Scripted

Leading global content and media producer and distributor Keshet International today announces that it is partnering with HOT, Israel’s largest cable company, and United Studios of Israel on new drama Autonomies [picture], to distribute the series globally and launch it at Series Mania. Autonomies has also been selected to compete in the event’s Official Competition next week.

A dystopian drama starring some of Israel’s top acting talent, Autonomies is a globally-relevant tale focusing on the burning issues of identity, religion, politics and personal freedom. The story is set in an alternate reality of present day Israel, a nation torn and divided by a wall into the secular “State of Israel”, whose capital is Tel Aviv, and the “Haredi Autonomy” in Jerusalem, run by an ultra-Orthodox religious group.

Living in the Autonomy, amongst this uneasy territorial status quo, is Broide, a Haredi wheeler-dealer who makes his living smuggling minor contraband between the two regions. One day he receives a job offer that will change his life: he is asked to kidnap a little girl who is at the heart of a custody battle between two families – one secular and one Haredi – and transfer her from the State of Israel to the Haredi Autonomy. This legal saga, followed by the kidnapping of the child, fuels a dramatic uproar that threatens to tear a fragile country to pieces.

Autonomies is also an impossible love story between two characters living on opposite sides of the wall. Dramatically strong and thematic, this affair of the heart has uniqueness and symbolic meaning relating to the overarching discourse – they become their own version of "Bonnie and Clyde", embarking on the kidnapping of the little girl together.

Created by Yehonatan Indursky and Ori Elon (creators of Shtisel), Autonomies is produced for HOT by United Studios of Israel, in collaboration with The AVI CHAI Foundation and with the support of the Gesher Multicultural Film Fund Ministry of Culture and Sport. The series is expected to premiere on HOT TV this later summer.

Keren Shahar, President of Distribution, Keshet International, said: “We’re delighted to be partnering with HOT and United Studios on this exceptional and very timely drama, and to be bringing another fine Israeli drama to Series Mania and to the worldwide marketplace.”

The screening of the first two episodes of Autonomies will be held on Tuesday 1 May at 8pm in Nouveau Siècle, and the second screening will take place on Wednesday 2nd May at 12pm at the Majestic movie theatre. Autonomies has also selected in the Official Competition, the winners of which will announced on Saturday 5th May at 8pm at the Nouveau Siècle.

The selection of Autonomies for the Series Mania competition follows hot on the heels of the success of Keshet International’s When Heroes Fly, which won Best Series at Canneseries earlier this month, as well as the selection of its drama series Sleeping Bears at Berlinale earlier this year.

Also being screened at Series Mania is Keshet International’s US whodunit thriller from complex Networks, In The Vault, where two episodes will be shown as part of the event’s Short Form Panorama section. The 8x22’ or 24 x 7’series, produced by Haven Entertainment for Go90, tells the story of how, one month into freshman year at college, a student is killed at a party. In The Vault focuses on the victim's surviving hall mates as they come to suspect one another of being the killer. Each student has secrets that may or may not serve as a motive, and none are safe from the others’ suspicions. Each episode spotlights a different character, so a hero one week is a villain the next.