| MUMBAI:
Following the popularity of comedy talent hunts on Hindi GECs, Zee Marathi has
now stepped into this genre of programming with the launch of Hasya
Samrat.
Says
Zee Marathi VP Ajay Bhalwankar, "Hasya Samrat
is a comedy talent hunt show which will dig out the Marathi
talent from the interiors of Maharashtra. With this show we
aim to popularize comedians in Marathi."
The
bi-weekly one hour show is slotted for 10 pm on Wednesdays and Thursdays and has
popular comedians Ashok Naygaonkar and Makrand Anaspure as judges. The
channel already has a reality show Idea Sa Re Ga Ma Pa, a music talent
hunt which has been doing well and delivering ratings between 3.5 to 4.5
(Tam week 27 and 28, C&S 4+ all Maharshtra). In
a bid to avoid clutter of reality TV programming on weekends, the channel has
extended its weekday primetime shows till Saturday, thus shifting the Saturday
primetime movie to 10 pm. Bhalwankar
says, "Every channel is eyeing for a strong weekend programming as a part
of which they show reality, movies and live events. Almost every channel has reality
shows to fill up their weekend programming, which is monotonous. Our idea was
to do something different. Rather than experimenting with different shows, we
just extended the weekday programmes to weekend." Programmes
like Home Minister, Vahinisaheb, Avaghachi Sansar, Ya sukhano ya, Asambhav,
Abhilasha, Adhuri ek Kahani are thus being aired at primetime till Saturday.
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