Apple TV Renews Israeli Spy Thriller Tehran For Season 2

Apple TV+ announced this week that it was renewing the Israeli spy series “Tehran” for a second season, which will become an Apple Original worldwide, Deadline first reported.

Apple TV had picked up the first season of the Israeli thriller, co-created by “Fauda” writer Moshe Zonder, last year and stepped in to co-produce it alongside Israeli broadcaster Kan 11. The show features dialogue in Persian, Hebrew, and some English.

The first season of “Tehran” chronicled the efforts of a young Mossad agent, Tamar Rabinyan, to complete a mission in the Iranian capital and escape safely with an Iranian counter-espionage agent hot on her heels.

The 8-episode show aired on Kan 11 and Apple TV+ starting in June 2020 and received rave reviews from viewers and critics alike.

VP of Kan television Tal Freifeld said this week that the broadcaster was pleased to announce the start of production for Tehran’s second season and to continue “to establish its status as the home of Israeli creation.”

“A production of such magnitude serves as a push for local industry professionals in such a difficult period and strengthens the international recognition of the power and uniqueness of Israeli culture and television,” Freifeld said in a statement.

Israeli TV shows have garnered widespread international attention over the past decade with series such as “Be’Tipul” (In Treatment), “Hatufim” (Prisoners of War), “Pilpelim Tzehubim” (Yellow Peppers), “Fauda,” and “Shtisel” getting picked up by leading streaming services and/or for local adaptations.

“Hatufim,” remade in the US as the wildly successful drama “Homeland,” was named the best foreign show of the decade by the New York Times in 2019, taking the first spot in a list of 30 top international TV series.

The widely popular “Fauda” ranked in the 8th spot on the NYT list. The show premiered in Israel in 2015 and on Netflix in late 2016, portraying the complicated conflict between Israelis and Palestinians through the story of an Israeli counter-terrorism unit operating in the West Bank and trying to capture (or kill) Hamas terrorists.

In October 2020, Kan 11 reached a deal with HBO Max for the global rights to the new highly acclaimed Israeli TV series Valley of Tears, based on the 1973 Yom Kippur War. Inspired by true events, the 10-part series depicts the war through the eyes of young combatants, telling four emotional and highly personal stories of individuals swept away from their loved ones by the ravages of war, with four parallel plotlines intertwined together into one climactic battle.

The miniseries reportedly cost $1 million per episode, according to a JTA report in August. The cost was said to be due in part because of the battle scenes.

In July, Apple TV+ ordered a 10-part adaptation of Israeli drama series “When Heroes Fly,” about four IDF veterans reunited for a rescue mission in Colombia. The Keshet series was created by Omri Givon and inspired by a novel of the same name by Amir Gutfreund

It is Keshet’s second Apple drama following its production of “Suspicion,” starring Uma Thurman and based on Amit Cohen and Maria Feldman’s “False Flag” series (“Kfulim” in Hebrew).

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