Star Stealer soon will be produced as a Viu Original; Through Viu Pitching Forum, Viu is focused on developing top talent and ideas for the advancement of the Indonesian  content industry

Jakarta – March 30  2019: Today, Viu, a leading OTT video service, announced the winner of its recently concluded Viu Pitching Forum (VPF) 2019 – Star Stealer by Aaron Timothy. This comes as the result of the Viu Pitching Forum 2019 auditions in ten cities in Indonesia and receiving hundreds of submissions. Star Stealer will now be produced as a Viu Original series.

 Announced in January, the Viu Pitching Forum (VPF), is Viu’s annual event, dedicated to developing top talent and ideas for lifting up the Indonesian content industry and resulting in the creation of Original series for Indonesian consumers who enjoy high quality local content.

 From March 25  to 30, twelve finalists attended workshops and were mentored by professionals in the Indonesian film industry such as Sammaria Simanjuntak, director and producer, Andri Cung, screenwriter and director; Aline Jusria, editor; Pritagita Arianegara, director, Royaha, IKJ-lecturer FFTV Production-Head of UPT Sinemaflex and Fadjar Hutomo, BEKRAF Deputy for Capital Access. At the end of this workshop on March 30, a judge team consisting of; Myra Suraryo, senior vice president of marketing Viu Indonesia; Sahana Kamath (Viu Head of Original Production Malaysia & Indonesia); Nia Dinata, senior director, producer; Melissa Karim, scirptwriter, producer; Lucky Kuswandi, scriptwriter, Director; Devina Sofiyanti, IKJ’s scriptwriter  and Fadjar Hutomo, BEKRAF Deputy for Capital Access announced the winner:  Star Stealer, a story by Aaron Timothy.

Star Stealer is a story about Kania, a drop-out college student who has to pay her father’s debt by stealing and selling famous artist’ memorabilia.

“The Viu Pitching Forum, now in its third year, has grown significantly. We are committed to investing in local talent by providing the right mentorship, financial means and technical support to produce high quality shows. Viu Originals is about developing locally relevant and compelling stories that resonate with millennials produced at international level standards. We congratulate Aaron Timothy for winning the 2019 edition of the Viu Pitching Forum and are excited to  bring Star Stealer  to Indonesian Viu’ers,” said Myra Suraryo, Senior Vice President of Marketing of Viu Indonesia and Judge of Viu Pitching Forum.

“The idea behind Star Stealer was very unique and the jury unanimously chose it as the winner because it was the most ready to be produced into 13 episodes. The storyline was fresh, illustrating life related to the young people which is VIU’s target audience. This is what made the story was chosen as the winner. This year’s participants are also more mature. Many story concepts reflect the lives of young people who cannot be separated from gadgets and cyberspace. Interesting reality,” explained Nia Dinata, Director, Producer, and Jury for Viu Pitching Forum.

“Through this process, we saw many interesting story ideas from diverse genres, including comedy dramas, romantic comedies, thrillers, family dramas, and  romantic dramas and musicals. Participants learned how to prepare a proposal and present to appeal to executive producers,” said Melissa Karim, Professional Script-writer & Producer, one of the Viu Pitching Forum judges.

“Just being a finalist was a very valuable opportunity for me. What a surprise to win,” said Aaron Timothy.

Meanwhile Fadjar Hutomo, Deputy of Capital Access of BEKRAF, stated that BEKRAF supported this initiative as an effort to develop and enrich local Indonesian content.

For more information on the Viu Pitching Forum, please visit www.viu.com, or download Viu applications at Google Play Store or App Store, or or visit Viu’s social media on  Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube