“I am 33 years old and I graduated from the economic faculty in St. Petersburg, where he was born and has lived his entire life. I specializies in international Economics and currently working in the largest TV companies in Russia. We produce 12 pay channels, and we need to buy all the required content. The work is intense”.
Julia Kapl: tell me something I may not know.
Sergey Moldovan: Many do not even know that there are jobs like mine. People think that software is just recorded in the Studio and what each channel does their own transmission. Before I started working in this field, I thought so, too. In General, there are different producers who create programs for different TV channels.
— What is the main trend today in the Russian TV?
— The most popular worldwide formats, for example, the musical show “the Voice” or the quiz show “Who wants to be a millionaire.” Sometimes Russian broadcasters replicate samples, change some detail, and argue that this idea belongs to them without paying for the rights. Domestic series can also be called a trend. Taken any idea from the outside and reproduced in the Russian reality. To date, we have about 20 public channels, each of which occupies its own niche and has its audience, and more than a hundred paid channels.
— What attracts you from a Brazilian TV crew?
— In 1980-e and 1990-e years of extraordinary success among Russian audiences enjoyed the TV series. Today the situation is different, but still have a good audience.
— You grew up in the era of the television series, do you remember any of them?
Yes. I remember “Slave Izaura”. It was the first big hit in Russia in the late 1980s, when I was about 10 years old, I remember how everyone was gathered around the television to watch the series. Then with great success the “Wild angel”, the Argentine series with Natalia Oreiro in the main role. It is still loved in Russia. Three years ago one channel bought the rights to reruns of the series and gave Natalie a tour around the country. It was pretty funny.
— In the Brazilian soap operas, we’ve seen a sharp social overtones, such as the inclusion in the story of same-sex couples. Russian television provides opportunities for these innovations?
— In Russia such series are unlikely to be popular. We are very conservative people. While it is impossible to imagine that the Russian channel showed a gay family – of sexual minorities. The TV would not take the risk, because the met on the rejection of the greater part of the population.
— Whether there were on TV a trace of some of the Soviet influence? Some resistance to American manufacturers?
— I think that the Soviet Union remained in the distant past, although many people still live like he is still here. But in St. Petersburg, in Moscow, in large cities in General, all different. Any rejection of American manufacturers there is, of course, if they do not touch such sensitive topics as gay couples. As for blockbusters, comedies and action, no problems.
TV in your country is not relegated to the background? Something has changed with the advent of the Internet?
— In Russia people are actively watching TV, whether public or pay channels. That’s why we have so many channels: there is a demand. This is the traditional hobby of the Russian people. You come home and immediately turn on the TV. We have the Internet, Yes, but we still prefer the whole day to watch TV.
— The extent to which television affects the Russian way of life?
— Almost the entire population of Russia watching the main TV channels of the country, “the First channel” and the channel “Russia”. What they say, settles in the minds of people. From a policy perspective, they are not looking for information in other sources, be they Newspapers or web sites. Prefer to stick to the opinion heard on TV.
