OML Entertainment, a media and entertainment company, has reportedly seen its stand-up comedy talents further push the envelope towards other avenues with the aim to place comedy at the core. It is believed that the step has allowed the platform to continue maintaining its position as a pop-cultural mainstay in India.
According to the company, 2022 saw OML individuals such as Zakir Khan perform and sell out the Beacon Theatre at Madison Square Garden in New York, while reportedly selling 68,000 tickets across 46 shows in nine countries. Additionally, two seasons of his show ‘Farzi Mushaira’ were released on Amazon MiniTV, while his third stand-up special ‘Tathastu’ was released on Amazon Prime Video. Furthermore, Khan also launched his own brand of biryani – Mehfil Biryani. Meanwhile, Aishwarya Mohanraj made a shift from a comic to emerging as a creator with 10x followers across platforms, now creating visual content in association with other brands on long-term projects.
Likewise, Tanmay Bhat created content for Netflix with ‘Tanmay Reacts,’ which is now reportedly in its fourth season. Bhat was part of the finale episode of Koffee With Karan season seven this year. Sumukhi Suresh worked with an OTT platform to integrate comedy for actors along with launching her own content company Motormouth Writers Pvt Ltd. Kumar Varun is believed to be in association with OML, and has launched a company Kumar Varun Quizzing Pvt Ltd under which quizzing projects and its IPs will be consolidated.
Furthermore, Anu Menon was the face of HDFC Bank’s ‘Vigil Aunty’ campaign for creating awareness about safe banking practices through a series of videos, reels, chat shows, among others, while OML is believed to have paved the way for Rahul Dua to be the host for Shark Tank India season two.
On the stand-up comedy front, Anirban Dasgupta featured in the show Just For Laughs New International Faces, and was on a month-long tour with comedians at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival across Australia. Similarly, Kanan Gill and Rahul Subramanian toured the UK and the USA. Further, Samay Raina’s India tour reportedly sold over 15,000 tickets, and Biswa Kalyan Rath’s USA six-cities tour sold over 8,000 tickets. Reportedly, Raina toured internationally in London, Dublin, Kenya, among others.
“Over the years, I believe OML has experienced growth to evolve as a custodian of all things pop culture in the country. However, we aim to be an artist-first agency, focusing on enabling our talents to build a connecting bridge between their art and its economy. We are looking forward to 2023, where we aim to continue to identify and strive to build avenues of monetisation for the creator ecosystem. I think diversification and thinking bigger has become important, and one of our focuses is going to be able to provide those solutions across the board, to both the artists and the brands we work with,” Rishabh Nahar, senior vice-president, OML, said.