The boom experienced by Hungary during the nineties with the invasion of Latin American telenovelas has plummeted due to a considerable change in viewers tastes.

	Dirk Gerkens.

he national commercial channels RTL Klub and TV2 used to air Latin American telenovelas on their prime time, having a great success that is still remembered, like the time they broadcasted Esmeralda –between 1998 and 1999– and Muñeca Brava, which heroines made several publicity visits to Hungary to promote their works in the country.
“For Latin American telenovelas, good years are behind. They’ve faded in popularity,” says Dirk Gerkens, CEO of RTL Klub. This is also sustained by the media agency Mediaedge:cia’s Managing Director, Zsolt Simon, who observes: “Until 2001, channels have aired Latin American telenovelas on prime time. As they started to shade, they were moved out of prime time into daytime, which is the current situation.”
Why have they dropped? According to some executives, Hungarians are more selective because since all the latest big trends in international television reached Hungary they have been able to choose from a greater offer of products.

Locally-produced
series have conquered the audience
By contrast, nowadays, two of the most successful prime time programs in Hungary are locally-produced daily series, which left far behind the slots that used to be occupied with Latin American telenovelas. In 1998, RTL Klub launched Barátok Közt (Among Friends), while TV2 began to screen Jóban Rosszban (For better or for worse) at the beginning of 2005, averaging a 32.6% market share. The former –which does not directly compete with Jóban Rosszban– commands similar market shares; in fact, it used to have even larger shares.
Both series are entirely developed in Hungary, and one theory about their popularity is that they are closer to the reality of local viewers’ own lives.
“Hungarians are more attached to Mr. Pongracz –the protagonist of Jóban Rosszban– than to Mr. Lorenzo from Latin America,” says Peter Kiss, Executive Producer at Interaktiv-Fiction and responsible for this production, who adds that they reach a 18-49 year-old target audience that consists especially of female viewers.
Regarding this, head writer of RTL Klub´s Barátok Közt , Greg Stevens, states: “People want to see themselves. In any country, ratings always tend to be led by locally-made shows.”

	Peter Kolosi.

The economic aspect
Even though home-grown series enjoy high ratings of audience, their production costs are extremely high. We ask Peter Kolosi –Programm Planning Director of RTL Klub– if it is possible to achieve similar ratings by showing equally crowd-pulling shows that are cheaper to produce, or by taking the far more economic option of buying programs from abroad, and he said: “I estimate that the annual investment for making a daily series is from 5 to 7.5 million dollars. TV2 used to have different shows in the slot that is now occupied by Jóban Rosszban. But in fact, with the additional investment in this series they are not increasing their market share, which reached from 20 to 25% with much cheaper programs.”
According to RTL Klub’s CEO –Dirk Gerkens– the same happened with the series Barátok Közt, which has been a major investment difficult to recover. But it was one of the keys for securing market leadership. The executives assure that having a locally-produced series – even one that does not generate a huge profit – is a good thing for a channel from the marketing point of view. “These series are watched by a broad-range-of-age groups of viewers, meaning a wide audience for advertisers. They can be used to anchor a network, and provide a stable of stars that can give identity to a network.”

	Greg Stevens and Tamas Kalamar.

The future of Latin American telenovelas
So, are Latin American telenovelas consigned to a life on afternoon and morning slots on Hungarian television? They might not even be safe there. “Their place in daytime is being challenged by locally-made live discussion shows based on the Oprah and Roseanne model,” says Kolosi, and he names some problems regarding the purchasing of Latin American telenovelas: “They are unpredictable. If you see them, you don’t see why this one was successful and the other was not.” He also states that they are not good for helping brand a channel –one of the benefits of the Hungarian series.

	Baratok Kozt, being filmed.

Telenovelas on cable
Latin American telenovelas continue to be shown on cable and satellite channels, widening their small audience.
Irisz channel –aimed mainly at women– shows a lot of romantic serials, while satellite channel Romantica shows Latin American telenovelas 24 hours a day. Gabrielle Grubanovich, Head of PR at Zone Vision broadcaster, says on their current prime time they are showing Como en El Cine, Padre Coraje, Sabor a Ti, La mujer de Judas and Rebeca. She declines to reveal the cost of purchasing the shows, the advertising revenue generated, or the number of people watching the channel.
On the other hand, Hungarian satellite channel Viasat 3 is currently screening one telenovela called Vadmacska (Gata Salvaje) –a co-production between Venezuela and the United States– daily at 9.40 a.m. and 5.30 p.m., attracting market shares of between 2.7% and 11.8%.