“After watching the BBC program programs on Chinese history and culture, it’s slightly different from the documentaries that we have done ourselves, and so coming from the outsiders perspective, it is a very unique way of understanding another culture, and this is something that’s quite fresh for me myself to watch,” Huang added.

Several upcoming Chinese television projects, including Sino-British co-productions, were presented at the forum.

Richard Nash, director of “Children of Shanghai,” highlighted untapped opportunities for Anglo-Chinese collaboration. “We’re finding that traditional media here are quite resistant to stories about China that aren’t about just negative things about politics or entirely bland neutral things about geography and buildings,” Nash told Variety. His London-based partnership is focusing on social media platforms including TikTok and Weibo to reach audiences.

“There are 20 amazing artists all based around Britain, who are of Chinese origin, who have got amazing stories,” Nash said, noting strong Chinese interest in British creativity. “There’s a huge interest from Chinese people in British creativity, spontaneity. They want to learn these things, and we’re just often not engaging.”