In just 8,000 sq m, about the size of a football pitch, Shudian Studio houses an international bank, a pharmacy, a police station, a hair salon, a luxury boutique, a courtroom, multiple hospital wards, offices, banquet rooms and even a private jet.
Every month in this complex of tightly packed film sets in southern China, producers rattle through about 10 “mini-drama” series — soap operas comprising episodes of two minutes or less — in one of the global entertainment industry’s fastest-growing sectors.
Chinese studios and start-ups popularised the format during the Covid-19 pandemic, garnering hundreds of millions of fans as short-form video apps such as Douyin, China’s version of TikTok, took off. The market is forecast to reach Rmb68.6bn ($9.6bn) this year, which would exceed China’s traditional box office, according to Shenzhen-based consultancy DataEye.