KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia-based production company Double Vision dominated the National Level categories to become the production house with the most national wins across the board at the recent 2020 Asian Academy Creative Awards.
Its second season of the cross-border crime drama The Bridge and its reboot of one of Malaysia's most iconic and longest-running sitcoms, Kopitiam: Double Shot, swept across 10 categories.
Double Vision will now represent Malaysia to compete against 15 other countries at the regional level of the awards at the end of the year.
The Bridge Season 2, which is the first Asian adaptation of the original Swedish-Danish production of Hans Rosenfeldt's Nordic noir crime television series, captured national wins in the categories for Best Drama Series, Best Adaptation Of An Existing Format, Best Original Screenplay and Best Sound.
It also garnered Best Actor in a Leading Role for Bront Palarae and Best Actress in a Leading Role (Rebecca Lim), Best Actor in a Supporting Role (Miller Khan) and Best Actress in a Supporting Role (Aida Aris).
To top it off, Kopitiam: Double Shot won Best Comedy Programme and Best Comedy Performance (Melissa Campbell) as well.
"The Bridge is one of the biggest shows to come out of Southeast Asia and we are very proud that were able to build on Season 1 and make the show even bigger and better with some of the best talent (both on and off screen) from around the region. It certainly was a challenge but we persevered and to be recognised at the Asian Academy Creative Awards as the best in Malaysia in so many categories is a great validation of our work," said Double Vision's head of production and executive producer Min Lim in a press statement today.
The Bridge Season 2, which stars Bront Palarae, Ario Bayu and Rebecca Lim, is directed by TJ Lee, Jason Chong and Zahir Omar, and aired earlier this year on Viu and HBO Asia.
"To add the Kopitiam: Double Shot wins to that is really the icing on the cake. The original Kopitiam was a winner at the Asian Television Awards (the former AACA) so to be able to do this again with the reboot feels amazing."
"To come away from this prestigious award ceremony with national wins in 10 categories is such a wonderful testimony and validation of our vision – that high quality content which resonates with a diverse Asian audience works. And to be able to do it with different people from around the region from different walks of life – that's diversity at its finest," she said.
Meanwhile, Bront said that he viewed the success of The Bridge as the result of a dedicated team effort.
"We are only a representative of the entire production who had worked extremely hard to create a high quality drama," he said.
Touted as Asia Pacific's most prestigious award for creative excellence, the AAA is an event of the Singapore Media Festival, hosted by the Info-communications Media Development Authority (IMDA) of Singapore.