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Minute-Long Soap Operas Are Here. Is America Ready?

Popularized in China during the pandemic, ReelShort and other apps are hoping to bring minute-by-minute melodramas to the United States.

When Albee Zhang received an offer to produce cheesy short-form features made for phones last spring, she was skeptical, and so, she declined.

But the offers kept coming. Finally, Ms. Zhang, who has been a producer for 12 years, realized it could be a profitable new way of storytelling and said yes.

Since last summer, she has produced two short-form features and is working on four more for several apps that are creating cookie-cutter content aimed at women.

Think: Lifetime movie cut up into TikTok videos. Think: soap opera, but for the short attention span of the internet age.

The biggest player in this new genre is ReelShort, an app that offers melodramatic content in minute-long, vertically shot episodes and is hoping to bring a successful formula established abroad to the United States by hooking millions of people on its short-form content.

“The Double Life of My Billionaire Husband” is one of the many short features you can watch on ReelShort, an app that offers short dramatic content meant to be watched on phones. ReelShort
@reelshortapp On your 18th birthday, the Moon Goddess granted you a RED wolf. She said a new journey awaited you, but there were also evil forces after your power… Called weak your whole life, what POWER could you possibly have?! #fyp #reelshort #binge #bingeworthy #bingewatching #obsessed #obsession #mustwatch #witch #alpha #werewolf #moon #wolfpack #booktok #luna #drama #film #movie #tiktok #tv #tvseries #shortclips #tvclips #filmtok #movietok #dramatok #romance #love #marriage #relationship #couple #dramatiktok #filmtiktok #movietiktoks #saturday #saturdayvibes #saturdaymood #saturdaymotivation #saturdayfeels #saturdayfeeling #weekend #weekendvibes ♬ original sound – ReelShort APP

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Source: Elections - nytimes.com


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